Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba

[MFauli]

Episode 5:

Only 7 minutes in or so, but I must vent: I've never experienced such a lack of emotions on my side while watching a dramatic situation like this. These smith masks erase any seriousness. People are dying, murdered by gruesome, creepy monsters, but I'm closer to laughing my ass off than feeling sadness for them, because of how fucking dumb everyone's faces look.

This must be one of the worst design choices in all of anime/manga. It doesn't even make sense that they're wearing those masks in their village, like, do they NEVER take them off? That's bs.

Really, really bad design and it's ruining this arc so far.

Edit: The artwork-scene LOL. It looked like some comedy/parody.

Edit 2: And while the attack of Tanjiro's at the end looked cool, it was totally unearned compared to his finishing moves against earlier boss demons. Meh :/ Also more "inherited memories" bs.

[neflight86]

Episode 5:

Only 7 minutes in or so, but I must vent: I've never experienced such a lack of emotions on my side while watching a dramatic situation like this. These smith masks erase any seriousness. People are dying, murdered by gruesome, creepy monsters, but I'm closer to laughing my ass off than feeling sadness for them, because of how fucking dumb everyone's faces look.

You really can't look past that and see what else is on offer? It seems to evoke a negative response on an emotional level from you. Since you are pretty much alone in your distaste, I don't think any discussion on that will be fruitful. But we can always try!

It's a design choice recycled from a niche japanese cultural oddity; not really worth letting ruin your viewing experience further. Personally, I got used to it in the first episode of this arc- was that the entire village wears them your issue with it?

Edit 2: And while the attack of Tanjiro's at the end looked cool, it was totally unearned compared to his finishing moves against earlier boss demons. Meh :/ Also more "inherited memories" bs.

This whole arc feels somewhat slipshod compared to the previous ones. I believe that is due to weaker build up of the conflicts and the upper demons having less 'fame' to their misdeeds. This is essentially a surprise attack on a high value strategic target (swordsmith village) with impeccably poor timing because of reasons unbeknownst to us (yes, number 5 got intel on this place, but why just now?). We're not aware of how these demons have been tormenting humans for hundreds of years, so this is just a targeted strike, and purely tactical engagements have limited room for emotional payoff. The artsy demon gets a few evil points for his corpses in a jar, but it's too little, too late for big impact.

Tanjiro's super 'time to climax the fight' attack is kind of sudden, and it would bother me if I believed for a second that this battle was over from it alone. Nice that Nezuko decided to share her boom-blood with her brother's sword and sit the rest of this out, apparently, but the spectacle was fun.

I'm glad that the physical projectiles appear to be consistently poisoned; to not be would feel like a tactical oversight. Needles through the face looks painful, though. I wish the wind hashira would react more.

So Genya is also a demon rebel? Disappointing that there are more, but probably good in the long run from a storytelling perspective. I thought demons could sense each other or something, as they were always able to tell Nezuko was one of them (and question her) in the early arcs, I thought.

Steps in the right direction, but we're still not back to peak Demon Slayer yet.

[DarthEnderX]

This must be one of the worst design choices in all of anime/manga.

Japanese people are probably fine with it. Since it's cultural.