Kimetsu no Yaiba

May 17, 2020

abystoma2

Mixed Feelings

As of the time of writing this review, I have yet to see the anime adaptation. Therefore, I’d like to offer you a point of view untainted by the ufotable hype. Note that this review might contain some spoilers, though nothing too specific.

“Why should it matter if you’ve seen the anime or not?” is what you might be asking, so I’d like to address that first. I suspect that the anime adaptation had a huge impact on the manga ratings. It’s understandable to an extent, sure, I bet ufotable did a good job with the animation of action scenes which are the core of this ... series. Should a source material be praised because of the achievements of the adaptations though? I don’t think so. And yes, I have some numbers to support my claim about the undeserved ratings boost. In 2017, Kimetsu no Yaiba had mean score of 7.46. A week before the anime started airing, it was at 7.92. During the time period when the anime was airing the score jumped from that to 8.50 (with the current mean score being 8.55). That’s a jump up of almost 0.60 which is something that pretty much never happens organically. Sure, you could claim that the manga suddenly got better (and coincidentally in the same time frame as the anime was airing). The manga arcs published during this period was Swordsmith Village arc and a training arc after it so no, there was no sudden spike in the quality of the manga content. You can check the scores on Wayback Machine, and learn that MAL mean scores aren’t always to be trusted.

Well, that’s enough of a rant, now to the manga-only experience review.

Now, I’m usually quick to complain about a slow story progression and unnecessary padding. This time, I’ll have to complain about the story going way too fast. Sure, at least there are no fillers, but in exchange Kimetsu no Yaiba goes with extreme on the other side of the spectrum. Reading it feels like the author is trying to do an any% battle shounen speedrun. Everything is happening so fast in this manga. Training? Nah, here’s two chapters, two year timeskip, the protagonist is now no longer a random village hillbilly but a stronk boi who can fight demons. Good job on smashing those big rocks kid, now you’re fully prepared to fight ruthless and almost immortal creatures. Sure, training arcs tend to be not that interesting, but not only they can be made interesting, they are also important to help establishing the power system of battle shounen, which Kimetsu no Yaiba fails at completely. More on that later, now back to speedrunning.

The worldbuilding is pretty much non-existent with the sole focus on rawly progressing the plot. The protagonist’s first assigned mission ever? Boom, here’s the main antagonist just strolling there, what an amazingly lucky encounter. Most of the characters feel just like a cannon fodder whose death are used for a cheap thrill. The cast dies off faster than you can create any attachment to the characters. What was probably supposed to be a dramatic character conclusion end with the impact of “Meh, another one’s dead. What was his name again?” The supporting cast dies like flies and so do the minor antagonists. It’s hardly a shock value when such thing is made a mundane occurrence. Oh yeah, also just slap some random tragic backstories for the demon in cheap attempt to not look so shallow.

Few minor happenings later the final arc starts, which makes up a whole third of the whole manga. That one’s a bit special. It’s at the same time way too long and keeping the whole speedrun spirit too. The cheapness of deaths become even way cheaper, as if the author said “fuck it, I’m almost done with the manga anyway, I’ll just kill of most of the characters”. And no, they still don’t die in any satisfying (for the reader) way. The stock of nameless characters seems to be endless too, as bunch of unknown demon hunters seem get mass-murdered with almost every attack of almost every demon, yet they keep flowing in right up to the final boss encounter. How many demon hunters are there anyway? Because I fell like hundreds of them died just in the backgrounds of this arc alone. The final fight is riddled with all of the cliché bullshits such as the power of friendship, trashed characters that shouldn’t have been able to even stand up by any mean suddenly rejoining the fight again, “this isn’t even my final form you fools”, asspulls, and revivals. Yes, after all of the slaughter the author is now suddenly too much of a coward to let some of the characters die. At least go all the way in if this is what you decide to do, don’t back up at the last moment to leave us with this lukewarm entirely uninteresting and artificial-feeling ending. The epilogue chapter is an absolute joke. Well, at least I wish it was just a joke. It’s more disappointing and laughtable than the finale and epilogue of Prison School, to give you an idea about this trainwreck. I had to doublecheck if this wasn’t just some fanmade chapter, that’s how much it doesn’t fit.

I have mentioned the absolute disaster of a power system previously, right? Let’s expand on that. Some sacrifices had to be made to make the speedrun possible and explanation of the powers was one of them. The last thing that makes any sense is the Total Concentration Breathing technique. Master the way you breath and do it consciously all the time to achieve a handy power-up for your stats. A bit of JoJo rip-off but sure, I’ll take it, with some suspension of disbelief it makes sense. How do we get from there to swords summoning fire, pillars of water, mist or a goddamn snakes? Fuck if I know, it’s some sort of breathing technique so you’ll have to make some shit up to make sense of it, because the manga sure isn’t going to help you with that. Tanjiro’s dad did ceremonial sword dancing, which made him a fire swordsman. Others just ripped of the fire technique to make their own breaths. How does remaking a fire technique help you summon butterflies with a sword slash? No idea. “It just works”, as they say.

The characters themselves are flashy but forgettable. The flagship Nezuko admittedly excels as being adorable while still having enjoyable fighting mode side, but that’s as far as likeable characters go. Tanjiro is a ball of screams and bruteforcing given a human shape. Zenitsu is an annoying idiot with creepy tendencies who is completely useless until the plot demands him to do something. Inosuke is a ball of even more screaming and bruteforcing also given (more or less) human shape. The hashiras have basically the personalities of their character design.

Honestly from some points I started to cheer for the demons instead. The protagonists are boring shounen templates with no depth. The demons at least have some motivations beyond “AAAAAAA DEMON REEEEEEEEE” and as ironic as it is, they have goals more relatable to actual humans such as just wanting to enjoy their lives. I don’t think this was intentional on author’s part though, the baddies are relatable only in comparison to the blandness of the other side.

One saving grace of Kimetsu no Yaiba is the artstyle. While I wouldn’t go as far to say that the art is great, it’s certainly distinguishable and original. At least one part of this manga that attracts the readers’ attention, at least one part of this whole thing that is somehow interesting.

Overall, if you’re a fan of regular battle shounen, this might be your jam. If you’re looking for anything with a substance, you would waste your time here. As pretentious as it might sound, ultimately this manga just feels… immature.

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