I have to hand it to Kimetsu no Yaiba.  There was a little bobble for me there in the third episode which probably comes down to personal taste more than anything, but this show really doesn’t miss a trick.  The “t’s” and all crossed and the “i’s” dotted with a great sense of responsibility, and each step is in its proper sequential order.  It just goes to show that when very familiar and frankly not all that inspiring material is handled with exceptional care and attention, it can cross the great passage and become a successful final product.

I think the choice of seiyuu here is quite reflective of this approach, and of both the relative strengths and weaknesses of this sort of series.  Everyone here sounds familiar, with even minor characters like the two guides (who remind me of the Washiki Zarashi from Hoozuki no Reitetsu, ROFL) voiced by big names like Yuuki Aoi and Izawa Shiroi.  Need a crow?  Yamzazki Takumi.  A goofy swordsmith named Haganezuka?  Namikawa Daisuke will work.  A surly anti-hero/rival can only be Okamoto Nobuhiko, and how could a neurotic BFF not be Shimono Hiro?

These are all very competent, professional actors (obviously).  But we hear them and know immediately who they are, which takes us out of the moment with the character itself a bit.  That’s the trade-off of Kimetsu no Yaiba – nothing here is a surprise, but it’s one of the rare anime that delivers both sasuga and sakuga in large measure.  I noted in my Mix post yesterday that it takes a certain genius to make the familiar riveting over and over, but Kimetsu no Yaiba is something a little different from that.  It’s not the subtle nuances that make it stand out – it’s the fact that the things we recognize are presented more attractively than we see them most of the time.

With all that stipulated, I thought this was a really good episode – maybe the best of the series so far.  We started off with Tanjirou seeing a flashback from the perspective of the composite demon (that’s one hell of a nose he has).  This is a bit pat (no surprise), but I like the way Kimetsu keeps the focus on Tanjirou’s compassion as the core element of his character.  No matter the personal wrongs done to him, he never fights the demons from a place of hatred – it’s something he’s doing because someone has to, and his first thought after it’s over is always empathy for the soul of the creature he’s just killed.

It’s probably best that Tanjirou didn’t tell Urokodaki that it was his fox masks getting all his kids eaten.  But even so, I have to question the demon slayer selection process if 80% or more of your finalists die during the trial.  This world is obviously short on demons slayers – wouldn’t one who’s just “pretty good” at killing youkai be better alive than dead?  Maybe apprenticed, allowed to retake the test in the future (like the Hunter Exam)?  Well, whatever – I also noticed that the leader (another iconic seiyuu, Morikawa Toshiyuki) made reference to five survivors, where we only saw four.  Also, his tone suggests that even that many is more than usual, which only bolsters my misgivings about the whole exercise.

My assumption is that all these survivors – including the silent butterfly girl – will prove important later, not just the Shimono Hiro one.  For now though Tanjirou goes off on his own again, literally dragging himself back to Casa de Urokodaki, where Nezuko has briefly woken up (Uroko suggests she sleeps as a substitute for eating human flesh).  Eventually Haganezuka shows up with his sword, Nichirin (the survivors choose the “ore” it’s made from), which he fully expects to turn bright red and is bitterly disappointed when it instead chooses jet black.  And Tanjirou’s crow shows up with his first marching orders – head to a village to the northwest where young girls have been disappearing every night.  The prologue is over, it seems, and the story proper begins…