So how’s that whole picking Kimetsu back up thing going?  It’s an interesting and important question, for me anyway as the guy doing this.  On balance I think I’d have to say the ledger balance is on the positive side.  I certainly have no regrets – this arc has been briskly entertaining more often than not, and occasionally dazzling.  I haven’t had that “Eureka” moment where the reason for this series’ unprecedented popularity becomes clear at last (and I suspect I never will), but coming back was certainly made easier by the fact that I never disliked Kimetsu no Yaiba – I just don’t really get it.

This episode wasn’t as balls-out awesome as last week’s, but the second half especially was very fun.  There was too much screaming and crying for my taste, which is a problem I have with this show at times.  I’m also tired of dead sibling flashbacks happening every time Tanjirou gets into trouble, and the next hero in line always arriving at the last nanosecond to prevent disaster is a shounen trope I’ve never cared for (we got it twice this week).  The whole lullaby scene was incredibly heavy-handed, too.  But if we’re not grading on a curve – was it worthy of the biggest short-term seller in animanga history – it was overall a very good ep.

The whole issue of Daki being kinda weak for an Upper Six oni has been hanging over this arc for a while.  And seeing F-cup Nezuko beat the snot out of her didn’t do anything to dispel that.  Frankly this fight was pretty one-sided, which I suppose one might excuse on the grounds that Tanjirou softened Daki up for Nezuko – except that Tanjirou really shouldn’t have had a chance against her either.  I was hoping there was some sort of explanation coming and happily there was, though I think the jury is still out on how well it holds water.

Of bigger concern to Tanjirou was that Nezuko was clearly starting to enjoy herself.  This is kind of his worst nightmare, that Nezuko would finally lose whatever mysterious string it was that kept her tethered to her human self and go full demon.  She did save his life by doing so of course, but this is not a moment for him to be looking for silver linings.  Indeed, with Daki subdued Nezuko’s blood lust goes out of control with a bunch of wounded hoomans around (which give us our first “last possible nanosecond” moment of the week).  Fortunately there’s some part of her (the music critic part) still left, and Tanjirou manages to sing her back from the brink (and down several sizes) – for now.

That gives way to the main event and easily the best part of the episode, where the big matter of Daki’s weakness finally gets some focus.  I would say first of all that I had no idea it was Ohsaka Ryouta playing Gyuutarou.  That’s been an increasingly common occurrence in recent years, as he’s gravitated towards quirky supporting and often villainous roles, but he was once an anime it boy almost as big as Hanae Natsuki is now.  He was great playing protagonists, he’s great as a character actor – he’s just great period, with a huge range, and I’d love to hear him a lot more often than we do these days.

Just what the relationship between Daki and Gyuutarou is we don’t know yet, despite her calling him Onii-san.  Gyuutarou refers to them as being “part of the same person”, and he seems to emerge out of Daki’s body.  Since Daki at this point is reduced to a blubbering mess of beheaded self-pity it would be nice to think Gyuutarou is the main event here, otherwise the whole upper level oni thing takes a bit of a credibility hit.  As is often the case with Demon Slayer I find the youkai more interesting than the slayers, and Gyuutarou is a riot from the moment Ohsaka starts cutting loose.  I’m looking forward to seeing how all this fits together (and maybe to seeing Uzui get his ass kicked a little – he’s a cocky bugger).