Anime 40456 Kimetsu No Yaiba Movie Mugen Ressha-hen Reviews Filter Check 2

This is my first anime review, so bear with me here. There are some slight spoilers, so please be warned.

Before I even begin to get into the meat and potatoes of this review, I just want to give my opinion on what should have been done. Simply put, this should not have been a stand alone movie. This should have been part of a second season. It did not have the strength in any category besides art and sound to thrive around other amazing movies that have come out in recent years.

Excitement does not even begin to describe the anticipation I felt going into this ... movie. After watching the original series and being very satisfied, Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, the highest selling Japanese movie in the box office ever, should have been a mind-blowing experience, filled with great story, breathtaking animation, and amazing characters. Sadly, only one of those statements turned out to be true.

I wish I could at least say that the movie was somewhat enjoyable, but I literally found myself falling asleep multiple times through the movie. So lets begin this reivew.

Art: 10
It comes as no surprise that Ufotable have delivered yet another artistic masterpiece. Keep in mind that I saw this movie in theaters when I say what I am about to say. The movie starts, and the opening scene with the trees starts to roll. I turned to my friend and asked, "What trailer is this?" He replied, without sarcasm, "I think this is the Rurouni Kenshin live action trailer." It was only until Kagaya showed up on the screen when I realized that I was watching the Demon Slayer. That's how realistic the backgrounds were. Moreover, the Rengoku and Akaza fight was one of the craziest fights I have ever seen, not to mention this movie boasting impressive 3D animation. It would feel wrong giving this movie's art anything less that a 10.

Sound: 9
Seeing this movie in theaters, I was a little disappointed in the sound quality, although the cinema it was playing in is to blame. Simply put, the OST for this movie was breathtaking, bringing back one of my favorite tracks from the first season, Rui's theme. As always, Ufotable brought their very best when it came to effects too. All in all, the quality was very solid, and lived up to the reputation that Ufotable has gained for it's sound design.

Characters: 4
Unfortunately, the pros for Demon Slayer: Mugen Train end at the sound design, because everything else about this movie was at the very most, average. The characters introduced this movie were bland, uninteresting, and boring. The only newly introduced character in this movie that I thought was somewhat acceptable was Rengoku, but even he wasn't anything special. Honestly, the 'darker' parts of this movie were a complete and utter joke. You could tell that the writers were trying so hard to emotionally captivate you, but between the terribly written jokes and the appalling story, there was nothing to get attached to. Tanjiro was as average as he was in the first season. Zenitsu literally gets 10 minute of on screen time, if that. Inosuke, while enjoyable to watch, has no depth to him that makes you want to know more. (Nezuko however, is amazing as always). All in all, the characters in this movie were subpar, to say the least.

Story: 2
In terms of story alone, this is one of the worst movies I have ever seen. The first 20 minutes of the movie are boring setup, followed by another 30 minutes of 'rising action', which felt like millennia. On top of that, there was little to no climax. It almost felt like the writers didn't know where to highest point of the movie, so they just made the entire second half a steady descending peak. You thought Enmu was the big boss? Nope. Instead, another demon that we have never met before comes out of literal nowhere, and starts fighting Rengoku. It made so little sense, that I could not concentrate on the thing that makes Demon Slayer so great; the art.

Enjoyment: 4
This movie was a disappointment in terms of enjoyment. Sure, the first season of Demon Slayer may not have been critically amazing, but at least it was super fucking enjoyable. This on the other hand literally had me falling asleep at times. I didn't give a single shit about any of the characters, as they were made to be shallow and uninteresting, and I didn't think any of the writing was enjoyable. What I did enjoy, however, were the fights. Holy shit, Ufotable went so hard, especially with the Rengoku fight.

Overall: 6
This movie was disappointing. I went into it hoping for an action packed, emotional, and fun movie, but left with a mediocre OVA. If you love Demon Slayer and it's characters, I would 100% recommend this movie. If you were iffy about the show, maybe this isn't for you. I am giving this a 6 for the time being strictly based on how stellar the production was. Nothing else. If this movie had the same story and characters, but had mediocre art and sound, this would be the worst movie I have ever seen.

Let's start with the negative first. The film itself lasts almost 2 hours, and there are 2 villains. One of them is useless, and seriously because not only does that one villain have no role but the whole part with him is completely unnecessary and in no way contributes to the development of the story. In addition, too much time was wasted here to suggest that the things that happen to the main characters are used for their character development, which did not happen. There’s also the classic problem of many shonen stories, and that’s bad writing of villains and by that I mean both, ... and especially the initial villain who’s only there to be a punching bag. The next problem is related to the last third of the film, first of all there is an attempt to draw some so-called philosophy that is not well realized. Next up are those dialogues that are catastrophically poorly written, and there's also the end of a film that creates excessive pathos from very not-sad things. Now let's get to the good stuff. First of all, the film immediately begins without summarizing previous events and the occasional extra word about the power system. And of course the animation is very good with very detailed and fluid fights, and the music is a bit weaker than in the series, but still very good that contributes to the hype in the action scenes.

Animation

God tier Ufotable animation with a few horrible cgi scenes- not enough to detract from the incredible animation though.

Sound

Yuki Kajiura is a goddess. In my opinion, the soundtrack in the movie is even better than the soundtrack for season one.

Characters

This is my main problem with this movie. I thought that coming out of the first season that the characters would develop in the upcoming movie. Nope. Every last character in this is tropey, bland, and just poorly made characters. Tanjiro has no drive to him, not even the stereotypical shonen "I fight for my friends". I think he’s best summed up when that person goes ... into Tanjiro’s mind and looked around and was like “whoa. there is literally nothing here.” Rengoku was an awful character with no personality. He was put up as the "blunt" kind of character, and then in a five minute flashback they tried to make him some deep character that you were emotionally involved in. His death was a joke. I thought that maybe Tanjiro would develop as a character when he saw the flashbacks with his family being all like "why would you leave us to die" but this opportunity for character growth was not taken at all, and was brushed off to the side with a "My family would never say that!" No character depth at all.

Story

This also comes back to the characters. Most of the situations that happen in this story aren't results of the character's choices driving the plot forward, they just kinda happen. I think the mangaka looked at what was popular with season 1, and just catered to the audience with that. "Oh, people liked Nezuko? Let's throw in some quirky cute Nezuko scenes. People liked Inosuke? Let's give an unreasonable amount of screentime to Inosuke doing goofy Inosuke things that contributes absolutely nothing to the plot. One last little thing that bugged the shit out of me was the tryhard edgy scenes in the flashbacks. Tanjiro slashing his neck to wake up out of the dream world and the family's death scene were just trying so damn hard to be edgy that it just came off as funny to me.

Enjoyment

I thought that after I saw the Tale of Princess Kaguya and the Heaven's Feel III movie in theaters (an actually good Ufotable movie) that audiences at anime showings in theaters were actually civilized. I was wrong. Except for maybe Endgame, this was the worse theater experience of my life. Some concepts seem so simple that they wouldn't need to be explained, but I guess that common theater etiquette isn't one of those concepts for anime fans. If you're in a theater, don't scream at the screen, don't have a fucking aneurism when a slightly funny scene happens, and don't try to sing the hinokami song incredibly loudly when it comes on. The combination of the theater experience with Mugen Train just being an overall disappointing movie just left a bad taste in my mouth.

I think that the appeal of Demonslayer towards mainstream audiences is the amazing animation, cool fights, and sick music (especially episode 19) I really think that if any other studio got this manga and adapted it, it wouldn't be known in mainstream audiences nearly as much. Without Ufotable, Demonslayer wouldn't be what it is. You can kinda see this if you look at the manga score in comparison to the anime score- and I think the only reason the manga score is even that high is because of the loyal anime fans. I've read up to the movie in the manga and it just was so incredibly boring that I have no idea why people would read ahead of the anime when the anime adaptation is the only worthwhile part of the franchise. Walking out of the theaters it just kinda made me sad that such incredible production values were wasted on such garbage source material. I'm just hoping for the last Fate route to be adapted by Ufotable- maybe that will make me feel better.

Of course, you're allowed to like what you like, and if you did like it I'm not telling you to change your opinion, but this is just why I didn't like this movie

I really don't understand why this is a movie and why it is two hours long.

Let's start with the good things.
As you might expect from demon slayer production value is very good although not that much better than the show. Music was on point and really elevated some of the scenes. I really enjoyed Rengoku, but he lacked development and screen time to really influence my opinion of the movie.

And this is when I start to run out of the positives, if you enjoyed Demon Slayer for its characters then good for you, but they still feel like someone took one personality trait and turned ... it into person. What was surprising for me is the lack of nicely animated fights. Whenever we have an action scene there is some nice artwork and a quick slash. I feel like most of the work went into those characteristic flames which follow unremareble movements of their swords.

Story wise it is incredible how simple it is.
There is a train with a bad guy, our heroes get on the train, they have a dream and then they beat the bad guy. It was so simple in fact that at many times I felt like authors where trying hard to buy them some time and get to those two hours. Even worse, after little over an hour they complete their mission and to keep the movie running for a bit longer, random generic bad guy shows up.

I can only recommend you this movie if you enjoyed Demon slayer, but if you didn't it is a waste of time.

The movie to this series is like a high production episode to the series, and everybody who liked the series will obviously like this movie, but if the series isn't your thing then this won't change your mind.
For me Kimetsu no Yaiba is fine, I'm not too keen on any of the characters, how can I say it they're a bit too goofy and simplistic for the most part, I liked the horror aesthetic they were going for but they always betrayed that by changing the art style and inserting comedy into a horror like atmosphere. This film has all the problems I had with ... the series carried over.

To be more specific to the film I felt like the first half was underwhelming, it had a lot of the issues mentioned before and it just wasn't exciting, I was wondering how they were going to drag it out to be two hours. The final boss which was exciting as we were awarded with some really cool high production action though some of the scenes with the new characters would have hit me more if had more time to actually get to know them.

Overall this film to me was fine, it was a bit on the boring side to begin with, but I enjoyed it mostly for the cool action and production values. The story and characters are nothing impressive, but the film still was entertaining enough for me to say I didn't waste my time

Would I recommend it? Well its easy did you like s1? if yes then watch it.

(MILD SPOILERS AHEAD)

This movie is absolutely what you wanna watch if you loved the first season.

Not only because it's a direct continuation and following the manga, but because it's done masterfully.
With incredible animated moments, this takes the level of animation we had at the peaks of season 1 and fills the movie with that perfect blend of 2D and 3D that we loved, and it helps flesh out from the funniest moment to the most epic to the saddest.

But now that we have the animation out of the way we can talk about the rest.

I didn't quite enjoy the first season story and characters, and ... this movie is no different.
The characters I enjoyed the most were Tanjiro and Rengoku, they both had heartbreaking moments and overall made the movie more interesting.

-Obligatory Imouto appreciation segment, now let's return to the review-

But as good at that was, Inosuke and Zenitsu always had to break the tense and sad moments with their goofiness, and ruin the mood for me at times.
Example (mild spoilers?)
When certain sad scene was happening, people in the cinema were full on crying, people like me that are a bit more strong in that aspect were also affected, and there was a silent and tense atmosphere in the room that could have made that scene more powerful when remembering it...
But the director decided that what he should show next was Inosuke crying in a comic way, making everyone in the room laugh (I just thought it was stupid), and breaking the whole atmosphere.
I know that scene is probably better in the manga, but THEN the author goes on and puts some more jokes about how the MCs are crying instead on focusing on the fuckin sad scene.

In a story department I understand that this movie is not supposed to have a very long story, and it was decent for what it was, (SPOILERS) but I can't say I enjoyed the main villain we were following not being present on the climax of the movie, and not being able to feel sorry for him like with other demons in the series. He wasn't interesting or relatable in any way, and I put him in the story department because I feel like he was just a plot device to lead the movie to an end that hadn't been foreshadowed or anticipated in almost any way.

TL;DR: Great animation, good character moments ruined by boar boy being "funny", almost inexistent story, mid villain.

Overall, a great movie for the ones who loved the previous season, but I'll personally have to give it a low score, saved by wonderful animation and sound work.

Ok, I'm gonna be 100 with all of you. I haven't finished the show. In fact, I don't really ever plan to, as for lack of better terms, it just isn't for me. With that said however, the Demon Slayer movie was actually pretty fun.

I won't regurgitate the plot to you because their isn't really any deep plot here. Everything in the trailer is exactly what the film is and to a fault. That said, the animation of the film is ALOT more consistent here then in the show. The character work is still solid, but the fluidness of the animation never feels nearly ... as disjointed as the show. The WOW moments are indeed WOW and although this is nowhere near the level of quality that Ufotable puts into Fate, or even in the same ball park as Garden of Sinners, it does have a nice pop to it that most Shonen shows tend to lack. Alot of the humor that ruined the show for myself, is also tamed down as the runtime being left with under 2 hours means that every second wasted on their shit jokes, means a second wasted on flushing out the villain and heroes. Luckily, the filmmakers went with the right call and cut the needless humor in order to give us a smart and compelling bad guy. And he is just that. A bad guy. The show also has a tendency to Naruto its bad guys and make them "tragic", which in reality has become such a bad trope in Shonen that it's almost worth it to make fun of. No, here in this film we get a BAD GUY and that's awesome to see.

On the other hand, this film is set up for the second season. We get a shocking death. Unclosed ends. A tragic note. On the one side, I commend the film for do this and making the movie actually matter, because seriously the amount of anime films that are just useless cash grabs in this genre is unbelievable (looking at you My Hero), that said though, if you're like me and don't care about the show, the story and death of a character really doesn't mean sh*t to you. With how long his death scene is, it really starts getting repetitive. The little amount of humor that is in this film are awful. The jokes aren't' funny. They're badly timed. And they make a joke out of any of the tension so the film has to work itself back up after losing it.

all in all, this film is a mixed bag. As someone who has seen ALOT of sh*t anime "tie in" films, Much of what this film does make me appreciate it. That said, what makes it Demon Slayer is what makes me hate it. I wish this level of craft and writing went for other series because wow some really needed it (again looking at you My Hero) but as far as this goes. It's a solid watch and well worth seeing in theaters if you get the chance. Fan or Not.

First of all, I really liked the first adaptation of the series, but Demon slayer has gone downhill and it will only go down from here, this shit is so boring I watched the whole movie on 2x speed, skipping 10 seconds every 2 minutes of the boring ass parts of the story, sorry for the people who spent money in the cinemas to watch a 2 hour shitfest.

Story (1):
Truly pathetic, who thought it's a good idea for a show like Demon Slayer to have an arc on A FUCKING TRAIN, that's probably the dumbest place to have an arc on with a world ... setting like that.

Art (8):
Although story is garbage the Art is the thing that carried, the studio did a great job on this one.

Sound (4):
The sound design is decent, It would've been better if they put more work in this to carry the other impurities.

Characters (5):
(SPOILERS, even though this shit isn't even worth watching)

Tanjiro is such a p*ssy that it's annoying, the scene where he goes on to get stabbed by the train operator instead of knocking him out or killing him, why would you not just cut his head off to save yourself from getting killed?

AND THEN HE GOES ON TO SAY I CAN'T DIE BECAUSE THE MAN WHO STABBED ME IS GOING TO BECOME A MURDERER????? THE FUCK? WHO IS WRITING THIS SHIT PLEASE GET ON SOME MEDS.

(SPOILERS ENDED, still a bad show)

I don't think I got any problems with the other characters, excluding the dream demon, his voice actor just sounded like he went in the studio on life support and started reading lines with 0 emotion.

At least Inosuke carried.

Enjoyment (4):
The only thing that kept me watching is the fight scenes, art and Inosuke, other than that it's boring and not worth watching.

Overall (5)

The story section is full of spoilers so if you want to avoid those my TL;DR review is:
Story boring and no interesting character interactions or growth, though the art is really good. Worth watching if you want to see the pretty fights, but the $15 I spent on a ticket didn't seem worth it.

Art & Sound-
The art is great, but you knew that; in particular everything involving Rengoku was sick. The sound effects were really nice, but I found the music to feel kinda generic. Like the epic music played at the epic parts and the sad music played at the sad parts, but I ... didn't find any of it notably good or interesting.

Story & Characters- Spoilers ahead
Splitting the story into across two villains who are effectively disconnected just made both feel worse. That kind of thing would be fine in a series where having some episodes without development is fine, but in a movie that seems like it should contain a full meaningful arc, it just ends up feeling disappointing. At least Upper Three was fun to watch because of the flashy fight, but Lower One just felt boring which is especially bad when they're the villain for most of the movie. I wish the sleep stuff had given my boy Zenitsu something to do since it seems like he'd be uniquely suited to that situation, but it ended up being completely pointless. Usually dream based stuff in fiction is used to give characters personal revelations, since it's something that can't be solved with violence, but instead all it's used to do is show that Tanjiro has a very good soul or some shit idk it's dumb. At least Rengoku is fun to watch, even if it was extremely obvious that he would die.

I guess I'll just add that I thought the comedy was pretty good, especially involving Inosuke.

I don't like long reviews so I will leave a relatively short one.

This movie is amazing and a spectacle in the sound and animation departments and just ok in every other way.
I like sakuga as much as the next person and this film is full of it. The sound design and action scenes are incredible. Unfortunately this is where anything remarkable about the movie ends.
The characters are one dimensional, the story uninspired and the backgrounds while well drawn are very samey. The CG monsters should have been left out of the movie as they jerk you out of the movie with whiplash from how ... bad they are compared to the fluid animation everywhere else.

-small spoiler-


The biggest issue with the movie is there is a lot of weight put on the idea I should care about a character solely because he has an expository dream for 20 minutes worth of runtime. In this dream we are treated to a cliche side-story showing what a nice onii-san he is. TL;DR The dream sequence didn't really get me to identify with, or even care about the character enough. The failure of the dream in making me empathize with said character more than I would for any human, turned what I assume was supposed to be the titular moment of the movie into a "Could you please just get on with it and stop screaming like a toddler?" moment.


-end spoiler-

In short the movie is ok. I didn't feel ripped off seeing it. Ok bordering on slightly subpar, is all it will ever be in the scope of film; unless commercial success is how you measure these things, then I guess this deserves a 10.

I want to start this review by saying that I think it is not the same to be a hater than someone who simply did not like something and explains the reasons, I am in the second group that I comment.

Well, after seeing the first season of this anime and now the movie I have come to the conclusion that I will never like the kimetsu no yaiba franchise for various reasons. But I swear I've tried to like it.

1) STORY. 5.
The story is common and simple, as in the vast majority of the shonen nekketsu. But this wouldn't be a problem if the dialogues ... weren't so bad.
I believe that the story has potential and that the premise is good, but the narration, the forced and basic dialogues make it impossible, in my opinion, to empathize with the events.

For example, imagine that you and your friend are going to write about the same topic, the same character, and the same goals. After writing it, you share the story of each one and one is much better than the other, the ingredients being the same. Why? Because the important thing is not WHAT happens, it is HOW it happens.
And I think that in general, how things happen in this anime make them unenjoyable. SPOILER: for example Rengoku's death is obvious from the beginning of the film because of the leader's scene at the beginning and because he is the only character that they tell something about in his dream. It was obvious.

2) ANIMATION 10.
I think it is impossible to make a better animation in 2021.

3) OST 8.
Good but nothing incredible, on the line.

4) CHARACTERS.
The characters have almost no personality. If they are villains they do villain things, and if they are heroes they do hero things, but nothing else.

In this movie there are two villains, who obviously do bad things, but what else? I do not care about the fights they have with these characters because there is no tension, there is no background, they fail to capture my interest because I simply see a good and a bad hitting each other, nothing more.

And worst of all. The moment of the dream ... that was the perfect moment to show some more background of the characters because they are supposed to dream about what makes them happiest, but it only happens with Rengoku (Because he is going to die) since Tanjiro does not there is nothing new, we already know how he feels about his family.
What about Zenitsu and Inosuke? that the mangaka shits on his own characters. Because with them dream scenes you are telling me that Zenitsu's personality revolves around nezuko (very sad) and Inosuke's on being a loud lider, nothing more.

5) THE COMEDY.... OMG.
Comedy is bad, but in a bad sense of the word.
I can't explain it, it even makes me uncomfortable, the attempts to break the 4th wall are mediocre and I feel that the author is not capable of bringing a good balance between comedy and action, like FMAB, JJK or Gintama.
The first words of the most important character in the movie consist of saying for 30 seconds "how delicious" just sad.

6) And finally, some unanswered questions about the movie.

We know that Tanjiro wakes up by committing suicide. When zenitsu and inosuke do that?
Why does another villain appear if the mission was not his? How is he so stupid to show up a few hours before dawn?
Why does Tanjiro's father appear as a ghost in his dream to give him the idea of suicide?
Why Rengoku's dream seem like a sad memory instead of a happy dream?

Overall, is it the worst I've ever seen? No, but it hurts me that this movie is the highest grossing in the history of Japan above others.

I honestly think this movie was just fine. The sales of the movie made me expect a lot more but I think that for the future I should remove the sales from the actual art. All that to say that this movie was still enjoyable. The characters in this movie felt somewhat shallow. Rengoku's character didn't really leave an impact on me even with the emotional feeling, but the art and voice acting was great. It was really easy to immerse myself in this movie and into the story because the sound direction and music were great. I felt like this could've easily just been ... a couple of episodes just stitched together.

I wish I could've enjoyed this movie more but as it stands I couldn't give this movie anything more than a 6.

I'm really glad I got the chance to finally watch the film in theaters in its fullest experience (surround sound haha). As an adapted movie, Kimetsu no Yaiba's Infinity Train is a faithful adaptation its original source material, elevating and enhancing the panels to its fullest potential. The animation and sound were nothing short of amazing, breath-taking, and cinematic. One should not expect anything less from big names like Ufotable Studio and Yuki Kaijura with notable works under her belt like the Fate series.

My review becomes a bit more subjective regarding the story at this point, so please take it with a grain of ... salt. While I do commend the accuracy to the source material adaption, the problem here is that the source itself has glaring pacing and execution issues which consequently are reflected in the film as a result. It unfortunately plagues the later arcs in the manga as well, but I've already covered that in an older KimeYai review.

"Kimetsu no Yaiba: Infnity Train" thus suffers from what I like to call the 'Marvel Movies' formula in which the viewer is given lots of plot, but little to no story. The events in the film are just moving at such a fast pace (x happens, now y happens, etc), the viewer has little time to soak in and reflect on emotions characters may feel, thus removing any sort of emotional connection that should be fostered. This is just something personal and specific, but I'm a little sad they left out a core detail during the dream sequences when the children find the Demon Slayers' dream core. I remember reading in the manga Rengoku's core was described as brittle, reflecting how though he may put up a bold front on the outside, on the inside he struggles to hold his own being the only person in his family/life to have faith in himself.

This is more rambling, but I really wish the Infinity Train arc had happened later in the series to fix its pacing and character development with Red Light District arc possibly happening before it. That could have given more time to develop the characters more like Rengoku. While I appreciate his character and personality, 10 chapters was far too short to really see him shine and this is reflected in the film also. The moments he happens to appear in the film his aura really commands the frame, but his screen time unfortunately was limited to either a few appearances save for the very last part of the film.

In retrospect, the film was a fun experience with jaw-dropping visuals and heart-wrenching drama, but the movie from hindsight might feel somewhat hollow to some viewers like myself.

All that glitters is not gold and this movie is perfect capsulation of that concept.

Art:
The one unequivocal positive is the art and Mugen Train is yet another beautiful piece of animation from Ufotable. My only complaints about the art is the rather boring setting of the train and the drab CGI tentacle but those two shortcomings are easily overshadowed with bright and fluid animation Demon Slayer is known for. Rengoku especially I feel was animated well beyond of my high expectations for Ufotable.


Story/characters:
Demon Slayer has always been a generic Shounen story but hoo-boy do they take generic to a whole 'nother level with this ... one. It really feels like the writers just soaked a piece of a paper in a bath of all the most basic shounen plot and character traits and out came the script for Mugen Train. Beyond that, the characters we already know seem a shell of what the are in the show. It felt like I was watching someone's imitation of the characters instead of the authentic thing. Because of this combined with a weak story it ends up meaning anything impactful that is tried falls flat. I obviously did not expect some master craft of story telling but I do expect the highest grossing anime film of all time to not just rely on the most basic of Shounen tropes of the last 30 years.

If what you are looking for is some well animated eye candy then Mugen Train is for you. If you are looking for anything else beyond that then Mugen Train is probably not for you.

I've always believed in the MAL scores, but after seeing this movie, I'm sure scores are useless, the movie is very weak, it shouldn't even be in the TOP 50, there are hundreds of better works!!!

I've watched the anime three times, it's incredibly good, the movie even with amazing arts and animations, it's a disappointment, the story is so bad you think you're watching a 2 hour filler, many scenes don't even make sense, the performance of the characters is ridiculous, and this was one of the strong points of demon slayers, the villains are a disappointment, Rui and his saga are infinitely superior!!!
The hype ... for the next season has drastically decreased!!!

Now I am not a crazy fan of Demon Slayer like others, so I feel I am able to give a much fairer take on the film compared to a fanbase that is super defensive over any criticism regarding it. Demon Slayer season 1 was a fine season with issues. The main ones being its story, writing and characters.
Sadly, this doesn’t get much better in a film format. I have to question what the thought process for this as this should have either been the first arc of season 2 or an OVA. This film feels like a crash grab. So, what is exactly ... wrong with it? Well, let’s jump into that.

First off, let’s talk about the good of this film. The main calling card for Demon Slayer is its art and animation. This film doesn’t drop the ball here. There is no bad shot here at all. Everything is so well done and polish from an animation standpoint. I think the strongest aspect of the animation is moment to moment usage throughout the film. Factor in really good directing and framing of all shots you can really the size, scale, and feel of all shots. You are given enough time to let everything you’re seeing sink in.

If you’re a fan of the animation of Demon Slayer season 1, I don’t think you will not be mad here as Ufotable knocks it out of the park. This is easily one of the best aspects of the film. The attention to detail this series takes with everything is a joy to watch.

Up next, let’s talk about the English voice acting. I feel everyone has shown great improvement from season 1. I see a lot more comfort from everyone in their roles. They’re really getting the hang of what they want to project. I think the standout performances for this is Bryce Papenbrook as Inosuke and Mark Whitten as Rengoku. I think both men did an excellent of not only being funny but good with the material they were given. They really sold you on their characters the most in my opinion.
Since I bought up his English voice actor, I should take time to talk about how Rengoku was my favorite character in the film. He had a good character arc and the film felt more about him at times than others. I also think his fighting style was cool too.

Lastly, I think the soundtrack and fights throughout the film were amazing. I think both teams in charge of these just knock it out of the park. Good fights are a requirement of a Shonen anime so not having good fights can really hurt the overall enjoyment of a viewer. The same goes with the soundtrack each piece of music really hits all the notes to get an emotional reaction out of you. The timing and placement of the music is really good too. Nothing feels out of place.

Now onto the bad, sadly, there is a lot to talk about here as a common criticism from more critical critics of Demon Slayer is its writing and characters. The writing has been criticized for lacking in depth, detail, and being overall lackluster. Demon Slayer struggles greatly with defining goals and rationales for both its heroes and villains. The most you can get from either side is, “We must kill demons and keep everyone safe!” From the Demon Slayer core and for the villains you get, “We wish to feast on human blood and wipe out the Demon Slayer core!” Some of the lower-level demons just looking to move up to the upper rankings by piling up enough dead bodies to please their master.

Well, this carries into the film with Tanjiro, Inosuke, and Zenitsu with the aid of Hashira Rengoku being sent to figure out why humans are disappearing from the Mugen Train. That isn’t a bad start, but it gets bad as our main three characters: Tanjiro, Inosuke, and Zenitsu have zero-character development. While I like one of the characters in our main lead Tanjiro, I have a very low opinion of Inosuke and Zenitsu. To simply put, I think they suck as characters and add nothing to story while disrupting the serious tone Demon Slayer desperately tries to maintain. Both Zenitsu and Inosuke are equally annoying in differing ways. Zenitsu just cries a bunch and can’t shut up. Inosuke is just a worse version of Bakugo with swords. I can say that Inosuke is slowly becoming better but I doubt he will ever go through any meaningful change.

Another issue with the writing is the number of plot holes and extreme use of deus ex machnia. A number of things go unexplained as it feels like there was a setup and conflict created but no one thought out how our heroes would overcome the power of the Lower One. Those powers being the ability to use his blood to spend people into a deep sleep giving them dreams of their greatest desires before feasting on them by destroying their spirit cores. Sounds good, right?

Well, it’s not as you are only given a reason as to how Tanjiro got out of the dream while Zenitsu is moving and attacking while still being asleep, Rengoku breaks it just because he is a Hashira I guess, and I don’t even know how Inosuke broke the spell.

Now the third act gives us a good fight and okay conclusion to the story, but it doesn’t save what is a film that could have been better serve an OVA. There is a number of plot holes here to make the ending and what Tanjiro says at the end worth while as this can be seen as a major lost for the Demon Slayer core. I wish that was handled better.

The last thing I want to bring attention to this section of the review is just how bad the villain was. His English voice actor was good, but he doesn’t really talk about anything important. On top of getting a weak motive for his actions, you can only see this villain as just a jobber for our heroes to defeat. He is not a threat at all. He is just, “I am gonna kill these humans to get more blood from the master so I can become an upper-level demon!” There is nothing else to him. He is extremely one dimensional. He is just evil for the sake of being evil.

The ending of this story is okay as they are able to save everyone and Rengoku gives his life saving all of them, but it gets ruin with Tanjiro’s speech calling a demon a coward. It doesn’t really make him, or the Demon Slayer core look strong as they lost one of their best fighters. While I’m happy there is no force happy ending, the speech really doesn’t help things for the Demon Slayer core. I also feel killing Rengoku off just as he was getting good as a character felt lazy.

In conclusion, Demon Slayer Mugen Train is an extremely poorly film that is carried by its art, animation, soundtrack, sound design, and English voice acting. This film was extremely overrated and overhyped by its fans. I was extremely disappointed by this film. I spent over 21 dollars on this film, so to say I have a little bit of buyer’s remorse is an understatement. This is a good film if you are a crazy fan of Demon Slayer but if you are not this is something you will watch once and forget about it as nothing much happens until the end. Not a bad movie, but not a good one at all either.

I really liked the first season of Demon Slayer. It was well balanced with having 5 to 6 episodes that were full on fights focused and after them you got 4 to 5 lay-down episodes to get some comedy elements in this cruel wolrd of the show.
After season one was over, I was so big excited to see these visuals on a big screen in a cinema.

Now the time has come and I am deeply disappointed.
It wasn't the simple story, for what Demon Slayer has always been criticized for.
The animation & the fight scenes were stunning & badass. The soundtrack was glorious. All of ... these incredible good points about the movie are being hold down by the annoying comedy elements. Right after a fight some lame joke just ruins it. And I hate myself that this is the reason why I am disappointed.

Even Tanjirou, who I liked in the show, got on my nerves here.

I am still looking forward to the upcoming new season, but if the comedy & action pacing is exactly like it was in the movie then I dont know if I will continue watching it.

Only dropping this review as a bookmark to when the series ends and the disappointment reels in and the shiny gloss comes off. This is a movie stretched thin and let's face it if the B-plot started halfway through the movie would be half as long.

The shounen stuff does get annoying after a while. Tanjiro's scream felt unnecessary, the comedy is a bit off tone and the scope creep is becoming apparent. I'd love to comment on this but I'd just be spoiling the manga at this point.

The music was great if you have a keen ear you probably heard some of the creative ... decisions such as the traditional Japanese vocal. The high pitched phrases are often overused and it's very promising to see something done differently. In this case, it was passed through what I assume was a phone filter and then heavily autotuned to match the hard power chords. While i thought this was awesome they go and slap some hard piano on top and vocals, which are okay but you throw in the melancholic strings and its generic all of a sudden. Awesome music just poor direction i guess.

From here it's just philosophical, like a previous review mentioned do sky-high sales mean something is good and vice versa. I like this premise but it just scratches the surface of what the industry is and isn't and what this becomes in the backdrop of such a unique culture. I'd like to break that down but that's too much work I'm not a youtuber.

TL: DR Movie okay, soundtrack generic and seeds of disappointment for later instalments confirmed.

I'm gonna be honest that I wanted to like this movie after the show which was good, but the movie is a very big "eh" at best.

The animation is always very good, no problems there. But putting a sparkly bow on a terrible story doesn't make it better.
My biggest gripe is feeling sad for deaths (no spoilers) when you barely know their characters. I think everyone had that in games like Telltale's Walking Dead for example, where you immediately meet a character and they get killed off and the cast makes it seem like they lost their dearest, closest friend.
I'm sorry but please give a ... reason to give a sh*t. The few flashbacks to try and make us sympathise do absolutely nothing and barely gave any info why they would be missed other than "he's a cool character." I'd be far less on about this if it wasn't the whole entire emotional crux for the movie, if anything the only reason why this movie was made.

Should've been part of the new season so they could've had more episodes to actually build up the characters and go deeper into the story.

There is something about shounen anime movie adaptions that does not sit right with me. The directors always seem to assume that a movie has to outdo its show in every regard. The result is that most scenes, irregardless of their type (dialogue/joke/action) are blown out of proportion and feel off. This usually works well for action scenes, but this movie is a good example of even that failing. Then there is always this assumption in the air that the movie's audience is severely lacking in intelligence, thus these movies tend to over explain literally everything. It still kind of works in some movies that ... excel in some ways enough to make up for it. In this case however the exposition itself is so over the top and omni present that soured my enjoyment of watching it. Halfway in and I could no longer take it seriously. Although there had been some good scenes those were not enough to make up for the at times ridiculously bad directing. Character in this one constantly explain things that would be better left shown or implied.

The plot itself is still pretty good for the most part. Just the execution of the story does not always flow well as some parts that did not need or deserve it were quite overblown. Maybe I missed something, but this movies lacks a certain roundness because a later development was is not being forshadowed enough. However some moments I really enjoyed.

Art and sound are good if we ignore the abuse of bad 3D around the third quarter. Personally I am not a fan of the art style however.

Surely this is a great watch for real fans of the franchise. But for spectators without any emotional investment into the characters this movie has too many issues to be really worth its time.