My Experience With Anime: Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba

My story:

I have never been interested in visiting Anime. I would see it late at night on TV, but never sat down and watched it. Nobody in my hometown watched it. And quite frankly, they would probably be made fun of if they did watch it.

The closest thing to Anime that I have ever watched was Avatar: The Last Airbender and that never felt like the weird, goofy Anime that I thought of.

Now I am in college and being out in the world, I have realized that a lot of people my age watch Anime.

A few of my closest friends in college even watch Anime. I admit that I have made fun of them before for watching it because I thought it was too nerdy.

When I think of Anime, I think of characters with overexaggerated features. I never thought of Anime as storytelling.

Boy... was I wrong!

My friend is trying to convince me to watch Anime and I finally say I will start one and see. He tells me to watch Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba on Hulu.

I love storytelling and beautiful cinematography in films, so he thinks it would be perfect for me to start on.

I sit down and watch the first episode, and I am hooked!

After finishing the season on Hulu, I can say I am a fan of Anime. Granted this is the first and only Anime series I have watched so far, but there is something special about this genre of storytelling.

Anime is a beautiful, unique, exciting way to tell a story.

The characters are on a journey. They have a goal and will do whatever it takes to accomplish this goal.

The characters are the best thing about this experience. They are driven. They matter.

There is so much depth devoted to making these characters feel real that I forgot they were even drawings. The emotion exerted from these characters flowed right into the room. You lose the aspect of the TV and you are with these characters on their mission.

Every single character is driven by something. They have a past they are trying to escape. They are emotionally driven. This is what made them so fulfilling to me.

By the time they have reached the end, you are just as exhausted as they are. You feel the pain, the emotion, the development that these characters have just gone through.

They are a completely different character and that is incredibly important while on the hero's journey.

The character development is not the only thing that makes Anime worth watching.

The main reason I would not watch Anime is because of the design of the characters. It weirded me out that the girls have oversized boobs and the characters act goofy at times.

I understand that I have only watched Demon Slayer that did not have this aspect, but the animation is flawless.

It is just beautiful to look at.

The creativity that goes into creating these sceneries, characters, and every little detail in the background is incredible!

The thing is that Anime is able to do stuff that live-action just can't. They are able to draw the characters in a way that creates intense action scenes.

In Demon Slayer, for example, when a sword is flying through the air the filmmakers are able to slow it down, get close and personal with the blade and use shots that add to the intensity of the action.

The background may turn into a bunch of lines following the character to show just how fast he/she is moving. This also adds to the intensity.

In live-action films, this would just look goofy. But it works in Anime.

We feel the speed, the impact, the emotion. All the creative team behind the project has to do is draw the features on the character to show pain or anger. The overexaggerated features add to the level of pain or anger the character feels.

This really got me invested in the scenes.

Okay. So, right off the bat, I loved Demon Slayer. There is something amazingly beautiful about this Anime.

Within the first episode, I was sold on the two characters. I was rooting for them to succeed in their quest.

The two characters are brother and sister, Tanjiro and Nezuko.

After their family is killed by a demon, Nezuko is turned into a demon. Tanjiro vows to turn his little sister back into a human by joining the Demon Slayer Corps and find a cure.

With every episode, we see Tanjiro train hard to become a demon slayer and enact revenge. Because he is so driven by emotion, we care and want him to succeed.

Nezuko barely speaks through the series because she has bamboo in her mouth so she doesn't hurt anyone. However, this does not stop us from caring about her.

A lot of that has to do with the way Tanjiro feels about her and will risk his life for her, but she shows so much emotion. Just by touching a human on the cheek or the look in her eyes show the audience that she is not a normal demon. She has an effect on people other than her brother.

Another thing that adds emotional weight to this Anime is the friendship that occurs.

On his mission, Tanjiro meets to polar opposites, Zenitsu and Inosuke.

Zenitsu is a scared young demon slayer and Inosuke is a bloodthirsty slayer that is not as tough as he thinks.

The two characters introduced both have something in their past that makes them who they are. Even two characters introduced later in the series are well-rounded people.

However, what is most interesting the interactions between the three characters.

They each are different and unique and this causes a lot of character development. They must learn to get along. It creates some funny moments but also some emotional ones as well.

As said earlier, the action is over the top. I loved every single action sequence in this season.

The shots that the filmmakers created are jawdropping beautiful. They were able to set these shots up to intensify the moments that bring you right into the action. Tanjiro's emotion behind his actions just added to the action in a way I never expected.

Every action sequence was a learning curve for Tanjiro. Every one was more difficult than the last and added a new obstacle for Tanjiro to overcome. Wich just added to his character development.

I am a fan of Anime!

That is something I never thought I would say... maybe hell froze over.

If you have never watched Anime and don't know where to start, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba is a perfect way to do so. I think it contains everything that one would want from an Anime.

I am definitely going to watch more Anime and learn more about the genre.

I did not know what to expect when I sat down to watch Demon Slayer, but one thing is for sure.

Anime is more than a genre.

Anime is art.