I’m not going to comment about the pacing anymore from here on out. I’m tired of it already, so I’ll just go straight to events happening in this episode. Surprisingly, this episode was pretty descent for me. The fights weren’t bad and balanced properly between the girls and the original cast with the new ones. However, I did notice that the studio seemed to be playing favorites in the animations. From what I saw, it’s obvious that the quality of the animation and choreography of Sesshomaru’s fight against Kirinmaru is far superior than the the rest. That is to say, it doesn’t mean the other fights were bad. I’m pleased to see Inuyasha’s original gang, along with the new cast, worked together to protect their demon and human friends, coordinating with each other with their respective specialities to restrict the Grim Butterfly’s movement.
Back to the Half-Demon Princesses’ side, both Rion and Kirin have lost it as the Grim Butterfly seemed to have escalate their inner negativities. For Rion, it’s her inner hatred for her father who always brought her to his battles without ever considering her feelings. At first, she was always worried for her father every time she watched him fighting, but as times passed, she grew tired and resentful of her own father who kept neglecting her feeling. Adding more to my frustration, Kirinmaru actually has the audacity to scold Sesshomaru for bringing Rin, reciting how the Dog-Demon General once told him not to bring children and women to battlefield. He brought Rion to his battles before, which led to her death, who was he to scold Sesshomaru? And he still haven’t learned his lesson, still aiming to become the strongest, even using Rion as an excuse to justify his action. Even Sesshomaru could see how pitiful Kirinmaru had become.
In regards to Rion, Kirin and Riku brought up the fact that Rion was killed by a half-demon, but she never spoke bad about the half-demon who killed her and even entrusted the half-demon Towa with the Zanzeiken to defeat her father. After what happened to her, it’s normal if Rion came to despise half-demon, but she’s never shown to resent them. At first, I thought that Rion was just being a kind-hearted girl and wise enough not to think that all half-demons were the same. However, from Riku’s reaction when he seemed to have realized something, there’s something more to it. Considering the title of the series, I began to think that perhaps Rion is actually a half-demon herself? I know that it seemed unlikely that Kirinmaru would be in a relationship with a human woman considering how he view humans, but I couldn’t think of any other possibility.
Kirin has turned 180 degrees ever since learning of Rion’s death. Before, he was fine with only destroying the comet to protect the Reiwa era, but knowing about what happened to Rion changed his mind completely and his negative feelings completely went out of control. During his stay in Reiwa era, Kirin admitted he was disappointed that there’s no record of demons’ role in helping humans in history, there’s only legends and fairytales that depicted demons as evil beings. While Kirin acknowledged the foolishness of the demons and liked the humans of Reiwa era where he lived, he was not blind to the fact that humans were equally foolish, especially their trait of pushing away anyone whom they considered different. With what happened to Rion, Kirin believed that annihilating “unnecessary demons” and ruling over humans would give birth to a new history the yokai like himself deserve as well as fulfilling Rion’s wish for a peaceful world.
Towa, having been a victim of bullying since she was a child and as someone who crossed through time like he did, understood what Kirin meant. However, what made Towa different from Kirin was Towa have seen not only the ugliness, but also the beauty of both demons and humans. Understanding and accepting both sides enable her not to stereotype them.
Looks like there’s around 2 episodes left? Please, let’s just get this over with.
Kazanova, just wanted to check if you received my comment on last week’s Yashahime post.
I mentioned there that if the anime version is disappointing you, then you should try the manga adaptation as it has better pacing and rewrites a good portion of events for a different but effective read.
Sorry for the late reply. Yes, I’ve read the manga from the link you’ve sent me. Thank you, I’ve been looking for any RAW or Scan of the manga. But I noticed there are some pages missing from the scans. I enjoyed the manga version so far, though I think the beginning went too fast. Still, I think it’s better, especially the fact that the girls actually properly spoke with Kaede about their respective parents instead of just hearing bits from people here and there. And Koga! His appearance in the manga is a very welcome change! And not forgetting the fact that Souta actually did some research to make it easy for Towa to use her cell phone and the sorts, which explained how Towa was still able to use her cell phone and others, unlike anime made the girls seems to just randomly brought their modern items without proper planning.
Honestly Yashahime could have been better but a weak foundation in the first season is biting them back painfully with the the pacing and execution.
Covid can’t be attributed to the problems with the series- it seems to me a sequel to the Final Act was in the works for a long time before it was green lit, so what have the directors and writer been doing? They had plenty of time to at least come up with logical and consistent plot and character development while waiting to convince Rimini Takahashi…but chose to wait until it was actually happening and began scrambling to get things done…
From what I heard, the studio initially wanted to make a sequel about Inuyasha and Kagome’s son, but the idea was turned down by Rumiko Takahashi, so they have to change the idea of the series into focusing on Sesshomaru’s twin daughters instead.
I did hear that…but it was just the gender swap, right? What kind of story did they plan for Kagome’s son?
Which reminds me…why twin girls? They could have gone with a boy and a girl twin since they have this difficulty in writing a great story about the daughters- in the old days no matter the culture boys were valued over girls so we could have also explored the dynamics between sibling boy and girl hanyos-all we’ve had were only-child hanyos…
I don’t think it’s just a matter of gender swap, plus it’s focused on Inuyasha and Kagome’s son, so they must have a different story. Since it was changed to Sesshomaru’s twin daughters, they’ll have to change how the story will go on.
Maybe that’a the point? They don’t want to follow the old days and want to make things different so it’ll feel refreshing and didn’t just do a repeat of the original Inuyasha. But unfortunately, they failed and instead spent more times on unnecessary fillers instead of fully focusing on the girls, the main plot, the girls relation to the old cast , and the new villains.