Reviews with content warning for Blood - Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Vol. 11: A Close Fight

Reviews tagging 'Blood'

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Vol. 11: A Close Fight by Koyoharu Gotouge

6 reviews

wylanslcve's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

hey, inosuke... may I have some of that plot armour? and, obanai... you had ONE JOB.

apart from a few grievances I have with this volume (which we'll get to in a second), this conclusion to the entertainment district arc was great! I wish we got to see more of tengen's wives involved in the final battle, but seeing hinatsuru fighting alongside this arc's core characters was still enjoyable. speaking of which, I actually love how the relationship between tengen and his wives were written - tengen loves and treats all his wives in ways that aren't exactly equal, but compensate for their different personalities, and it's so sweet to me. and the wives are basically sisters! they even bicker like sisters! this is the only instance of polygamy I've ever seen work out well.

also, can we please talk about the scene where

nezuko uses her blood demon art to heal tengen and the wives are all screaming at her to stop because "it's too soon to cremate him"

? that's comedy gold right there. and all those scenes were

nezuko is carrying tanjiro on her back

were adorable to me.

daki and gyutaro's backstory was so tragic but added so much depth and complexity to their characters - while I might not forgive or excuse their actions, I really appreciated how much they were humanised (as much as demons can be humanised) in this volume.

that being said, while I did for the most part enjoy the action in this volume and thought the ending was overall a satisfying one, there were a few things that made this conclusion fall flat for me. I'm going to be getting into pretty heavy spoilers, so I'll keep these criticisms hidden behind spoiler warnings.

firstly,

zenitsu only being a competent demon slayer when he's asleep makes about less sense in this volume than it did in previous instalments. he wasn't just fighting unconsciously as we've seen in previous instances - he was strategising and communicating with the other characters, all while <i>being asleep</i>. he could've been awake this entire battle and it wouldn't have made any difference to me. I've always felt like zenitsu was wasted potential, but especially given some of the great character moments he has in this arc (such as when he stood up to daki when she was abusing one of the girls in one of the houses)... they kind of feel pointless given his role in this final battle. it would've been great to use this final confrontation as an opportunity to develop his character as he overcomes his cowardice and anxiety, but unfortunately that wasn't the case here.

secondly,

inosuke somehow managing to survive being stabbed through the heart and being infected with deadly poison really ruined this ending for me. this isn't me saying I want inosuke to die - believe me, that's the last thing I want - but come on, him being able to shift the position of his internal organs? him being able to survive deadly poison (even ones he's never been exposed to before) because he grew up in the mountains? we've already set the standard with rengoku that key characters can die in this universe, that they're not invincible to the blows they might take - if you didn't want to kill off inosuke, why include this at all? I get it's fantasy and not supposed to be realistic, but there's a fine line between something not being realistic and being a terrible writing decision. something being fictional shouldn't be an excuse for bad writing.

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