Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons”: Hashira Speed Training [Review]

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons” is a pretty compressed episode in terms of story. Mostly because it’s a case of Hashira speed training, and with three different Hashiras no less. Four if you count the cameo at the very end.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons”: Details

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons” is the fifth episode (you can read a review of Ep. 1, Ep. 2, Ep. 3, and Ep. 4 here) of the fourth season of this dark fantasy adventure and martial arts anime series. Said season comes on the heels of the previous season, which was the Swordsmith Village Arc. Meanwhile, said anime series as a whole is the anime adaptation of the manga of the same name by Koyoharu Gotouge. Ufotable (Fate/Zero, God Eater, Tales of Zestiria the X) is the animation studio behind this anime. Crunchyroll is the company licensing this anime for its NA debut.

Hideki Hosokawa is the director behind Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons”, with Hosokawa doing the storyboard alongside Haruo Sotozaki. As for the anime as a whole, Haruo Sotozaki is still the director. Ufotable collectively claims credit for the writing. Akifumi Fujio, Masanori Miyake, and Yūma Takahashi are all producing. Yuki Kajiura and Go Shiina composed the music you hear in the anime.

Speaking of music: the opening theme song for this season is “Mugen” (夢幻, lit. ’Dream’) by MY FIRST STORY and HYDE. The same band also performs “Tokoshie” (トコシエ, lit. ’Eternity’) as the ending theme music.

Voice Cast

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons” features the voices of Natsuki Hanae (Zach Aguilar in English dub) as Tanjiro Kamado, Hiro Shimono (Aleks Le in English dub) as Zenitsu Agatsuma, and Nobuhiko Okamoto (Zeno Robinson in English dub) as Genya Shinazugawa.

On the Hashira side, we have the voices of Kana Hanazawa (Kira Buckland in English dub) as Mitsuri Kanroji, Kenichi Suzumura (Erik Scott Kimerer in English dub) as Obanai Iguro, and Tomokazu Seki (Kaiji Tang in English dub) as Sanemi Shinazugawa.

When and Where to Watch

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons” made its airing and streaming (aka. simulcast) debut on June 9, 2024. You can watch this episode only on Crunchyroll at the moment. As for the previous seasons of the anime (including the anime film), you can watch it on Crunchyroll, Hulu, or Netflix.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons”: Synopsis

Alas, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba is an ongoing anime series. In fact, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons” only just premiered two days ago as of this writing. Thus, you will all get the official synopsis from Crunchyroll…is what I would like to say, but alas, there’s a problem. This pilot episode has nothing but a blank space where the synopsis should be. Thus, you will all get the official synopsis of the anime as a whole instead, also from Crunchyroll. You can check out that synopsis below:

It is the Taisho Period in Japan. Tanjiro, a kindhearted boy who sells charcoal for a living, finds his family slaughtered by a demon. To make matters worse, his younger sister Nezuko, the sole survivor, has been transformed into a demon herself.

Though devastated by this grim reality, Tanjiro resolves to become a “demon slayer” so that he can turn his sister back into a human, and kill the demon that massacred his family.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons”: The Good

There’s really no doubt about it. It’s the story of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons” that’s the best part about it. It’s all due to Koyoharu Gotouge and their work on the manga that this anime is an adaptation of. This is especially true given the structure of this episode. As I mentioned before, this whole episode is essentially a Hashira speed-training montage with three different Hashiras as the stars of the show. The episode is only 24 minutes long, so each Hashira got very little time to make an impact. What impact they did make though was still significant enough to make them quite memorable. Even Mitsuri Kanroji, despite basically getting only 3.5 minutes to herself, still made enough of an impact to be pretty noticeable.

Heck, one of the biggest reasons why the story works is in the third part with the Shinazugawas, The conflict between the two brothers is fascinating, and really makes you wonder about them and how their relationship will go over the course of the anime. Alas though, that seems to be something we’ll find out later in the story.

The animation enhances that story. As always, Ufotable shows its commitment to a very high level of quality with that animation. It’s not just in the action scenes, which remain as stylish and fluid as usual. It’s also in the food. Mitsuri’s stack of pancakes topped with a slice of butter and honeycomb looked most delicious.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 “I Even Ate Demons”: The Bad

Honestly, my one compaint about Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Hashira Training Arc Ep. 5 is how little time Mitsuri got in comparison with Obanai and Sanemi. Mitsuri got only 3.5 minutes of spotlight, while Obanai and Sanemi each got about 8 minutes. I feel like Mitsuri should’ve gotten an equal amount of spotlight as her fellow Hashira to balance it all out, but I guess it was not to be.

Still, if you want even more action than what was in this episode, then I highly suggest Solo Leveling or Kaiju No. 8. Those particular anime series have more than enough action to satisfy even the most hungry action junkies.

For more on Anime, make sure to check back to That Hashtag Show.

Keep Reading:

DEAD DEAD DEMONS DEDEDEDE DESTRUCTION Ep. 2: Misapplied Force [Review]