The only thing better than watching the newest and most popular anime of the season is watching it on the big screen. Specifically, that hit anime’s theatrical installment. This can either come in the form of a special recap film that stiches important episodes together, or a brand-new, anime-only original adventure. However, this may have changed in light of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba’s latest films.
As of this writing, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Infinity Castle — Part 1: Akaza Returns is dominating the global box office. With the way things are currently going, the new anime film is set to break a ton of world records by the end of its run. More importantly, the film is part of an ongoing wave of change in the anime industry that Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba started in 2020.
Anime Films Have Been Around Longer Than Most Fans Realize
To be clear, anime films are not a new development. On the contrary, they’ve been around as long as the medium has been. Some of the earliest recorded anime films are shorts that were made in the 1910s. But due to how difficult it is to preserve or even just find such old works of art, it will be a long time before historians and archivists determine which anime film really is the first of its kind. For now, the 3-second clip “Katsudo Shashin” — which features a boy writing on a blackboard — from 1907 is the oldest known anime.
Meanwhile, anime films, as anime fans understand them today, saw life some time between the ’60s and ’70s. Compilation films and what basically amount to an anime series’ feature-length filler episodes and/or finale owe a lot to the likes of Space Battleship Yamato (1977) and the Mobile Suit Gundam cinematic trilogy. Later in the ’90s, the likes of Neon Genesis Evangelion’s two cinematic follow-ups — Neon Genesis Evangelion: Death & Rebirth and The End of Evangelion — redefined what these kinds of anime films could be.
It was also around this time that self-contained anime films — both manga adaptations and wholly original works — rose to prominence. Studio Ghibli permanently changed the industry with its critically-acclaimed blockbusters and generational masterpieces. Even better, the legendary studio’s films helped bring anime to global audiences alongside equally landmark anime films like Akira and Ghost in the Shell. From this point onward, anime films carried an undeniable prestige to them.
But even with the occasional stand-alone anime film like A Silent Voice or Your Name, anime films were generally expected to be little more than an inconsequential extension of an ongoing anime. This was particularly egregious in the 2000s, when juggernauts like Shonen Jump’s Big Three — namely Bleach, Naruto and One Piece — exhausted even their biggest fans with their almost annual filler films. These anime films were reliably profitable but little else, until Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba changed everything in 2020.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba Changed the Game for Anime Films
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba is one of the biggest breakout anime of the late 2010s and early 2020s. The anime is so popular that its appeal and dominance can be felt and seen around the world, not just in Japan. This, however, didn’t stop its fanbase from being understandably worried when it was originally announced that the anime wouldn’t adapt the Mugen Train Arc into a season of episodes. Instead, the animators at Ufotable compressed the entire arc into the film Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train.
As it turns out, fans didn’t have anything to be concerned about because Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train exceeded everyone’s expectations. Not only did the film do the arc justice, but it also broke a lot of records along the way. To wit, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train is currently the highest-grossing film of 2020, the highest-grossing film in Japanese cinemas, the highest-grossing Japanese film worldwide, and the highest-grossing R-rated animated film of all time.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train was such a global phenomenon that Ufotable capitalized on it as quickly as it could. Not long after its first film’s hit theatrical runn, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba compilation films were released in quick succession. It also didn’t take long for Ufotable to announce that they’ll follow up the Mugen Train Arc’s cinematic treatment by doing the same for the Infinity Castle Arc, which is the manga’s penultimate storyline. However, this also means that the anime will stop making new seasons.
In lieu of making Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Season 5 or more episodes, Ufotable will turn the manga’s final arcs into a cinematic trilogy. This began with Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Infinity Castle — Part 1: Akaza Returns, which just hit theaters this year. The next two films are expected to release in 2027 and 2029, respectively. If it wasn’t obvious enough, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba irrevocably changed how anime films are perceived and made for the foreseeable future.
Anime Films Are Slowly Becoming the Anime Industry’s Preferred Way of Adapting Manga
Besides proving that there’s a massive audience of anime fans across the globe who are willing to go out in droves to catch their favorite series on the big screen, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train also showed a new path forward for anime films. For one, it proved that ongoing anime’s newest films can and should be so much more than disposable, non-canon filler. This didn’t just incentivize fans to watch the film, but it also gives important storylines like the Mugen Train Arc the reverence they deserve.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train stands in sharp contrast to the likes of Dragon Ball Z’s countless films, most of which aren’t considered canon. Worse, some of Dragon Ball Z’s films even contradict the mainline anime’s established characterization, world-building and power system. Meanwhile, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train and Infinity Castle — Part 1: Akaza Returns are the epic and emotional payoffs to some of the anime’s biggest and most important events yet.
Even better, other anime followed Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train’s footsteps. Just as Ufotable did, Production I.G. forewent a finale season for Haikyu!! for a two-part cinematic conclusion in Haikyu!! The Dumpster Battle, and the upcoming Haikyu!! vs. The Little Giant. Similarly, MAPPA turned Chainsaw Man’s Bomb Girl Arc into the film Chainsaw Man — The Movie: Reze Arc rather than make Season 2. Even the cult anime Mononoke is set to wrap up its decades-old cliffhangers with EOTA’s cinematic trilogy on Netflix.
It’s also worth noting that condensing manga arcs into anime films instead of anime seasons is more practical. Anime films generally have longer production cycles than series, which gives the animators more time to work and even rest than they’d normally get from a weekly series. The extra time and budget also gives them more freedom to experiment with the animation in ways that are impossible within the constraints of television. Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba started a trend that, hopefully, isn’t ending any time soon.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu No Yaiba Started a New & Unprecedented Era for Anime Films
Of course, it doesn’t hurt to be critical of this recent development. From a more cynical lens, it can’t be denied that money played a part in Ufotable’s decision to adapt Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba’s final arcs into just three films instead of a season or two. It could be argued that Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba’s sprawling story — and other manga like it — works better in a serialized format, not in a collection of abridged films. Furthermore, it’s inevitable that the Infinity Castle and Sunrise Countdown Arc films will be rereleased as episodic anime at a later date.
With this in mind, it’s hard not to deny that the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba films are partly being made not to be stand-alone cinematic events, but to be content that can and will be mined for more later on. But even if this is the case, and even acknowledging how this has always been the more unappealing nature of the anime industry, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba’s films are anything but cheap and insulting cash-grabs. They’re everything fans ever hoped for, and they’re the kinds of experiences they never thought were possible before.
Case in point, a fan cosplaying as Shinobu Kochu reportedly fainted after watching the latest Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba film. Even as the anime nears its grand finale, this will thankfully not be the end of anime films like Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Mugen Train or Infinity Castle. Longform anime series can and still will be made, but thanks to Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, the industry discovered a new way to adapt manga. Whether Ufotable realized it or not, they opened the floodgates for more cinematic manga adaptations in the future.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — The Movie: Infinity Castle — Part 1: Akaza Returns is now playing in theaters.
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