Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle Is It Worth The Hype?

 

The movie I'm writing about today is Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle. This is the most recent anime movie released in the United States which aired on September 12th 2025. This movie stands out to me because demon slayer was one of the first anime to change their shows from seasonal releases to movie releases in theaters. It surprisingly was a massive hit in the US even though there is a lot of stigma from people about anime. In the news there hasn't been much talk besides promotions but on social media there have been plenty of stories about people who couldn't control their excitement in theaters and freaked out. During all of September I couldn't scroll on tiktok without seeing a post about this movie. 

Demon Slayer: infinity castle is part 1 of a 3 part series for the finale of this franchise. With a run time of 155 minutes which is insane for an animated movie, having a longer or equal run time then most live action movies. “In this film, Tanjiro Kamado and his allies from the Demon Slayer Corps launch a decisive mission inside the ominous stronghold of Muzan Kibutsuji, known as the “Infinity Castle.” There, they face the Upper Rank demons — including Akaza, who returns for a dramatic showdown — as the final battle of the series looms.” The director of this movie was Haruo Sotozaki who adapted the manga created by Koyoharu Gotouge. Gotouge hasn’t created a big franchise besides Demon Slayer although he has made multiple one shot manga stories such as Kagarigari in 2013. Gotouge has also won multiple awards such as the Japan Cartoonists Association Award (2021) and Noma Publishing Culture Prize (2020). The director of this movie, Sotozaki, hasn't worked on much besides Demon Slayer. He has been a part of their team adapting animations all the way from season 1 to the most recent movie. At the box office in the United States its opening weekend made 70 million dollars, after its full time in theaters it made 126 million dollars. In Japan it made 263 million USD, a lot more revenue than the US due to anime's popularity being extreme across seas. 

This movie is similar to other installments of the series because it is still the same linear story. What it has done differently, is lack of comedic relief. Throughout the series there have been characters to lighten the mood but in this movie those characters are placed into this chaotic battle. They made the themes of this movie darker and more serious to show that this series is coming to an end and the consequences are real. This movie instead of following a strict 3 act sequence it is all jumbled around to really illustrate the chaoticness of the final battle. 

This movie is similar to other Shonen anime by having a multiple part ending typically being a war type arc such as Naruto Shippuden 4th great ninja war, or Bleach One Thousand Year Blood War. This is a common trope that most animes do to conclude their amazing shows with a massive war that has hinted at and built to the entire series that the fans are extremely excited for. They also use big supernatural set pieces for their ending which is another common trope in anime and has been seen in many shows like Attack On Titan, Jujutsu Kaisen, and Chainsaw Man. Although there are a lot of similarities to other anime, demon slayer also did a lot differently. Typically anime change the pacing of the manga when adapting to make it more easy to digest as a viewer. Some anime that have done that are One Piece, Naruto, and Bleach. They tend to extend the content as much as they can to make more episodes or movies so that way they can make even more money. Demon Slayer on the other hand decided to stay true to the manga to fully capture the story and art of the manga. Demon slayer also focuses on choreography instead of power scaling. In anime it's typically who is the strongest or who can become the strongest to win. For example in Dragon Ball Z they kept introducing new villains who continue to grow stronger and by the end of the show the characters are strong enough to destroy galaxies and can change the matter of reality. In Demon Slayer they decided to keep a sort of grounded power scale, and instead of seeing who's the strongest it focuses on who uses their abilities and techniques the best to beat their opponents. 

 

What makes this movie so important? The entire story of Demon Slayer is based on Japanese folk lore. The concepts of Demons, Oni, and Yokai are classic parts in old Japanese folk lore. Demon Slayer used this to easily connect with their audiences on old stories Japanese people have heard this entire life. This also reflects some of their culture to the outside world with a fun entertaining twist. Alongside folk lore making this movie important the technical and artistic achievements also add to it. The animation made by Ufotable (studio) is praised for its combination of 2D and 3D animation, this made the infinity castle look supernatural and also physically real. The sound design is also praised in this movie. The fans have mentioned how the sound effects, voice acting, and sound track amplify the atmosphere of scenes in the movie.  

This movie follows trends of serialized story telling. In recent movies they typically have them in trilogies, sequels, or sagas. Demon Slayer is following the trend of trilogies to maximize revenue, and to keep releasing movies and grow the hype of the series. This movie also is an example of the rise in global anime as mainstream entertainment. Anime is no longer a niche community as it was 5+ years ago. Anime has grown in popularity all over the world in the recent years and will only continue to grow. 

    This movie was aimed towards long time fans of the series. The movie stars off with no explanation of what had happened prior to this story. The manga and anime has been running for a long time now but when it was originally released its main target audience was younger audiences and anime fans. This anime starts off as a basic run of the mill shonen anime which fans can never get bored of. It's the same thing in American action movies, people are always going to watch a movie that has big explosions and great fights which is the same for anime.  

The only “offensive” material in the movie is suicidal themes. In some backstories in this movie they use themes of suicide to fully capture the gutwrenching feeling of their life. Weather these themes are offensive or not all depends on the viewers opinion because suicidal themes are nothing new in media and have been seen in many popular movies, shows, and books.  

The biggest strength of this movie is its beautiful crisp animation. Demon Slayer has been called one of the best animated anime ever and has only gone up in praise as they keep releasing more content. Another strength of this movie is the hype. The author has been building on this massive final battle for a long time and now that we are here in the story every scene feels even better. The emotions in this movie are also very deep and add to the story perfectly. With multiple deaths of main characters throughout this movie it really shows that this arc in the series really is the last one and the stakes are a lot higher than before. Even though it has many strengths it also has some weaknesses. This movie lacks an ending because it is a set up for the set movie to come out. At the end of the movie it kinda just ends, this left fans unsatisfied with the conclusion but it also made them excited for the next installment. This movie also lacks pacing near the back half. At the start of the movie it is fast passed actions for about an hour and a half straight. This kept fans on the edge of their seats just to get bored near the ending. They had a very very very long backstory for almost an hour of the screen time. Sure it was important information but it is hard to follow up some of the best action scenes with a slow sad story. I believe this movie is amazing and critics do as well. Metacritic.com gave this movie a very high score of 80/100 and rated it higher than any other piece of work this series has pushed out. On IMDB this movie got a score of 8.5 stars out of 10. Both of these critic sights gave it an amazing score but not a perfect score which is close to impossible. The author perfectly captured the first part of the finale, and a finale done right will always top the rest of the show. This movie for now is memorable until the next big anime movie comes out or the next in this series. In the past anime movies are extremely hyped up at release but then get outshined by the next one to come out bigger and better. I believe that this movie will hold its popularity until part 2 comes out or when the Chainsaw Man movie comes out which is another very popular anime right now and is seen as one of Demons Slayer competitors. 

On social media the Demon Slayer account on X is very active with promotions or updates on future work, this account has a massive following of 1.9million. When the trailer released on social media it got 40 million views in under 24 hours. I have watched and read every piece of this story that has been released and I will continue to watch the releases. The level of animation in this movie is something you can’t get anywhere else. Online I’ve only heard good things about this movie. It is one of the most popular anime being released currently and it's hard for something this popular to be disregarded and called bad media. 

Overall Demon Slayer Infinity Castle is a beautifully animated movie with a lot of hype behind it. It is a very emotional first part to the final trilogy of Demon Slayer. Its action packed fights, beautiful sound, and cliffhanger ending brings in more excitement for the next installment. Throughout this critique I've learned the cultural folk lore significance and how much it was praised by the biggest critiques. This showed me how important fan engagement and digital marketing are in making anime a global phenomenon. In the end, the movie is memorable, influential, and sets the stage perfectly for the next parts of the trilogy.