The Importance of Family in Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba

 

This blog post includes spoilers for Demon Slayer and is directed towards people who have already read the series, or do not mind spoilers and still want to learn about it!

    If you remember a while back, I made a blog post on the series Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. It was a very basic run-down of the plot and my overall thoughts and a review of it (I encourage you to read that one first before this one!) However, recently I decided to reread the series and noted how important the theme of family was throughout it. So, this blog post does exactly that and is going to be focusing on a couple of instances that highlight the importance of family. As I said before, this will include spoilers and it is recommended you have knowledge on the series to understand this post a bit better.

Tanjiro and Nezuko after being saved by Giyuu

    From the very start of the series, the concept of family is one that is heavily emphasized in Demon Slayer. The opening scene is an interaction between the main character Tanjiro and his family. One of the driving motives for Tanjiro is protecting his family and the readers see how much he values them. Throughout the story, he constantly refers to their words and is reminded of memories they shared. He also deals with survivor’s guilt with being the only surviving member of his family. Additionally, the whole plot revolves around Tanjiro trying to find a cure for his little sister to turn her back into a human. One thing that is different, however, is that when people are turned into demons, they often lose all of their humanity and forget the lives they lived when they were a human. The case with Nezuko is different in which her humanity is still intact by remembering her deceased family and as a result, she holds compassion for all humans and views them all as her family. Sibling dynamics are one of the most recurring themes in this story and the readers find that many siblings parallel Tanjiro and Nezuko. Their relationship emphasizes that family sticks together, regardless of the situation they may be in.

  

Rui after seeing Nezuko save Tanjiro

     One of the earlier encounters the readers see with family is with the demon Rui and his constant want for a family, going to any lengths for one. His backstory is a tragic one; he grew up weak and frail under the care of his parents. He was approached by Muzan with the prospect of being turned into a demon in exchange for a stronger body. Readily accepting his deal, Rui killed many people as a demon, leading to his parents plotting to kill him in his sleep so he couldn’t harm more people. However, Rui knew about this and killed his parents before they could do that, leading to his yearning for a family. Tanjiro and Nezuko encounter Rui in the mountaintops, surrounded by other demons that he claims to be his family. Tanjiro immediately takes note that the family dynamic is all controlled by Rui and how he immediately cuts off any of his “family members” that disobey him and goes on to find a replacement. In the middle of the fight, Nezuko rushes in to take a hit for Tanjiro. Seeing this, Rui craves the same bond that they have and immediately wants to take Nezuko as his younger sister. Tanjiro fights back and says how “nobody can ever sever [his] bonds with Nezuko”. Rui was constantly driven by the fact that his human family had never really loved him, as they tried killing him in his sleep. As he was dying, a memory came across him and he realized that his parents were planning on killing themselves after so they would all be reunited in the afterlife. This battle reestablishes what it truly means to be a real family and how one cannot last with fake bonds. It also goes to show the importance of family and how each character may interpret it differently. Though you don’t have to be related by blood to be considered each other's family, Rui instills fear into his “family members” to achieve the nuclear family dynamic he’s always craved.

Parallel between Gyutaro and Tanjiro

    Daki and Gyutaro are two demons who are brother and sister but ended up as demons due to their tragic life as humans. Growing up in the lowest class of the Red Light District, they were already met with misfortune early on. In a place where beauty was valued, Gyutaro grew up sickly due to neglect from his mother. He was ostracized and mistreated by the others around him due to his appearance and personality. When his younger sister was born, things started to look up for them. Daki was extremely beautiful and Gyutaro gained a sense of pride and had something to protect now. Though it seemed things would end out well for them, Gyutaro returned one day to find his younger sister burned as a punishment from stabbing a person’s eye out. Her beauty diminished and the siblings were left there to die. It was only later on when they were approached by an Upper Moon demon they were turned into demons. 

A promise made between Daki and Gyutaro

    One of the reasons why they are so important to the story is that Daki and Gyutaro parallel Tanjiro and Nezuko’s characters; an older brother who has had to look out for his younger sister his entire life, vowing to never leave her. While fighting them, Tanjiro even makes an observation about how similar their circumstances were and that if only one thing went differently, he could’ve been a demon and ended up in this situation as well. The readers find in a flashback that Gyutaro promises to never leave his younger sister, following the same pattern as Tanjiro and Nezuko. Interestingly enough, another connection between these two pairings is how they all ended up being who they are now. When they were about to die, Gyutaro and Daki were approached by Douma, an Upper Demon, sparing their life in exchange of being turned into a demon. In the beginning of the series, when Tanjiro finds his sister acting hostilely when she is first turned into a demon, he is saved by Giyuu who also spares their lives and promises not to kill Nezuko. Douma is what Giyuu was to Tanjiro and Nezuko, both giving them one more chance. I personally love how they made these characters parallel each other, since their situations were so similar but just thrown off by different circumstances.

    Family is one of the primary factors that drives the plot of Demon Slayer and many of the characters’ motives. Personally for me, I am a very family-oriented person and this series having the theme of family is one of the reasons why I love it so much. I only focused on a couple of characters to show the significance of family, but there are many more I could’ve written about (and that really goes to show how important it is to the story). I hope this blog post helped you appreciate this series a little more or even encourages you to read it if you haven’t yet!

-Khuyen