This review contains mild spoilers for Yashahime: HalfDemon Princess 520https://otakukart.com/wpcontent/uploads/2021/02/yashahimeprinceshalfdemon.jpg Inuyasha was somewhat of an important anime for me. It was one of the first anime that I went out of my way to watch. It was also one of the first anime that I identified as an anime instead of a cartoon. Thus Inuyasha was among the shows that cemented my status as an anime fan. I was enthralled by the moody creepy tone of the show. I was amazed by the seemingly limitless world Takahashi and the anime staff had created. I was drawn in by the spectacular action and the exciting adventure. I loved the cast of charactersthatwerentnamedShippo. And yes I of course patiently waited for Inuyasha and Kagome to officially become an item. I fondly remember going to my tiny local library at the time downloading episodes so I could watch them later on my Acer Aspire One since I didnt have internet at home. All that said I wouldnt call Inuyasha my favorite series by any stretch. Its certainly not a bad show but it does drag and it just didnt grip me the same way Ranma 1/2 Code Geass or Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood did. Im definitely nostalgic towards Inuyasha but not to the point where I hold it on a pedestal. My history with Inuyasha is important context for my feelings towards Yashahime. In fact Id say this is important context for any review of this show because from what Ive seen practically no one in the western fandom is watching this show as a standalone. Feelings toward Yashahime seem to be extremely tied to ones feelings towards Inuyasha. At the end of the day its still its own show with strengths and weaknesses unconstrained from its predecessor but the amount of leeway youre willing to give said weaknesses the amount of weight youre willing to give said strengths depends on your view or lack thereof of Inuyasha. I liked Inuyasha enough to immediately be onboard with its sequel series Yashahime: Princess HalfDemon when it was announced out of the blue in May of 2020. I was optimistic: after all I was never one to balk at the merehttps://anilist.co/anime/104051/MagiaRecordPuellaMagiMadokaMagicaSideStory/ existencehttps://anilist.co/review/3981 ofhttps://anilist.co/review/5670 ahttps://anilist.co/review/3555 sequelhttps://anilist.co/review/6501. I was just happy to see that Inuyasha would continue in some form and I was excited to watch the next generation of a show that I enjoyed. Making matters better despite being animeonly it was stated that original mangaka Rumiko Takahashi would be heavily involved in production. This seemed to confirm that if nothing else Yashahime would be authentic. To an optimist this seemed to confirm that Yashahime would be good. 520https://i.redd.it/5p0rg3ahefo61.jpg And I have to say that it was good or at least good enough. Its certainly not perfect by any stretch but neither was Inuyasha. For better and for worse this feels like a continuation of Inuyasha warts and all. Fortunately I didnt find the warts bad enough to ward me away from the show. Yashahime taking place over fourteen years since the end of Inuyasha follows Towa her demonhunting twinsister Setsuna both are the daughters of Sesshomaru and their bounty huning cousin Moroha Inuyasha and Kagomes daughter. When they were young Towa and Setsuna were caught in a forest fire and seperated from one another. Towa soon finds herself sucked into a time portal and teleported centuries into the future where she is found and subsequently adopted by Sota Higurashi. Despite being a halfdemon shes raised in the modern era and told to hide her powers much to her chagrin. When Towa is fourteen the portal to the past opens once more reuniting her with her halfsister who seems to have forgotten her as well as introducing her to her cousin. When the trio return to the past they are summoned by the spirit of the Tree of Ages. The spirit requests for them to slay their father as well as the dastardly Demon Lord Kirinmaru. The three refuse and after they leave we see Rin trapped in the Tree of Ages. The trio decide to forge their own path with Towa deciding to search for the Dream Butterfly which may hold her sisters suppressed memories. As the three journey they find themselves clashing with Kirinmarus servants who wish to destroy the trio referred to as halfdemon princesses for their leader. 520https://i.yt.com/vi/Kr4EZM0A14/maxresdefault.jpg I loved the main trio the eponymous yashahime. I liked Towas kind and gentle nature which contrasted nicely with her relatives more cutthroat and/or cold personalities. Its somewhat underutilized but I enjoyed the fact that shes a temporal fish out of water in both eras thus making it more apparent why she clings so strongly to Moroha and Setsuna. I also thought it was really cool that Towa is intentionally not traditionally feminine in design nor personality. Its pretty admirable that the show doesnt feel beholden to restrictive ideas of girlhood though I suppose Takahashi has always been good at this. Moroha is an absolute treat and she quickly became my favorite Inuyasha character. Shes cheerful endearing in her knowledge of demons cocky and rowdy with her boisterous nature contrasting nicely with Towa whos more lax and Setsuna whos more aloof. She really commands a presence that the other two dont drawing you into her antics. Finally theres the aloof nononsense Setsuna. While I admittedly found her a bit boring I cant deny that I enjoyed seeing her dynamic with the others and it was nice seeing her gradually thaw. While the original cast dont appear too often a fact Ill get into momentarily its always nice when they do. I definitely thought Kirinmaru was a fun antagonist by the end of the shows run even if he seemed a bit bland at first. I hope I dont sound negative when I say that the main trio carry this anime how much you like it is really determined by how much you enjoy their personalities and their dynamic with one another. This statement inandofitself isnt really a knock on the show its very clear that more than anything the show is preoccupied with the girls relationship. I personally loved them as a group and even if every interaction wasnt phenomenal seeing the three interact with each other every week quickly became a comforting ritual. I came to see Inuyasha continuation and I stayed to watch these cool demon girls vibe with one another. 520https://i2.wp.com/butwhythopodcast.com/wpcontent/uploads/2021/01/ErWBuCgVcAIu9Qt.jpg?fit=8002C450ssl=1 Im pleased to say that the world of Yashahime is as interesting as it was before in Inuyasha. Its expansive with colorful demons around every corner. We also get to learn more about how the world of demon lords work thanks to the presence of Kirinmaru and his entourage. Yashahime has essentially the same sense of adventure that I know and love. The shows various moods at times whimsical sometimes adventurous and other times creepy is thanks in large part to returning composer Kaoru Wada. All of these aspects serve to make the show feel authentic stylistically Inuyasha fans should have no trouble getting into Yashahime. The fights were also pretty good. 9 times out of 10 theyre not phenomenal but theyre animated well enough and always managed to hold my attention. Much like its predecessor the cast of Yashahime use interesting attacks some of which return from before. Theres nothing quite as iconic as the OG casts Iron Reaver Soul Stealer Wind Scar Wind Tunnel or Backslash Wave but Im sure thats half because I havent had to hear them for almost twohundred episodes and half because I havent heard the new attacks in English. And now onto the less good stuff. Theyre probably more numerous than things I like and its a testament to how much I enjoyed the character dynamic that I walked away liking this show overall. 520https://i1.wp.com/unitedsquid.com/wpcontent/uploads/2021/01/YashahimeReviewSucksBadGoodMorohaTowaSetsunaInuyasha.png?fit=6602C374ssl=1 Before I talk about anything I have to address the elephant in the room that is the parentage of the twins. In this show Sesshomaru and Rin or Sesshorin is canonized as a ship. It might seem like a minor thing but this has broken the show for many people. Some have even called for Takahasi and Sunrise to be boycotted due to this revelation. My thoughts and justification of said thoughts regarding the matter are irrelevant youll have an opinion and my words wont convince you otherwise. While I thought the pairing was really the most logical choice narratively on the onset its certainly not ideal and I have to jump through some hoops to be somewhat comfortable with it. As for the show itself it can feel really meandering. Its monsteroftheweek format doesnt do it much favors in terms of being interesting. Yashahime very quickly shuffles into a routine and if youre not onehundredpercent onboard with this routine then it will get boring eventually. Deviations from said routine are sporadic there arent really arcs that spice things up to look forward to. The plot barely moves forward during a given episode it doesnt feel like were any closer to a goal. Like I said before how much you like seeing the main trio bounce off of one another will make or break this show for you because for more episodes than not thats essentially all you have. 520https://i.yt.com/vi/G54z537HEQg/maxresdefault.jpg This is a legitimate critique but what gets me are people somehow acting like Inuyasha didnt have the same issue. If you take off your nostalgia goggles youll realize that the the pacing of Inuyasha was absolutely atrocious. In Inuyasha things could get boring quickly if you werent a fan of the monsteroftheweek format. Inuyasha has a metric ton of filler that you probably wont notice as an animeonly watcher because it fits in so well with the format of the original manga. Inuyasha takes forever to reach its destination. Theres no reason the manga went on for twelve years for a conclusion that readers largely could predict when they first picked up the manga. Inuyasha is the quintessential its about the journey rather than the destination manga with the character dynamics and development being the main takeaway from the show. If this sounds familiar youd be correct: this is Yashahime. If nothing else Yashahime is onbrand. And its fine to criticize this show for taking what didnt work about Inuyasha after all a sequel should improve upon the predecessor and Yashahime shows that the Inuyasha format doesnt quite work in the modern age. What annoys me however is that people act like these traits arent in Inuyasha calling Yashahime an anomaly. Many criticize Yashahime as being illdefined which is a bit unfair as Inuyasha took a while for its plot and characters to solidify yet no one acknowledges it. I can see if this was going to just be oneseason but come on this is a sequel of Inuyasha everyone knows its going to last forever. I have to admit that some of my fondness comes from feeling the need to defend it from the doublestandard of many Inuyasha fans ...but this defense can only go so far. Yashahime certainly has its own unique problems. For one I struggled to think of a conclusion for my synopsis because theres no impetus for a journey. The trio kind of just stumble upon things. While Inuyasha and Yashahime both feel meandering Yashahime takes the cake for not having a strong unified goal for the main characters. Setsuna just slays demons as assignments come up and Moroha hunts demons for their bounties. Towa at the very least does have the ambitous goal of finding the dream butterfly but it really doesnt amount to much when shes not actively looking for it. She kind of just tags along with the other two in hopes that shell just happen to find relevant information. While having them refuse the Tree of Ages request did a good job of establishing their characters it absolutely neutered a solid goal. 520https://static3.cbrimages.com/wordpress/wpcontent/uploads/2021/03/Yashahime2321.jpg With the trio consisting of the children of Inuyasha and Sesshomaru youd think their family would come into play more. This is unfortunately one of the shows big missteps. The cast of Inuyasha is criminally underutilized both as characters and as impetuses for the yashahimes developments. It would be nice to see how Inuyasha Kagome Rin and Sesshomaru work as parents. Unfortunately all of them save for Sesshomaru are indisposed before the show begins and the trio know nexttonothing about them. This would be fine...if there werent characters that could logically inform them about their parents. Miroku Kaede Kohaku and Sango arent ever too far from Setsuna yet they dont talk to her about her parents. Hell despite being good friends with them they dont seem to inquire about their parents nor indicate that anythings wrong. Towa lived with the Higurashis yet she doesnt seem to think anything of Inuyasha and Kagome. Towa Setsuna and Moroha themselves dont really seem interested in their pasts which is extremely unsatisfying to watch. This is where the shows relation to Inuyasha really hurts it if you watched this show first you wouldnt be attached to the original cast thus it wouldnt feel so frustrating to see the characters be so blas about their family. As is for most viewers theres a nasty disconnect between what the characters want and what you want the characters to want. Yashahime creates a bit of a mystery as to what happened to the original cast but it feels cheap because it would be quick to figure out if anyone cared as much as they should. Besides feeling unrealistic the lack of interest on the girls part robs them of yet another potential goal. 520https://i.yt.com/vi/EGADTglgaM/maxresdefault.jpg The lack of drive from the characters is made all the worse due to the relative lack of stakes. The girls usually can very handily defeat anything thats thrown at them. The characters rarely have to train and in general nothing feels tense. The pacing certainly doesnt help most of the time a conflict is neatly wrapped up in an episode ensuring that viewers are seldom on the edge of their seat. By the time you get to the final third Yashahime starts to feel like its running on fumes with the trio the only thing keeping viewers coming back. The showrunners seemed to realize this as we finally get an episode dedicated to the events with the original cast that led to Yashahime proper. There are also episodes dedicated to Moroha Setsuna and the villains backstories. Unfortunately while I enjoyed these episodes they felt a bit too little too late and I would have enjoyed them more earlier. Additionally between these more important episodes there are still episodes that feel extremely inconsequential. From my laundry list of complaints it might be hard to fathom my final score because I know you already scrolled down to see it. Youre doubtlessly wondering how in the world can I come out liking this when it ends up being so messy. As I said I really enjoyed the interactions between the three leads. Beyond that while Id prefer consistently good quality or at the very least having the lull episodes more evenly spread out the last stretch does make up for a lackluster beginning. I dont dislike the backstory episodes they just came a bit late for my liking. We finally get twoparter episodes and the last two episodes are really great. 520https://media.comicbook.com/2020/11/yashahimeenglishdubpreview12438681280x0.jpeg This culminates in a finale that hits all the right notes for me. We see genuine development from both Towa and Setsuna the trios relationship is very well executed the plot actually moves forward and theres a breathtakingly awesome fight. The episode is also very visceral I remember seeing Setsunas wound and saying oh damn thats...gnad somehow mixing both bad and gnarly. Despite the shows flaws after seeing that wonderful shot of Sesshomaru giving his sword to his daughter and after seeing the postepisode announcement that thered be a second season as I knew it wouldhttps://i.pin.com/originals/09/99/47/0999475525c3542f240649cd16fcbb45.jpg I knew Id be coming back for more not because I felt obligated to but because I genuinely wanted more Yashahime. This isnt to say the episode was perfect the strength of the characters are called into question and the motivations are illdefined for one. Unlike with Destinyhttps://anilist.co/review/10290 however thinking about the ending didnt make it unravel for me. I could think about it a bit understand its flaws then realize I still love the episode despite them. I appreciated the spectacle before me. The last episode and perhaps Yashahime as a whole might be a bit of a turn your brain off show. And I hate to say that because it sounds disparaging and the last time I said that I ended up being so very very wronghttps://anilist.co/review/3675 but I think it applies here. Theres not much to GGundamhttps://anilist.co/review/3900 but I still love that. Whether you like to admit it or not Inuyasha wasnt the absolute smartest of shows either but it worked. Yashahime might not be great but its pretty fun at times. 520https://64.media.tumblr.com/14650cf177cdcad23818f339ee2b9d80/e76340ffa80b052a76/s1280x1920/64848599e93af4b932a816c66abc2108629b5813.png Yashahime isnt by any means a masterpiece. I wouldnt even call it great. Its meandering to the point of numbness for most of its run it underutilizes series veterans character motivations are seldom used to drive the plot and its adherence to its monsteroftheweek setup can make it extremely monotonous at times. There are times when Yashahime gets downright bad. Despite all this I dont think Yashahime deserves all the derision and exhaustion thats lodged at it. I think a lot of the trouble comes from comparing it to Inuyasha. Part of me wants to say that this show is a better watch if youre not so hung up on the fact that this is a sequel to Inuyasha. I want to say that this show works better on its own and that comparison ever the thief of joy is what hurts this show more than anything. But thats a moot point because as I stated it feels like practically everyone who watched this show watched Inuyasha. And why wouldnt they? This is a sequel after all so even if it should drawin new fans it should also satisfy fans of the original show comparison is inevitable. Finally and this is the kicker Im not entirely sure that the show would be a better watch without the connection to Inuyasha. Im sure the show is fine on its own but its biggest draw is its connection to the previous series regardless of how satisfying that connection ends up being. I dont know if anyone at least in the Western sphere would even watch Yashahime on its own. Beyond that the trios relation to previous characters and the desire to see them meet said characters is easy engagement and endearment. Just look at my praises a lot of them come from the fact that this feels like Inuyasha. That said as Ive spent this review showing this is a doubleedged sword with the handling of the the returning characters the trio growing up orphanedhttps://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HappyEndingOverride and the SesshoRin situation being just a few points of contention born from its proximity to its predecessor. So for better and for worse the show is made and broken by its relation to Inuyasha. At the end of the day Yashahime is nothing groundbreaking neither as a sequel or as a standalone property. The things that work only just offset the many many things that dont. But what can I say at the end of the day this is a show that I enjoyed despite its flaws. Even if its not my favorite of shows like Inuyasha I can see myself watching this for a long time because of the characters. Yashahimes a hard show to hate a bit of a hard one to love but an easy one to like wellenough. 200https://i.ur.com/hBHIhmG.png 520https://wallpapercave.com/wp/wp7787153.jpg