Tentacle-Free Anime: "InuYasha" (2000) Shonen Impressions

- by Kazekun, 29 September 2014

The story of the star-crossed lovers. It’s as old as Shakespeare, and probably even older. But only so many stories of these, either doomed or hopeful, couples can withstand the test of time. Romeo & Juliet being, obviously, the biggest example. To Anime fans, though, there is no bigger “Romeo & Juliet” in history than the story of InuYasha and Kagome. Or InuYasha and Kikyou, whichever ship of yours sails the fastest.

InuYasha (2000); 
Episodes: 27 (in Season 1, discussed here); 
Director: Masashi Ikeda;
Studio: Sunrise;
Rating: PG-13

Summary: Kagome Higurashi, after being pulled down a well by a demon, finds herself in Sengoku period of feudal Japan, where she learns that a powerful jewel has been reborn inside her body. After the jewel shatters in an attempt to retrieve it from one of the many demons who was after its power, Kagome must join forces with the half-demon InuYasha (also after the jewel's power) to track down the shards of the jewel before its power falls into the wrong hands. [AnimeNetworks.com]

InuYasha, created by the ever-so talented Rumiko Takahashi, offers a lot of diversity in the world our characters are thrust into. Kagome is just a normal, young girl from the future, pulled down into a time-travelling well that only she can access by a demon, who is after the jewel that is hidden inside her body (unbeknownst to her). So begins the series that more or less invented the word “shipping” as we entertainment fiends know it today.

Season 1 DVD box art.

Of course, as you watch season 1, it’s pretty clear who is going to end up with who, but Takahashi feels the need to drag it out. Because not only is the search for the broken jewel shards important, but so is the natural growth of the characters; and both of these are treated as equally crucial. Also, because this is a long-running story there are quite a few filler episodes thrown in. Not having the original manga, I’m not 100% certain which ones are all fillers, but it’s more or less easy enough to tell that at least a good number of them are supposed to be.

And that’s fine, I’m not in the camp that says filler stories are the devil’s work and should be excommunicated from a long-running show. Now, I do take issue with 100 or so episodes in a row being pure filler (and that does happen on some shows), but with InuYasha the filler episodes have always been sprinkled-in with all the manga-canon stories. So it’s not that bad at all.

The characters are all pretty fun, InuYasha likes to put on a tough guy act, due to his half-demon inferiority complex, Shippo hates danger, Kagome is smitten with a man she knows she can never have (and tries so very hard to hide it), Miroku is a hilarious, lecherous monk, and Sango is the tough broad who wants to see justice done for her family. And it’s actually quite a lot of fun to see how everyone plays off one another.

Cast promo shot. From left-to-right: InuYasha, Kagoma, Kilala, Sango, Shippo and Miroku.

The first season also introduces us to our big, bad villains of the series. Naraku and Kikyou, both of which have a history with InuYasha and both are after the life of our heroic half-demon. With the insertion of Kikyou, a very interesting love triangle is formed and is pretty well detailed and explored in season 1. But the story has to be dragged out, because even though all 3 characters are where they need to be to confess all their feelings for one another by the end of season 1, Kagome, Kikyou, and InuYasha still want to play the “who will end with who?” game. Sigh.

Kikyou and two of her soul gatherers.

The action is pretty great - there are a lot of neat concepts here as well, surrounding many different demons and monsters our heroes face. There are also quite a few stories based around old Japanese mythology. These references are quite fun to catch if you’re familiar with the stories.

Season 1 feels like Takahashi didn’t think the story was going to go on forever, so she pulled out all the stops for many different characters to reach their end growth points. But since the story was popular enough, the show must go on. And that’s not inherently a bad thing in InuYasha, as at least there is still quite a bit of story introduced by the end of season 1 that allows the journey to continue for however long it needs to. This anime has pulled that off better than others, let me tell you.

The Shikon Jewel shatters!

InuYasha is a fun fantasy adventure, with intriguing, likeable characters, fun action, and fine sense of scope and mythos to back up its expanding story. The show is done with (as of this review) 8 seasons total. But I recently re-watched season 1 and figured this would make for a fun Shonen Impressions journey. So look for more down the line. I grew up with InuYasha, I still very much love the series, so getting to revisit it will be quite enjoyable. Hopefully the rest of the series can live up to my nostalgia.

Final Score: 4 Scattered Shikon Jewel Shards out of 5


Have you seen "InuYasha"? How did you enjoy the movie and the review? 

Tagged: Tentacle-Free Anime.

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