Tanjiro vs Rui | Demon Slayer Best Fight
Tanjiro vs Rui was the best fight in Demon Slayer. The fight occurs in Demon Slayer episode 19. The fight between Tanjiro and Rui was a cleverly directed and masterfully animated battle.
The fight takes place in a dark moonlit forest with music elevating the fight.The 3-D camera movements as Tanjiro attacks Rui is exciting. The entire choreography of the fight was great. The background art is beautiful and the thick lines around the character designs of Tanjiro and Rui complements the realistic backgrounds.
*Spoilers below*:
Who is Rui?
Rui is a demon that holds the position of Lower Moon Five (one of Twelve Kizuki). The Twelve Kizuki, or Demon Moons, are powerful demon generals that serve directly under Muzan Kibutsuji. Members of the Twelve Kizuki have their number ranks engraved on their eyeballs.
Rui is the strongest antagonist that Tanjiro faces in the first season of Demon Slayer.
Rui has the appearance of a little boy. He has white skin and white hair. He wears a kimono that has pictures of spider webs.
Rui is also cold-hearted and very sadistic. He controls others through fear and violence and will do anything to get his way.
Rui was once a sick human child who had a frail body. Muzan Kibutsuji found him and transformed him into a demon, giving him a strong body. However, he had to eat humans to survive. When his parents saw him kill a human, they decide to try to kill Rui and themselves as a way of atoning. They failed and Rui, feeling betrayed, murdered them in a blind rage.
Feeling riddled with guilt after killing his parents, he joins Muzan. He slowly loses his memory as a human but feels an empty void. To fill that void, he transforms other humans into demons with Muzan’s authorization, establishing the Spider Family to replace his lost one.
Rui is voiced by Kouki Uchiyama, who is known for playing intimidating villains. These include Tomura Shigaraki from My Hero Academia (2016), Midnight from Fairy Tail (2009), and Meruem from Hunter x Hunter (2013).
Rui’s First Appearance
Rui first appears when the demoness, Mother of the Spider Family, starts controlling the members of the Demon Slayer Corps through puppet strings made by spiders. As Tanjiro and Inosuke try to cut off the strings attached to the controlled Demon Slayers, Rui appears standing on threads above Tanjiro and Inosuke. He tells them “Don’t disturb my family’s peaceful life”. Inosuke jumps and tries to reach Rui but fails. Before leaving, he tells Tanjiro and Inosuke that Mother will kill them.
Rui is later seen saying that no one will break his family bond, giving the impression that him and Spider Family are a happy family that is united. However, he appears before Mother later and tells her she better hurry before he tells Father and she, terrified, begs him not to tell Father. This means this is a dysfunctional family where abuse is common. Rui’s earlier description of this family was a facade.
Rui’s Skills and Abilities
One of Rui’s ability is being able to turn humans into demons like Muzan Kibutsuji. He is also able to make other demons stronger and have his spider-like appearance.
Rui’s most strongest ability is the ability to create strong threads that are able to cut through human bones and flesh. Demon Slayer did a good job of introducing his strength when a smug member of the Demon Slayer Corp tries to attack him from behind, believing he is just a little kid demon. Rui brutally cuts him up to pieces and the slayer instantly dies. Rui’s thread is so strong that during the battle between him and Tanjiro, Tanjiro’s sword breaks when he tries to cut it.
Rui has a Demon Blood Art that further strengthens his threads, turning them red.
Who is Tanjiro?
Tanjiro is the main protagonist of Demon Slayer. He is a kind boy who is very empathetic. One of his most defining traits is the love he has for his family. Tanjiro cares deeply about his family and understands how families should be. Whereas Rui doesn’t really understand family dynamics and or how to forge a real bond.
Tanjiro’s Skills and Abilities
Tanjiro uses a breathing technique called total concentration breathing, which strengthens his physical skills and allows him to fight demons.
One of the forms of Tanjiro’s total concentration breathing is water breathing, which uses the element of water as sword techniques.
Tanjiro was taught water breathing by Sakonji Urokodaki. Water can change in form and it allows Tanjiro to battle various opponents and adapt to multiple situations.
Tanjiro has mastered 10 forms of water breathing:
First Form: Water Surface Splash – A flying slash attack that boosted by a water wave with maximum momentum.
Second Form: Water Wheel – A leaping attack that strikes its target using a violent wheel of water.
Third Form: Flowing Dance – A flowing attack that uses precise footwork to mimic the movement of waves on the surface.
Fourth Form: Strike Tide – A fierce tide covers the striking blade and slashes demons to pieces with two streamlined slashes.
Fifth Form: Blessed Rain After the Drought – A merciful stroke that uses a gentle rain to offer the slain a tranquil end.
Sixth Form: Whirlpool – A slicing vortex created using a violent twist of the user’s body.
Seventh Form: Drop Ripple Thrust Curve – The fastest sword thrusting technique. A fast, pinpoint accurate stab.
Eighth Form: Waterfall Basin – A downward slash that unleashes the full fury of a waterfall to crash down on an enemy below.
Ninth Form: Splashing Water Flow, Turbulent – A move that minimizes the footing and landing time needed to approach a target at high speed.
Tenth Form: Constant Flux – The user spins like a writhing dragon, gaining more force on their strikes with each rotation.
Background of Tanjiro vs Rui Fight
When Tanjiro finally finds Mother of the Spider family, who is controlling the Demon Slayers, he immediately strikes. Instead of fighting back, Mother realizes if she dies, she will be released and will know peace. She lets Tanjiro chop her head off and she dies happily knowing shes finally free.
In a flashback, it’s revealed how Father of the Spider Family tortured her while other members of the Spider Family just watched and encouraged it.
It is later revealed that Rui tortures and hurts anyone in the Spider Family that does not fulfill their role or disappoints him in any way. He craves a family bond but doesn’t truly know how to forge a real family bond, instead resorting to violence and torture.
When Tanjiro sees Rui hurting the Daughter of the Spider Family, he is surprised and asks them if they’re allies. Rui responds by saying they’re family and to stay out of it. Tanjiro tells him that’s not a real family bond and all he picks up between Daughter and Rui are terror, hatred, and repulsion.
Rui becomes angry and attacks Tanjiro, saying he wont kill him right away. When Tanjiro tries to slash the thread with his first form of Water Breathing, his sword snaps in half.
Tanjiro vs Rui
After Tanjiro’s sword breaks, Rui completely overpowers Tanjiro. Rui decides to get serious and sends multiple threads at Tanjiro, Nezuko jumps in and protects him. Nezuko becomes severely injured and her wounds are slow to heal.
Rui becomes overwhelmed with emotion at the sight of seeing Nezuko protect Tanjiro. He sees how siblings protect each other and is so moved that he decides he wants a genuine bond like Tanjiro and Nezuko. He asks Tanjiro to hand Nezuko over to him so he can make her his new sister. Tanjiro refuses and tells him using terror to shackle someone is not the bond of a family.
Rui manages to grab Nezuko using his threads and then traps her among his threads. Tanjiro is unable to cut off Rui’s head with his broken blade. When Rui continues to hurt Nezuko using his threads, Tanjiro unleashes his final water form technique: the tenth form.
Tanjiro’s tenth form: Constant Flux manages to be effective against Rui’s threads. However, when Rui unleashes his Demon Blood Art: Cutting Thread Cage, Tanjiro is unable to slash them and his life flashes before his eyes.
As Tanjiro’s life flashes before his eyes, he remembers during his childhood, his dad would dance a kagura dance on New Years Day as a prayer to the God of Fire (Hinokami) to ward off injuries and disasters. Tanjiro’s dad was able to use a breathing technique to dance in the snow for a long time despite having a frail body.
Tanjiro uses the breathing technique used by his dad and performs his father’s kagura dance with his sword, turning his tenth form water attack into a fire dragon attack, allowing him to cut Rui’s threads.
Tanjiro manages to find an opening while cutting the threads. Nezuko has a vision of her mother and she wakes up to use Nezuko uses a Demon Blood Art on the threads that have her in the air. Her blood ignites, burning through the threads and the fire travels down the threads to Rui, severing the ones about to strike Tanjiro. Tanjiro is able to land a clean hit and Rui’s head falls off.
Tanjiro tells Rui that the bond between him Nezuko can’t be severed by anyone.
Animation and Direction of Tanjiro vs Rui Fight
The Tanjiro vs Rui fight had tons of cool animation. The studio behind Demon Slayer is Ufotable.
Ufotable is great studio known for their in-house talent, which is not typical of most studios as alot of them hire freelancers. They are also known for their multiple quality departments (photography, background art, digital team, etc.), and their reputation for skillfully integrating 3-D animation with 2D (something most studios are bad at that).
Ufotable is able to really deliver with Tanjiro’s kagura dance. The dance is a fantastic use of rotoscoping that really brings the scene to life. Rotoscoping is an animation technique that animators use to trace over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to produce realistic action. The purpose of rotoscoping is either to animate a scene completely using a live-action reference, or to add animation to a live-action scene while tracking the movement of the camera and the live-action elements.
Ufotable was also able to make the flames and the CGI environment really standout.
There are alot of memorable sequences in this Tanjiro vs Rui fight. The animation and the emotional aspect of this episode was amazing. When Tanjiro uses his tenth form, the painterly ink-like waves with lush blues juxtaposed against the photorealistic background look nice.
There was a full view and experience of fast-paced movements and a consistent following of Tanjiro flying through the air, swinging at every direction.
The person that deserves most of the credit for this episode is Toshiyuki Shirai. Shirai is an important asset to ufotable. He made the storyboard for Demon Slayer episode 19 and also directed it. This episode feels very grand and emotional as Tanjiro attacks Rui and the flashback plays. Shirai was able to really deliver a masterful performance.
Another person that made Demon Slayer episode 19 a success was action and effect animator, Nozomu Abe. What makes Ufotable stand out from other studios is it’s spectacular digital team. Abe is an outstanding animator that gets many high profile request because of his style. However, Abe’s effect animations tends to be dense and it can be hard for viewers to really see and appreciate his animations.
Ufotable is to able to enhance his style because of their amazing coloring and photography team. The processing Ufotable’s digital team also helps bring Abe’s effects to life.
Music in the Tanjiro vs Rui Fight
One of the most best things about the fight between Tanjiro and Rui is the music. The song is by Go Shiina and Nami Nakagawa.
The soundtrack was able to shine and really complement the animation.
The song gets inserted right after Tanjiro’s had his vision of childhood and he does his dad’s kagura dance as the song plays. The end result is stunning.
It gets viewers fired up while hitting right in the feels. The family illustrations done by Matsushima’s family at the end credit scenes is the icing on the cake, reinforcing the theme of bonds and family.
Aftermath of Tanjiro vs Rui Fight
Tanjiro collapses and is unable to move after unleashing his final attack. Tanjiro senses that Rui is still alive and Rui then stands up and puts his head back on. He tells Tanjiro he cut his neck with one of his own threads when he realized he would be decapitated by his sword.
Rui begins to use his Demon Blood Art to finish Tanjiro off but he is saved by Giyu, the Demon Slayer who saved him when his sister turned into a demon. Rui uses his Demon Blood Art at Giyu but Giyu uses his Eleventh form: Dead Calm to rip Rui’s thread before they reach him. Giyu then cuts Rui’s head off.
Before dying, he regains his memories as a human and realized he missed his real parents so much he suppressed the memory of them, but was never satisfied with his fake family. Overwhelmed by grief, Rui apologizes to his parents as they fade away as a family.
His death prompts Muzan to kill the remaining Lower Moons, as he starts considering them too weak compared to Upper Moons.
Conclusion
Ufotable is a studio that earned its praise for its high caliber animation and consistently delivering quality content. They deliver with this fight between Tanjiro vs Rui.
Family and bonds are a central theme and Demon Slayer is able to clearly convey where each character stands.
The Tanjiro vs Rui fight has the perfect combination of flawless animation, gorgeous music and emotional impact and is easily the best fight in Demon Slayer.
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