Inuyasha – Series Review

I can’t believe finding a bunch of crystals could make for such an entertaining show.

Inuyasha’s main story revolves around Inuyasha and Kagome finding the Sacred Jewel shards scattered across a demon-infested feudal Japan. Inuyasha and Kagome meet and befriend a bunch of characters such as the lecherous monk Miroku, Sango the demon-slayer, and Shippo. Along the way, treachery, struggle for power, revival of a long-lost love, rejection and many other story lines will gradually emerge.

Be ready however for filler episodes plague Inuyasha. It seems as though I was watching monster-of-the-week type of episodes for some time before anything happened. There are some pretty good character development and story if you stick with it though.

Honestly, my interests in the entire Inuyasha crew died somewhere around the second season and by the end of it all (episode 167) it seems as though they haven’t progressed that far in terms of character development from where they had started. They were pretty much the same.

The love triangle among Kikyo, Kagome, and Inuyasha just never ends. I mean every single time the love triangle just keeps popping up every time these three get a mile within one another! Finish it already! Inuyasha just doesn’t know what to do around Kikyo and Kagome becomes repressed and unsure of herself. It happens all the time. I guess that’s just the real innocence of each character and a real sense of shyness. How cute.

Other characters such as the Sesshomaru, Rin, Kikyo, and Kohaku were far more intriguing, even though at first these characters seemed one-dimensional. Every time I saw them in the next-episode-previews I had a sudden urge to continue. I don’t know about other Inuyasha fans, but the scenes with Sesshomaru and Rin are just absolute gold.

How does this stack up as a fighting anime? Well, usually not well, for some semi-rare occasions, it is fantastic stuff. The moment Inuyasha learns his Wind Scar (Kaze no Kizu) technique, be ready to kill yourself, as he will use this move and variations of it all the way to the end. Hundreds of monsters attacking that village? Use the Wind Scar! Big bad boss around? Use the Wind Scar. Can’t get through those boulders? Well how about you use that Wind Scar!

One major peeve I had with this series is frankly a lack of an ending. However, the last episode of Inuyasha is both a blessing and a curse. It’s good they did not make up an ending of their own, so for people who wish to pursue with the story can do so by reading up on the manga, an option looking very attractive to me at this point of time. For those who can’t get their hands on the manga, that’s why the ending is a curse because they’ll never know how the story continues! I have invested many hours into watching these 167 episodes and into the characters. I really do wish to finish what I started since frankly they cut off at such a critical point in the story where it seems everything was just coming to a close. Well, at least I think it would have been over soon, but hell the manga can just keep going and going.

All in all, I enjoyed Inuyasha for what it was. Sure it had a massive amount of fillers and took some time to get going, but overall I enjoyed the characters here. Like the story, they too took awhile to develop, but when they did it, made for some great moments that kept me hooked.

Rating: 3.5/5