The holiday season has been been a boon for the Demon Slayer franchise with a record-breaking movie at the box office in a year when COVID-19 has made a mess of out of the entertainment industry. With Christmas approaching, the series dropped yet another trailer for the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba the Movie Mugen Train.
The series' official Twitter account released this particular trailer for Demon Slayer ahead of a 4DX release on December 26. For those unafraid of spoilers and simply want to see what the movie is all about, this trailer is a good look at the slick animation, which is something the studio that did this series, Ufotable, is known for.
The movie continuing to break box office records in Japan fuels much of the hype with a release out west coming sometime in 2021. The official Twitter account put its box office totals just 520 million yen ($5.02 million) shy of an all-time record in Japan. The current record holder is another anime movie, Spirited Away by Studio Ghibli and legendary director Hayao Miyazaki. The film is also the fifth highest-grossing film of the year worldwide after surpassing Sonic The Hedgehog and now trails Christopher Nolan’s thriller Tenet which is in fourth.
The Demon Slayer franchise kicked off with the manga by Koyoharu Gotouge then continued with a popular tv anime adaptation released in 2019. Ufotable handled both the series and movie sparing no expense in making it one of the prettiest looking anime series of that year. It is available to watch on streaming right now on both Crunchyroll and Funimation.
There is no guarantee that the Demon Slayer movie will enjoy the same success out west as it did in Japan, but it's a sure bet that there are many outside the country aware of how well it’s been received. Whether that translates into large box office numbers in the US remains to be seen.
The movie still does not have a firm release date and pandemic-related restrictions across the country are a likely reason. Another option would be a release on streaming services, but there has yet to be any mention of that.
The Demon Slayer movie is slated to release in the U.S. in early 2021.
Source: Demon Slayer|Twitter