Kimetsu no Yaiba: Mugen Ressha-hen Episode 3

With our main cast in a deep slumber, we take a look inside each of their dreams as the kids working with Enmu travel inside their respective dreams to find and destroy the spiritual core.

I don’t remember if they ever explained this but I wonder how many times these kids have done this before. The girl in Rengoku’s dream remarked never “seen a red one before”. How many has she seen then? Again, memory is bad but we’ll see the explanations we get later.

This episode solely focused on each individual person’s ideal dream, a dream that shows something important to the individual or makes them happy. For Zenitsu, obviously it’s having a cute date with Nezuko and spending time with her and her being all over him. For Inosuke, it’s being a leader and having his friends as underlings with the four of them heading out on missions and destroying enemies. The main enemy in his dream being a weird bug version of the Mugen train, which is pretty funny. And y’know, Inosuke’s dream could have been him alone going out and defeating enemies and bosses. But to have Tanjiro and the others along with him I think is significant, since Inosuke used to like doing things on his own and his own way. So while they’re underlings in the dream, it’s still something. And spoiler alert, these dreams aren’t too important to the story and doesn’t exactly fit the mood for the rest of the episode either. Thankfully it’s short and sweet and doesn’t overstay its welcome too much, but it’s there to give the audience a quick laugh before the later sad parts.

Rengoku’s dream is an interesting one. At first it may seem like a weird one because the very first thing that happens in his dream is him telling his father about him becoming a Hashira, and his father rudely shutting him down. These dreams are supposed to be ones where it’s supposed to be a utopia to the individual like we see with the other ones. But Rengoku’s is more like simply reliving a memory. But, this just may mean how important Rengoku’s father and brother are to him. Again, I really have to commend Rengoku’s positivity. Even with his father saying some very hurtful things to him, and being very honest with his little brother about it, he still moves on with a smile on his face. And ugh! His words for his little brother with all the support and encouragement, no matter who or what he ends up becoming in the future, he’ll always be proud of him. So sweet! Honestly this should be something their father should say, but Rengoku seems to be taking on that role with how depressed and uninterested their father is now. I’m glad that his little brother has an older brother like him. The family situation is odd with his father suddenly becoming a different person, from a warm and kind father that taught his sons the way of the sword, to becoming cold and simply staying in bed and letting everything he knew go. Again, Rengoku takes over in that regard. Rengoku mentions that his mother passed away from illness, and it may be that her death really affected their father. We still don’t know nearly enough about the family so that’s the only thing we can deduce. Still, it’s sad because especially with that addition in the first episode, you can really sense that pride in both Rengoku and his father as Hashira. Especially with Rengoku taking his father’s steps very seriously, as we saw that he has the same style as his father from the comparison we saw in the first episode when it comes to stance and sheathing their sword. I’m dying to know more about his family.

Now Tanjiro’s dream…we knew it would be this. We all know it would be about his family, and it STILL kills me. Now, I’m the type of person that doesn’t like to cry in front of other people. And even though we were all socially distanced in the movie theater (and duh, it’s dark), I still don’t like crying in public spaces. I did my best to hold my emotions back. Same thing when I watched Coco in the theaters. Everyone around me was sobbing and I was gripping the arm rests like DON’T YOU FUCKING CRY, YOU IDIOT. I did not. HOWEVER. I’m alone in my room and I couldn’t stop the tears when Tanjiro’s youngest brother ran and begged him not to leave them behind. :’)

Holy crap, ow.

Again, I’m telling you the family feels are going to get me every time. Tanjiro’s monologue of “If only this never happened…” and seeing his scenarios of them living a simple, but fun and happy life just kills me. He’d make charcoal for his family, they would pick supplies together, make rice cakes together, never even have to use a sword in his life. This is the one dream where you really wouldn’t want to leave, as you have this opportunity right here to be able to do those things. And yet Tanjiro accepts that that will never be, and he needs to wake up from this dream and face his reality. And I love that throughout this whole scene, not once did Tanjiro ever turn around to look at his family. I remember watching the first time, the whole time I was thinking “DON’T TURN BACK!” Because if he did, either it would make the goodbye even more painful, or he would just run back to them. The turbulent emotions would just stall him from something he really needed to do, and as painful as it was to hear his tiny brother cry and scream for him, he needed to let them go and move on. But of course, he will always remember his family. Makes me cry just typing that.

One other interesting thing from this little segment were the actual spiritual cores, the inside of their hearts. Rengoku’s is fiery and hectic, with his core being red which I guess is unusual. Is the fire because he’s the Flame Hashira, are those the flames of his passion? Or could it signify something else about Rengoku? Tanjiro’s was very fitting for him. The inside of his heart is just like Tanjiro himself: calm and pure. Tanjiro is a beautiful person with a pure heart, and the spiritual core area perfectly represents that. Again, it makes me curious about Rengoku’s.

Some people see the dream sequence as a bit of a slow down, and to an extend I agree (especially with the comedic dreams that don’t really matter), but it was an interesting look into Rengoku’s past. And Tanjiro’s was really well done too, as painful as it was. T_T