English Dub Review: Yashahime: Princess Half-Demon “The One Behind the Forest Fire”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

The girls are bemoaning their lack of success with bounty hunting, when Towa drops her cell phone. Setsuna briefly attempts to slay it, but ultimately her two compatriots call her off.

When they arrive to Jyubei’s, they’re shocked to find a “pretty person”, as Moroha puts it. Riku steps forward to explain he has a job for them on behalf of Tamano, a beautiful village girl who narrowly escaped from Homura, an evil mountain god.

Tamano explains that she was raised by her grandparents, but once she turned 13, men started pursuing her for marriage. Suitors came from far and wide, enchanted by her beauty. But ultimately, Homura kidnapped her and trapped her in his enchanted mansion in the snowy mountains.

As they lived together, Homura became increasingly jealous, killing anyone who even looked at her. He locked her away, but she managed to escape. As she ran from the mansion, she fainted in the snow, which is where Riku found her.

The pirate explains he needs the half demons to slay Homura for him. Moroha jumps at the change to get out of cleaning duty.

Towa, Setsuna, and Moroha arrive at Homura’s enchanted mansion, where he’s bemoaning Tamano’s escape.

Moroha charges right in. Homura sends her flying with his flames, although thankfully she has the protection of the fire rat cape.

Setsuna and Towa take him on, only to discover he’s the one who set the forest fire that separated them as children.

Towa is enraged, which amplifies her demon powers. Homura is determined to kill them to cover up his failure, vowing to turn them all into ash.

Tamano returns to the mountains with Riku to tell Homura she’ll never return to his side. Her assertion sends him into a frenzy of rage, and burns himself to death.

Riku reflects that nothing but destruction comes from loving humans. Towa reflects that she doesn’t need her phone anymore, since Setsuna is right there with her.

Our take:

They changed the intro and outro themes!? I love that they added some additional detail in the intro sequence to highlight more characters, but personally, I preferred NEW ERA by SixTones. However, I must admit that the new track, BURN by NEWS is highly appropriate for this episode. The new end theme also has improved imagery, but i still prefer the first one.

In addition to the switch up with the opening theme, this episode is full of surprises. Tamano’s tale is basically a Beauty and the Beast situation, although with a far less happy ending than the Disney version.

I was a little shocked to see the rest of the characters taking her plight so lightly. Jyubei seems sympathetic to Homura’s crazed jealousy, while Moroha thinks everyone vying for her attention sounds pretty good. I understand that Towa’s comparison to it being “like her smartphone” is mostly for the funny reaction from the other characters, but it also seems a bit harsh.

Towa and Moroha slightly redeem themselves when confronting Homura. But ultimately it’s Tamano saying she’ll never return that defeats the demon, so it kind of feels like a wash.

At least we get a few more details regarding the forest fire that separated the twins as children, but par for the course for this show (and anime in general), it raises more questions than it answers. Was Sesshomaru just sure his kids could escape, or did he view them as a necessary sacrifice to save Rin?

Oh, and worth noting that this is the episode where we see Snowball Moroha, of meme infamy.

While the end feels a bit rushed and somewhat unsatisfying (Towa doesn’t get her revenge, Tamano’s problems are still glossed over for her captor’s feelings), it does feature some quality visuals with the action and some truly stellar voice acting. Regrettably, no one has stepped forward to claim to be the voices of Tamano, Homura, OR Zero in English dub at this point in time, but that doesn’t make them any less impressive.

The mood shift between Homura fighting the Yashahime and literally immolating himself over Tamano’s rejection is abrupt, but the voice actor plays it up with Dragon Ball Z level camp. It’s still not exactly funny, considering his harmful actions, but the sudden shifts in pitch from low roars to shocked squeaks is impressive in it’s own right.

Tamano’s voice actor brings a subtle power to her sweetly soft spoken character. She’s not portrayed as a super active character, and yet her determination to face her captor shows a great deal of strength, which is reflected nicely in her voice.

Despite it’s issues, this interlude sets things up nicely for the next episode. While it’s still unclear what Riku’s connection is to the twin’s tale (also, is he…not human? Or just super against demon-human relationships? But he likes Towa???) there seem to be answers on the horizon.

Unfortunately, only time will tell what new questions will arise to fill the vacuum.