This article is part of a directory: Spring 2024 Anime – Episode Reviews, Lore Discussions, & Recommendations

Table of contents

Highlights

Fans eagerly await Demon Slayer season 4 to dive deep into characters and train for the final showdown with Muzan.
Muzan remains a looming threat, controlling an army of demons and planning a full attack on the Demon Slayers Corp.
The Hashira Training Arc will provide key character histories and Nezuko's role in the final battle with Muzan.

Considered one of the biggest anime to hit the world in the past ten years, there is a lot of anticipation for the fourth season of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. Not only did the third season pack a wallop of an ending, but it also hinted at major things to come for fans of the franchise.

While most of the time fans would be speculating on what is to come in the next season of their favorite series, the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba manga has been completed for a while now, meaning that fans who want to know where the series ends need only to pick up a book to find out what happens next. Still, how this might translate to animation is up for debate, and that is what fans are here to analyze.

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How Closely Has Demon Slayer Been Following the Manga?

So far, the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba anime adaptation has followed the manga storyline very closely. Unlike most popular shounen anime that is created, Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba actually has complete seasons, so there are breaks in the production cycle. Each season has 13 episodes that have been dedicated to one arc of the manga. The only exception to this is Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train, which covered a whole arc in a single two-hour movie (though it was later broken up into a "bonus season" which totaled 7 episodes worth of material).

The Other Demon Slayer Movies

Some at this point may be doing their research and notice that there are two additional Demon Slayer movies:

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – To the Swordsmith Village
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – To the Hashira Training

It should be noted that these are compilation movies in which the last few episodes of each season (plus the first couple of the next season), so these are not important when taking the whole Demon Slayer arc into account.

What Happened in the Previous Season of Demon Slayer?

The previous season had Tanjiro and Nezuko protecting the Swordsmith Village after it was targeted by demons. Amid the giant battle, a new weapon is forged for Tanjiro, which he uses (despite it not REALLY being finished yet) to kill the head of the demons - Gyutaro - which ultimately results in the other five demons also going to Hell. The final battle ends up taking so long that Nezuko is caught in the sunlight, and Tanjiro fears that his sister has perished, and that his journey has been for nothing. Thankfully, it is reveled that Nezuko is safe, being one of the rare demons who is immune to sunlight. Not only does she not have to stay in her box during the day anymore, she has even started to regain some of her speech.

While Tanjiro celebrates though, a figure far away is also celebrating for a different reason; Muzan, the demon king, has become aware of Nezuko's gift. Elated that he has finally found a demon who is immune to sunlight, he plans to gather the rest of the Upper Demons and launch a full attack on the Demon Slayers Corp to absorb Nezuko and become immortal.

Muzan's Involvement in the Series So Far

While being positioned as the main antagonist, Muzan has largely been kept off-screen for all but a few episodes of the series so far. Despite the ultimate goal of defeating him being central to the story, it is very difficult to get to him as he controls an army of demons. In fact, all the demons the protagonists have faced so far are a result of Muzan sending them to do his bidding.

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What Can Fans Expect from Demon Slayer Season 4?

The next arc that fans of Demon Slayer can look forward to is the Hashira Training Arc. As the name implies, there is going to be a lot of training during this season. In fact, if producers wanted to make the series last a season or two longer, this would be an ideal opportunity for them to write some of their own filler episodes to stretch the arc out into a couple of seasons (please keep in mind fans don't know if they're actually going to do that, we're just pointing out if there was a place for the producers to do this, here is where they would have the most ideal place to). Barring that from happening, fans will be disappointed to learn that the story isn't going to progress as far in this season as it has in other seasons.

This season will be all about everyone prepping for the final battle with Muzan, and this won't take place until the Final Battle Arc the following season. However, this is also where viewers will learn many of the histories of their favorite characters. In the Hashira Training Arc, viewers will finally get the history of many of their favorite characters revealed. This will naturally be tied into the train regimes they have to go through, as this manga arc embraces that trope wholeheartedly. Likewise, the planning for the final attack from Muzan will be on full display, and fans are going to see more of how he runs his organization than fans have before. Finally, with Nezuko being immune to the sun and regaining some of her humanity, fans are going to see her help out with the final battle with Muzan and his demons.

Whether there will be filler material or not, the manga promises that fans will see the most character development this series has received since the first season. While the previous couple of arcs doubled down on spectacular action sequences, the upcoming fourth season is going to be focusing on character development before the big final hits us (and fans still don't know if that's going to be in the form of a final season or a couple movies, so stay tuned for those announcements).