Daemons Of The Shadow Realm Ep. 10 “Long-Arm And Long-Leg”: Monstrous Clash [Review]

Daemons of the Shadow Realm gives us an epic clash between monsters and humans in Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg”. To be more precise actually, it’s a clash between daemons, with the humans being caught firmly in the middle. However, the humans here also show that despite being so clearly outmatched, they can still put up a pretty good fight. Especially if they have modern technology and weapons on their side.

Daemons of the Shadow Realm Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg”: Details in Brief

Daemons of the Shadow Realm Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg” is the tenth episode (you can read my reviews for Ep. 1, Ep. 2, Ep. 3, Ep. 4, Ep. 5, Ep. 6, Ep. 7, Ep. 8, and Ep. 9 here) of this dark fantasy action adventure anime series. Said anime is the anime adaptation of the manga of the same name by Hiromu Arakawa (Fullmetal Alchemist, Silver Spoon, The Heroic Legend of Arslan).

Bones Film (Fullmetal Alchemist, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Ouran High School Host Club, My Hero Academia) is the animation studio behind this anime. Masahiro Andō is the director behind this anime, with Noboru Takagi as the writer, and Kenichiro Suehiro as the composer for the music.

Speaking of that music, the opening theme song for Daemons of the Shadow Realm is “Time to Fly” by Vaundy. Meanwhile, “Let’s Fly” by yama is the ending theme song.

Daemons of the Shadow Realm Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg”: The Good

The story of Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg” is basically one long and continuous storyline, but it’s a good one. All because this entire episode is essentially a long battle scene, with Yuru (voiced by Kensho Ono (JP) and Ben Stegmair (EN)), Left (voiced by Takako Honda (JP) and Colleen Clinkenbeard (EN)) and Right (voiced by Rikiya Koyama (JP) and Bill Butts (EN)), Dera (voiced by Yuichi Nakamura (JP) and Jarrod Greene (EN)), and even the sole surviving person tailing them against a pair of very powerful and extremely creepy daemons named Tenaga (voiced by Ako Mayama (JP)) and Ashinaga (voiced by Shigeru Chiba (JP)). To be precise: they’re actually a single being called Tenaga-Ashinaga, and they’re intensely creepy and horrific despite their vaguely silly-sounding names.

The result in this clash is an epic battle worthy of a Godzilla movie. The battle choreography is masterful, with action that’s easy to follow and filled with stylish movements, with an emphasis on quick, sudden actions and grapples. It’s like watching something in between a mixed martial arts fight and a judo match in some ways, making the melee part of the battle quite entertaining.

Guns on Daemon Action

We even get some delicious action with modern firearms. There’s a scene I want to highlight where Dera’s Glock pistol gets sliced apart near the muzzle, and the camera zooms in on the severed end of the gun. In slow motion, we see that severed end fly off, and inside is the severed barrel, slide end, and even the recoil spring. It’s an amazingly detailed look at a Glock pistol’s inner workings that did not need to be there, but is definitely appreciated.

Another thing I appreciate is that this episode very clearly demonstrates that sufficiently powerful guns can in fact harm daemons. It requires a massive gun like the sniper rifle Dera pulls out, but it can happen. It’s a very nice touch there in my honest opinion, demonstrating how humans can seriously injure and even kill daemons due to the march of technology. All with the most satisfying animation from Bones Film’ animation team, of course. They made the working of a bolt-action rifle look and sound so satisfying as Dera slowly and carefully operated that bolt to avoid giving himself away, complete with the softly ejecting cartridge. As a fan of firearms, it tickled my fancy just a bit.

Don’t Forget the Story

It’s definitely not just the action that makes Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg”. The story complements the action in the most wondrous ways. We even get a random side character join in as apparently a new permanent member of the cast, which is all the more remarkable since she’d be a throwaway cannon fodder character in any other story. It’s truly a hallmark of Hiromu Arakawa that she can turn random side characters only an episode old into highly memorable people that you suddenly want to see survive just to learn more about them. Hopefully, we shall learn more about this random housewife in the next episode of Daemons of the Shadow Realm.

Along with the overall mystery going on with Yuru and his dormant Seal power. It becomes quite obvious that someone contrived the whole battle as a way to force Yuru to activate Seal. The only question at this point is who. Is it Higashi Village that wants him to become their Seal user already? Is it the middle Kagemori son for reasons known only to him? We can only find out later.

Daemons of the Shadow Realm Ep. 10 “Long-Arm and Long-Leg”: The Bad

I have to admit: my one complaint is a pet peeve. The previous episode of Daemons of the Shadow Realm very prominently showed off a RPG-7 in Dera’s safehouse arsenal. And yet, he did not use it in this episode at all. If a high-caliber rifle could do that much damage to Tenaga-Ashinaga, then imagine what a HEAT warhead could do against them? Sadly, it shall never happen, and that poor RPG-7 will go unused. For now, at least. Here’s hoping that Dera saves it for a future adversary so that Russian anti-tank weapon can finally get its spot in the limelight and not just be an unused Chekhov’s rocket launcher.

Anime Recommendations

Fortunately, there’s many options if you can’t wait for next week to get more action. You can check out Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, Kaiju No. 8, DDDD, DAN DA DAN, Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online II, Zenshu, Blue Box, Solo Leveling, Black Butler, Nyaight of the Living Cat, May I Ask for One Final Thing?, and/or TRIGUN STARGAZE for some of that. However, if you want to cool off a bit after all that action, then you might like Spy x Family, Senpai is an Otokonoko, Apocalypse Hotel, Spice and Wolf: Merchant Meets the Wise Wolf, The Ancient Magus’ Bride, My Dress-Up Darling, This Monster Wants to Eat Me, Hana-Kimi, Journal with Witch, and/or Witch Hat Atelier.

What did you think of this week’s episode of Daemons of the Shadow Realm? Tell us your action-packed thoughts in the comments section below.

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