Daemons of the Shadow Realm 1×1 and 1×2 Review – “Asa and Yuru” and “Right and Left”

Another one of the much-anticipated new anime of this year, Daemons of the Shadow Realm episodes 1 and 2, titled ‘Asa and Yuru’ and ‘Right and Left’, offered an enjoyable introduction to a supernatural story. However, I’m still waiting for it to blow me away.

I’m not saying that I didn’t enjoy watching the first two episodes of Daemon of the Shadow Realms anime season one. The beginning chapters had a nice mix of emotions, action, mystery, and comedy. However, having seen the online hype surrounding the debut, I was, in a sense, expecting something exceptional. The recent premiere of the Witch Hat Atelier anime gave me that. So, it is possible. And just maybe, my expectations might be surpassed down the line as the narrative sets up an interesting dynamic between the lead siblings.

‘Asa and Yuru’ opened with a flashback depicting the birth of the twins named Asa and Yuru. Apparantly, it was so important for the twins to “divide” the night and day that the mother-in-law of the pregnant woman urged her to prevent giving birth to the second child until sunrise. Such a gap between the two births was required because the twins were meant to control the two guardian daemons of the village. The father didn’t look too happy about the twins’ so-called destiny, with his initial reaction being connected to how the episodes unfolded.

A time jump to Yuru and Asa being around 16 years old showed Yuru having grown into a skilled hunter. In contrast, Asa was kept imprisoned inside a room. However, her situation wasn’t to be thought of as a punishment because Asa was supposed to serve a particular role in protecting the village. Her seclusion was deemed necessary. It also involved a very limited number of people being able to interact with her, namely, Yuru and their grandmother.

Even though you could tell that the writers were trying to create mystery surrounding Asa’s accommodations, it didn’t have much of an impact on me as a viewer who had already watched the promotional content featuring a very different young woman as Asa. So, yeah, Yuru had grown up believing a lie about his sister. The young lady he had been interacting with for a decade wasn’t his sister at all, which I’ll get to in a bit.

Talking about Yuru’s village, it’s hidden somewhere on a mountain, with the young inhabitants having no idea about planes and other modern technology. A magical barrier was responsible for keeping outsiders from finding the village. It also messed with the villagers’ eyesight, with Yuru and his young friend thinking that the loud noise of planes flying overhead was the sound of dragons. Though a couple of villagers had managed to leave, they rarely returned. The only regular visitor was a trader named Dera who brought food, medicinal herbs, and other items for the villagers to trade. Again, having watched the promotional content, I knew there was more to Dera than being your typical salesman.

Things drastically changed for the locals when the barrier disappeared one day, and armed soldiers began to brutally kill any villager they laid eyes on. The citizens stood no chance against the soldiers, especially because a majority of them had never seen a gun before. Not only that, but a girl named Gabby had a peculiar ability to bite big chunks out of a person’s body by mimicking biting motions with her hands. I wasn’t expecting the attack on the village to be so vicious. Apparantly, according to Gabby, the villagers deserved to die. But I couldn’t help but feel sorry for them, because I had no idea what they had done wrong to warrant such deaths.

Linking to the title of the anime, the first-ever daemon we saw was Gabby’s. Turns out, her hand motions controlled a spherical daemon with a lot of teeth. Due to not everyone seeing daemons unless they were born with said ability or the daemons made themselves visible to “normal” humans, it would seem like something invisible was biting people to death.

Coming to a major mystery driving the narrative, a black-haired young woman wearing an eyepatch announced herself as the real Asa after killing the fake Asa being kept imprisoned. While I liked Yuru experiencing a rollercoaster of emotions after witnessing the murder of the person he had believed to be his sister by the hands of a stranger who had stated she was Yuru’s real sister, this particular development didn’t pack of punch for me because, as I mentioned before, I knew the real Asa was speaking the truth, having seen the marketing material.

The fake Asa was revealed to be some kind of blood-made daemon that the grandmother could control. Ewww. But also, cool!

Wanting to protect what was left of his village and to get revenge for his “dead” sister led to Yuru following Dera’s orders to summon the village’s guardians, called Left and Right, with episode 2 focusing on the humanoid demons demonstrating their powers. I liked how, similar to Yuru and Asa, the daemons were also male (Right) and female (Left).

Right went to look for survivors while Left fought Gabby’s daemon. Yuru showed himself to be a lead character I could find myself rooting for. Instead of simply allowing Left to solo Gabby’s daemon, Yuru was ready, equipped with a bow and arrow, to land some good shots at Gabby as soon as the opportunity arose. As Asa later put it, Yuru had the heart of a hunter. Yuru had grown up protecting the village without supernatural assistance for more than a decade. Suddenly becoming the Master of two spirits wasn’t going to change his protective nature when it came to what he could do to ensure a threat was eliminated.

With Asa withdrawing her forces from the village after confirming that Yuru was indeed alive, I’m looking forward to when the siblings will reunite again. There’s so much they needed to talk about. As far as I could tell, their goals clashed with each other. Yuru wanted to find a way to keep his village safe while learning more about his destiny being connected to Left and Right, while Asa wanted the village to pay for what they had done to her. It’s revealed that Yuru’s parents ran away from the place, along with child Asa, almost 10 years ago. That’s why a fake Asa was created to keep Yuru inside the village and connected with Left and Right, for some reason.

Having the animosity exist between twin siblings made for an interesting dynamic, especially one that was far more interesting compared to if the rivalry had been between two non-related characters, with the narrative building toward an enemies-to-lovers trope.

Since Yuru was taken to the outside world to hide from Asa and whoever she worked for, I’m looking forward to accompanying him on his journey to learn more about modern times and the supernatural aspects of this fictional setting. We got some information about how there were good and bad daemons, as well as how there was a tier system involved. On their way to the city via car ride, driven by Dera’s teammate named Hana, a beautiful female spirit riding a horse was described as Oshirasama, aka god-like beings that were rare to encounter. She knew Left and Right and was glad to see them again outside the village after, I think, 400 years.

As for Asa, I’m very intrigued by her ability to unleash powerful telekinetic bursts without relying on a daemon. Due to the twins being said to control Left and Right, I’m looking forward to seeing what type of connection Asa shared with Left and Right.

Also, with Dera having pulled out the talisman used to summon Left and Right (involving Yuru’s blood), I wouldn’t be surprised if Dera or someone else used the talisman to control or hinder the spirits down the line.

The first two chapters of the Daemons of the Shadow Realm anime definitely had me seated. Yes, I was expecting a lot more because of the hype, but having said that, I can’t wait for the next installment!

Did you watch Daemons of the Shadow Realm anime episodes 1 and 2? What did you think of them?

Let us know.

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

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