Personally, i did not care much for the movie as a standalone release. The setting, being exclusively on the train was god awful, compared to the open world that the first season offered. Character development hit an all time low. The MC is still perfect, earnest and brave, the other two are just comedic relief as per usual, Nezuko offers little to no fanservice, and all the effort that was put into Rengokus story felt like it was there to squeeze more juicy tears from the audience at the very end. But hey, maybe the antagonists were really cool and had depth. No again. Their motivation was cliche to borderline non-existant and they simply just served as plot devices.
Now, with the movie alone, they would have gotten away with it. There's still pretty visuals (except the 3D tentacle porn in the last few episodes), audio is very much on point, so to me at least it, the movie was passable as an intermission to the second season. I did not even read what the second season was about and just got into the first episode, to see a familiar character whoms fate i was already familiar with, Rengoku. I was like, alright, cool, maybe this is set somewhere between the first season and the movie. Then, there is the first mention about the train. I am so naive that i thought, ok, maybe this is a different train. Then, i recognized the name of the train by the second episode and though, ok, they're setting this up for an absolutely new spin on the movie.
Needless to say, having watched all of it, i feel like an idiot. But above all else, i feel betrayed and baffled. How can anyone do this? Who releases a movie and then a 7 episode season, where 5 of the episodes are literally that movie, and the first two are just pointless fillers? I at least thought i would find solace in the fact that the great majority will share this view, that the reviews here on MAL would destroy it and that the overall rating would reflect what a blasphemy it is.
Alas, that is not the case, and going back to my initial statement, it seems they've gotten away with it. Most people seem to view this season as a wonderful oportunity to be reminded of how great the movie was as percieved through the spectacles to their soul, and you know what, that's fine. I'll just go back to watching Monster or something else with actual depth if that is my preference and hope that the 3rd season will not be a 7 episode that now starts with the movie for 5 and ends with 2 fillers to spice things up.
