The Thirteen Buddha, along with Taishakuten and Bonten, must confront the evil Māra. Māra seeks revenge against Shaka Nyorai, who had previously saved the world from suffering and conflict by achieving enlightenment. – ANN
Streaming: Crunchyroll and Hidive
Episodes: 12
Source: Game
Episode Summary: It’s been centuries since Taishakuten and Bonten have visited the material world, so when they easily dispatch a manifestation of human vice and want something else to do afterward, they’re thwarted by all the modern conveniences (like washing machines and supermarkets) that have appeared in the meantime. The other Buddha tell them to relax and enjoy their time on Earth, but sitting around is boring and they’re both chomping at the bit to rid the world of other vices.
Shaka Nyorai takes the two out on an instructional journey, and points out that all humans suffer from some sort of vice, though most are small. The heavenly inclination would be to dispatch them before they grow larger, but that would take every hour of every day in perpetuity. Part of being human is learning to thwart these things on one’s own, and thus Taishakuten and Bonten need to learn when to leave well-enough alone. Just as they are settling into Earthly life, however, the peace is disturbed by the presence of an old enemy.
Impressions: One thing that’s always kind of bothered me about anime is that the genres that are seemingly aimed directly at me so often disappoint. I’ll admit it – I’m a heterosexual woman and I enjoy looking at attractive male anime characters. Blushing over cartoon images might seem weird to some folks, but it’s such a major part of anime fandom that I’m no longer all that ashamed to mention it. Some anime contain a few hot guys, and some anime like this one contain a baker’s dozen, plus a few; that ought to give it even more appeal, right? Unfortunately, attractive men don’t always contribute to an attractive anime series.
An issue I find with many “hot guys doing hot things” series is that the characters are sometimes presented like any other awkward anime info-dump, bombarding the viewer with names and faces that they can’t hope to remember in such short order. There are a ton of characters in this anime, and while they’re all pretty different-looking, if you asked me to name any of them off (besides the two focal characters) I wouldn’t be able to do it. In an opening scene we meet almost all of them back-to-back as they go about their morning at the temple; each gets to say a line or two as their name plates are shown on screen. My assumption is that they’ll all get some more screen time as the series’ story unfolds, fleshing out their image a bit. That’s fine, but front-loading the first episode with so many characters is frustrating no matter what happens later on.
I suspect that this would be less of an issue if I were more familiar with Buddhist culture and history. Most of what I know about Buddhism has been gleaned in bits and pieces over the years. I’m lucky that I was exposed to the concept in high school, because there are many people in the United States that have a a distorted sense of which religions are important to learn about or not (even though nobody is being forced to adhere to one religion or another… but this is a rant for another time and place). One of my friends also spent a good chunk of time studying Buddhism and through her I learned most of what little I know and can draw upon in these kinds of opportunities. It helps that she and I did a presentation about Shinto and Buddhism in anime several years ago for a convention. In any case, I’m mostly-untrained, and so putting all the names and faces together in this particular context is more difficult than if all the names were familiar.
Still, there are little jokes and gags sprinkled throughout the episode that were amusing even for a neophyte like myself. Many people who adhere to Buddhist teachings (especially clergy like monks or the literal deities in this anime) choose vegetarianism as a way to keep from doing harm to other creatures in the world, and there’s a very amusing scene at the end where all the characters have dinner at a family restaurant. Their orders are all greatly altered to remove any animal protein, and as the wait staff reads off what seems like an almost endless string of order alterations, it’s hard not to chuckle (not that vegetarianism is a joke, it’s more that the wait staff is extremely on-point in a way that feels as though it could only happen in Japan).
One aspect of the episode that I really appreciated was Shaka Nyorai’s insistence that having vices is just a part of being human, and that attempting to rid humanity of its minor, controllable issues removes their ability to learn to handle them on their own. I’ve talked about this many times, but as someone dealing with mental illness, I sometimes struggle with indulging myself as a form of self-therapy. Occasionally I’ll eat too much junk food when I’m feeling really down, or start trying to buy my way toward happiness by spending money on stuff (usually anime off of my wish list, so at least it could be argued that it’s somewhat constructive in terms of my hobbies… maybe). Really, though, I’m avoiding addressing the root of my problems by spending that energy in ways that could easily become destructive if I let them get out of control. Luckily over the years I’ve become pretty good at recognizing when I’m in this state of mind and putting away the potato chips or deleting my online shopping cart if I need to, mostly because I’ve had the opportunity to learn to do so through experience. Though this is honestly a pretty silly episode overall, I can appreciate it when comedic scenarios still allow for bits of wisdom to shine through.
This episode is very short on plot until the very end, at which point I’m guessing it falls more in step with whatever goals there are to achieve within the actual game. It’s these sorts of intro episodes that are the most difficult for me to talk about because they feel like fluff – all goofy character moments for characters I don’t know yet, with the promise of movement within a story that’s barely established. I’m guessing knowledge of the game’s mechanics and story would be helpful, and of course it’s for that audience that the anime version is targeted. And criticizing that might sound as ridiculous as criticizing later entries in the MCU – if you don’t know what’s going on at this point, it’s not the adaptation’s fault nor its duty to bring every single person up to speed. At least there are plenty of cute guys to look at.
Pros: The character designs are a bit over-the-top but attractive. There’s a good message in this episode about allowing people to solve their own problems when possible.
Cons: There are too many characters introduced too quickly to keep track of. The first episode is mostly fluff.
Grade: C