Saint☆Oniisan

Ok, so pretty much everyone here knows or even heard of Hataraku Maou-sama right? The one where the Demon Lord is transported the the human world and forced to live among the society of humans. Well, Saint☆Onii-san is pretty similar to HM, only that instead of a demon lord, we've got religious icons living their daily lives in the human world (disguising as ordinary citizens as part of their two-month vacation from their holy duty), and those figures are Jesus and Buddha.

Yes, you've heard right. That Jesus. And that Buddha.

Kinda sounds like a scene coming from the song One of Us by Joan Osborne if ... I say so myself. And upon seeing this OVA (2 episodes, one episode for now), it made me laugh so hard and said to myself, those religious zealots screaming blasphemy will be having a field day upon seeing these, and that could be annoying. Well, sorry for them, but this anime preaches nothing but pure fun and hilarity.

In fact, this anime basically answers: What if God was one of us? Just a slob like one of us, Just a stranger on the bus, Trying to make His way ho - er, damn, I just sang that song. Funny thing is, they are roommates in an apartment managed by Matsuda-san the strict landlady. Even more funnier is the fact that two of the most revered religious figures in history are scared shitless of her! The scenes usually shift from Matsuda-san's perspective to the two 'foreign men', but usually most of the screentime is allocated to Matsuda-san, who in all honesty, suspects the two as anything but ordinary foreigners renting and sharing a room. Its understandable, because since they boarded there, strange things have happened. Like Jesus' unintentional miracles (levitating much?) and Buddha's godly charisma (it literally glows!). Hilarity ensues when she scolds them afterwards!

That said, this light-hearted anime should not be taken seriously and in all honesty, parodying the daily lives of religious figures is quite novel in itself, if not daring. So enjoy this nice addition to this season's to be watched anime, and at the end of the day, you'll be wondering if Joan Osbourne's song influenced the author into writing this funny piece of a series.

Welp, looks like I just made my first ever review, lol. Thanks for reading!

I really wanted to like this anime, but sadly, the comedy mostly fell flat and the VAs didn’t do a great job. There’s not much to write about an anime with just 2 short episodes, so I’ll keep my review brief.

The reason I gave it a 6 (and nothing lower) is because even though I didn’t like the anime, I didn’t dislike it either – it was pretty average. The setting is quite unique, of course, and more power to animators who can go through concepts on anime without involving high school children, nudity or violence. It’s a nice and sweet comedy, suitable even for ... children, although if I’m being honest, a lot of jokes went over my head. I mean, I’m someone who has a fair amount of knowledge about Christianity, and unlike most other people, I know quite a lot about Buddhism (seeing how Gautam Buddh was born in my country) so I was surprised at how many references I didn’t understand. And if I didn’t get them, then how is it those people who gave this anime such a high rating, get them? Did they study Buddhism in college or something?
Elitists. SMH.

Speaking of, Buddhism was all about peace and ahinsa, so the concept of wearing silk shirts (leave alone decorating them) would have been out of the question for Buddh, so the animators fuked up there. Same for the negative stereotype “the water is dirty” comment for India – it wasn’t really funny, it was outright offensive, something that would *never* be uttered by Buddh for his motherland. And before you tell me to “laugh it off”, let me know how you’d feel if, for example, you’re a religious American who sees Jesus calling all Americans fat, ugly and stupid?

The art, animation and sounds - everything is average. Anyway, give it a watch. Who knows? You might enjoy it more than I did!

PS. Just for kicks, just *imagine* the uproar that this anime would have been created if it where Mohammed in place of Buddh!

As soon as I saw this show's description I knew I had to see it. I love religious humor, and I grew up in a semi-Christian religion, so I think I know enough to appreciate the Christian humor, at least.
The only part I ended up liking is the original premise. I didn't find this funny. At all. I think it might be because the show didn't go far enough in it's humor, so as to not offend religious anime watchers. Also, I don't know very much about Hinduism, so that could have affected my enjoyment. Still, I didn't find any of Jesus's humor funny. ... It's fairly slice-of-life, which might be holding it back some. If it showed more situations or things going on, I might have liked it more. As it stands, I thought the whole story was pretty shallow.
The art and sound are fine. People have different styles of comedy they like, so you might want to check this out anyways. It's short enough to not waste too much of your time.