Anime Review: Ghastly Prince Enma Burning Up (Japanese title: Dororon Enma-kun Meera Mera)
It is the 1970s in Japan, a time of rising inflation, the Oil Crisis and the Vietnam War. But most of that’s grown-up problems. For elementary school student Harumi, the most pressing issue is that there’s a monster stealing her teachers’ and friends’ faces. While fleeing the Mug Mugger, Harumi runs into a school shed which has a surprising basement–a tunnel to a pocket dimension!
This turns out to be the hideout of the Demon Patrol, yokai from Hell tasked with returning escaped demons to the netherworld. They are led by Prince Enma, nephew of King Enma, judge of Hell; Princess Yukiko, an ice maiden; Kappaeru, an aquatic kappa monster; and Chapeaudie, a talking hat that Enma wears. They are, as a group, rather lazy, but Harumi does manage to talk them into fighting the creature that attacked her friends.
This 2011 anime series is based on a 1970s manga by Go Nagai, his first attempt at bringing his transgressive sensibilities to material specifically aimed at children. In contrast to some of the other adaptations over the years, this one de-emphasizes gore and the darker tones and instead goes for crass humor and fanservice.
Prince Enma is a fire-wielder, and appropriately hot-blooded and impulsive. Great when fighting a monster, not so hot when he wants to peep at girls or feel them up. He does the vast majority of the fighting for the Demon Patrol. Yuki has snow and ice powers, but is constantly endangering her allies when she uses them, and has a nasty habit of getting stripped and tied up. The kappa is nearly useless in combat, even if he can get the opponent in the water with him, so mostly acts as a scout. And Chapeaudie…is a hat.
Harumi acts as the token human, a fairly ordinary girl who gets dragged into weird situations and dangerous battles she’s in no way ready for. She’s got a bit more common sense than the others, and is sometimes put out by their lackadaisical attitude towards their job and most other things. This is partially explained by the reveal that demons don’t actually die. “Killing” them just sends them back to Hell, a painful inconvenience, but hardly a game over.
The Demon Patrol fights an assortment of monsters of the week, like Das Foot and Skulliosis, and recurring mastermind Princess Enpi, who wants to make the world a more titillating and fun place and doesn’t quite grasp the downside of her goal or that her minions aren’t actually helping. Eventually, the theological underpinnings of the setting come into play, and it looks like curtains for humanity as we know it.
The Tubi streaming service has subtitles, which try to translate most of the jokes and cultural references into something that will work in English… not always successfully. Still, many of the gags come through just fine.
Content note: Much of the humor in the series is designed to appeal to the sensibilities of twelve-year-olds who are highly amused by things their parents would be shocked by. Slapstick violence, nudity, poop jokes, perving on girls (with multiple scenes being basically sexual assault), blasphemy and the like. Many parents may want to have their children skip this one.
There’s some good voice acting here, and a bunch of “interesting” scenarios for the “I hope this doesn’t awake something in me” crowd, but if you’re not into Go Nagai’s sense of humor, this series might be one to skip. Recommended to the animation fan who always felt American kiddie shows were a bit too tame growing up.
