COMIC REVIEW: Tales of the Buddha Before He Got Enlightened
Posted by silverfox1967 on September 19, 2012
Before he was ‘enlightened’, our hero Buddha travelled the globe, meeting the ancient civilisations of his time, from the pagans & the Vikings, to the Greeks & the Romans, in search of pearls of wisdom – this, is that story!
Let me start by saying that I really loved ”Tales of the Buddha Before He Got Enlightened“. Clearly Alan Grant & Jon Haward were always going to cross the line with a comic book in which Buddha swears, gets into fights, trips out on weed and basically ‘screws’ around, but I think they also took the very safe view that generally Buddhists don’t take hostages. In fact, when you think about it, Buddhists are probably the safest people to offend – over the years I’ve seen some hateful stuff written about them, especially in Christian bookstores – and never once have I heard a story of a devout Buddhist kicking off and laying into someone for religious intolerance.
Not that Buddha is the only religious icon lampooned in this book. Jesus is a hippy, constantly complaining that his Dad watches everything that he does, but still finding time to grab a guitar and sing “It’s Raining Men”. The Greek gods get a grilling (again, safe territory there). There are also guest appearances from Merlin (representing the pagans), and the Osmonds (high-five for the Mormons). Islam is oh, so safely skirted around – Buddha tries to put the ‘fun’ rather than the ‘mental’ into fundamentalism, but doesn’t mention or depict anyone by name – the writers are clearly crazy, but not stupid!
In essence, the book is a collection of 2-5 page stories chronicling the adventures of Buddha, as he travels through foreign lands and different times: drinking reindeer’s pee in Lapland to get the ultimate ‘high’, has sex with Cleopatra in a bath of milk, and even sings alongside Elvis.
I really liked it, and it made me laugh and smile in equal amounts. Do I think any less of anyone’s religion? Oh, course not. And I’ve got some really good Christian friend who would read this & laugh, and not be offended. Clearly, there are some parts of America where they will probably queue up to burn copies, but hey – those are probably the same people who think Jesus was white with blonde hair and blue eyes.
Take a deep breath, push the boat out, and give this a read…
Rating: 4/5
Reporter: SilverFox
