English Dub Review: Heaven Official’s Blessing “Daily Life at Chestnut Temple”

Overview:

Xie Lian is traveling back to his temple with a charming stranger. They are attacked by ghosts but Xie Lian knows some tricks on how to fool them and with the strangers help ensures their escape. Xie seems to think the stranger is a ghost themself but hasn’t found much evidence. People suddenly start worshipping at his shrine and then a man comes needing help and passes out.

Our Take:

I don’t know about you but I am not buying this stranger’s story. He’s totally Hua Cheng right? It’s pretty obvious to me that that’s who he actually is. He’s got second main character vibes all over him and we need that character to be introduced right??

We started hitting on some of the yaoi tropes you might have been looking for. Which when you boil it down is essentially romance anime tropes just with two guys. Which is kind of refreshing and nice when you think about it. Hua almost falls out of the cart after going over a bump and Xie grabs him by the hand. There’s some awkward shuffling here and there but none of the really annoying blushing that romance anime is usually known for.

The reason I felt like I was watching Scooby-Doo is because of all the ghost talk. It felt like most of the episode was “ghost this” and “ghost that”. Just unlike Scooby-Doo, the ghosts here were all real. They weren’t all that scary, to be honest, and I would have liked some of those skills Xie Lian showed off last time.

The sexual tension was palpable in this episode. You could feel the attraction between the two main characters and heck they even slept in the same bed! Talk about progress right?? All joking aside, I really do love the softer, character-developing moments. I think the beauty of the animation and the characters are all going to combine to tell a really sweet story by the time we’re done.