Depictions of Karma in Anime

When it comes to a topic like karma, it is interesting to see how it gets depicted in the media and how we as an audience observe it. For me, there were a few animes that came to mind and a couple characters that dealt with the consequences of their actions, or in this case, dealt with the bad karma that came their way. 

One of the first animes that came to mind when thinking about karma was Death Note. The whole premise of the show is that the main character, Light Yagami, is essentially given a book and suddenly takes on the power of controlling people’s fate, mainly their demise. What made this show more interesting is seeing how karma slapped Light right across the face 

throughout the entire show. After causing the deaths of people left and right, it was becoming harder and harder to cover his tracks. The biggest example is ultimately how the show ended. After causing so much death and chaos and being constantly surrounded by bad karma, his actions throughout the show ultimately lead to his own demise where he got caught and got himself killed in the end. 

Another big example of karma actually comes from the very beginning of Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood. The two main characters, Ed and Al Elric, attempt to bring their mother back from the dead using alchemy. Alchemy is a type of sorcery basically and in simple terms, you’re NOT supposed to use it to bring back the dead. Of course Ed and Al went against this and decided to go ahead with their plan anyways. Ultimately, karma struck them as they not only failed to bring their body back, but lost Al’s Body and Ed’s arm in the process. They spend the rest of the show trying to get Al’s body back as his soul is stuck in full body armor, as well as get Ed’s arm back. 

If you watch both of these shows, it’s crazy to see how these characters are affected so much by their actions and how much karma they basically got for them. Death Note shows the longer lasting effects of karma while Fullmetal Alchemist shows how fast the effects of karma can come around. I highly recommend both of these shows, and hopefully you find these plots including karma as fascinating as I do.