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Hajime no Ippo

edited May 2011 in Anime
I knew this show was going to be good in advance, but oh mans. Just watched the first two episodes. It's a standard shonen fighting formula applied to boxing. However, there's just something about it that has that extreme energy all the time. There are those moments in Initial D or Hokuto no Ken that are all "oh shit son." In just the first two episodes of Hajime no Ippo there have been at least four or five of them. If it keeps up this pace it will be epic and amazing. If it starts to slow down to DBZ levels when there's actual boxing matches later on, then it will be a sad wasted potential.
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Comments

  • edited May 2011
    It won't slow down. The show is absolutely amazing. There's a reason why I've read all 900 something chapters of the manga.

    Unfortunately, the very best part of the manga hasn't even been animated yet.
    Post edited by chaosof99 on
  • Unfortunately, the very best part of the manga hasn't even been animated yet.
    are you talking about when Takamura punches a bear in the face until it dies and then wears its pelt?
  • edited May 2011
    No, I'm talking about the Coach Kamogawa's flashback story, which would have come next right after the end of the 2nd season of the anime.
    Post edited by chaosof99 on
  • While HnI is a quality show (and I really ought to finish it), a big part of why I like it is because it's the last show that Madhouse did by hand.
  • Yeah, the show keeps getting better and better. One of my all time favorites.
  • Unfortunately, the very best part of the manga hasn't even been animated yet.
    are you talking about when ...?
    I thought I saw that in the 2nd season? Maybe I'm just remembering the manga ... hmmm
  • Finished the first arc so the first "fight" is over. I like how the fight only spanned two episodes. I also like how it shows Ippo working crazy hard. In other shows the hero gets their skills from luck or some supernatural bullshit or something. Like Luffy just eats a Gum Gum fruit and that's it. Or Takumi, who works, but doesn't even know or care. Ippo works crazy hard, likes doing it, and wants to do it. I think that is the minor tweak to the formula that makes this show more exciting. The only natural talent Ippo had was strength from working for his parents. The rest he had to do on his own.
  • Unfortunately, the very best part of the manga hasn't even been animated yet.
    are you talking about when ...?
    I thought I saw that in the 2nd season? Maybe I'm just remembering the manga ... hmmm
    There is a short flashback when the Australian fighter is introduced.
  • Finished the first arc so the first "fight" is over. I like how the fight only spanned two episodes. I also like how it shows Ippo working crazy hard. In other shows the hero gets their skills from luck or some supernatural bullshit or something. Like Luffy just eats a Gum Gum fruit and that's it. Or Takumi, who works, but doesn't even know or care. Ippo works crazy hard, likes doing it, and wants to do it. I think that is the minor tweak to the formula that makes this show more exciting. The only natural talent Ippo had was strength from working for his parents. The rest he had to do on his own.
    So, It's History's Strongest Boxer Ippo?
  • So, It's History's Strongest Boxer Ippo?
    It IS! Now I wanna watch me some Kenichi again!
  • Finished the first arc so the first "fight" is over. I like how the fight only spanned two episodes. I also like how it shows Ippo working crazy hard. In other shows the hero gets their skills from luck or some supernatural bullshit or something. Like Luffy just eats a Gum Gum fruit and that's it. Or Takumi, who works, but doesn't even know or care. Ippo works crazy hard, likes doing it, and wants to do it. I think that is the minor tweak to the formula that makes this show more exciting. The only natural talent Ippo had was strength from working for his parents. The rest he had to do on his own.
    Actually from what I have seen in the first 5 episodes is that Ippo has some amount of natural talent for boxing, but it's still mostly about hard work. The thing I dislike the show most is Ippos naiviness, I also dislike Ippos lack of spine, but it's quite easy to see that growing one will be central part of his character development, so I accept that.
  • The thing I dislike the show most is Ippos naiviness, I also dislike Ippos lack of spine, but it's quite easy to see that growing one will be central part of his character development, so I accept that.
    I agree his wussitude is kind of annoying. The thing is, it serves two purposes. One is that it makes him the undisputed good guy. There is nothing evil about him. That is what allows you to root for him even when the opponents aren't bad. Miyata isn't a bad guy at all, but Ippo is still the good guy in that fight because he is so pure in spirit. There's also an absolute guarantee that he is going to become badass, you can see it in the opening animation. That is going to be so awesome in a Snow Crash fantasy fulfillment kind of way.
    "Until a man is twenty-five, he still thinks, every so often, that under the right circumstances he could be the baddest motherfucker in the world. If I moved to a martial-arts monastery in China and studied real hard for ten years. If my family was wiped out by Colombian drug dealers and I swore myself to revenge. If I got a fatal disease, had one year to live, and devoted it to wiping out street crime. If I just dropped out and devoted my life to being bad."
    — Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash)
  • It IS! Now I wanna watch me some Kenichi again!
    I'm finally getting around to reading the manga - it's pretty decent, and I like it for pretty much what Scott said there - Kenichi doesn't have any special talent for martial arts, or anything special about him at all, really, he just gets better through insanely hard work. Well, that, and it's one of the very few Shonen fighting things where it's less about the crazy techniques than about the character development - though of course, there is still lots of crazy, it's not the driving force.
  • Yeah, I like that his special attack isn't something unrealistic or fantastical like "hundred power whirlwind swing!" but is "textbook uppercut."
  • All of Ippos attacks are his specials.
  • Yeah, I like that his special attack isn't something unrealistic or fantastical like "hundred power whirlwind swing!" but is "textbook uppercut."
    Much the same with Kenichi - He has no talent for martial arts, and thus uses basic techniques - while the techniques get a little more complex over time, he never stops with using his strong fundamentals, and even when he starts getting to slightly more complex stuff, it's still ground level basic compared to his opponents.
  • Guts and practice.
  • Guts
    Next episode: Ippo vs. the Aggro Crag!
  • Is Hajime no Ippo available in English or are there just scans of it online?
  • edited May 2011
    Like Luffy just eats a Gum Gum fruit and that's it.
    While there is some supernatural thing to it, as is the nature of the series and the plot device of Devil fruits, it's hardly like that. If you remember, Luffy ate that fruit at age 7, and left his island at age 17. We later learn at least for a bit how he spent that 10 years. The manga also later makes a 3-year time skip, during which Luffy trains. Plus a lot of inventive use on how to use Devil Fruits. Luffy does train and grow through it, as do other characters. We just don't see it.

    The difference between the series and other shonen fighting series is twofold:
    1) Hajime no Ippo shows that character growth in full detail. Some might even say it is too much of the minutiae, but that's how it makes its bread and butter.

    2) More importantly is that unlike other fighting shows (Bleach, Naruto, One Piece), Hajime no Ippo has seasons and eventually ends at a point, still leaves open space for the continuation. It also gave itself a lot of leeway and stuff to animate before it was eventually animated. This allows for the series to be planned out and pack in a lot of chapters of the manga, without the fear of catching up and running out of stuff to animate. The series also doesn't start to implement filler, or crawl on an annoyingly slow pace like those other shows do.

    Episodes of the One Piece anime have come to creep down to about a chapter and a half per anime episode, which is very slow, but at least in chapters of One Piece there is always something happening. In Bleach it is even worse and it's absolutely unbearable. HnI on the other hand has eaten pretty much exactly 400 chapters of the manga with 102 episodes of serialized anime, a 90 minute movie and a 60 minute OVA, so approximately 110 episodes of anime converted. That clocks in a little under 4 chapters of the manga per episode which is incredibly fast for a shonen fighting series. And that's why that show works!

    BTW, correct viewing order is Season 1, Movie, OVA, Season 2, if you're going all the way.
    Is Hajime no Ippo available in English or are there just scans of it online?
    The manga has never been licensed in the U.S. (or germany for that matter) and I'm utterly perplexed by that fact. The entire series has however been scanlated and you can everything up to chapter 918 (!) on this here website which I used to read it. The manga is up to chapter 934 now, which I'm sure will be added later, though they're also around the internet somewhere for sure. The series is insanely long, but I definitely worth the time to read. If you watch all of the anime, you don't have to read the firs 399 chatpers of it at all, since the anime sticks very, very closely to the manga.
    Post edited by chaosof99 on
  • BTW, correct viewing order is Season 1, Movie, OVA, Season 2, if you're going all the way.
    Noted. I only have Season 2 currently. I shall have to acquire the rest.
  • Oh, I do have one other complaint with the show. At least so far it makes absolutely no mention whatsoever of concussions or other conditions like chronic traumatic encephalopathy that are so common in boxing. Sure, they talk about brains being rattled such that your legs stop working when you get nailed in the chin. The thing is they act as if there are no long term repercussions whatsoever. Also while the mom is cool, even the coolest mom would be concerned about her son coming home with so much damage.
  • Well, I started reading the scans online (when I really should be studying for my Trusts and Estates final tomorrow, thanks for that, btw) and I'm enjoying it. So far, it seems very similar to Slam dunk, with a lot of the same tropes and cliches and whatnot. I'm probably more ok with that because I'm not as familiar with shonen sports manga, as opposed to shonen fighting manga, so I'm not as "been there, read that," like I am with Naruto, Bleach, One Piece, etc.

    I would imagine though, that if I read a lot more sports manga it would start to get just as repetitive as fighting manga.

    Oh, it's also a little weird how much they praise Mike Tyson in the beginning chapters, considering what happened to him.
  • Oh, it's also a little weird how much they praise Mike Tyson in the beginning chapters, considering what happened to him.
    I haven't seen any Mike Tyson praise in the anime, however he deserves that praise. I mention this a lot, but the world is full of horrible people with exceptional talent. There's nothing wrong with recognizing the amazing talents while admonishing the person who possesses those talents. Mike Tyson was a horrible human being, and is now slightly less so, but you can't say anything bad about his boxing talents. Just watch him fight on YouTube. It's truly amazing.
  • Oh, it's also a little weird how much they praise Mike Tyson in the beginning chapters, considering what happened to him.
    I haven't seen any Mike Tyson praise in the anime, however he deserves that praise. I mention this a lot, but the world is full of horrible people with exceptional talent. There's nothing wrong with recognizing the amazing talents while admonishing the person who possesses those talents. Mike Tyson was a horrible human being, and is now slightly less so, but you can't say anything bad about his boxing talents. Just watch him fight on YouTube. It's truly amazing.
    For the most part, I agree with you, but I was generally referring to Tyson's later career; how he lost to Buster Douglas because he ditched his trainer, the whole ear-biting incident, etc.
  • For the most part, I agree with you, but I was generally referring to Tyson's later career; how he lost to Buster Douglas because he ditched his trainer, the whole ear-biting incident, etc.
    Same as Michael Jackson.
  • For the most part, I agree with you, but I was generally referring to Tyson's later career; how he lost to Buster Douglas because he ditched his trainer, the whole ear-biting incident, etc.
    Same as Michael Jackson.
    Yeah, that's actually a great analogy.... or even Mel Gibson.
  • It should be noted that the manga started in 1990, so before pretty much all the stupid shit about Mike Tyson really came to light. Probably because of that stupid shit, they cut that praise out of the anime, though Ippo's fighting style is still styled after Tyson's (at least that's what I'm told).

    As for the health hazards of Boxing, Ippo often ends up in a hospital after a particularly long fight so it's hardly not mentioned. As for chronic conditions like Concussion syndrome or detached retinas, they are talked about a bit later on in the manga, but yeah, they aren't overly concerned with it.

    Ippo, as well as other series that constantly praise it (e.g. Bakuman), has really made me want to read or watch Ashita no Joe. Unfortunately, it's basically available nowhere. I believe the chronic health hazards are thematic touched upon a bit more in it.
  • though Ippo's fighting style is still styled after Tyson's (at least that's what I'm told).
    It definitely is. You could make a pretty good video with real footage of Tyson and anime footage of Ippo side by side, if it hasn't been done already.
  • Jabu Jabu Jabu

    Jabu Jabu
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