Anime: Megalo Box

Megalo Box - Tomorrow's Joe, today.

Megalo Box is a 2018 spring anime, animated by TMS Entertainment. The show is intended as a retelling of the 1968 classic Ashita no Joe ("Tomorrow's Joe", also known as "Champion Joe" in the west), and was made to honour the original's 50th anniversary as a manga. Ashita no Joe is one of the seminal sports works both as a manga and subsequently as an anime, the classic underdog tale of Joe Yabuki rising to the top in the post-war Japanese boxing world having inspired practically every sports manga and anime afterwards in some way (some, admittedly, more than others). As a retelling, Megalo Box takes many of the classic characters and some elements of the original show and weaves a story of a cyberpunk-like future: The Joe analogue, "Junk Dog", fights in fixed underground gambling rings for the sport of 'megalo boxing', boxing with the addition of mechanical arm strength enhancers known as 'gear'. One day, a chance encounter with reigning megalo boxing champion Yuri (an analogue for Tooru Rikiishi from the original Ashita no Joe) inspires "Junk Dog" to go pro in the hopes of getting to fight the champion himself in his own ring, rechristening himself "Joe" and dragging his trainer Nanbu Gansaku with him on a one-way shot for the top.

Throughout this review I'll try not to let my very fond regard for the original manga get too much in the way -- which should not be very hard, because aside from being a very obvious loving and very respectful homage the show is pretty good on its own and capable of standing as its own story. Not completely flawlessly so, sadly, but I'll get into that below.

Art & Animation: 9/10 -- Made me nostalgic for the 90ies, in all the best ways.

Megalo box comes out swinging with an art style far removed from what you expect from a 2010s anime. With its drab, brown-grey palette, rough and clear lines and character design right out of something like Cowboy Bebop or Trigun, the show looks like it was created in the 1990s or early 2000s. The show intentionally goes for an SD look, and upscaling your stream to 1080p does almost nothing to it.

Personally, I love it. In addition to being stylishly retro, the animation and character design are both top-notch. The fight scenes, although sadly not as long, detailed or lovingly rendered as I think they could have been if the show had more time and budget, manage to get a lot done with what they have. The lavish corporate offices and arenas of the 'haves' contrast with the bridge where Joe trains or the dilapidated outskirts he hails from. Excellence all around.

Sound & Music: 9/10 -- Why these voice actors aren't more famous I'll never know. After this job more of them deserve to be.

Produced by mabuana with some vocal tracks by rap artist COMA-CHI, Megalo Box's soundtrack is a mixure of hip-hop with some rock and techno elements to emphasise the foil of Junk Dog's roughneck life, Yuri's perfectly-planned path to victory, the energy and drama of boxing matches and the in-between match life of training and corporate skullduggery. The end result is very good.

There are a few vocal rap numbers that may come off as slightly cringy (they did for me, at any rate), but even in these the music managed to match up very well to the on-screen events and plenty of musical numbers, especially the main theme of the anime (which makes its dramatic entrance in the final moments of the first episode and the previews). In between the varied display of genres and the high quality of the pieces, complete with how well they underbuild their scenes, the in-show music is truly great. The intro, "bite" by LEO imai, sounds like eighties hard-rock right out of Fist of the North Star, my main problem being that it's not really as energetic as I feel an intro to this show *should* be -- though decent, it's still the weakest piece of the soundtrack. The ending, "Kakatte koi-yo" by Eri Nakamura, works better by being a light-hearted ending to the oftentimes somewhat heavy cliffhangers of the episodes, giving an effect similar to Neon Genesis Evangelion's "Fly me to the Moon" and "Hoshi Yori Saki ni Mitsukete Ageru" from One-Punch Man. Despite the weak spot of the OP, I would otherwise call the soundtrack near flawless for its genre.

Similarly, the voicework is excellent as well. Between Yoshimasa Hosoya's enthusiastic and working-class sounding Junk Dog, Hiroki Yasumoto's sinister baritone for Yuri and Shirou Sato giving Nanbu the perfect mix of 'lovably selfish jerk' and 'serious and caring veteran trainer' to understand just what sort of person he is after two-three lines, the voicework matches the characters perfectly. They even throw in some (sadly uncredited) native speakers for Mexican and American boxers Iglesias and Burroughs, which was a nice touch. Ultimately I have very little to no criticisms of the voicework either, barring the somewhat clumsy English dialogue. I'd love to hear what it sounds like when it's dubbed.

Story: 7/10 -- If the writers could pace as well as they write cliffhangers, this show would be perfect.

Megalo Box is a classic sports-based 'underdog punches his way to the top' narrative, which is really to be expected the moment you know it's a retelling of Ashita no Joe. Anyone who has seen the original is probably not going to walk away surprised, nor is anyone who has ever seen the underdog narrative from any other source. When you start the show the question isn't going to be "is the last two episodes going to involve Junk Dog and Yuri's final match?" because the show makes this obvious from the moment the two lay eyes at each other, the question becomes "can the writers successfully fill the in-between ten episodes with interesting drama, fights and characters?". And the answer to that is, generally, yes. Without spoiling too much, yes, the finale is Yuri vs Joe, and yes, the story up to that point has mostly been excellent. The flow is generally good, and the writers are masters of setting up for the next episode by ending each episode on a near perfect moment to keep the viewers hooked.

The main problem lies in that "mostly", namely that I feel that thirteen episodes weren't enough for this show as the writers clearly had a story to tell and just not enough time and budget to get it all in with proper pacing. A few fights end up summarized or start in medias res, and there simply isn't enough space to set up all the scenes and characters with what they need given their promise and set-ups. If shows I've seen like Mawaru Penguindrum was a show that suffered from having just too much content for 13 episodes and stretching it out for a boring 26-episode run, Megalo Box is the exact opposite and feels just a bit too rushed without an episode or two to fill in the semi-finals and finals. The whole plot point of gear also feels almost a bit tacked on in places, given that Joe makes it big by boxing without one -- apparently he's just that good and no-one else has been able to do it up until now, for some reason.

To add to this is, of course, the ending. Look, it's been fifty years, we all know how Ashita no Joe's two major arcs end, yes? They're probably two of the most well-known twists in classic anime (spoiler alert): Joe accidentally kills Rikiishi by giving him brain damage during their climactic fight, and then goes all out in the finale against Jose Mendoza, dying with no regrets after 14 rounds with the world champion. People had real-world funerals for the characters, it's that famous. Megalo Box spends most of its runtime foreshadowing a similar dramatic ending or twist and then, well, without spoiling too much let's say that while it was a perfectly adequate ending that tied the story together, 'adequate' was a definitive step-down for a show that had been as good as this one up to then.

Characters: 8/10 -- Many surprises? No. Any surprises? Surprisingly, yes.

The characters drive the story of Megalo Box more than the actual plot does, given the predictability of the latter. The cast is economical and tends to stay focused on five central characters, adding some limelight to the fight of the episode but only to the degree that the characters need to feel like both humans and provide Joe with his opposition of the day. This is mostly a hit process with only one or two misses, and some of Joe's opponents (Aragaki in particular) almost feel like they'd be as good as, or better than, Joe himself as protagonists. Other characters are sadly underused despite their potential, but again this is a pacing and "we lacked time" issue more than anything else. The dialogue feels good and manages to toe the line between "boring and pedestrian" and "unrealistically overdramatic": Lines that at times feel incredibly cheesy end up being somewhat grounded and can be written off as a bit of in-character boasting from cocky protagonist Joe.

Overall I don't have much to say about such a compact character gallery; they're all fairly good if somewhat predictable. Even the mandatory Bratty Kid Sidekick, Sachio, felt a little better than the average for the archetype due to some added depth and the show knowing not to overuse his moodiness and instead use it as a foil to the hot-blooded Joe and the over-cautious Nanbu, with Sachio's brattiness becoming a way for him to tell the pair to knock it off and cooperate.

Value: 8/10 -- Will never surpass the original, but on the other hand it probably didn't want to.

Megalo Box, when it comes down to it, is a bit odd in that it's not really that much about the boxing, in the end. If you want lovingly rendered blow-by-blow boxing matches with running commentary of stances, special techniques and fighters' strengths and abilities, you're better off watching Hajime no Ippo. Due to its constraints, the show becomes more of a classic underdog tale of rising from the gutter to the stars with a boxing theme than about the sport itself. This ends up costing it a bit in the originality department, but it also helps a bit in making in accessible due to not being locked behind a lot of lingo and technical details. Ultimately, what I think defines this show's 'value' the most is how well it catches the light of the 1970s original and shines it forward into this distant future of 2018, and Megalo Box does an able job of reflecting and honouring the original. I hope people will enjoy this show for what it is and would not regret recommending it to anyone not immediately turned off by its premise. And maybe get more people into Ashita no Joe too, that'd be neat. Darn kids nowadays ought to remember their origins mumblegrumble...

Enjoyment: 9/10 -- If every classic 70s anime is going to get a remake as good as this, I would not say no to more.

I'm not going to beat around the bush: Megalo Box was my favourite show of 2018, easily beating out most other shows I was watching at the time and coming in first on my 'anticipated' list for twelve weeks until it ended. It's a bit cheesy, a bit cliche and fairly predictable, but it's so well-crafted that I really didn't care. Recommended for anyone who wants a short inspirational drama watch.

Total: 8.5/10 -- Not DEAD yet...

In case this wasn't already crystal clear, let me re-iterate: As a retelling of Ashita no Joe, Megalo Box is a triumph that manages to put its own spin on a classic tale, and as a stand-alone feature it's a somewhat predictable tale but not bereft of charm, grace, tight pacing, good dialogue and a stellar audio-visual impression that sticks with you long after the final blow has landed. A few stumbling blocks regarding the ending and a somewhat rushed second half aside, it's an extremely good show and both the studio, the writers, the VAs and the music writer deserve accolades for a very good job indeed. Megalo Box is probably the best sports anime I've seen in years, even edging out Yuri on Ice!! with little trouble and possibly standing up to Ping-Pong as a sports-themed story, and while I don't hope the studio gets pressured into making a half-baked second season I do hope they carry the success with them and put equal love and care into their next project. Either way, Megalo Box makes it clear that while Joe's flame may have burned out, his memory will live on with us all.