Anime: Hajime no Ippo: The Fighting!

Originally Posted 10/28/09: Note, I've received a lot of negative comments on this review before. Be aware that I'm fine with that so long as you disagree respectfully and don't launch personal attacks.

Alright bear with me. I've never written a review before. I just felt as if I had to come here and have my say after suffering through all 76 episodes of this series.

Coming into Hajime no Ippo, I was truly excited. I am an avid fan of shounen and sports animes and this was ranked 6th highest in average rating in A-P so I was confident that there was no way this series could bust. In the end, though, Hajime no Ippo isn't exactly bad, but it's mediocre at best.

Story: Hajime no Ippo commits the cardinal sin of really any story (anime or otherwise): it's boring. In a series entirely predicated on Ippo's boxing matches, they all (save one) progress EXACTLY the same way. Ippo is the underdog, he starts to lose early, gets knocked down a few times, he has guts, he gets up, he gets a KO and wins. It gets to the point where even the characters in the anime recognize the pattern. They all recognize that when Ippo goes down that just means he's about to pop back up with a KO and they verbally say so. Very depressing there; if your own characters know what's going to happen before you write it, there is a problem.

This happens utterly regardless of the skill level or fighting style of his opponent. When every match progresses exactly the same, it's hard to identify if Ippo is actually progressing as a boxer and person and, if so, exactly how much. I mean theoretically if Ippo barely beats the worst boxer in Japan then barely beats one of the best in Japan a few episodes later, what am I supposed to take away as far as Ippo's talent level exactly? I did like how they continued to make references to famous historical boxers, though I wish they had done that more often.

Outside the fights the story, well, doesn't really exist. He has a love interest for a few episodes who suddenly disappears for 20 episodes before showing up again months later acting like no time had passed outside of a perfunctory "long time no see". His rival plays a big role in the early episodes before leaving the country and essentially never returning, leaving that rivalry dead. His burgeoning friendship with his former bullier (I think that's a word) shows up for an episode every now and again but has no major role. Honestly my favorite episodes were the ones that dealt the least with boxing, which for a boxing anime is pretty bad. I enjoyed the love interest, rival, and friendship storylines, but no effort was given to flesh them out and all three were abandoned. If I just want to watch boxing, I'll watch the real thing. I watched a boxing anime because I want boxing with a story attached.

Perhaps more than anything else what annoyed me was the fact that they tacked on an extra episode at the end of the anime. In episode 75, the entire series is wrapped up including the final battle a series of still-action shots of the aftereffects of the final match of the series. And then after that they added one more useless filler episode in episode 76. Really? Who the heck uses a filler episode for the series finale? I mean come on, even Naruto didn't do that and they have more filler episodes than the average anime has total episodes.

Animation: Well I'd first like to point out that I don't think I've ever seen such ugly female character models. Even when we were shown a female character who was supposed to be especially ugly, I could hardly tell compared to the other females that had been shown. The male character models weren't much better either. Outside that, the fighting scenes were good I suppose. I don't know how to critically examine animation so I'll just say it's no Ergo Proxy or Eden of the East, but the animation doesn't detract from the anime. I did enjoy watching the animation of the fights. Even if I knew the results beforehand, actually watching the matches progress is clearly one of best parts of Hajime no Ippo. The animation is clearly dated, but the boxing matches are really exciting to see.

Sound: Again, I'm not quite sure how to approach this criticially. The OP/ED songs were good and fit the anime well. The voice acting was good and the sound effects from the boxing matches sonded good. I don't know if this fits under sound exactly, but I got really bored of hearing Aoki and Kimura say something along the lines of "Oh no, Ippo is going to lose/Alright, Ippo's winning" followed by Takamura saying "No he's not and here's why..." as he narrates the fight for the next 30 seconds in almost every match. It got to the point where towards the end of the series I actually shouted "Shut up" at my computer when I saw one of these exchanges starting up.

Characters: Now here I'm at a quandary on how to address this. On the one side, I loved the characters. From the cocky and perverted Takamura, to the cliche shounen hero Ippo, to the determined but comical Aoki and Kimura, all were interesting and relatable. The only character that I couldn't stand was Geromichi. He had no story attached to him and he brought out nothing in any of the other characters. Thankfully the writers discovered this as well and shipped him off to God-knows-where. The flipside of that is that many of Ippo's opponents also disappear after fighting him once. This was a real pity as some of these boxers had really good storylines and backgrounds.

On the other hand, none of the characters progress in the slightest. Every single character is exactly the same when we first see them compared to the end of the series. The only exception is Umezawa, but outside the 2-3 episodes where his change takes place, he's mostly used as a background character. Takamura is just as cocky, Aoki and Kimura are just as determined yet mediocre, Ippo is just as overly-polite and humble and his self confidence does a 180 in the first episode and remains the same for the rest of the series.

The anime tries some half-hearted attempt at making Ippo progress in the final battle when he thinks things like "I must have been crazy to challenge this man" and stuff like that, but that was just stupid. For no reason whatsoever they randomly had Ippo have thoughts that were completely out-of-character. He'd never cared before about how badly his opponent was beating him and he'd always enjoyed the tough fights. All the sudden he doesn't? No, just no.

Overall: Honestly I'm not even sure this should be rated as high as 6/10 and I think I was influenced to put it that high because everyone else on the planet seems to love this anime. There was near 0 character progression and the story was almost a copy/paste job for every match except with a different face on the opponent boxer. There are better shounen animes and there are better sports animes. I don't know what people see in this anime but I'm willing to listen if you've got comments. Sorry for the ramble/rant :/

Before starting:[br]At first I thought what could a sport anime about boxing do. But after I watched it I was hooked from the first episode and the anime turned out to be very good.[br][br]Animation: 8[br]Animation is good but has a classic style of drawing which some might not like, otherwise the action scenes were animated nicely and make you feel the weight of the punch.[br][br]Sound: 8[br]Soundtracks are very good and goes well with the anime, there's sometracks that you might like but nothing will grap your attention and make you feel to get the soundtracks, but music is a matter of taste so as long as it goes well with the anime it's great. OPs and EDs are also nice and you might like to hear them several times rather than skipping.[br][br]Story: 7[br]The story was too generic and not something new, but it was made in away that'll make you like it very much. It's about a boy who gets bullied very often and then he is saved by a boxer, then he start to learn boxing and it changes his life completely. It might be a predictable story at times, but a great one nevertheless. One good point here is that there aren't tremendous amount of flashbacks that'll annoy the hell out of you, also the plot goes at a very fast rate rather than concentrating on training and other unnecessary stuff. One thing though is that the ending was not an ending that covered everything, in fact the main goal of the main character was left unreached and that's because the original manga is still ongoing. This series has 2 specials as a sequel so you might want to watch them, but they don't cover an ending that the series lacked.[br][br]Character: 9[br]Characters are good most of the time. You'll happen to like a lot of characters and like to hear info about them, like their back stories for example. There aren't any characters whom you can call "villains" since this is about boxing, but there are plenty of boxers who gave the main character a hard time.[br][br]Value: 8[br]If you are someone who rewatch anime, this will be worth rewatching since you'll end the anime wanting more to watch and rewatching it is a good choice.[br][br]Enjoyment: 10[br]You'll probably enjoy this series regardless of anything. This series managed to keep me entertained throughout the whole series. There's no time where you'll get bored and want the episode to just finish.[br][br]In conclusion, whether you like boxing or not you must free your time for this series since it's really worth watching.[br]

First of all, i'd like to mention that this a boxer reviewing a boxing anime so i might not be objective at all. (:

About the boxing in Hajime No Ippo: I must say that Ippo's progress is quite the impossible one (It takes months to even settle the technique for the jab and straight). On the other hand, training routines are exactly what they should be. I learned a technique from this anime, that i never heard of before, and it's definitely working (strenghtening the toes with catching tennis balls). People who like boxing will love this anime. People watching this anime without any hint about boxing will grow a sympathy for it for sure.

Animation: the animation looks so old fashioned, just as Initial D. (I guess that's a solid reason for people to categorize Hajime No Ippo and Initial D as similar animes). However, the animation's quality gets to stage in fighting scenes. I want to watch the fights over and over again. "8"

Sound: Tsuneo Imahori rocks ! I also liked his work in Gungrave but Hajime No Ippo ost is definitely awesome. Dubbing is another brilliant element of Hajime No Ippo; i can't guess better voices for any character in anime. "10"

Story: It's a typical sports anime but its draws you out somehow. "8"

Characters: I can say that i liked the main character, Ippo. However side characters are the most entertaining in my opinion. Buddies in Kamogawa Gym, Ippo's rivals... man i like them all. "10"

Value: Definitely worth to watch again and again. "10"

For those who likes sports or not, Hajime No Ippo is definitely worth to give a shot. The sense of humour is absolutely great, music is outstanding, fights are awesome. what more can i say..

This series features the life of a boy named Ippo who explores boxing and begins to change his life.
It also gives a great insight in the daily life of professional boxer.

Animation:
It's nothing new, but it's not really old yet, either, so average I guess, but exspeccialy the punches in the fights are very good animated.
-> 8 points

Sound:
The voices sound rather good and are giving the right atmosphere, they also support the rare humor, either.
There are very few annoying voices and they appear rarely, either, so it's bearable.
The fighting sounds are very atmospheric and the noises from the people watching the fights in the halls arn't really giving the perfect atmosphere that makes you feel like you would sit in the hall yourself, but still makes it easier to imagine it.
All in all the sound is a bit inferior to the animation.
-> 7 points

Story:
The story definetly has its heights when Ippo trains in ordner to get stronger to win the fights and each time he got stronger you feel really good either, exspeccialy when he discovers a new technique with thinking about it before.
The background, getting up with pure willpower after falling down on the mat, is fascinating, anyway, but if you finished watching the series you feel like they should have spend less time on some minor things and more time on his growth as a boxer and his further fights or maybe they should have just maken a few more episodes, atleast I wasn't satisfied with the end.
There is some boy girl love, too, but unfortunately it doesn't even reach the stage where they would confess, much less the stage where they would kiss. Again a point where you feel they should have spend more time in.
The flow is good as long as there are exciting fights, it's easy to watch more episodes in one rush than you can count on two hands, but there are some times when you don't feel like watching anymore, either, in other words times where the anime gets a bit boring.
So you can summarize the story is good all in all, but still easily improvable
-> 7 points

Character:
You get a deep look into the main characters feelings, ambitions and his personality and you also get attached to his fightings easily, but sometimes you can't help but getting annoyed by his naivety.
The characters surrounding him are well made, either, and you can easily imagine their personality even if they dont appear on screen often enough to learn more about them.
There are also many totaly different guys who appear as his enemys and keep the anime from getting boring and each of them has it's own background, personality and reasons to fight.
All in all there arn't anymore characters that annoy you besides Ippo, but since he's the main character it still has an impact if he get's annoying from times to times.
-> 7 points

Value:
Although the anime is entertaining and it features a unique theme, (atleast I didn't watch any animes featuring boxing before) it lacks variety and it ends when you just feel like it's starting to get really good.
Also I am not really into boxing, either, so I might have considert keeping it more likely if it featured some other material arts.
-> 6 points

Enjoyment:
I don't really like boxing too much, but the series still entertaint me very good from begining to end and the fights were packed with action supported by the solid animation.
If it would have had concentrated a bit more on ippos fights and growth, I would have been able to enjoy it even more, but this way I felt a bit unsatisfied in the end.
-> 7 points

Hajime no Ippo is one of the very best animes I've ever seen. The story is top notched and the fight scenes are beautifully done as well as the charater personalities. The drawing style however takes the animation grade all the way down to a 7 imo. And then to a 6 with all of the reused frames :o The sounds are good, keeps the anime flowing nicely. Oh, and did I mention it's funny as all hell, and sometimes sad enough to make you shed a fountain of tears :'(. All in all Hajime no Ippo will not dissapoint, and the only small small tiny itsy bitsy little diddle flaw it has is that it ends before the manga. Way before the manga. I mean way before the manga, which has 700+ issues and is still going to this day. So, after you watch this anime, the movie, and then Kumura vs Mashiba, check into the manga and you'll be on the 700th chapter in a few weeks. That good.

So check it out, best old school anime you'll find on the net.

Hajime no Ippo doesn't have the humor of Prince of Tennis, the sheer hair-raising intensity of Initial D, or the fine polish of Hikaru no Go, but quite possibly, it may be the best of all of them. If you at all like the sports anime genre, you owe it to yourself to watch Hajime no Ippo. Even if you don't like the sports anime genre, you don't get such an absurdly high rating on without genre-spanning appeal, so dammit, go watch it anyway.

Animation
A note about the animation, despite what other reviews have said, it's not dated and its certainly not shoddy, it's absolutely brilliant and fits both boxing and the sports anime genre like a glove. The animation in Ippo is well thought up and detailed, and is actually one of the strong points...but probably other reviewers were talking about the aesthetic appeal of the characters' faces. Not as bad as Initial D, but certainly not attractive.

Sound
I couldn't get over the music, which was not only appalling musically, but overly macho and used entirely too much bad English...but all that is par for the course for sports anime. Worse, that's just the vocals. Though I had somehow blocked it out, after listening to the OST, the BGM is far, far worse. The worst part is that some of the songs actually grow on you like bacteria on putrid, infected masses of decayed tissue, particularly the third intro Tumbling Dice, and the 1st ending Yuuzora no Kamihikouki.

The sound effects on the otherhand, are downright amazing. Yea, you know the Dempsey Roll soundeffect is pure cheese...but you love it anyway:) And the sound of ribs cracking...pure bliss.

Character
The main characters are actually kind of lacking on any kind of emotional level beyond that of the Fight, and on their strength alone, this anime would have received a far lower character rating, but like all good sports anime, the opponents receive a great deal of attention and are interesting by themselves.

Ippo's gymmates are real gems of character though, and provide the vast majority of the comic relief. Well, actually...the comic relief is probably the reason they lack emotionally outside of boxing:)

Extras
One more thing, I highly recommend the Playstation 2 game based on this series, which is titled in the US "Victorious Boxers" or something of the sort. Technically brilliant, it's also the most fun boxing game since Mike Tyson's Punchout. A real sleeper hit, and even more enjoyable if you've seen the series(I recommend you watch before playing, since I got considerably spoiled by doing it the other way around.)