Megalobox, a cyberpunk-ish reimagining of iconic boxing anime Ashita no Joe, is one of the most popular anime of the season–and it’s easy to see why. But it’s not the excellent animation or the thrilling boxing that keep viewers tuned in: it’s the believable human drama.
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A commentary on society and the class divide between rich and poor, Megalobox is set in a world where two different “worlds” exist side by side. The first is that of the city. It’s clean, ever expanding, and full of the latest technology. But once you pass the city limits, you enter the other world–that of the slums surrounding it.
The slums are basically the ruins of our world: old concrete buildings in disrepair, broken streets, and no real government besides the gang lords that keep their own kind of order. The whole societal system seems to be built so as to keep the two worlds separate.
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The city doesn’t need walls to keep the riff-raff out. They only need ID cards. If you have a citizen’s ID, you belong. If you don’t, you’re not a real person. It’s as simple as that. Everyone knows which world they belong in–and while it is possible for a city person to fall into the slums, there is no real way for one born there to claw their way out.
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It is these slums that have forged our hero, a nameless young man who goes by the ring name “Junk Dog.” Now, we don’t know exactly where he comes from–what his personal history is–but that’s not actually important. He is the same as everyone in the slums. It doesn’t matter how good he is at something or how smart he is, the system is designed to keep him down. There isn’t even any false hope to make him think things could be better. He can only accept the world as it is and move on.
This is made worse by the fact that Junk Dog does have a talent: he is an excellent, natural fighter. Like in the city, the premier sport of the slums is Megaloboxing–boxing but with no round limit… and a mecha exoskeleton worn by each boxer. Unfortunately, as this is the slums, his raw talent stands for nothing: all the matches are fixed.
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Junk Dog constantly demands that Nambu, his trainer/manager, let him fight for real. Putting his everything into a battle against an opponent would be Junk Dog’s way of being free despite the system holding him down. Of course, he isn’t allowed even this.
This is the drama at the core of Junk Dog. As he goes through fake fight after fake fight, he gets closer and closer to his breaking point. He rides more and more recklessly though the wasteland on his bike, trying to feel, at least for a moment, that he is free and alive. Of course, this only serves to point out that the only real freedom he has in this world is whether he is alive or dead.
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And that’s why he refuses to be a pawn anymore. He wants to test himself against real opponents–to do the one thing he’s any good at. And if he dies in the process, well, at least he died doing what he wanted.
Through selling his soul to the local mobster, he is reborn as “Joe,” a citizen of the city, and thus is able to enter Megolomania: the ultimate megaloboxing tournament that is open to everyone (read: every citizen). If he doesn’t win, not only he, but Nanbu as well, will be killed. But it’s not the fear of death that drives him, it’s that megalo boxing is all he has and this is his one chance to live his dream of being a man instead of a dog.
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Nunbu’s story is largely the opposite of Joe’s. He is a citizen (or at least was one) and was once the owner of a small, local megaloboxing gym. However, he eventually lost his will to fight and ended up as nothing but a yes-man to a local promoter in the slums. From then on he simply lived day to day, training his young talent to lose as he was told. A lifetime of punishment at the hands of the system has broken him and made him into a person able to survive in the slum and nothing else.
Much of his story in Megalobox centers around his past and how, through Joe, he is able to, little-by-little, return to being the man he once was. Of course, this is far from easy.
Nanbu is so beaten down–so used to being the coward–that he reacts that way by instinct. It is hard for him to believe in anyone or anything and so he often acts out of self-preservation instead of supporting Joe as he should. But what’s important is that he knows his faults–he is self aware of his failings. Thus we are constantly witnessing his internal battle between the broken man he is and the great man he could be.
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As Nanbu at the start of the series represents the kind of person Joe would become if he didn’t take his chance to break out of the system, our third main hero, Sachio, represents how Joe used to be as a child. Like Joe, Sachio has no family–well, no living family, anyway. He is first seen with a pack of kids, doing whatever he can to survive. The only joy in his life comes from the “red candy” he and his friends get for delivering salvage to the local junk shop.
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Like Joe, Sachio has a talent–though not as a boxer. Sachio has a gift for machines. He is able to not only fix them but improve them. However, when Joe becomes “Gearless” Joe–and starts competing without the mecha exoskeleton–he shows he has other talents as well. While Nanbu handles the management and overall fighting strategies, Sachio’s job is to plan Joe’s training and make sure Joe does it (or doesn’t if rest is called for).
While Joe took his chance to be all he could be as a young adult, Sachio’s chance has come much earlier. In his formative years, he has found a place to belong–a place where he matters–even without his parents. Unlike Joe at his age, Sachio knows from experience that he has real value. And with that knowledge comes hope. Unfortunately, hope is a fragile thing and–as it is tied to Joe’s one-in-a-million shot to become champion–there is all the more chance for it to be crushed before it has the chance to fully bloom.
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But for now, Joe stands against the system that has held him down all his life–fighting to prove he is more than just a mangy dog. Yet, even if Joe can’t escape the system, there is still a chance that his actions can inspire at least one other person to try–be that an aged manager or a brilliant street rat.
Megalobox can be viewed with English subtitles on Crunchyroll.
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The series for this week’s article was chosen by Patreon Supporter Hideo Teramoto as part of the $15 reward tier. If you would like to choose a currently airing series for me to write about, I’d love it if you would do the same.
Good read, you have a typo in the last sentence on the second paragraph after you introduce Sachio though.
Thanks for the heads up, man. It has been fixed.