Now that Sachio has spontaneously rapped, anime can officially retire on a job well done.

I could run out of superlatives (yes, even me) for an episode like that one pretty quickly.  It’s not so much that it was exceptional Megalo Box – I mean, this show is generally pretty great – but that it was so exceptionally true to what Megalo Box is.  There is something to be said for a pure original – conceived, start to finish, to be a self-contained anime and a story told in the time allotted to it.  But it still has to be great at telling a story if it wants to be the real deal – and like Gearless Joe himself, this show is the real deal.

There is an age-old question being asked here, a common thread in rags-to-riches sports tales like this one – can we escape who we truly are?  Fujimaki would certainly say no, and I think Nanbu-san himself has serious doubts.  And that’s certainly the way things are looking for quite a while, as all the wheels are in motion to throw the fight as ordered.  1980’s Stan Lee and his two henchmen are on-hand to make sure things go according to plan (the plan is a dive with a minute left in the third round) and Joe even seems to be doing his best to sell the story.

There’s something unutterably sad about Joe fighting Burroughs with no one in his corner – the symbolism hangs heavy in the air here.  He’s even wearing gear, though it’s obviously pretty low-rent.  But Sachio is in too much pain to witness this charade first-hand, despite being encouraged to by Yukiko (which seems unwise, knowing what she knows).  Burroughs calls himself “The Lion”, and he’s basically a pure power fighter – a strategy which while not especially romantic has proved one of the most durably successful in boxing over the decades.  Incidentally – this is the first time we’ve had Joe referred to as “Naked Boy”, isn’t it?

No question about it, the Sachio rap is the signature scene of the episode – and maybe of Megalo Box so far.  The series has incorporated rap already – and brilliantly – but for a character to spontaneously bear his soul through it right smack in the middle of the narrative is another matter.  It took balls of steel to do that, because if it had failed it would have been a disaster at this late stage.  But it did anything but fail – it was glorious.  It somehow communicated not just exactly what was in Sachio’s mind at that moment, but everything that makes Megalo Box what it is.  And it doesn’t hurt that the boy has seriously got some bars…

Hopelessness certainly seems to pervade everything at this stage.  Unlike in some of his fights, Joe seems to have the measure of this one – Burroughs is a beast, but in many ways a perfect opponent for Joe.  That makes his situation all the more galling, but there seems to be no way out.  And the punch that lays Joe out right on schedule is no love tap – he’s legit laid out flat by it.  That Sachio would run into the arena at that moment is a given in hindsight – he’s become the moral center of Team Nowhere, by necessity if nothing else.  But it’s when Yuri reminds him of his vow and Nanbu himself shouts “Get up, Joe!” that our hero truly regains his senses – and his sense of the moment.

Once Joe stands up, the outcome in the ring is a foregone conclusion, even if Burroughs doesn’t realize it.  No, it’s the outcome in the dressing room that projects the real drama – and Fujimaki’s goons heading into the arena to deal with Sachio is all part of that.  Nanbu’s fate was certainly foreshadowed, and it’s a grim take on an eye for an eye when both eyes belong to the same man.  That he was willing to do it himself seems to have impressed Fujimaki enough to at least buy Team Nowhere a little time – though my gut tells me that once the final match is over (with Yuri sure to be an overwhelming favorite, there’s no money to be made off that bout), his benevolence will quickly come to an end.