Hajime No Ippo is a Japanese manga series and anime considered by many as one of the greatest of all time. It’s a boxing-themed show written and illustrated by George Morikawa. It has been serialized since 1989, and its anime adaptation ran from 2003 to 2014. It suddenly stopped, but recent rumors speculate it’s coming back for a fourth season.
Season 4 Update
Despite fans craving a fourth season, it’s unlikely the show will make a comeback anytime soon. According to a Reddit poll based on 320 votes, 270 users believe it won’t return and 50 fans hope it will!
The production team hasn’t released an official statement regarding its return and no trailers have been shared. Even if they announced it’s returning today, it will take three or four years before it’s made, this means the a return isn’t likely until at least 2027 (best case scenario). Most likely, the production team doesn’t think a new series would be popular enough to be profitable.
Plot
Ippo Makunouchi was a quiet high schooler who couldn’t make friends since he was usually helping his mom manage their family fishing charter business. Because of this, he is often a target for bullies.
When he was being beaten up by goons, a passing middleweight professional boxer intervened and took the wounded Ippo to the Kamogawa Gym for treatment. They attempted to cheer him up by allowing him to express his anger on a sandbag.
That’s how they saw the young man’s potential in boxing. Following that incident, Ippo gave the predicament a lot of thought and decided that he wanted to pursue a professional boxing career.
Manga
Since October 11, 1989, the manga has been serialized in Kodansha’s Weekly Shonen Magazine. It has been printed in the publication for almost 30 years, with the 1000th chapter published in December 2012.
In 2021, it was the eighth longest-running manga series in Japan, with over 1300 chapters produced. Kodansha has divided the chapters into separate tankobon volumes.
For the first time in its 33 years of activity, it was officially confirmed in 2021 that the series would be released digitally, beginning July 1 of that year. This is also what sparked the speculations for the anime’s season four.
Anime
Hajime no Ippo is a 75-episode anime TV series directed by Satoshi Nishimura and presented by Madhouse, Nippon Television, and VAP. It aired on Nippon TV on October 4, 2000.
Kohei Kiyasu voiced the protagonist of the show. Koyama Rikiya, Fujiwara Keiji, Utsumi Kenji, Takagi Wataru, and Tamara Yukari are also part of the main cast.In North America, Geneon Entertainment licensed the first series in 2003 and issued it under the title Fighting Spirit.
The first season aired from October 3, 2000, to March 27, 2002. It came back with a season two on January 6, 2009, until June 30 of the same year. Season 3 was from October 5, 2013, up to March 29, 2014.
