Nomad: Megalo Box 2

Megalo Box is an advanced form of boxing where competitors wear metal frames called Gear. When the first ever Megalonia tournament took place, "Gearless" Joe became its champion and known to all as a legendary fighter. However, soon after, he lost an exhibition match against the second champion and vanished from the public eye.

Seven years later, Joe now goes by "Nomad" and keeps a low profile, occasionally fighting in a few underground matches to get by. He is haunted by hallucinations and relies on a set of painkillers to numb his mind.

During a match, Joe wins against an opponent, Chief, who purposefully loses for some extra cash from gamblers. Subsequently, Joe discovers that Chief is from a community of immigrants called the Casa. Chief is gradually trying to make enough money to purchase the land where they live illegally. At first, Joe hesitates to get involved, but eventually decides to lend the Casa a helping hand.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Joe Main

Hosoya, Yoshimasa Japanese

Chief Supporting

Tanaka, Miou Japanese

Nanbu, Gansaku Supporting

Saitou, Shirou Japanese

Yuuri Supporting

Yasumoto, Hiroki Japanese

Sachio Supporting

Murase, Michiyo Japanese

Shirato, Yukiko Supporting

Mori, Nanako Japanese

Aragaki, Tatsumi Leonald Supporting

Tamura, Makoto Japanese

Shirato, Mikio Supporting

Suzuki, Tatsuhisa Japanese

Marla Supporting

Farahnaz, Nikray Japanese

Fujimaki Supporting

Kinoshita, Hiroyuki Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Abe, Kengo Producer

Tsuchiya, Junichirou Producer

Herek, Samantha Assistant Producer

Reviews

Jun 27, 2021

KANLen09

Recommended

"As the wind whirled by, a Hummingbird appeared before the Nomad as they made their way through the wasteland.

Hummingbird: Will you listen to my song, Nomad? I'm in a hurry, ask someone else.

But the Hummingbird just won't give up and pursued the Nomad.

Hummingbird: Please, I must sing my song.
Nomad: You're rather selfish. Sorry, but I' m just not in the mood. I'm on a journey to die.
Hummingbird: But that's ridiculous. Who goes on a journey to die?
Nomad: It's the truth. Why would I bother lying before I die?
...
But the hummingbird refused to give up.

Hummingbird: Then how about this? If I can make you lie, listen to my song. If I fail to do so, I will say no more.

Wanting to be freed from the persistent pest, the Nomad agreed.

Hummingbird: Why do you want to die?
Nomad: Because I lost everything.
Hummingbird: That's a lie.
Nomad: But it's not a lie. I lost my home, my fortune...and my family died from illness. I've got nothing left.
Hummingbird: No, you still have eyes to see me and ears to hear my song. You even have a mouth to speak to me.
Nomad: Yes, you're right.

Though they felt that they had been duped, the Nomad admitted defeat.

Nomad: All right, I lose.

The Nomad didn't want any more trouble, and stopped to hear the Hummingbird's song. The voice was so beautiful that it filled the Nomad's empty heart with a gentle warmth just for a moment.

After it had finished its song, the Hummingbird flew towards the ray of sunlight that was peeking through the clouds."
- The Hummingbird and the Nomad (Storybook)

Redemption. The most successful and decorated Olympian of all time, Michael "Flying Fish" Phelps, sums the one word this way: "Perseverance, determination, commitment, and courage-those things are real. The desire for redemption drives you."

Going back to Megalo Box, the prequel being a creation and a homage to the 50th anniversary of Ashita no Joe a.k.a Tomorrow's Joe, was a fun watch when the anime first debuted in Spring 2018, but quickly faded into obscurity for it being like a stereotypical Shounen anime where the underdog fights his way through all the underground boxing ring matches, to then rise up and be a formidable foe. Even I'll admit that going back to Season 1 now, just feels like the re-watch has made the experience much worse and a slog to finish this "boxing" anime.

But the sequel here, dubbed Megalo Box 2: Nomad? NOW THIS IS A 100% GAME CHANGER of anything but everything that we haven't yet seen before. And apparently the production team behind the prequel also thought of it the exact same way with director You Moriyama, whom producer Minako Fujiyoshi had to convince him to do so, thinking that the prequel by itself is an open-and-shut case. Rather than make yet another season of staying with the whole "tribute to the past" thingie-a-bob (which was what attributed to the less-than-stellar feedback in both Japan and the West at the time), the staff team scrapped that idea, and went for a more mature theme that displays the post events of Gearless Joe in a long timeskip of 7 years, where everyone has matured and Joe's fall from grace as a depressed adult post-Megalonia. Instead of sticking to the same "Ashita no Joe" guns that bullets could crack for its own niche, the production staff team went for a more independent work which incoporates real-life societal issues, while still following Joe as he travels from place to place, while simultaneously not being able to move on from his past friends and rivals. AND BOY DOES IT SHOW, I'd say this change greatly increased the impact that boxing anime fans have been craving for the longest time.

If anything, this Nomad sequel proves one crucial thing that is missing from the prequel: character development IS KING, neither the boxing matches (though since this is a boxing anime at its core, it has to be there) nor the impact of wins or losses. As such, Nomad starts out differently than your average sequel, giving it the vibe sense that the world of the past is present, but you cannot always look back to your glory days and make the same results again. And that's Gearless Joe's re-account of his mature life being the Nomad: the one who wanders around with no goal in sight.

Need I mention that Nomad itself is more complex (as foreshadowed by the production team), but still reigniting the same flame of nostalgia? Because that is what it is: the Gearless Joe is not the same Gearless Joe 7 years later, and has largely kept to a low-profile state after losing out to Yuri's young successor Edison Liu, leading to his recluse life under painkiller drugs and earning money from his old ways of underground boxing matches. If you're wondering why I'd mention a "nonsensical" story in the beginning of this review, "The Nomad and the Hummingbird" is essentially the mature-but-depressed and delusional Joe's road from cradle to death, then riding the road to redemption, and it is a crucial pointer in the progression of the sequel. Through the same-old and new characters that are like character arcs in and of itself (and outstanding ones at that), these people will teach Joe the meaning of life, and what it meant by getting through all the trouble of being an outcast and making the most out of the new life, setting new goals, objectives and aspirations for the future. Seriously though, never have I been so captivated by a character-centric story so jarring, yet is intensely intriguing and hits at the heartstrings like a solemn foreign song played on the guitar. You can never find a better original story like this that is done through much of the production staff team's back-and-forth multiple discussions about the new Gearless Joe and his mature characterization, but fix as much as they can it did to give it an edge that I can say, is on a much higher pedestal than any typical "underdog to champion" fame kind of boxing show.

Mature being the theme of Nomad, and of course, with such a huge timeskip, Joe and the kids of Team Nowhere have matured A WHOLE LOT. We all know what happened to Joe, but in the course of events, his manager-cum-coach Nanbu...shall I say, had some life complications to the point that Sachio and crew thought that Joe was solely at fault when he "abandoned" them for his own gain when going against the former No. 1's student successor (Edison Liu). Needless to say, all of that was a recipe for disaster, as the tables had drastically turned on Joe: the loss of his Megalonia "champion" status, and Sachio with the Team Nowhere kids exiting Joe's life thereafter. 7 years later, everyone obviously grows up, but Joe's fame got so much on his head that the loss subjected him to post-natal depression. Overtime, the new characters Chief (an Afro-Latino immigrant) and Mac "The Hero" Rosario (brought in as the new technological face of boxing Gear) encounters Joe, fights him, and teaches each other about what their human values are worth fighting for, hence the symbolism of "The Nomad and the Hummingbird", which explicitly interchanges the roles between the three Megaloboxers (once in each character arc), educating them and edifying the meaning of "coming home to the family". Even if all is lost, your family will still be right beside you, even through the course of life and death. And you know that I ABSOLUTELY LOVE symbolisms in shows, and Nomad does an outstanding job at reading between the lines when it comes to characterization of the tightly packed and immaculate kind.

TMS Entertainment is back to produce this show (without the help of its subsidary 3xCube which also produced the classic Ashita no Joe), but this time, the old-school style animation is largely improved for the better. Even Joe's VA Yoshimasa Hosoya was surprised at the improved animation, and quote-unquote "was surprised by the improved animation which he felt to be more fit of a movie rather than a TV series". Season 1 wasn't bad, but the asinine tight production schedule, other than the tribute of sampling full HD to old 480p visuals, made it truly stand out in its time. Season 2 here is largely more of the same, though I'd guess that 3 years of production development is more than enough time to make this sequel work its legs to kick out wonders. It is an unique mold, all on its own.

Even the music by famed composer mabanua is back with more of the same-old, old-school style instrumentals, but incorporating with Mexican-Spanish themes. Such as the OP "The theme of the Nomad" which is meant to sound like a glorification of Gearless Joe's better days in mono, to the Latin-American ED "El Canto del Colibrí" (translated as "The Hummingbird's Song") in full Spanish Tejano "folk" style music, meant as a song of the hummingbird, seen as a messenger of the gods used to convey good and peaceful thoughts to kin about their loved ones, dead or alive. And even as much as I miss LEO Imai's hyper OP "Bite" of the prequel, this narrative shift of a sequel does not need all the barking and biting hype, and settles for the comtemporaries to add the classic punch to the impact.

Overall, it's insane to see a famed sequel like Megalo Box 2: Nomad, be so shunned by the community, because other than it being a vastly superior sequel, it can also be taken in as an independent work all by itself. Providing the fact that you have to bear through the decent prequel to get to this sequel, I can safely tell you that the wait is worth the trouble.

Este es un Anime Excepcional Secuela! Realmenté excellenté.

Reviewer’s Rating: 10

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Sep 21, 2021

KingJC

Mixed Feelings

I loved the first series. Just the ending was a let down. Didn't like the outcome of the final episode. Ruined it for me. First season is a 10. Second season is a 5. I am pretty upset about the ending. Before the last episode it was a 10/10. Then the ending killed it for me. That said the music is fantastic. Also really enjoyed the nomad and the hummingbird story.

The ending did feel rushed. Pacing could have been better. Art was fantastic. I hope there isn't a third season, they would prolly ruin it like they did this season. It went from amazing ... to a super let down so fast.
I really wish I didn't watch the last episode. Real boxer Joe is the goat.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Jul 12, 2025

Supersonic_Pain

Not Recommended

Funny

I thought it was the worst of Megalo Box 1 combined with some weird, disjointed decisions.

As mentioned in S1's review, I haven't seen Ashita no Joe so I have no idea how much, if any of this, is the fault of its predecessor and it's just following the script but having an excuse doesn't absolve you of poor writing decisions.

In the previous season, I said I didn't think the majority of the boxing matches were well-written and S2 solves this issue by making the boxing matches even less prominent and having even less memorable boxers.

For what it's worth, the boxers that DO matter feel less ... like battle shounen/sports anime opponents and more like characters but on the other hand, there are only really 2 outside of Joe himself that I thought were really all that relevant (3 if you want to count Liu but idk, man, are we really counting LIU?).

And, ironically, the 2 boxers represent the big characters of the, like, completely different 2 arcs that are in this show. The first few episodes feel like a sucker punch, especially if you're fresh off S1 like me.

You're kinda thrown in the deep end and Joe's in deeper shit than he ever was in S1, even if he doesn't have the Mafia breathing down his neck.

And there's this distinct Hispanic flavor to the show which is cool but it's weird that the first few episodes are Joe helping a group of immigrants (speaking of which, is this show not set in Japan? I guess I assumed it was considering all of the scientists are Japanese and there are quite a few Japanese characters in the boxing world including Aragaki, Samejima, and Nanbu and this trend continues into S2... is there a wave of Hispanic immigration into Japan that I didn't know about?) and they just become background characters for the rest of the show.

I guess it was the best part of the season even if I didn't like Joe's arc this season but, like, it didn't even feel like the same show to me personally. Even Chief, the one character who actually matters from this arc, he just dips and like, okay, sure.

If this were the entire season, maybe I'd give it a point or two back, but it's such a weird place for the story to go.

And then they just go back into Megalo Box S1 world and I feel like we should talk about Joe's arc now.

We see Joe and he's Da Nomad(: Megalo Box 2) and he's on cheap pain pills and he's fighting with Gear in underground fights again because he's such a Tortured Soul and the kids from the first season hate him because he did something stinky and like, what the fuck, dude?

You would think crippling his opponent/rival, apparently for life since he's still in the wheelchair in S2, would be the catalyst for this downfall but no, apparently that's all peaches and cream. Obviously not going to say what triggered this downfall because that's a spoiler but idk man, it wasn't that big a deal. In fact, Sachio being such a dickhead dweeb about it only served to make me strongly dislike him this season. Really, I don't like any of the kids this season. There's one who is just "the freelance reporter" and that feels like his whole gimmick. I guess I was feeling kind last season for not criticizing Bonjiri for being Fatass: The Character but he still is that but now he's a chef because he's fat.

We also get arguably the biggest new character in Mac Rosario and it leans into the more technological aspects of Megalo Box (and brings back the Shirato siblings, Yukiko getting a stylish hair cut) and this arc also has interesting things to say about brain damage and CTE but because they spend a few episodes on the immigrant thing and a couple more unrelated episodes about Joe and his relationship with the kids from S1, they only get a few episodes to do ANYTHING with it and it's more "oh, this new guy [not the Shiratos, a different guy] who is responsible for the brain chip in Mac is actually a big dickhead and the brain chip is making him crash out."

They even tease Joe having health effects from his boxing + pain pill abuse but other than leading to the wet fart of an ending for the one somewhat decent boxing match in the season, they don't get enough time to do anything with this either since they introduce that concept way too late.

I get why they wouldn't want to write Mac pulling a Chris Benoit but it's a victim of the biggest culprit of this season (and given a different issue, Megalo Box in general).

Similar to S1, this show is also 13 episodes. Maybe they could have given both arcs more time to breathe if it wasn't 13 episodes but as is, they should've cut one and let the other one cook. I would've respected the show more if it was all about the immigrant arc and we got to see Chief and the others for more than 4 episodes because I think that is by far the stronger arc. It would have been more tonally consistent if we just stuck with the latter arc.

As is, I did not really care for any of the new characters, I thought a lot of the older characters were either just There (Aragaki, Yuri, I guess Yukiko?) or made actively worse (Joe, the kids), the show feels like 2 different shows glued together (or, arguably, clickbait since it keeps the Hispanic theming post-immigrant arc despite not really doing a whole lot with it after E4), and the boxing is even less prominent and good than it was in S1.

I'm probably being generous giving it a 4 but, like, I don't know man, it didn't piss me off or anything. Maybe it's because I didn't end up caring for Megalo Box S1 that much in the end but this one was just kind of not very good and that's about it.

I don't really see why you'd feel the need to watch this. The first 4 episodes are kind of intriguing so you can watch those maybe but it's just kind of for the best to imagine it doesn't exist and the show ended with Joe vs. Yuri.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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