Episode 39

EPISODE 39

粉砕！幽助怒りの鉄拳 (Funsai! Yuusukue Ikari no Tekken)

Annihilation! Yusuke’s Iron Fist of Fury

First Broadcast: July 17, 1993

Equivalent Manga Chapter(s): second half of chapter 69 (WSJ #20, 1992, May 4), chapter 70 (WSJ #21-22, 1992, May 11)

Summary: After thoroughly pounding Kurama, Baku-Ken finally lets Yusuke switch in. Yusuke sees through Baku-Ken’s fog technique, defeating him easily. He then begins fighting the wind-master Jin, whose flying techniques give Yusuke some trouble.

Anime/manga differences after the jump.

Differences from the Manga

(What's all this about?  Read here)

• If you’ve been reading the entries up to now, you know that by this point in the Dark Tournament the anime’s established a set pattern for filler where whenever anything important happens, they show the reactions of the supporting cast.  Sometimes these are just quick shots of them, sometimes it’s little conversations they have.  These bits typically aren’t terribly interesting on their own, so I’m just going to stop mentioning them unless they are particularly notable, or I just feel like it.  Right now the peanut gallery consists of: Koenma and Jorge, Keiko and Shizuru, Botan and Kuwabara, and then Sakyo, Butajiri, and sometimes Toguro.  Just assume that any quick shot of them reacting or talking is filler.  Mask and Hiei have some filler like this too, but not as much as there is manga material of them analyzing the fight.

• At the start of the episode, Koto tries to stop Baku-Ken from hitting Kurama, but he knocks her aside (something similar already happened in both the manga and anime).

• After Baku-Ken finally throws Kurama out of bounds, in the manga Koto actually bothers counting to 10 before declaring he’s lost, while in the anime she simply says Kurama is unable to fight.

• In the manga Mask thinks to herself about how Hiei was ready to fight along with Yusuke if Baku-Ken didn’t stop attacking the defenseless Kurama.  In the anime she says this out loud to Ruka, and Ruka responds by saying they couldn’t get out of her barrier.  Mask says they could.  Then there’s a quick bit where Kuwabara wants to fight again, but thinks better of it.

• In the manga Baku-Ken just instantly comes out with his fog sweat technique.  In the anime he takes a long time producing all the necessary sweat.  Yusuke asks is it’s OK for him to get so hot and sweaty before even fighting, Kuwabara comments that Baku-Ken has some fancy technique up his sleeve, and Butajiri says the same thing to Sakyo.

• The fog sweat technique also gets a fancy name in the anime: Shura ninjutsu: Hakuen no Kiri (Asura Ninja Art: White Smoke Fog).

• The fog sweat technique actually makes Yusuke nervous in the anime, while in the manga he shows no real reaction.  On the same note, in the manga Yusuke stands still and lets Baku-Ken hit him once before noting that such weak punches couldn’t have killed Kurama, while in the anime Yusuke actually tries to dodge Baku-Ken’s attacks and gets hit several times before finally concluding that the attacks suck.

• Chapter 69 ends with Yusuke declaring he’ll beat Baku-Ken in a two-page spread.  And indeed, in chapter 70 Baku-Ken’s defeat is depicted in a two-page spread.  This joke obviously doesn’t work in the anime, so instead Yusuke just says more generic stuff about being able to kill Baku-Ken in one blow.

• As Baku-Ken tries to appeal to Yusuke to spare him, in the anime he says that someone like Yusuke should know how you can lose your head in the middle of a fight.  Then he catches Yusuke off-guard and smashes a rocky piece of the broken arena over his head.  The rock crumbles away harmlessly against Yusuke’s head.

• When Kurama tells Yusuke about how the Masho-Tsukai Team members don’t fight in order of strength, in the manga there’s a chart illustrating this, with the three members fought so far sorted and labeled by strength: Toya (very strong), Gama (quite strong), Baku-Ken (idiot).

• In the anime Mask notes that for some reason Ruka’s barrier is having a healing effect on Hiei’s arm.  The anime also goofs and has her refer to Hiei as possessing rei-ryoku (the spiritual power of humans) instead of yo-ryoku (the spectral power of demons).

• Before Yusuke and Jin start to fight, there’s a Koenma/Jorge scene.  Koenma is happily eating crab, confident that Yusuke will win, but Jorge says this is no time to relax and eat.  Koenma agrees and puts down the crab, only for Jorge to immediately eat it.