Episode 16 (Season 2)

The Two Hawks
Episode Information
Previous	Itagaki, Debut Match
Episode	Season 2 #16
Next	Wild Child
Japanese Title	二羽の鷹
Romanized Title	Futaba no Taka
Arc	Battle of Hawk Arc
Manga	Round 365 (p.7-19) Round 366 (p.1-19) Round 367 (p.1-19) Round 368 (p.2-11)
Air dates
Japanese	April 21, 2009
Music
Opening	Hekireki
Ending	8AM

The Two Hawks is Round 16 of the Hajime no Ippo: New Challenger anime, which is the adaptation of Jōji Morikawa's Hajime no Ippo series.

Details

• Characters Introduced: Bryan Hawk
• Real Life People Mentioned: Sadaharu Ō

Summary

As the match between Takamura and West begins, Takamura has trouble gathering strength due to his failed weight control. Takamura suddenly rushes in and throws a combination of left and rights on West's block. West attempts to counter an incoming left, but Takamura feints with the left and lands a right straight on West's face. As the audience assumes West can't stand after taking that, everyone including Takamura becomes shocked as West was unfazed by it. Takamura throws a left and a right hook on West's face, however, it was ineffective by Takamura's light punches. West is surprised Takamura really KO'd fourteen of his opponents with such light punches. Takamura backs away, knowing that West has already figured out that there is no strength in his punches. Knowing that he can't last in the later rounds, Takamura decides to gesture for him to come to the centre of the ring, however, West doesn't fall for it, figuring out Takamura's plan of using counters. Takamura gets angry and rushes at West with a combination of huge punches that West dodges until the first round ends. Takamura is in the lead by points since he stayed on the offense, but is also visibly exhausted as he slowly goes to his corner. Takamura drinks water after being told not to by Kamogawa, who tells him that if he gets hit on his body now, the pain from having swallowed water will be excruciating. West and his coach are thrilled that Takamura and Kamogawa are getting heated. West feels lucky that he is about to get a world ranking so easily.

As the second round begins, Takamura continues to rush West with left and right punches while West uses footwork to move away and dodge while landing a few left jabs until the middle of the sixth round. Takamura's rush stops as he is visibly exhausted from running around the ring. Takamura wished to overcome West's tactic of tiring him out, wanting to be like Sadaharu Ō, who managed to hit more home runs than anyone could ever imagine, but feels like his body is weak. West goes to Takamura and throws a left straight that hits his block, and then a one-two that lands on his face. While he can see the punches, Takamura continues to get hit as his weakened body is unable to dodge them. Takamura puts up his block to block the barrage of punches with his back against the ropes. West lands a left body blow on Takamura, who then drops his block. With Takamura's face unprotected, West prepares to throw a big left. As Takamura was waiting for a counter chance, he throws a right. Both boxers land their attack in a dual exchange, however, Takamura is the one who is unsteady afterwards.

As West goes for another attack, Takamura clinches him as he knows he would fall over if he doesn't hold onto something. As the referee orders Takamura to break the clinch, Takamura is shocked by what he sees in the audience. As Ippo, Aoki, Kimura, Kamogawa, and Yagi try to figure out what he is looking at, they are surprised to see Hawk with two women watching from the audience. The referee forces the clinch to break, but Takamura is still staring at Hawk, wondering why he is there. West wonders what Takamura is looking at as he pushes him to the ropes with punches to his block, not fearing getting hit with a counter since he won the dual exchange. Still staring at Hawk, Takamura wonders if he came to spy on him and is irritated at him grinning while having a woman on each arm. Takamura is hit directly with a right to his face. As West prepares to throw a right, Takamura gets angry that West is smirking, and throws a right of his own, causing a dual exchange. The dual exchange leaves both boxers unsteady. Takamura and West continue hitting each other with right-on-right and left-on-left dual exchanges that moves to the centre of the ring as Takamura starts to win the dual exchanges. The dual exchanges stop as Takamura lands a big right on West's face, sending him to the ropes. West lands a right straight on Takamura's face, however, Takamura quickly hits back with a right straight to his face that sends West through the ropes right in front of Hawk. The referee signals the match to be over, with Takamura as the winner with a ring out victory in the sixth round.

Takamura doesn't raise his hand in celebration, instead he stares at Hawk as the audience notices the American has came to Japan to watch the fight. The victory interviewer tries to give Takamura the mic, but he declines it, stating that he has nothing to say to someone who forget to bring their "luggage", willing to talk to him after he goes back home and gets it. Takamura then walks out of the ring. At the waiting room, Takamura is being interviewed by a big group of reporters as Aoki, Kimura, and Ippo are amazed that he won while in such a bad condition, with Kimura and Aoki claiming they never saw him snap like he did before. Takamura tells the reporters how the ring out was intentional because of him seeing Hawk with two women, and it was satisfying seeing them get scared and run away. Hawk enters the room, stating he would first want to shake hands with Takamura. He continues, saying that he came to Japan to see Takamura's power and believes that he will be in a better condition to fight when they have their match. Takamura decides that a handshake would be fine. Hawk then states that he came to Japan to partake of some of its "famous delicacies", Takamura believes it to be food, but Hawk confirms it to be Asian women, as he heard Japanese women are particularly tasty. Hawk's words shock the whole room as he laughs and asks for Takamura's handshake.

Trivia

• Early in the match, West mentioned how he was surprised Takamura got fourteen consecutive KO's. This is an error as Takamura had fifteen consecutive KO's by that point. The error exists in the manga as well.

Anime-Manga Differences

See also: Anime-Manga Differences

Credits

Characters are named as they appear in the credits.

Role	English Name	Japanese	Rōmaji
Ippo Makunouchi	Kōhei Kiyasu	喜安 浩平	Kiyasu Kōhei
Mamoru Takamura	Rikiya Koyama	小山 力也	Koyama Rikiya
Masaru Aoki	Wataru Takagi	高木 渉	Takagi Wataru
Tatsuya Kimura	Keiji Fujiwara	藤原 啓治	Fujiwara Keiji
Coach Kamogawa	Kenji Utsumi	内海 賢二	Utsumi Kenji
Yagi	Toshihiko Nakajima	中嶋 聡彦	Nakajima Toshihiko
Bryan Hawk	Akio Ōtsuka	大塚 明夫	Ōtsuka Akio
Live Announcer	Jin Horikawa	堀川 仁	Horikawa Jin
Referee	Hisashi Izumi	いずみ 尚	Izumi Hisashi
Ring Announcer	Akimitsu Takase	高瀬 右光	Takase Akimitsu
Morris West	Tomoyuki Shimura	志村 知幸	Shimura Tomoyuki
Morris' Second	Takuma Suzuki	鈴木 琢磨	Suzuki Takuma
Unknown	Kazutoshi Hatano Satoru Inoue Genta Fukuda Kazumi Makabe Naoko Sugiura	波多野 和俊 井上 悟 福田 彦太 真壁 かずみ 杉浦 奈保子	Hatano Kazutoshi Inoue Satoru Fukuda Genta Makabe Kazumi Sugiura Naoko

Episode Credits

Role	English Name	Japanese	Rōmaji
Screenplay	Yasuhiro Kadowaki	門脇 康裕	Kadowaki Yasuhiro
Storyboard	Ken'ichi Kawamura	川村 賢一	Kawamura Ken'ichi
Director	Kim Min-sun
Animation Director	Kim Bo-kyeong Kwon Hyeok-jung Hideo Hayashi (Action)	林 秀夫	Hayashi Hideo