Shippuu! Iron Leaguer

If you like sports anime, shounen, anime from the 90's, and robots especially, there’s a pretty good chance Shippu Iron Leaguer is the anime for you. If you still aren’t quite sure or want to know a little more, let’s go into detail on what this anime is about.

Welcome to the Iron League! The most popular sports league in the world where robots are the players. The League covers a wide variety of games: you want a sport, we've got a robot for it! From soccer to basketball, baseball to football, even bowling and golf! Sounds great on paper but there’s one big problem: ... rough play, underhanded tactics, and straight up brutality are the norm across the board, with the crowd loving every second of it.

But Silver Castle, the worst and weakest team in the League, play a bit different, going into every match with the principles of fair play, respect, honor, and kindness for their opponents and the game. Which is all well and good as far as morality is concerned, but most of the time it just means they're getting the bolts kicked out of them. That is until one day a robot with origins shrouded in mystery by the name of Magnum Ace lends Silver Castle his power, helps recruit new and skilled members to their cause, and vows to install a heart of justice into the corrupt Iron League.

Right off the bat I’ve got to give this anime props where props is due for the interesting and unique concept, especially refreshing in the sports anime genre which is known to be very formulaic and by the numbers (a sports anime that doesn’t take place in a school setting? Who would have thought it.). There might be like 2? other sports playing robots manga or anime out there and none of them are done quite like this.

The series doesn’t just use the concept as mere set dressing either, it goes deeper and explores it amply through a variety of sports with specially designed Leaguer types for each one. Each Leaguer has a unique mechanic or design trait that helps them stand out and show us which kinds of ways they play and excel at their sport, which makes even the side cast fun to meet. (And if you’re worried at all about the toy-like designs of the robots, not once while watching did I feel like I was being advertised to or watching a glorified toy commercial.)

Without treading much into the territory of spoilers, this isn’t JUST a sports anime either. There is more to the Iron League than meets the eye, and this anime doesn’t shy away from exploring and showing us that deeper side—all without being too heavy-handed or preachy about it either.

This anime is dumb, but in an awesome way. Iron Leaguer delivers in spades on the kind of goofy, hilarious, and fun over the top action you’d want from a robots playing sports anime. Nowhere else are you going to see a karate robot punch a hockey puck so hard it disintegrates, or a kendo robot cut a baseball and then have it explode, or a unified team kick that sends a soccer ball blasting to the net with the strength of a nuclear bomb. Absurd, surely. Enjoyable? Definitely.

The first half of the series is where it’s at its most solid and consistent, focusing mainly on Silver Castle building the team and attempting to win the soccer league to gain a standing in the world cup. The second half of the series sees things change up a bit, giving us some of the highest highs coupled with the lowest lows. We have a travelling the world arc with some amazing self contained character episodes and exploration of the setting, which kind of goes on for longer than it should and ultimately turns out to have no real bearing on the plot. This is followed by a final arc which, while it goes harder than anything else before it, introduces a handful of new characters and ideas that don’t quite get the room they need to breathe or be fully explored.

The cast itself are very charming, with each robot having a unique design and personality which helps them stand out and remain enjoyable and entertaining even in times when they’re just chilling with the group or playing with the team. From the passionate and fiery soccer star Mach Windy, to the serious robot-of-few-words samurai Kiwami Juurouta, or the lovable Topjoy, a character who is nothing but positivity and good vibes yet manages to avoid being overbearing or annoying.

Magnum Ace is easily the star of the show, serving as an incredibly refreshing MC especially in the sports anime genre. Instead of a bright-eyed bushy-tailed newbie with a special skill that becomes the team’s ace in the hole, Magnum is a hardened veteran with a wealth of power, skill, and knowledge, balanced splendidly by a humble down-to-earth personality and kind heart. While strong, resolved, and determined, he’s not invincible or infallible and his greatest victories come from him supporting others and others supporting him in turn.

While there are enough character moments and focus episodes for individual members to be fleshed out and have their own identities and charm, there aren’t really any ongoing character arcs or development beyond the team’s introductory episodes, or a few select members of the cast who do get that development (cheers to you Gold Brothers). But, much like a sports anime in this case, the characters are easily the strongest part of it and all are easy to love and get attached to. (This goes for the side cast, human characters, and even the villains as well, though the robots do get most of the love here.)

Interesting premise, ideas, and characters aside, this anime is far from perfect. At the end of the day it’s still a kid’s show with more than a fair share of dumb stuff, rushed, clumsy, and half-baked execution, low budget, moments that are just straight up bad, and a lot of little things that don’t quite make sense.

Calling it a good anime or a bad anime is going to be really subjective here, and the quality of the show can vary drastically from episode to episode, even from moment to moment. But what brings it all together in the end are a super charming cast of characters and the series’ core messages of fair play, teamwork, respect, the impact of kindness, and just having fun with your friends. Corny, of course, but these messages are delivered so genuinely and with such heart and charm that it becomes VERY difficult to hate or even dislike this series even at its worst.

Because of that, I find it hard not to recommend, especially if robots and sports are your kind of thing.

Mecha anime in the 80’s and 90’s were often experimental, ideas become reality just because ‘hey why not’, concepts thrown at a wall just to see what would stick and become the next big hit franchise. While Iron Leaguer wasn’t one of those that stuck around for the long haul—especially in the west with no dub or “official” english release to be found—I find myself feeling glad that this anime was a thing that happened and that it even exists at all. An anime like this had to happen somewhere at some point in time and I’m glad that this is the one we got. All I can say is that this is probably the best mid-tier anime I’ve ever watched that I highly recommend checking it out.

Shippu! Iron Leaguer is not an incredible show, and you should watch it. Especially if you like robots. This is one of my all-time favourites.

It's probably fair to say that at no point in its life was this show a chart-topper. From its.. interesting robot designs and continually subpar animation to its repetitive and often limited soundtrack and aggressively corny plot beats, Iron Leaguer is clearly not the cream the of the crop. It never received an English release, so the vast majority of its English-speaking viewers have been given the opportunity to see it thanks to the efforts of fansubbers Alpha Numbers and Silver ... Castle. I think it's pretty telling, then, that most reviews here from those that have watched the whole show have given it a better score than those elements perhaps deserve.

On a surface level, this is a weird combination of a half-assed sports anime that's more about sportsmanship than actually playing sport, and a sentient mecha show that dips into the ethics of robotics. Kinda. If you like the talking, feeling kind of robots, this is going to be very up your alley.

The run-of-the-mill sports championship content of this show is underpinned by a deeper, weirdly darker narrative about old robots being retired and used for war. Perhaps inadvertently, this intrigue is coupled with a surprisingly effective framing of our enigmatic protagonist Magnum Ace that starts suspenseful, turns into something deeply interesting, and is concluded with an arc that breaks open the consequences of that mystery and interrogates his character, using him as a metaphor for the moral basis of the show. Iron Leaguer is not well written on a moment-to-moment basis, but over its 52-episode run this throughline is bewilderingly well-executed.

The rest of the main cast, for the most part, spend their focus episodes being interesting and endearing and then fade into the background as soon as they're over. The plots often alternate between being cheesy and outright ridiculous, and so much of this show is unintentionally funny that it makes an amazing drinking game.

The show sucks. But it has a driving plot that works, enough interesting characters at any given time to support it, and most of all - elevating it above other lackluster old animes, imo - it has heart. Give it a chance and if it's for you, you'll see what I mean.

one of the things on the amazon jp site that caught my eye was somebody said I HAVE TO show this anime to my child. I totally agree!! good message and fun to watch.

I feel that fans of this show are crazy fans even if they haven’t seen the show in years. I can only imagine the joy the Japanese fans felt when the show finally got released to DVD 10 years after airing.

This is definitely a special anime. It’s so goood that you can tell in 1993 or 4 or whenever that they’re never going to make something this good again or rather ... i wish they would! In other words, a true classic! I am calling this a classic because of the QUALITY not because it’s old or the first anime to do x. I wish people would stop calling boring old animes as classic because it’s old. I wish people would stop saying oh it’s the nostalgia or whatever to dismiss 90s/80s anime (it basically depends on the anime). For me i remember I loved watching a bunch of anime as a child and remember they were fun. But then i watched some of those again years later after I forget all the details and then after re-watching i went what ? that’s it? i realized at that point it’s ONLY really fun for children but not for me now. It’s not a bad thing necessarily. Some pass that test, some don’t. it’s pretty obvious whether it does or not. LET ME TELL you that this anime shines now and then. I would guess that when I was a child I wasn’t drawn to this anime… you know robots + sports screams shounen anime. I probably watched on a whim and then realized the show is actually REALLY good. I feel like there’s no such thing as I hate x genre in anime. I think it means you haven’t a seen a good anime in that genre. That’s another reason why I think it’s special. I hate shonen anime and this one is if you try to categorize it from the nature of the show but it’s so gooooooood. Whenever say ugh this anime went all shonen on me I mean that in the worst way possible lol… ie the end of kurenai. despite that there are “shonen” anime that I do like.

I feel like this anime could only be done via anime and that too adds to the specialness of the anime. If it was 26 eps, it wouldn’t be as good, if it was live action that would be really difficult lol… For nodame cantabile I was thinking how the animation is not that anime and so it’s not as expressive as iron leaguer when it comes to facial expression or any type of expression.. they kept the instrument playing animation to a minimum? for obvious reasons. I was thinking what’s the point of making this into an anime?? I thought the drama was better… I REALLY loved the facial expressions and other stuff they did for expression in iron leaguer so it made me think of this.

I love the message of the show. I love how it doesn’t come off forced or cheesy as it has in other anime shows especially the kids shows (wedding peach…) . i love how even though it’s a kids show it can definitely enjoyed by adults. few children’s shows can also be enjoyed by adults and this is one of them. There’s also mystery and surprises. There’s parts that I LOVE… those scenes where x finds about y’s secret or x learns the truth about y. While i was watching i was so curious as to how the character would react and what they would say and now that i’ve seen it, i want to see it again lol.

random thought while I was watching. I was thinking “hey since ryuuken is the karate leaguer he’s like asian so does he have the smallest eyes?” but his eyes looked big in this scene so eh to that silly theory.

I further confirmed the specialness of the anime when I read the interviews by the producers on the official site and how they had all this inspiration from real baseball players and more and were having fun and working hard to make it (like the animators). Also one of them said that this show is for children but they also want people of other ages to watch… he went on to say that overly making it from a child’s pov isn’t a children’s anime. rather, anime that can be enjoyed by adults and old people and children are true children anime. They had no CG back then 😦 but i wonder if the show would look like shit if they used CG…After i finished watching it i really wanted to read interviews. there’s interviews on the official website but I want more. I was thinking if they had interviews or something in anime magazines in the 90s… like i want to read those tooooo. also I felt like reading other fans thoughts… well the japanese fans.

there’s no romance but there’s bromance. in fact you could watch it from a a dirty yaoi fangirl pov lol. there are scenes or lines that could be interpreted like that. I definitely watched from that point of view from time to time lol. i also watched from a serious pov too. Magnum x windy forever ❤ ! lol. IRON LEAUGER is so much more moe than the anime nowadays that try so hard… AND FAIL. It reminds me of some of the realllly trashy american singers that think they’re “sexy” or they think they have to be trashy or almost naked (naked as possible) to be sexy.. they don’t seem to understand that that’s not necessary. I’ve seen time it and time again on immotral song or even in k-pop that it’s possible to be classy and sexy at the same time. it’s so oversexualized in america.

there’s comedy too. it’s smidge of comedy but when they put it in here and there with the animation or situation or a line that put a smile on my face or made me chuckle. it’s so well done because of the characters/character designs and the whole set-up. there isn’t a lot of comedy, BUT none of the comedy fails. the point of the show isn’t comedy anyway but the comedy in it is 5/5 lol. The just completes the show~

so in that way there’s cuteness and moe ( I moed out sometimes lol). the animes now a days try way too hard to the point where the show is boring as hell unless you’re a creepy otaku or they have NO class or it’s so obvious they’re trying so hard. I really want those otakus to watch this anime. for this show that kind of stuff is effortless and those little moments of moe and cuteness is to die for. I LOVED it when magnum winked lol. nowadays the moe is getting really creepy or boring or way too maniac or plain tasteless or too… much ie borderline softcore porno/hentai/whatever you call it. i feel like the moe here occurred naturally or it came off naturally as a result of all the hard-work they put into show rather than like using moe to cover their asses which is a noticeable trend in anime right now. I like the word bromance more than yaoi and i don’t know what yaoi really means anyways (how far do they go lol). they’re robots anyhooooo. so i feel like the bromance is all innocent and fun and if you want to think all twisted and whatnot draw weird fanart go ahead~

I love the animation. the character designs kick ass. For example, the inning on magnum’s back is so CUTE lol. I gotta pause and stare at everyone’s designs lol. one time they zoomed into their shoes/feet. they were all so unique and cute lolz. no seriously i need to inundate this post with the ADORABLE CHARACTER DEISGNS. some of them are BADASS of course but I can still see the cuteness in the badass designs tooooooooo. that’s another reason why this show is so awesome. It has so much going on for it.

The human character designs are good. i was reading in the interview somebody drew the humans asked the producer or somebody is this alright. whaddya think? so i could tell they were being
particular with it. if you think ruri is ugly or whatever then i guess you can since she’s a normal girl. they show a movie star in one ep and that movie star was really pretty. so i think it’s fine ruri isn’t as pretty as the movi star. i dont’ tihnk ruri ugly though personally. I think the girl designs that are overly moed up are ugly actually if anything… .not to mention not a smidge of originality. it reminds me of south korean plastic surgery epidemic. NOSE, EYES, JAW-LINE, FAT-DISTRIBUTION. wtf

The action/animation was intense and exciting and they definitely planned it out well. The beginning of the series was sorta normal but as things progressed the animation got more intense. I really mean it as intense and exciting. that’s the only way I can describe it. don’t worry it’s not a mediocre sports/shonen (no seriously what is up with the crap people proclaim as epic being the boring shit in the world?) anime. the games are exciting, i was saying they're screwed every other episode lol. that’s what makes it interesting. plus the episodes where the game should be most exciting really is exciting… you don’t have to worry about quality when it comes to that. It was awesome. I had a blast watching those episodes because there’s moments where I’m like omg what’s gonna happen/omg i can’t believe this happened/omg how’s it gonna end/omg i can’t believe it’s ending like this/ lol. it’s a lot of omg’s like every couple minutes??? I found it fun and enjoyable to watch… and that’s what makes someone want to recommend a certain anime to another person because you want to pass on your enjoyment and hope or think that they’ll enjoy it as well.

I love the facial expressions they did with the robots. it’s so expressive. When I was reading the interview, they had separate people for separate things like a person was in charge of facial expression, another for posing etc etc. so I totally LOVED that when I watched. It’s so well done and i could tell they put effort into minuscule stuff like that even before i read the interview. there’s stuff I notice or feel or whatever while watch and reading the interview just affirms that or explains what I was feeling and love how it goes both ways like that. i really really feel what the creators put in to this … their sweats, tears, soul, love for sports, etc,etc. going back to what i was saying i loved what they did with their eyes. I thought it was interesting how their mouths are pink inside like humans lol. Not to mention SUPER CUTE!!! one aspect of the show that seems sorta contradicting is what makes it so good and special and unique. that is how the robots are metal so they shouldn’t be humanly but actually they’re more human than the humans lol.

I also love how the thicklines add to the menace(?) /intensity/impact

The people who made this anime mentioned in the interview on the official website how they had trouble with consistently drawing the characters and robots the same in terms of their relative heights/size. I think they argued about it and got frustrated lol. I think it’s cute and it’s anime so it’s all GOOD. it adds to the enjoyment in my opinion.. spot the quirks!

CHARACTERS

I wonder if there’s a main character? Is it Magnum Ace? I mean everything is connected to him. If he’s not, then there’s no main character. Anyways I loved all the characters. They’re ALL likable and have their cute character designs. I loved the way top joy talked with the nes and the intonation. not sure if english speakers can tell that his intonation is a little off because i remember when i was wtaching lovely complex with zero japanese studying i couldn’t really hear a significant difference from the way these characters talked vs characters in any other anime but if i were to watch it now i would be like oh it’s so kansai-ben lol. Anyways I loved SEAGULL… the voice acting, the way they drew him, the angle, the pose, etc, and his story or whatever scene with him had me glued me to the screen. THEY utilized the side characters really well.

VOICE ACTING

I loved all the voice acting. everyone fitted the character. MAGNUM’s voice is PERFECTTTTTTTT. I liked all the voice actor’s voices… like i gotta look up what other anime they’re in. I loved the recycling of the Voice actors too lol. like the voice actor of someone on silver castle ends up voicing the baddie’s ___ voice. it’s interesting. actually out of the gold brothers i liked gold mask the best because of his voice… but i like all of ’em so much! sometimes i wanted to know the voice actor of some really minor person in the episode but then when i chcked out the credits they credit main and minor but they don’t include e single character that was in the episode. so i asked on chiebukuro who did mihaeru’s voice because i loved her voice and they were like…well one person replied that it was this voice actor who plays another characteron iron leaguer… so maybe that’s why they don’t credit a character because they recycle the voice actors and we’re supposed to know which one did that minor character (sometimes the va is reall ygood at changing their voices to play different characters so it’s sorta hard. do they still do this practice now a days ? lol.

and of course i LOVEd THE BGM. when i saw them use the bgm in the first ep I was scared they might overuse it but they didn’t overuse it at all imo… and i watched eps in a row etc etc… you know how some tv dramas have something special going on for it especially the bgm like hanazakari no kimtiachi e or JIN or this… you can tell they’re putting their all into it the shows.

So I didn’t watch the previews till after i saw the episode because I want to be as surprised as much as possible. But after certain episodes I was thinking even if i watched the preview i couldn’t have predicted this lol. there’s some good surprises

MUSIC

The opening is awesome. it totally matches the show. It’s definitely good enough to be used throughout the whole run. as you watch the show you realize how amazing the opening song is. I was wondering for the part where they sing IRON LEAGUER with japanese pronounciation of aian riiiiiiiii gaaaaaaaaaa….it sounds like they’re saying eiennnnn leaguer. it doe snot sound like aiannnnnn riiiiiiii gaaaaaaaaaa like it should. in the show they say iron leaguer a lot and they aian riii gaaa. maybe they’re doing that on purpose cause you know eien means forever,eternal. I never reallllllly got why he’s saying it like eiennnnnn riiiiii gaaa.

the ending song is really goood, i love the message. i love hearing the seiyuu’s of characters sing the song. here it is ruri’s seiyuu.

the second ending song is silly lol. the lyrics are simple and fitting. i was gonna watch it once then i realized that they’re changing the lyrics up for the song. it’s so funny hearing magnum ace sing such a silly song.

they changed the animation for the op and let me say that the second opening is rather intense. in fact i couldn’t even tell wtf was going on at some parts because of the credits so i definitely gotta go check out the creditles version. yes they deserve their credit but we can’t see the animator’s work… thank god for creditless opening.

WEAKNESS

If I HAD to bring up the weakness it would be this certain arc … one reason is because after it was right after a couple REALLY REALLY interesting/INTENSE/EXCITING eps (it literally makes me go omg who knew sports anime could get this good……. ) . the eps were sorta filler-type but then they technically aren’t… and the way that arc ended was kickass AMAZING so that’s why i wrote if i HAD To bring up a ~~ but I still liked that arc as a whole. in this arc there’s eps that are better than others. another thing is towards the end, you’ve seen all the tricks they pull and whatever so it’s not as fresh as in the beginning… but you know the last game was exciting so.. no complaints. I never felt like the games were ever stretched out… perfect ratio of action/dialogue/announcer”s dialogue/talking to self time/robots communicating to each other via telepathy or technology or whatever.. stuff became more big and intense as it went on… i guess that’s the shonen factor but i LOVED IT. like i said before i hate shonen anime b.c. i instinctively hate shonen anime because i ain’t a shonen. but if it’s a really well-done shonen like this I’m all for it, i feel it.

but you know something i wished happened was there was more character development in the last 10-15 episodes as in OTHER characters but then i’m not sure if that would’ve taken away from the character they were developing during those episodes. But you know what i also wish they developed the character they were developing during those eps more like his _____s (I’m not gonna fill that in, those who watched know what comes before the s, hint PLURAL). they gave us something but i wish it was more. that’s selfish request that will never come true lolz.

a fine 52-episode anime that is WELL-DONE.!!! it makes me lament the animes now-a-days that are 13-eps and are suckfest from beginning to end or it could’ve been better if it was longer or try to “move” the audience even though they didn’t develop the characters etc etc. but i loved zetsubou sensei and i think 13 eps was fine for that since the second season was not as interesting and the third season was unwatchable. it all depends on the show and how well done it is etc etc etc.

so it’s completely subbed for chinese and korean (thank god for these lol). it’s done partially for english. This anime has HEART… It's very HEART-WARMING.

oh and the ova is not good. i don’t know it has holes… i don’t understand the point of it.are ovas that are released after the tv series always bad…??

I was so sad when i finished watching the series. the ending is good and satisfying but i’m sad that’ it’s over. no i donn’t want to it to go on endlessly like naruto. that would make the show turn into 1/10… I sorta confirmed this with the OVA. The only thing positive about the ova I can say is they came up with some interesting robots with the designs (creative stuff… ) and animation of course. I think that’s how one feels after being absorbed and watching something really fun and significant. plus i can’t un-watch this. I gotta wait many years before rewatching lol…. i already know the story and surprises etc but like I said I LOVED some of those scenes. I don’t understand what’s the point of OVAs. i was thinking of the word masturbation with OVAs… because the only people who are going to watch it are FANS not people who you are trying to hoook on the show like with anime tv series. so the people making it know you want to see it or buy it and they know that you loved the series. so they probably can tell what you loved about the series and try to include it in the OVA but it’s not the same thing because that stuff was happening in the series while it was going on (in that atmosphere that was built from past eps and whatnot), while now in the OVA it’s happening after the series “concluded” so… it’s like… novelty effect is worn off and it’s NOT the same thing. as much as i love the characters and the world the anime is set in, I enjoyd it in the ANIME series and i’ll re-live it by re-watching the episodes instead of some weird OVA that’s trying to recreate that??? I want to enjoy the real deal 100% iron leaguer world, not some half-bajed iron leaguer world. but the thing is if the series is really good, usually a good story is told and the ends are tied. so if you gotta something afterwards, you gotta create some friction, and problems or introduce something new etc. otherwise it’s a filler episode of the series ?? so basically the OVA has the potential to destroy what the tv series has done because of what an ova is… something that concluded beautifully gets unconcluded with whatever new thing they come up with. but anyways i loved the series and i dont’ want to talk shit about the iron leaguer ovas. i’m saying, i loved the SERIES but i didn’t like the ovas. I was thinking after i watched the series or the OVAs of stuff I want to know more about with characters and whatnot… so I was thinking maybe the OVA could’ve been better if they told us about the details that fans want to know about the iron leaguers and the story. BUT THEN I READ that there’s some LD (what is that?) that was released and how they wrote the robot’s biography or something on it for all 7 main robots.