Tag: Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens anime cover art featuring main characters
Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens Cover Art

Overview

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens is an anime about a group of hitmen and various other underworld professionals who happen to be on a baseball team called the Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens. Most of the series takes place in the city of Fukuoka where a large percentage of the population work as hitmen or have other, similar professions.

In this city, one hitman stands above the rest, the Niwaka Samurai. The Niwaka Samurai is more of an urban legend among hitmen than an actual person and he has earned the nickname, “the hitman hitman” due to his tendency to take jobs involving the assassinations of other hitmen.

He’s also called the Niwaka Samurai because of the mask he wears and the katana he uses to kill.

The general plot of this anime is that a ragtag group of underworld professionals team up to take down one of the largest crime syndicates in the city. There are also various sub-plot lines about some of the main and supporting characters.

Characters

Lin Xianming is the protagonist of the series. He’s a hitman who’s originally from China, but he moved to Fukuoka city in order to make enough money as a hitman to go back home and save his sister from her life of poverty. The most defining feature of Lin is that he cross-dresses and so his appearance starkly contrasts with his quick temper.

The other main character of the series is Zenji Banba. He runs his own freelance detective agency and has connections with many underworld professionals. Baseball is his favorite sport and he often makes baseball references when talking about anything.

I’ll just go over the characters featured in the cover art for the anime so next up is Enokida. He’s a professional hacker who often helps Banba and Lin with their work and various other tasks. Lin refers to him as “Mushroom” on account of his hairstyle.

Enokida also developed a small GPS tracker disguised as a black widow spider which is frequently used throughout the series. Despite the red back on the spider making it stand out more, Enokida defends this aesthetic choice by saying it looks cooler.

Saitou is another hitman who worked for the infamous Murder inc. for a short time before realizing that he doesn’t have what it takes to be a hitman. His main role in the series is to be the bait and is often used as such by Enokida without Saitou’s knowledge.

The last two characters featured on the cover art are Jirou and Misaki. Jirou is a gay man who works as an avenger. This means that he gets hired to take revenge out on people. So if someone got punched in the face, they would hire Jirou to find the person who committed the crime and punch them in the face as payback.

Misaki is an elementary school student who was adopted by Jirou. She helps Jirou with his avenger business typically by being part of his disguise. Nobody suspects someone with an elementary school girl is going to be a threat.

Both Jirou and Misaki match in that they each wear only one strap of their overalls which I thought was a nice touch.

Lin punching Yamato (from the anime Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens)
Lin punching Yamato

Conclusion

When Hakata Tonkotsu Ramens first started, I wasn’t sure if it was going to be any good. The general plot being focused around a city of hitmen seemed like it was too far-fetched, but it turned out to be good. In the end, I would give it a 7/10.

Also, while the show is about hitmen and underworld crime on the outside, it’s also very much about baseball which is different from anything else I’ve watched before.

However, I think the thing I liked the most about the series was having the same voice actor who voices Eren Yeager from Attack on Titan voice the cross-dressing hitman, Lin. The two characters act pretty similarly which is part of why I liked that so much.