History Manga / KenganAshura

** 滅堂, or Metsudo, contains the characters for "Overthrow/Destruction" and "Gathering/Hall". Depending how you read it, it can be translated as "Destroyer of the Order", symbolizing his upstart beginnings and monolothic stranglehold over the Association, [[spoiler: and the crumbling of that stability now that he's no longer Chairman and the previously established order of the Japanese underground is overturned.]]

* LegacyCharacter: The title of Fang of Metsudo, which belongs to the strongest fighter in Katahara Metsudo's employ. Kure Erioh is the first, and Annihilation Tournament fighter Kanoh Agito is the fifth. (Considering Metsudo's been Kengan Association chairman for ''fifty years'', this speaks a lot to the Fangs' power and durability.)

* ProWrestlingIsReal: The story is very aware of kayfabe, as are most of the characters, who treat the idea of fighting Sekibayashi Jun with actual martial arts as a joke. Sekibayashi enjoys playing up his pro wrestler imagery, including refusing to block in combat and assuming silly personas in the ring. However, he is also very happy to show his opponents that, scripted or not, he is still in extremely good shape and has a great deal of fighting skill, and with his skills as an actor, he's very capable of ObfuscatingStupidity. Another pro wrestler on Jun's team, Jose Kanzaki, demonstrates a far more agile, luchador-like style of wrestling (also in a real, no-rules fight), which proves to be just as effective as Jun's.

** Kiryu probably has the most dramatic reality check in the series in his battle against Gensai Kuroki where, despite having an unresolved rivalry with Ohma, practicing an esoteric and [[ArtisticLicenseBiology anatomy-shattering martial art]], having his own SuperMode and inventing numerous new techniques on the fly, he simply cannot stand up to a fundamentally superior opponent. Kuroki systematically dismantles his incredibly strong palm strikes piecemeal throughout the fight and shuts down all of Kiryu's improvised attempts at a comeback besides ''[[ScrewThisImOuttaHere using his own lethal palm strike to shove his heart out of the way]] just so he'd leave the match alive.'' Despite his extensive injuries, he later tries to take on Ohma while still horribly injured from the previous match, with predictable results.

* FoodPorn: Most of the fighters are ''huge'' {{Big Eater}}s due to their livestyle and needing to maintain muscle-mass and a considerable amount of attention is brought to the food they eat, which is usually plates stacked to the point of overflowing with protein. One of the most recurring [[AllThereInTheManual character profile elements]] is the character's favorite food, which is usually some dish or combination of dishes with hidden meanings to them(Liu Dongcheng for example, coming from AHouseDivided between Taiwan and Guangzhou, who's favorite dishes are Oyster Omelets and Dongpo Pork, which are housetown classics of Taiwan and Guangzhou respectively).

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: There are 32 different companies that end up participating in the Annilhation Tournament, each with their own fighter as well various other supports and employers. The number of regularly recurring characters ends up totaling somewhere around 70, and with {{Jobber}}s and only semi-recurring characters, that number is far above ''200'' by the time of ''Omega''.

* ViewersAreGoldfish: As part of a RunningGag, every single time a character appears onscreen for the first time in a chapter, their name and affiliation are listed. This includes Kazuo and Ohma, the main characters of the series. Notably, [[TropesAreTools this actually works quite well]], due to the LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters.

** Sekibayashi is a human tank who makes up for his unwillingness to block or dodge by being able to soak up an enormous amount of damage. After his win against Kiozan Takeru, he collapses from exhaustion after leaving the stadium.

** When using his "[[DangerousForbiddenTechnique Advance]]" technique, Ohma [[spoiler:is somehow able to overclock his heart, achieving a form of blood doping that gives him an immense boost in physical capabilities]].

* TheClan: The Kure Clan, a large family of assassins-for-hire who can be distinguished by their black sclera. ''Omega'' introduces the Wu family, which seems to be related to the Kure in some way.
* CombatPragmatist: The vast majority of fighters in the series could give a rat's ass about honour and will do whatever it takes to win, dirty, underhanded or otherwise. Early on in the series, Tokita Ohma proves just this when he delivers a GroinAttack to Ivan Karaev, noting that the man's high kicks left his defences wide open.
%%** As a master of silent killing, Muteba Gizenga exemplifies this, especially during his fight with Meguro Masaki.

* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: The series' best fighters are capable of feats such as [[SuperStrength punching through concrete]], [[AwesomenessByAnalysis being able to defend against bullets by reading the shooter's movements]] or [[SuperReflexes killing them before they can shoot]] and [[SuperToughness withstanding grueful blows that would have killed a normal person instantly]] by [[WeakButSkilled dispersing the force through their bodies by going limp at the time of impact]] or [[MusclesAreMeaningful flexing their entire body in response to an incoming attack.]]. However, aside from a few genetic anomalies such as Gozo (thoroughbred of two athletes who could stand up at ten days old and dominating track and field for 3 decades), Wakatsuki (born with 52x denser and numerous muscle fibers), Julius (responds incredibly well to lethal doses of steroids to become a medical miracle) and several old families like the Kure Clan who selectively breed with fighters and athletes and train their children from birth to be fighters or hitmen, they are all normal humans from incredibly different backgrounds whose extreme lifestyles and sheer dedication to training themselves and becoming the strongest allows them to accomplish these incredible feats. Even with the anomalies, their modified [=DNA=] isn't actually enough to realistically explain the feats they can accomplish (e.g. Julius is able to pull a racing car that's moving in the opposite direction at full speed without the chains he's wrapped in even managing to dig through his skin), but the series also exploits this well for a larger-than-life effect.

* {{Determinator}}: Pretty much every self-identified fighter ''will not stop fighting'' no matter how injured they get or how many bones they break in the process of proving themselves the strongest. They only go down when they either die or pass out.

* CoolVsAwesome: The series' specialty: Some of the matchups are between people of ''wildly'' different backgrounds who would never get the option to throw hands with other martial arts; One of the ''least'' unbelievable ones is a Featherweight Kung Fu master taking on a [[WrestlerInAllOfUs Sambist]] one-and-a-half times his own size [[spoiler: and convincingly beating said Sambist's ass.]]; In particular, one battle between a sumo and professional wrestler causes the entire audience to go absolutely bananas at getting to watch such a serendipitous (there's a major element of chance at how the Annihilation Tournament bracket was determined) match-up.

* CoolVsAwesome: A battle between a sumo and professional wrestler causes the entire audience to go absolutely bananas at getting to watch such a serendipitous (there's a quantity of chance at how the Annihilation Tournament brackets are determined) match-up.

* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: The series' best fighters are capable of feats such as [[SuperStrength punching through concrete]], [[AwesomenessByAnalysis being able to defend against bullets by reading the shooter's movements]] or [[SuperReflexes killing them before they can shoot]] and [[SuperToughness withstanding grueful blows that would have killed a normal person instantly]] by [[WeakButSkilled dispersing the force through their bodies by going limp at the time of impact]] or [[MusclesAreMeaningful flexing their entire body in response to an incoming attack.]]. However, aside from a few genetic anomalies such as Gozo (thoroughbred of two athletes who could stand up at ten days old and dominating track and field for 3 decades), Wakatsuki (born with 52x denser and numerous muscle fibers), Julius (responds incredibly well to lethal doses of steroids to become a medical miracle) and several old families like the Kure Clan who selectively breed with fighters and athletes and train their children from birth to be fighters or hitmen, they are all normal humans from incredibly different or extreme backgrounds whose sheer dedication to training themselves and becoming the strongest allows them to accomplish these incredible feats. Even with the anomalies, their modified [=DNA=] isn't actually enough to realistically explain the feats they can accomplish (e.g. Julius is able to pull a racing car that's moving in the opposite direction at full speed without the chains he's wrapped in even managing to dig through his skin), but the series also exploits this well for a larger-than-life effect.

** [[spoiler: Likewise, although Koga might be talented, six months of hellish training isn't enough to bring him up to the level required to participate in the Kengan-Purgatory Tournament, discounting the knife wounds he took.]]

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: There are 32 different companies that end up participating in the Annilhation Tournament, each with their own fighter as well various other supports and employers. The number of regularly recurring characters ends up totaling somewhere around 70, and with {{Jobbers}} and only semi-recurring characters, that number is far above ''200'' by the time of ''Omega''.

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: There are 32 different companies that end up participating in the Annilhation Tournament, each with their own fighter as well various other supports and employers. The number of recurring characters ends up totaling somewhere around 70.

* AdaptationInducedPlotHole: A minor case related to some of the refs from the manga being AdaptedOut. In the manga, referee decisions to call a match aren't always consistent (for example, sometimes the match is stopped the moment one fighter goes unconscious, while other matches continue on); however, this explained away by different refs canonically having distinct styles of refereeing. This is not the case in the anime, which uses only one ref—Yamamoto—making him just seem extremely inconsistent with his calls.

* AdaptationInducedPlotHole: A minor case related to some of the refs from the manga being AdaptedOut. In the manga, referee decisions to call a match aren't always consistent (for example, sometimes the match is stopped the moment one fighter goes unconscious, while other matches continue on), which is readily explained by different matches having different referees with their own predilections. However, they are all condensed into one ref, Yamamoto, in the anime, making him just seem extremely inconsistent with his calls.

** Himuro derides Nikaido Ren for being a "playboy-type" despite being one of the biggest playboys in the series and mocks the match between Nikaido vs. Setsuna for being a {{Bishonen}} battle. His friends, Kaneda and Okubo, can only stare at him, speechless at his self-condemning remarks.

* {{Leitmotif}}: With the exception of (So far) Wakatsuki and Murobuchi, whose fight was largely cut, [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laAq30ByTk8 each of the fighters]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SM9wjZRmsHw have their own theme songs]] that play during their introductions at the start their matches.

* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: The series' best fighters are capable of feats such as [[SuperStrength punching through concrete]], [[AwesomenessByAnalysis being able to defend against bullets by reading the shooter's movements]] or [[SuperReflexes killing them before they can shoot]] and [[SuperToughness withstanding grueful blows that would have killed a normal person instantly]] by [[WeakButSkilled dispersing the force through their bodies by going limp at the time of impact]] or [[MusclesAreMeaningful flexing their entire body in response to an incoming attack.]]. However, aside from a few genetic anomalies such as Wakatsuki (born with 52x denser and numerous muscle fibers), Julius (responds incredibly well to lethal doses of steroids to become a medical miracle) and several old families like the Kure Clan who selectively breed with fighters and athletes and train their children from birth to be fighters or hitmen, they are all normal humans whose sheer dedication to training themselves and becoming the strongest and accomplish these incredible feats. Even with the anomalies, their modified [=DNA=] isn't actually enough to realistically explain the feats they can accomplish (e.g. Julius is able to pull a racing car that's moving in the opposite direction at full speed without the chains he's wrapped in even managing to dig through his skin), but the series also exploits this well for a larger-than-life effect.

* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: The series' best fighters are capable of feats such as [[SuperStrength punching through concrete]], [[SuperSpeed reacting in time to defend against bullets]] and [[SuperToughness withstanding blows that would have otherwise killed a normal person]]. However, aside from a few genetic anomalies such as Wakatsuki (born with super dense muscles), Julius (pumps himself with steroids to build muscles) and the Kure Clan (uses genetic breeding to develop stronger fighters), they are all normal humans whose sheer dedication to training themselves and becoming the strongest allow them to accomplish these incredible feats. Even with the anomalies, their modified [=DNA=] isn't actually enough to realistically explain the feats they can accomplish (e.g. Julius is able to pull a racing car that's moving in the opposite direction at full speed without the chains he's wrapped in even managing to dig through his skin).