As a genre, shonen has a wide variety of tropes that it rarely strays away from. One of those is the existence of rival protagonists who often find themselves butting heads with one another. Almost every popular shonen has an example of this, be it Sasuke and Naruto or Vegeta against Goku.
While those are the more well-known battles, there have been plenty of other shonen protagonists who have come to blows with one another, sometimes even without a rivalry attached.
10 Street Fighter 2 Has Ryu & Ken Battle Each Other Because Of Bison’s Powers
No Street Fighter adaptation would be complete without Ryu and Ken having a moment where the two threw down with each other. They are both eternal rivals in the same way that Vegeta and Goku are.
In the Street Fighter 2 anime, Ken was controlled by Bison’s psycho power, forcing him to see Ryu as the enemy. Rather than fighting back, Ryu appealed to Ken’s humanity while his friend wailed at him. It took some time, but he managed to finally get through.
9 Rune Soldier Louie Had Jeanie Attack Louie Over A Perceived Gender Slight
Rune Soldier Louie isn’t a well-known shonen anime, nor is it one that would wow viewers if it was watched. It does have one of the more interesting reasons for protagonists fighting.
Jeanie thought Louie came back to save her because she was a woman, a slight she couldn’t stand for. Given that Louie wasn’t the smartest pea in the pod, she likely wasn’t that far off on his reasoning. Given what had happened to Jeanie earlier in the series, she had every right to be upset over the perceived slight as well.
8 Mick Angel’s & Ryo’s Hello Is Them Shooting At Each Other
Ryo in City Hunter is a unique protagonist in shonen as he doesn’t follow any of the usual formulae. He’s more of a Han Solo type than he is a Naruto or someone similar.
As a sweeper in the city, he’s far from the world’s best guy, making it no surprise that he has an unusual way of greeting his friends. In this case, it’s Mick Angel. Rather than shaking hands like normal people, they instead unload their guns at each other, laughing it up afterward.
7 Naraku Manipulates Sango Into Going After Inuyasha
As far as manipulative villains go, Naraku is one of the best at getting the protagonists to go after each other. He did it on numerous occasions, even turning his allies against one another.
His most dastardly plot was convincing Sango that Inuyasha was the one who slaughtered everyone in her village. It led to her leading a crusade against the fox demon that nearly ended up costing her life. Thankfully, it doesn’t end up with her dead.
6 All Of The Core Characters In Gundam Wing End Up Battling With Each Other
As far as introductions to characters go, Mobile Suit Gundam Wing has one of the most unique ways of doing it. The core group of Heero Yuy, Duo Maxwell, Trowa Barton, Quatre Winner, and Chang Wufei all end up battling each other briefly before they realize they are all actually on the same side.
It’s a perfect example of why a failure to communicate can cause so many problems. At least Wufei was able to talk everyone down.
5 Dais Ability Forces The Protagonists To Battle Each Other In Ronin Warriors
Dais, one of the villains in Ronin Warriors, has the unique ability to make those around him view others as him. It’s a form of illusion and manipulation that is rather foolproof in the right hands.
It’s what Aizen did during the Kankura Town Arc, only turned all the way up to eleven. It’s hard to blame the heroes for falling for it or for battling one another. You can’t ever waste an opportunity to take out a bad guy in shonen anime.
4 Luffy & Zoro Come To Blows Because Luffy Won’t Listen To Reason
Of all the more name-brand protagonists, no one has come to blows with their allies more often than Luffy has. He’s battled almost every member of his crew at one point in time, with the fight with Usopp easily the most eye-catching.
The one that gets glossed over is his battle with Zoro during the Whiskey Peak arc, mostly because it was played for laughs. Luffy in all his wisdom, attacked Zoro because he thought the Baroque Works Agents were nice people, even as Zoro tried explaining otherwise.
3 The Entire Plot Of Samurai Champloo Is Mugen & Jin Trying To Have A Proper Fight To The Death
Jin and Mugen in Samurai Champloo are a rare example of two protagonists who wanted to fight each other after having a brief tussle in the opening episode. There was no misunderstanding or manipulation, just two samurai who wanted to test their strength against an equally strong opponent.
Not only that, the two of them wanted it to be to the death. Ironically, their climactic battle doesn’t end up happening, the two of them bonding too much by the end.
2 Alice Tries To Stop Asuna From Seeing Kirito Because She Refuses To Explain Why
Communication is always key in anything, and the clash between Asuna and Alice is proof of that. Sure, Alice is gaining feelings for Kirito by this point, but the battle isn’t fully over his love. It’s actually because Asuna refuses to explain why she needs to see Kirito, despite them being in the middle of a war.
Had Asuna just explained she was Kirito’s wife from the beginning, it’s likely the two would have never come to blows. As it stands, Alice had every right to protect the catatonic hero from a person she didn’t know.
1 Kazuma & Ryuho Could Never See Eye To Eye In Scryed
For two people who saved the world more than once, both Kazuma and Ryuho could never see eye to eye in Scryed. Every single time they come together to successfully defeat a foe, they end up at each other’s throats afterward and often come to blows.
One of their fights ends with them opening a gateway to a parallel dimension, and the series even ends with them fighting again after defeating the government. The battle is far from friendly either, a true knockdown and drag-out war.