10 Best Anime Fights Of All Time
8. Spike Vs Vicious - Cowboy Bebop
The episode that cemented Cowboy Bebop's place among the all time classics, and the fight scene that defined one of the medium's all time great rivalries, the fight between Spike and Vicious in episode 5: Ballad Of Fallen Angels, is short, but truly something to behold.
While the fight lasts maybe 5 minutes if you include the shootout with Vicious' goons (which we do) it's packed with so much symbolism and thematic subtext that it makes the fight feel grand and epic while just being a gunfight in an abandoned church.
The setup is that after 5 episodes following the lovably flippant bounty hunter Spike Spiegel, we finally get a look into his backstory. And it is NOT fun, with him being a former hitman for a large crime syndicate, and having an old buddy named Vicious who wants to kill him for yet unexplained reasons. Vicious kidnaps Spike's part time bounty hunting, full time freeloader buddy Faye Valentine, goading him into a confrontation Spike has been running from for years.
This wouldn't be the last time these two would come to blows, and it technically ends in a draw. But a fight this gorgeously shot and this thematically rich cannot be left off this list.