Written by A. J. Marchisello

Directed by Gino Nichele

Rating: Awful

Guts Man tricks his way into Dr. Light’s home, then tries to get into his lab to steal something. The redesign of Guts Man is creative yet nonsensical, as if it was settled upon during committee so as not to confuse real little kids, though he’s still decent as a believable character. This is also supposed to be an episode that builds up the show’s underlying myth arc, but the attempt is ruined by it awkwardly ramming through its aesop and it being unable to decide if robots can or cannot eat human food.

Good Points

– Sgt. Night retrieving old robots and giving them new “purpose” is straight out of Dr. Wily’s playbook, though it still doesn’t make him much of a mastermind since Guts Man is such low-hanging fruit.

– Alright, fine, Guts Man’s theme as an Italian cafe remix is rather charming.

– Mega Man doesn’t want Guts Man’s weapon because it might compel him to eat garbage, which is a legitimate concern given how his variable weapon system works in this show.

Stupid Points

– Guts Man looks perfectly intact when Sgt. Night finds him, even though he’s in a junk pile and at the end of his life. The “decomposed to perfection” food in Dr. Light’s bio-electric generator is perfectly intact too. Turns out the show’s inability to show damage to anything undermines more than its fights, but those are undermined too! None of the kitchen is ever damaged by Mega Man fighting Guts Man, and Guts Man never damages the door to Dr. Light’s lab despite his best efforts, even though he’s a super strong robot. Guess Sgt. Night was wrong about him being powerful, but hey, he’s always been a terrible mastermind.

– Guts Man is now a robot who eats a lot and attacks with belly drums, which is such a stupefying misunderstanding of his name that you’d think this show was written by the same team responsible for Captain N: The Game Master. –actually, no, it gets even weirder than that when you realize that Fire Man and Guts Man have swapped jobs. Fire Man is now the construction robot and Guts Man is now the waste disposal robot. Why not use a robot like Junk Man or Dust Man instead of Guts Man?

– Dr. Light pointing out that robots don’t eat organic food actually makes no sense given the context of this entire show, where robots are haphazardly treated as identical to humans, and indeed Guts Man quickly proves him wrong. Aki was doing it long before with his school lunches though. Heck, Suna even tries to get Aki to do it AGAIN with the food paste Guts Man invents. Isn’t Dr. Light supposed to be the world’s greatest expert on robotics?

– Dr. Light having never seen Guts Man before or any robot like him raises a lot of questions. It makes it sound like Sgt. Night is so great at being sneaky and wily that he’s even hidden his overarching plan from the show’s writers.

– The overall theme about trusting your gut instincts is painfully awkward and a lame excuse for Suna to act stupid for an entire episode.

– And to cap it all off, the word “hangry” is uttered.