Conventional shounen anime adaptations always start off with a defined set of archetypal characters, with which genre fans are quite familiar. The character gallery generally consists of the chosen one, the antithetical frenemy figure, the oddball of a character who shines in the direst situation, the emotional support, along with some other stereotypes, and how the respective content chooses to portray the emotional complexity of each of these archetypes is what makes all the difference.

However, despite initiating its journey right from the shounen genre, in the later portions of the Baki series, the genre conventions are heightened to the point of ridiculousness, which is a sign of the self-aware nature of the source material itself. In terms of characterization, too, the journey is on a particularly set course with only the protagonist, Baki, being the focal point along with his father/prime adversary, Yujiro, which is a far cry from conventional multi-character arc animes.