After-Thoughts Review: My Hero Academia Season 1

Okay, so before I begin this review, I want to get some things out of the way. First of all, this series is only one season long right now and, even ignoring the second season announcement at the end of the last episode, the way the plot is laid out, this is not a series that is going to be resolved in just one or two seasons. This series is set up right from the get-go to be a long running shonen which, while not a bad thing by itself, does mean that there's a lot of room for anything I say here to become resolved or otherwise outdated. Any problem I cite here could be resolved in the next arc, positives might vanish, and any speculations I list here may end up wrong depending on the writer's behest. So, for those of you reading this, take what I say here with a grain of salt.

Secondly, I have not read the manga, I've only seen the first season of the anime and because of that I will not be taking manga information into account. That's not to say that that isn't important, just that I can't use what I don't know about.

With that out of the way, let's get rolling.

This series revolves around a main character known as Izuku Midoria, a young boy who wants to be a superhero. However, unlike the rest of us who grew up on DC and Marvel Comics, Izuku lives in a world where superpowers are common, and heroes and villains are every day things. The thing with Izuku, though, is that he does not have a superpower, at least not initially. It's established in the first episode that there's a particular physiology that superhumans have that can tell you whether they have powers, and Izuku simply doesn't have it. And because all this takes place in the first episode, none of this is particularly spoilerific.

Izuku, as a normal human, is discriminated against by most others around him for not having any superpowers, or quirks as the series likes to call them. Though it does come from pretty much everyone as far as I can tell, the worst of this harassment comes from a boy named Katsuki Bakugo, who not only has a really powerful quirk but also an innate talent and skill with it.

For those of you who aren't seeing the parallels quite yet, these two characters and their roles are quite similar to Naruto Uzumaki and Sasuke Uchiha from Naruto. Allow me to demonstrate with Naruto and Izuku first:

• Naruto and Izuku both suffer from some form of discrimination for some quality that they have no control over, the nine-tailed fox named Kurama for Naruto, and a lack of a quirk for Izuku.
• Both want to be among an esteemed position in order to gain respect from those around them, for Naruto it's the position as Hokage, and for Izuku it's All-Might's position as the symbol of peace.
• Both acquire some ability that they did not initially have that they will learn to rely upon in later arcs, for Naruto the Shadow Clone technique, for Izuku it's All-Might's Power "One for All."
• Both gain a mentor of relatively high status who takes a liking to them and teaches them for their own independent reasons, in the forms of Jiraiya and All-Might respectively.
• Both of them gain new friends and comrades after demonstrating some quality to them as well as more support from those around them.

There are some differences that are noteworthy but I'll get to those in a while. For now, let's compare Sasuke and Bakugo.

• Both are ultra-talented highly praised members of their respective environments. Though these reasons differ somewhat, they both are nonetheless highly respected.
• Both of them take issue with their respective protagonists, though there is a bit of a caveat with this one. At these two respective points in the series, Sasuke's relationship to Naruto was relatively mild. Bearing in mind, by episode 13 of Naruto, we haven't started the Chunin Exams yet, so there are aspects of Naruto and Sasuke's stories we don't see yet. At this stage, while Sasuke does definitely look down on Naruto, he doesn't really have any grudge against him or any reason to hate him other than he's loud and obnoxious. And while there is one particular panel in the beginning of the Tazuna arc that puzzled me because of how out of character it is for Sasuke, even this never gets to the level of aggression that Bakugo shows for Izuku. Just to give you an idea of how drastic this change is, in the first episode we see Sasuke's design and that's about it, nothing noteworthy in terms of behavior, while Bakugo tells Izuku to kill himself, that is noteworthy enough that they felt the need to show it in the first episode.
• Both characters have a fire-based power. Though these applications differ, to the point that Sasuke can only shoot fire out of his mouth, while Bakugo can ignite his hands, both have fire-based abilities, which would not be noteworthy by itself if it weren't combined with the other characteristics.
• Sasuke and Bakugo both develop a bit of insecurity around their respective protagonists when they see how strong they've gotten in a short span of time, and while this doesn't happen to Sasuke until the events leading up to the Valley of the End, in Bakugo we see it take place relatively early and also quite explosively.
• Bakugo and Sasuke get the highest marks in their respective establishments, Sasuke the highest score in his Graduating class, though it is shared with Shino and Ino due to the cap, and Bakugo has the highest score of anyone taking the entrance exam to UA. Though it's worth mentioning that this doesn't include Todoroki, who was recommended and didn't take the entrance exam as far as I can tell, but we'll get to him.

Now, there are some differences in these respective comparisons. However, the nature of these differences is something to be considered. For example:

• Izuku is not actively trying to surpass Bakugo the way Naruto was with Sasuke, Izuku is simply trying to be the best and overcoming Bakugo is simply along that line. Similarly, Sasuke had no real interest in his rivalry with Naruto until the Chunin exams hit where he actually voices it during the elimination round.
• Likewise, Bakugo is quite aggressive with Izuku to the point that he actively tries to harm him, Naruto never gets that violent but he does have a similar drive. Both of them have similar ambitions, though for completely different reasons.
• It's also worth noting that Izuku has black hair and eyes like Sasuke, while Bakugo's hair is a strawberry blond and and his eyes are distinctive as well, more like Naruto than Sasuke.

This is one of those instances where the characters they're based on have relevant characteristics shuffled to make them seem a lot less similar than they are. Though I don't want to make too much of this a comparison to Naruto, as Naruto seems to have similarities to other Shonen as well, I will say that there are a lot of characters from My Hero Academia that can be compared to characters in Naruto.

Iida's appearance, stern but polite demeanor, and speed-based and leg-based fighting style are relatively similar to Rock Lee, Asui's animal type power is relatable to Kiba Inuzuka, Yaoyarozu's ability to spawn matter and the relative skill it requires is quite similar to Tenten's skill with weapons, and Aizawa's eye-based abilities, strain, overall skill he possesses, relaxed to a fault demeanor, and even his unorthodox testing systems are relatively similar to Kakashi Hatake.

So, needless to say, there's quite a lot here that we've seen before even if not all of it is from Naruto. That said, there is good and bad that can be said about that based on what we have, not necessarily just bad.

The good is that, at least the anime, has yet to make any mistakes that Naruto has. Though Naruto might have had more solid stuff going for it at the 13 episode mark, My Hero Academia has prepared for the long term a lot better. We also have a lot more characters with a lot more defined traits than Naruto did for the short time-span. Just for comparison's sake, at the end of the 13th episode, we've already established motivations, personalities, and/or powers for Izuku, Bakugo, Todoroki, Yaoyarozu, Asui, Iida, Uraraka, and several others that I'm forgetting right now. We also seem to have an organization or entity that is going to be a major part of the manga even if we've seen very little of them so far.

By contrast, at the end of episode 13, the only characters besides Naruto who have established motivations, personalities, and/or powers are forgotten relatively quickly after the end of this arc, and while this does work in Kakashi's favor to set up some mystery around him, that doesn't change the fact that of the characters that have anything established about them other than Naruto, the only ones who manage to stick around after this point are Kakashi, Sakura, and Sasuke. Some characters we have designs for are not established until after this point, such as Shikamaru and Hinata, and while Zabuza and Haku are well executed they're killed off pretty quickly. Just as well Tazuna and Inari achieve their goal by the end of this arc, which means they no longer have a reason to stick around and, because Zabuza, Haku, and Gato are dead, we no longer have any antagonists.

To be fair, this is not a problem exclusive to Naruto. YuYu Hakusho doesn't really introduce any real antagonists until the first season is over. A lot of Bleach's initial antagonists become good guys or fade before having anything said about them. One Piece always had the Marines as an entity but they did not become an antagonist until CP9, before that, everyone else they'd fought, except Captain Morgan, had been pirates. Inuyasha doesn't establish an antagonist until the introduction of Miroku, which happens toward the halfway mark of the first season. Hunter X Hunter never really has an overarching antagonist unless you include the Phantom Troupe and, even then, they only apply to Kurapika. Fullmetal Alchemist, for as great as that is, spends most of the first 13 episodes establishing major players, so any antagonist is left out for that time. Trigun is episodic until the introduction of Knives, take that however you like. And while Baki the Grappler does have Yujiro Hanma as a notably evil character, for Baki, he's more of an obstacle than an antagonist.

To my knowledge, I only know two shonen besides My Hero Academia that establishes an antagonistic entity that stays relatively relevant for the majority of the anime or, in one case, manga. The first, and older of the two, Kenichi the Mightiest Disciple, establishes Ragnarok as an antagonistic threat to Kenichi within the first two or three episodes, and while Ragnarok disbands after defeating Ryuto Asamiya, Ragnarok was a smaller part of a larger organization collectively known as Yami, and while the antagonist for Kenichi shifts from Ragnarok to Yomi pretty quickly after that, they're both part of Yami so it's relatively effective. And, while the manga is incredibly long, the manga ends right as Yami is defeated.

The other is The Seven Deadly Sins, which I reviewed pretty recently but to summarize, the antagonistic entity, the Holy Knights, are established within the first episode. We are also introduced to several Holy Knights, particularly Gilthunder, who are major driving forces in the plot, even if it's not obvious until the end.

The downside to this, or rather a bad omen, is that while My Hero Academia has not made the same mistakes that Naruto has yet, in all fairness, at the end of episode 13, Naruto hadn't made its own mistakes yet either. A lot of the characters that we like that are dropped, such as Neji and Gaara, aren't even introduced yet, mechanics that are bullshit, such as Bloodline limits only being the ability to mix chakra natures, and the nonsensicalness of Eye Techniques belonging to the Sage of the Six Paths, have not yet been expounded enough to poke holes in yet, and at this point in the anime, we also have not had any filler.

My Hero Academia has a lot of potential and, while there are a lot of ways potential can be used effectively, there are just as many ways that potential can be squandered. As a result, I sincerely hope that this anime is not going to follow Naruto's example too closely. Naruto has a lot of good but also a lot of shit. And I really want My Hero Academia to be a success, not just because I like it but also because I don't want to give up on this series for the same reason I gave up on Naruto.

Animation wise, this is Studio Bones and if you're not familiar with Bones' work, they've created Fullmetal Alchemist, Soul Eater, the Cowboy Bebop movie, The Sword of the Stranger movie, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Wolf's Rain, Darker than Black, and Mob Psycho 100. If that doesn't give you an idea of how good this animation is, I'll explain.

Studio Bones is a relatively balanced animation studio in the sense that, for the most part, they're really good at everything but not the best at anything. Ufotable beats them in animation, Ghibli beats them in storytelling and narrative, Gainax has more notable endings, and Kyoto Animation is better at physics.

Studio Bones generally doesn't have anything that can be called objectively bad but not everything they do is amazing at everything either. Most Bones anime will either start off strong but peter out at the end, like Soul Eater, will be really good at some things but not others, like Wolf's Rain, or only works in one format, like The Sword of the Stranger.

My Hero Academia is a lot like Fullmetal Alchemist in the regard of animation, it's really good and might hold up for a long time but is not the best. If I had to pick a studio that would have animated My Hero Academia better, it would be Production IG. Production IG doesn't have better animation than Bones all the time but their animation is generally more consistent.

Of course the three others would've chosen would be either Ufotable, Kyoto Ani, and Studio Madhouse. I did not choose these for one reason each: Ufotable is a really high quality animation studio but they're really good at their particular style. And while they are the best at it, their style makes a lot of use of particle effects and 3D animation that would not fit the style this anime has now, and while you could change the style to what Ufotable is good at, I don't think that would've made it look better artistically.

Kyoto Ani would've done the style and the animation a lot better than Bones but I didn't choose them because Kyoto Ani would never touch this type of anime. Kyoto Ani, as far as I've seen, only tackles two types of stories: shojo romance, and slice of life comedies. Because of that, even if they could do My Hero Academia well, which there's no reason they wouldn't, for them to qualify they would actually have to be willing to put their hands on it.

Madhouse, however, is easily the worst of the bunch for one reason that anyone who's seen Madhouse's works knows about. Madhouse would've done the animation almost as well as Kyoto Ani, the style better than Ufotable, and would put their hands on it willingly. However, Madhouse has a reputation for giving all of their series only one season. This is troubling because most of the series they tackle have "Read the manga" type endings like No Game No Life, Black Lagoon, and High School of the Dead, all of which are good but could be better if they get new seasons, and while Black Lagoon got a continuation in the form of Roberta's Blood Trail, that had a similar ending to the anime, so it has the same problem. And because My Hero Academia is set up from the beginning to have multiple seasons, giving it to Madhouse would effectively be a death sentence.

The only exception Madhouse has in that regard that I can remember is Hunter X Hunter 2011 and even that has a read the manga ending that doesn't cover the Dark Continent arc at all, so it may have finished that series, but even then it's not in the clear.

Production IG doesn't get to the level that those three do but they are really good at keeping consistent animation even across longer running series. Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex is a prime example of that. Because of that, Studio Bones may have been the obvious pick but I don't necessarily think it was the best pick.

The dub is also quite praise worthy. With dubs that have protagonists with cracked voices or have a habit of screaming at everything, how fast you can get past that is generally a matter of life and death. Neon Genesis Evangelion could be an example of how much a show could be trashed if you get an awkward pick, with Spike Spencer's depiction of Shinji Ikari being meme worthy in how whiny it is, and I only say that because of how popular it is to mock said depiction.

Now, credit where credit is due, this is a character type that's really hard to get right, at least in terms of voice acting. Generally, these characters are made whiny or helpless so you can make them stronger later on but, for the duration of their crying and screaming, the actor has to strike a balance of believable fear and tolerable voice. The voice is especially important to get right because, while the fear won't last forever, the voice will, unless you do a time-skip drastic enough to justify changing the voice actor entirely.

That said, Izuku's screaming never got on my nerves. I find this commendable because, back when I saw Kenichi the Mightiest Disciple and heard how annoying the screaming was, I had to power through that before the dub got manageable and I simply thought that there's no way to get that right. Thankfully, Izuku proved me wrong and his English voice actor should be praised for that.

Bakugo's voice actor should also be praised. Generally a character who is praised by everyone and who is good at everything is hated because of the writing rather than the voice acting. Usually, the voice actors make these characters easy on your ears so that you like the voice but the writing makes you hate how perfect the character is. However, Bakugo's voice makes it clear that, while he is praised quite often, he's not someone you're supposed to like. Contrasted with Todoroki, who has a much more common voice related to the genius character type, this is enough to make it clear that these two have some things in common but are clearly separate entities.

Iida's voice is less commendable in that respect. When we first meet him, I thought he was a completely stuck up prick and, while his angry eyes might have had something to do with that, the voice acting didn't help either. Of course, we do eventually learn that he's simply trying to reach a higher standard and is just uptight, the series portrays it as if he was always like that, which the dub and the animation don't make clear.

While he does state lines that sound like direction on paper, the delivery made it sound aggressive, which made me misjudge him. When you have characters that are supposed to be liked or hated, it's generally good directing to make sure that which you're supposed to do is made clear early on so you know whether they're successful or not at what they achieve. Mysterious characters can benefit from early misdirection for the sake of a big reveal but Iida really doesn't have that excuse.

All-Might benefits from his voice actor for a very different reason. Namely that his voice actor, Christopher Sabat, is really good at manipulating his voice. For those who don't know, Chris Sabat voiced a majority of characters in the span of Dragon Ball, to the point that one could argue he might have been able to voice all of them. Just for clarification, three characters he voices are Chaotzu, Piccolo, and Vegeta. Three characters with radically different voices, tones, and personalities but they all work. However, Chris Sabat also voiced characters that sound nothing like characters in Dragon Ball, such as Alex Luis Armstrong from Fullmetal Alchemist, who sounds nothing like anything Dragon Ball has ever had.

While Sabat does have a limited range of voices he can do, it's worth noting that of all the characters he's voiced, only a handful sound like voices you've heard before. Yes Kuwabara in YuYu Hakusho sounds like Vegeta, Kyoma Mabuchi in Dimension W sounds like Piccolo, and Garland in Dissidia Final Fantasy sounds like Armstrong, but these are a small number of characters and each one is in pairs.

All-Might has two voices we've heard Sabat voice before based on his forms. His superhero form sounds like Armstrong, which is a really good fit. However, his thinner, more exhausted and damaged form sounds like Piccolo and, while that doesn't sound like a good fit at first, remember that Piccolo had a wider range of emotions than any other characters Sabat voiced in Dragon Ball. Chaotzu had sad moments, but he almost always sounded happy, even when he was neutral. Vegeta, likewise, whether he was cocky or despairing, just sounded like Vegeta.

My guess is that some voices he's done have different ranges from others and, out of all of them, Piccolo and Armstrong make the most sense for the two forms and fit the character best. Plus, it's an easy way to make it clear that one and the other are not supposed to be connected without having two separate voice actors. So in that respect, he's successful as far as I'm concerned.

The guy with the naval laser, for as unremarkable as I found him, also had decent direction. The voice made it clear that the character is supposed to be a parody of bishounen popular pretty-boys, or at least that's how I'm interpreting him. He thinks he's pretty and thinks he should be popular but the show makes it clear he's not supposed to be.

Asui's voice sounds somewhat throaty, which makes sense given the size of her tongue, her quirk requires that her throat be large enough to hold that tongue and, even with that, she does sound quite pleasant. I wouldn't necessarily say she'll be a waifu when she grows up, but for as easy as her voice would've been to screw up, she actually sounds nice.

Probably the only character I took issue with was Minoru Mineta, for more than one reason. While the voice and delivery fit the character, I have to question just how much of this character was designed the way he was supposed to be.

The first problem is that he's in UA. While he is a first year, and it's made clear that he's not exactly the greatest student in that class, UA as a school only has a passing rate of about 3%, the show even says 3 out of every hundred. You'd think that the fact he's in UA at all would mean that he's competent, serious, talented, or some combination of these, like the other students. The entrance exam, which only had 34 people pass in total, was graded based on three criteria, two of them from the physical power test, the other was the written. The two criteria in the physical exam are on kills, or how many points you gain from killing enemies that are worth points, and rescues, or how many people you're able to rescue in the allotted time. Bakugo and Izuku make it clear that you can be great at one and have zero points in the other and still pass. Hell, Izuku made 7th place even though he had zero kills, and Bakugo got to first place on kill points alone.

Though it is possible that Minoru got some rescue points, I doubt that was intentional since even the most intelligent students, like Iida, didn't figure out that they were graded on acts of heroism as well as power. So it's safe to say that every student who took the exam was aiming solely for kills. And his power, which is just balls that stick to things for an hour and bounce off him, is not exactly battle-centric and I fail to see how that would gain a fair amount of rescue points even if he did know about that criterion.

Even if we assume that he's at the bottom of the 34 who passed the exam, that's still within the top 4% and, given that there doesn't seem to be a limit on the types of powers there can be, I find it hard to believe that he would make it above anyone else. Sure, the vast array of powers means some of them are going to be useless but, it's made clear that UA is the toughest and hardest to enter school on becoming a hero in the entirety of Japan, there's no reason anyone with no battle-aptitude should be able to get in and become a hero, something All-Might even says himself to Izuku.

Then there's his personality. While it's clear that not every member of the class is as ambitious or serious about this as Bakugo or Iida respectively, everyone else shows some level of seriousness and composure when under duress, perhaps too much in the case of Bakugo and Todoroki all things considered. So then tell me how a complete crybaby managed to make it past Aizawa.

Of course his height, voice, demeanor, and the fact that he's wearing a diaper for some reason, might suggest that he's a child that got in because he's a genius. However, I don't find that likely. Child geniuses generally have two characteristics in common, highly adaptable intellect and fast rate of information processing. Minoru has displayed neither of these characteristics. No, he's not a complete moron but he's not exactly one I would call intelligent. Plus this is anime, and anime is known for fucking with our conceptions of age, so I doubt his appearance is indicative of his age.

Finally, he's a bit of a perv. And I don't mean "Oh, a young lad's libido" or anything like that. No, I mean he has a strong desire to fuck every woman at the campus and doesn't try to hide it. When he's introduced officially during the attack by the Legion of Evil, he states that he wanted to touch Yaoyarozu's breasts before dying. Which is pretty perverted. Not something that anyone would call a commendable goal.

The music, on the whole was pretty meh. None of it was bad but none of it really stood out either. I can't recall a single track that I can remember off the top of my head that doesn't require me to remember the scene it's playing over first. Some of it also kind of sounds like music that I might have heard in other productions and, because of that, as I remember it, I'm having a hard time remembering if the track I'm thinking of was for this anime or if it was for some other similar anime.

On the whole, the anime was really good. It hasn't fleshed itself out enough for me to give a solid recommendation but, if the anime fulfills its potential at some point, then I will definitely tell you to give it a watch. As it stands now, it hasn't done enough for me to give it a solid buy it rating but it's too well executed for me to tell you to skip it or wait until a second season improves it. So, for now, I'll tell you to give it a three episode try and, if it hasn't sold you by that point, what you do from there is what you're going to do.

Have a wonderful day.