My Hero Academia
a review by yxckson
a review by yxckson
Even a year and 70+ anime later, it still remains my favorite show of all time. Nothing beats this show for me. The entertainment I felt was unlike any other, the hype I felt was unlike any other, the emotions I felt were unlike any other, and I still can't explain how much I really love this show. I felt every emotion while watching this, and I still do 3 rewatches later.
[This review will be reviewing the show as a whole]
Before we get into the review, I would like to tell you that I am not one of the toxic MHA fans who thinks this show is factually the greatest of all time or ships All Might with Midoriya, you can miss me with that.
Also, here are my ratings for each season, the Two Heroes movie, and the manga itself.
Season 1: 10
Season 2: 10
Season 3: 9.5
Season 4: 7
Two Heroes: 9
Heroes Rising: 9.5
Manga: 10
My Hero Academia is about a boy named Izuku Midoriya and his quest to get into the prestigious high school U.A., and become the world's #1 hero like his idol, All Might. The world has superpowers called quirks which 80% of the population have. The problem is, Midoryia is quirkless, and it's pretty much impossible to become a hero without a quirk. Though, Midoryia meets All Might, and his world begins to change.
Now let's just get into everything I love about My Hero Academia.
My Hero Academia's plot is sounds simple, and for most of the show, yeah, it is pretty simple, but the execution of this simple plot is what makes the story great. Not only that, the story actually does get more complex the further it goes, and when you dig into it, you see all things that add to this story that make it not generic, but amazing.
You've probably heard this before, but My Hero Academia is the perfect example of a show that takes everything that's great about superhero shows and puts it into one story. The show doesn't strive on the things it does differently (which it still does do some things different), but instead it strives on what makes a story appealing and entertaining. This focus on entertainment and digging through what the pros and cons of a superpower-filled world are. If you are here for a complex story, then you aren't looking at one, if you want entertainment, then this is the show for you.
I've even showed this show to two people who either didn't watch much anime or didn't watch anime at all, and they both ended up loving it.
My Hero Academia is what I call the perfect starter anime.
What makes a true hero? People seem to miss that My Hero Academia is more than what it just shows on the outside. It's not just flashy fights, high emotions, and an underdog story, no, it's much more than just that. Perhaps one of the strongest pro's to this show is its philosphy of what actually makes a hero. Horikoshi is always expanding the world-building and giving more light to both the pro's and con's of a superhero society. They show this especially with the "Hero Killer" Stain, and how he justifies his killings by trying to make a better, more genuine hero society. Another example would also be Deku and his conflicting feelings about being the worthy successor to All Might, as he sees candidates like Mirio Togata and Shoto Todoroki that seem way more worthy of inheriting One For All, further proving that this show is more than just a refined underdog story. I won't get into the recent events in the manga of course, but let's say the writing, world-building, and character-building becomes INSANELY good, undoubtedly peaks there. There are many other events in the show that go by these themes, but I don't want to spoil anything major of course.
Let me just get this out of the way, the soundtrack is absolutely phenomenal, and it's easily my favorite soundtrack of all-time. It legitimately annihilates a ton of high budget Hollywood films. Seriously, it's that good. Every song on the soundtrack fits the mood of the show perfectly. It gets you hype at the right moments, it builds anticipation at the right moments, it makes you happy and calm at the right moments, and sometimes it even makes you sad at the right moments. I listen to a lot of the songs on the soundtrack, and I very rarely listen to anything without lyrics.
You have "You Say Run", which is easily the most prolific, hype-building, and motivating song on the soundtrack. This song makes me motivated to do the dishes or mow the lawn, yeah, it's THAT damn good. There's other absolute banger tracks like "My Hero Academia", "You can be a hero", "HERO A", "Might+U", "Sento-kunren", "Takahide koko", "Jet Say Run", and "PLUS ULTRA", and thats just to name a few.
And don't even get me started with the openings and endings to this show. Every single damn opening (in my opinion) is a banger, and there are 4-5 endings that I actually listen to at the end of each episode, which I NEVER do. In S4's case, I loved both of the openings and endings for the that season, so I ended up watching the full 25 minutes every single episode. I even loved the credits song from the "Two Heroes" movie, "Longhope Philia". I'll just list my favorite opening and ending at the bottom.
__OP: (OP2) Peace Sign - Kenshi Yonezu
ED: (ED7) Shout Baby - Ryokuoushoku Shakai__
I'm feeling a strong 10 on this soundtrack.
This show's characters are just phenomenal. Nearly every single one of the students in 1-A are enjoyable (except Bakugo in S1 but he got a lot better) and nearly every character in 1-A gets quite the screentime, and there are 20 students in the class. This show has unique storylines for a lot of the students of 1-A, showing their motivations, their problems, and their strengths, which helps in keeping the show fresh.
The villains of this show all have clear motivations, especially villains like Stain, who make you think twice if they are actually a villain or not just because of their motivation which displays a huge flaw in the current hero system that they have. The level of awareness that the creator, Kohei Horikoshi, shows for his story, is definitely incredible.
The character development is also insane. You see some characters in S1 and compare them to S4, and they seem like completely different people. The creator, Kohei Horikoshi knows that if the story it just focuses on the main character 24/7, it will eventually get boring, so he builds up a lot of the characters, some even outside of 1-A, so we can see what characters outside of Midoriya and Bakugo are going through. It's seriously some impressive stuff.
My Hero Academia isn't a perfect show, but to me it truly is a masterpiece and a classic. Of course, like every show, My Hero Academia has flaws. For me, the flaws some people had with the show I either didn't agree with or didn't mind, though there are some flaws that I think the show definitely has. I think that there are sometimes too many flashbacks, Bakugo is a average rival character until the second and third season, and the pacing is sometimes a bit of an issue, but despite all of that, the surreal level of entertainment I get from this show typically negates these problems for me.
My Hero Academia is not going to be a show everyone loves, because not everyone will want to see a show that focuses on the entertainment aspect or they simply just didn't enjoy it, but it's a show I will be praising until the day I die.
Is My Hero Academia overrated? In my opinion, it's hard to answer. I know it's not the greatest anime ever created like some of the toxic fans think, but I definitely think that this show is a classic and a masterpiece in its own way.
If this show wasn't my first anime, I don't think I would have gotten into the medium, so I am forever thankful for my favorite show of all-time, My Hero Academia.
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