My Hero Academia’s Ending Was Terrible

Boku no Hero Academia aka My Hero Academia is a shounen-anime that follows a young boy named Izuku Midoriya who strives to become a hero in a world where everyone has an ability of sorts… but he doesn’t. He’s part of the very few people who were born without any such “quirk” and yet he strives to become a hero regardless.

One would think the show’s premise is exciting, but the author inevitably ran it into the ground, recently ending the show in a terrible way… which is what I wanted to talk about today.

I’m a fan of the franchise, btw, and I loved the world and followed the whole thing from start to finish. I loved the work… but ever since the final saga began, it just dragged on and on with more and more flaws piling up, resulting in a “mid” ending and some severe dissatisfaction. This post will go into all the things I liked/disliked about the show.

There will be spoilers.

Also, in this post, I just inserted random screenshots from the anime, as well as one featuring Lady Nagant (who I miss dearly btw). These are just there to break up the text. I didn’t want to use animal pictures again for this one, so yea.

Flawed from the Get-Go

Izuku Midoriya, also known as Deku, is a young boy with no ability whose key traits are that he “moves without thinking” to try and save others even when he’s powerless himself. Whereas other people are just standing by as his childhood friend and bully, Bakugo, gets swallowed whole by a villain, he’s the only one who tries to save his friend/bully.

Aside from that, however, Deku is also often portrayed as highly analytical, taking notes on other heroes, being an incredibly huge fanboy of others, and taking notes wherever he can. As a character, you’d think he’d use this characteristic to his advantage to work with others and to really strategize on how to beat his enemies…

But no, the show kind of forgets about this altogether eventually, which I found pretty upsetting. By chapter 3, Deku gains a quirk that grants him incredible power. His idol, All Might, needs a successor and as such makes him swallow a hair to pass on “One For All”, so that Deku, too, can become a hero.

As a result, the premise of the show is irrelevant all of a sudden since Deku now actually has an ability that he might not be able to control fully but it’s an ability regardless, completely defeating the purpose of the show or why people started reading it.

Anyway, Deku attends the UA, the hero school, to strive to become a hero and using his quirk frequently destroys whole parts of his body.

When he punches targets with his super strength, it would break every bone of his arm and as such, he still had to manage his quirk properly and try to do a lot without relying on it… eventually mastering it and unleashing only a percentage of the quirk at a time to ensure he’s not left incapacitated.

But then, this ability that has been passed down by heroes for generations, One For All, suddenly starts manifesting the powers of other heroes who possessed it before and who are no longer with us, and as such, Deku goes from “one of the few who has no quirk” to “one of two people who has multiple quirks” which winds up creating issues narratively.

Don’t get me wrong. I love stories where an underdog character goes from zero to hero… but in this case, it’s less so because of hard work and more so because of him just being lucky. In a way, it reminds me of the many people in the real world who are just born into good families and who never had to go hungry and who can follow their dreams because of their privilege.

Deku is a manifestation of that, in a way, and I found that decision to be incredibly poor.

From a writing perspective, I actually still enjoyed the show a lot, though, because he had to figure out how to use these abilities while keeping his secret and dodging the eyes of others, especially while a bigger enemy, All For One, was planning a big return soon.

Main Character Syndrome

Deku idolizes All Might, the greatest hero of all time, and as such copies his every move. He became All Might’s successor when others were much more capable of becoming that. He became All Might’s successor despite not being able to handle the quirk… just because All Might was quirkless himself. It was a matter of sympathy more than anything – or at least that’s what it felt like in hindsight.

When Deku meets Mirio Togata who was originally planned to become All Might’s successor and who is incredibly capable, a rivalry starts and Deku isn’t too sure if All Might’s decision to pass on his quirk to Deku was the right call. This rivalry is eventually decided by Horikoshi by having Mirio flash his ass in front of the “big bad”, Shigaraki, in the final stage to buy Deku some time. All of Mirio was suddenly reduced to a big joke and it settled the whole rivalry between them in a way that I found pretty saddening.

On top of that, though, Deku has what I’d deem “main character syndrome” which makes him want to solve everything by himself. One strength that My Hero Academia had was that all the side characters mattered and that the power creep wasn’t too big from one classmate to another, even as they grew stronger through training and hardships.

Eventually, however, this doesn’t matter as much since Deku not only manifests multiple quirks but also ends up mastering them, eventually going “rogue” and fighting villains by himself after a war and having to battle all of his former classmates on his own because they want him back and he wants to handle everything alone… and this battle between all of them, even with Deku being sleep-deprived and weakened from repeated battles, ends up being quite close still. Deku is just on another level, altogether.

Deku’s main characteristics were…

• he’s super analytical
• he’s quirkless
• he idolizes All Might (and other heroes)
• he moves before he can think

The analytical trait was seen as something funny and endearing at first but eventually didn’t matter at all. It only ever shows up again in the very last chapter where he seems to obsess in a creepy way about the ways that a future hero could use his ability. It’s a characteristic that would have been amazing in battles but rather than focusing on that, Horikoshi figured that “the power of incredibly violence” was much more compelling.

As previously mentioned, the quirkless nature of Deku is irrelevant after chapter 3. His idolization of All Might also becomes irrelevant eventually when Deku figures out that he doesn’t have to punch enemies (especially after he no longer can use his arms due to the strain) and he instead starts kicking people. I know it sounds trivial but that was peak My Hero right there. He eventually even leaves All Might in the dirt, disrespecting him in a way by claiming that he can’t learn more from his idol.

And this last trait about moving before thinking is something that is terrible. In a way, it’s good to be able to act when acting is needed… but during their training camp arc, instead of calling for help, he ends up fighting an incredibly dangerous foe all by himself when there are others around who’d be much more useful in a fight. For this he is reprimanded severely since he could have died there. It seems like he learned from it… but syke, the didn’t! He keeps doing it over and over and over again because clearly, he’s the main character in his point of view and because of that he has to do everything by himself.

The bonds forged in their class room? Irrelevant. This is the story of how Deku become the strongest hero (quote from Season 2 of the anime) and as such, we need to watch him do bad things over and over again which paint him as an egocentrical power-hungry maniac more than the analytical and smart little boy that he used to be.

Villains contribute to World-Building – so let’s kill the villains off.

Horikoshi’s world-building is flawed in a way. The show’s focused on the heroes to such a degree that we end up barely getting any world-building through the main characters. Instead, the most interesting parts of this world are parts we learn about due to the villains.

Endeavour, for instance, is portrayed as a villain amongst heroes who abused his family to create a successor who can wield his flames to surpass him and his rival. It’s interesting how this is handled, how the story talks about trauma and mistakes, and how people can change without Endeavour ever fully redeeming himself. He’s not forgiven but he makes genuine amends to fix what he’s done even if it might not be possible.

Meanwhile, a mutant villain named Spinner was ostracized by society and attack viciously by all sorts of people. Apparently, people with quirks that alter their appearance like his are persecuted and discriminated against. We learned about all of this only through his struggle as a villain and only through his mouth and point of view.

The darker side of the world with persecution and discrimination could have just not been mentioned at all and it would just not exist. But precisely because of Spinner it exists now in the world and it makes the world better… There are heroes with mutant quirks like him.

His hero equivalent, Mezo Shoji, also known as Tentacole, is someone who can grow multiple arms and other appendages through the use of his quirk but even without using it, he has these wing-like arms and he has to cover up his face due to his deformed and nose-less face as well as the many scars, presumably gotten through the persecutors.

He very much could be someone who could have told that story of discrimination in society. There were plenty of opportunities out there to involve a story about discrimination in this world which could eventually then segway into Spinner’s story… but Horikoshi either never thought of it until the end and hence decided to pit Mezo against Spinner as a result of a brilliant idea… or he did think of it but didn’t want to include it in the early parts of the show which is an odd decision, in my opinion.

Anyway, Spinner is defeated and the revolts are quelled. In the end, we see Mezo Shoji speak up against discrimination like that and being praised for his efforts to do so but it comes with a bitter taste due to Spinner’s sacrifice that was needed for this change to happen.

The world of My Hero Academia isn’t perfect. There are dark sides to it and we only learn of the depth of My Hero Academia through the lense of the villains… as such, it’s a genuine shame that villains are killed off most of the time rather than letting them be the change they want to see and having someone stop them from being too extreme, I guess.

Even in the final saga, we have two chapters where the origin of All For One and One For All is explained, in detail, and you’d think that this would have happened earlier or would have been done for longer… but no… we get two chapters on the origin story. Wow.

Talk no Jutsu

If you’ve seen Naruto or Naruto Shippuden, you might be aware of the “Talk no Jutsu” which people make fun off frequently in shows. It’s when the main character talks to the enemy and then convinces them to not do genocide. It’s super effective!

For the longest time in this Final Saga of My Hero Academia, Deku kept wanting to “save Shigaraki” who literally can exterminate thousands of life forms with not even a touch and who has done so repeatedly.

Deku keeps wanting to talk to him and doesn’t want to kill Shigaraki, at all… whatsoever… but then he simply does. Shigaraki is my favourite character in the show and his past being orchestrated by the main villain (who also just dies eventually) was a big reveal that I found interesting. That said, he’s dead. Gone. Can’t even redeem himself or make amends or anything.

So, Horikoshi had us sit through tens of chapters of Deku not wanting to kill Shigaraki only for him to do it in the end despite his convictions. Wow.

The final saga dragged on for ages, by the way, with us awaiting a new chapter every week, at times every two weeks due to breaks, and the show becoming worse and worse by the week. It dragged on for so long and instead of focusing on the final fight between Deku and Shigaraki (which, to be fair, was not great), we kept seeing Uraraka (Deku’s main love interest and fellow hero) and Toga (Deku’s stalker and psychotic killer) have a heart-to-heart about how they both love Deku for absolutely no reason whatsoever. These are teenagers fighting to death while discussing their love interests and how cool of a guy he is or something.

It was genuinely bizarre.

Toga ends up stabbing Uraraka but by the end of it, Uraraka ends up getting through to Toga and literally talk-no-jutsu-ing her into becoming good and not killing people. Wow. But then Uraraka is about to die of blood-loss, so Toga uses her ability to drink some of Uraraka’s blood, turn into her and then donate all of her own blood to Uraraka to be able to save Uraraka at the cost of her life.

So, now, Toga is dead. Uraraka lives. The whole thing about Toga’s struggle with bullying, mental health and her self-image… doesn’t matter anymore. Toga is dead. Those stories won’t be told anymore. Horikoshi killed those stories. Also, in the end, Uraraka and Deku aren’t even implied to get together or possibly marry or have a relationship or anything… Hence, that was kinda pointless. Why did we end up spending so many chapters on Uraraka’s feelings on Deku if they’re not even getting together in the end? Feels like a scam to me.

Similarly, there is a villain named Jin Bubaigawara or Twice whose ability it is to create clones of himself but he eventually ends up losing his mind because he’s no longer sure who is the original or whether he is a clone himself of someone else and they all end up killing each other in the end to find out. His whole background chapter was one of my favourites because it highlights the struggles with mental health in this society and the way in which there is no place for people like Jin in this world because there was no help for him and nobody seemed to care about him, at all.

Anyway, he’s dead.

The Ending

By the end of the show, the conflict is resolved, we skip forward into the future after eight more years and see that Deku didn’t become the strongest hero, after all, and instead focused on becoming a teacher which I find inspiring as it tells the story of how there are everyday heroes.

In Japan, for that matter, teachers are of an incredibly standing in society since they are the ones who nurture the future generations. So, Deku losing his ability functions as a frame for the story and him becoming a teacher after graduating from hero academy is something that I find very cool.

What I dislike, however, is that the story just wrapped up all of a sudden in three chapters, basically. We didn’t ever meet Deku’s father even though Horikoshi said we’d meet him. We don’t know what becomes of Eri. We don’t know much about Deku’s classmates because he didn’t see them in years due to scheduling conflicts. By the end of the show, Deku is handed a briefcase that will enable him to become a hero, presumably through support gadgets but like… why didn’t the show just focus on that from the start? Why did we have to give him a quirk in the first place?

Anyway, it feels very unsatisfactory because the show dragged on for ever and had us experience fights that weren’t fights at all but discussions… and then those discussions didn’t matter after all because those villains that are being talked to get killed anyway or change their mind, I guess.

It feels upsetting and if I could, I’d get a refund on my time invested into this franchise.

I definitely love the world and the prequel (My Hero Academia: Vigilante) as well as early My Hero chapters but until after Rogue Deku… it’s a good show but as a fan of Horikoshi’s prior work, I just didn’t feel like this was it.

For what it’s worth, Shigaraki as the ultimate opponent is basically just Madara Uchiha from Naruto Shippuden. He’s got infinite strength, infinite stamina, infinite energy, infinite regeneration, an instant-death ability that is only being stopped by some complications, and he’s just unstoppable.

As such, Shigaraki gets Deus Ex Machina’d by Deku shooting his ability into the newly mutated Shigaraki and having his individual predecessors and quirks ravage Shigaraki’s mind until Shigaraki dies… or something.

It makes no sense, at all, and frankly, I don’t think it was any good. I actually wouldn’t have minded at all if Shigaraki just won and the world got destroyed or something as it still would have been better than what we got.

Heck, for a show that was aiming to end everything for so long by having Deku and Shigaraki have a conversation, who knows?

Maybe it would have been better if Deku literally convinces Shigaraki to change his ways – and then Eri could reverse the mutations and all of that… and maybe Shigaraki could make amends by using his ability to get rid of all the plastic and nuclear waste in this world. Literally would have been amazing, wouldn’t it have been?

Well, at least better than what we got.

Deku peaked in High School

My Hero Academia is a show about heroes and villains. The story is told and all that we thought was good ends up actually being quite dark and rotten. People struggle but only the villains are the ones who say anything about it, really, and I don’t know how to feel about that. I sympathize with the villains more than the heroes. In fact, I don’t know why most heroes in this society wanted to become heroes. Fame? Riches? Recognition? Genuine good-will? Who knows?

The world is cool and I hope to see a super early prequel of sorts eventually… but like… I’m upset because the story could have been much, much, much better if Deku was just quirkless.

They literally defeated the whole purpose of the show three chapters into it and then ran it into the ground by making him super strong but not strong enough to defeat this demon lord of a villain… so then, Horikoshi had to rely on deus ex machina type shit to fix the story and manage to overcome this villain that he created.

I’m just sad because there were so many good arcs in the show but by the end of it all, I just wanted to see it end. I wanted to see Horikoshi use his gift to actually still fix the story… but instead, he kind of ruined it by pulling out the god from the machine and killing Shigaraki when we really didn’t want to kill him for what felt like thirty chapters.

As someone who loved Barrage (rest in peace) and really enjoyed Oumagadoki Zoo, I know Horikoshi can do better… It’s just a shame that he ended up struggling to come up with a good ending after all that. Truly, a shame.

This post was originally written by Dan Dicere from Indiecator.

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