My Hero Academia Season 4

Since it first began airing, “My Hero Academia” has been the unwitting punching bag for joyless old dogs like me who have lost the childlike fascination with watching cartoon characters whale on each other with little rhyme or reason. Not that My Hero Academia has ever really prided itself on intricate or brutal fights worth revisiting when compared to some of its peers, because in all honesty, as of late, this anime has lacked even that to keep me motivated to continue on. If there’s one thing that My Hero Academia’s 4th season has proven, it’s that mangaka Kohei Horikoshi has mastered the artof spinning his wheels. And that’s not to say that the production team attached to this project doesn’t share a portion of the blame, for all I know, the manga could just be THAT much better. But this score, this review, it’s not a nagging response as a disgruntled fan of the manga frustrated with the panel to frame fidelity, I don’t have that frame of reference to care all that much. I’m sure it doesn’t need to be said because the general lack of excitement for this season more or less speaks for itself, but this is the most uneven and nonessential season of the My Hero Academia anime to date. Not counting any brief transitional arcs, Season 4 can essentially be divided into two major story arcs, the “Shie Hassaikai arc” (for brevity's sake I’ll simply refer to it as the “Overhaul arc”) as well as the “U.A. School Festival arc”. If I were to describe the essential structure of this season, it’s sort of a weird Frankenstein’s monster of the latter halves of both the Second and Third season. Cursory filler aside, the Overhaul arc doesn’t take much time to get going and after a point resigns itself as a collection of poorly strung together action sequences of varying quality. Let me just say, for as poorly handled as that License arc was in the third season as both a transition from the previous arc and as a necessary plot device, I contend the School Festival arc might be even worse. There are plenty of fans who have dubbed this arc “filler”, which isn’t necessarily true in the literal application of the term. But the severe lack of consequence in this arc does make it feel like fluff. I’ll humor anyone who’s curious about Gentle and La Brava later. Of course, it wouldn’t be a season of My Hero Academia without debilitating amounts of pointless character introductions, most of which you’ll probably never see again and live and die with their shallow characterization. The reverence for comic books is cool, it really is, but unlike comic books which have the benefit of recontextualization, My Hero Academia feels pointlessly overstuffed. I’m not expecting Frank Miller or Grant Morrison to write their own takes on these characters, so it just feels like Horikoshi is overpopulating this world for the sake of it (I will gladly eat my crow if more manga like Vigilantes are green-lit). One issue I have with the way Horikoshi writes characters is the utilitarian manner in which he will introduce and then dispose of them like they never mattered all that much I.e., scapegoating. This happens a few times throughout this season, one of which is with Mirio. With the way the kid was gassed up by his peers and specifically by Nighteye for being more deserving of the torch that All Might left behind than Deku, it was a clear path to this kid’s demise. The obvious parallel you can draw with the Overhaul arc is with the Hero Killer arc but it also heavily treads territory that the Raid arc did in Season 3. Mirio is essentially a stand-in for All Might, both of them being used in the exact same way. Have both of them fight the villain, have both of them lose their powers, have both of them reaffirm Deku’s goal as the “Number 1 Hero”. Not to diminish Mirio’s character, he’s likable enough on his own, but his lack of presence in the story up until that point only makes his story beat vastly inferior to All Might’s (and it’s already annoying enough that they were used in the same way). Nighteye is handled in a similar fashion. The show expects you to care about what ultimately ends up transpiring but barely gives you a chance to even digest his character before it happens. If nothing else, it’s pitiful. Eri is the latest addition in a long line of prepubescent power-sources (lolis specifically) to be exploited for the protagonist’s use. You’ve seen it in Berserk. You’ve seen it in the Monogatari Series. You’ve seen it in the A Certain Series. I get it though, I get the fun hacky appeal of having a little girl be the source of immense power, it’s “ironic” if not just a bit on the nose. The issue is, compared to characters like Schierke and Shinobu, Eri’s character starts and ends with her status as a plot device. She has no personality, not much of a backstory, not much of anything really, but the story expects you to care and buy into the other characters’ investment in saving her because she’s a little girl. It’s such an easy out. Deku in Season 4 is like that beater car you bought with your first two paychecks in high school. 6 years later and now it has a tacky spoiler, phone mount, and a full tank of gas. At this point, you can’t be bothered to change anything about it because you’re just going to get rid of it when given the chance. Deku in Season 4 is just Deku from Season 1, except now he has cup-holders. I get that the intent was to make his conflict simple and relatable for the audience by having him overcome his bullies as well as the societal role handed to him because of his shortcomings. But all of that hard work and studying is undercut by the number of plot conveniences and hand-outs hoisted upon him. For as hard as Horikoshi tries to make this kid relatable, his character arc feels as insincere as Naruto finding out he was kid Jesus. That said, Horikoshi, please, You have A TON of characters in Class 1-A that have yet to do much of anything, stop needlessly proliferating this fucking cast like a pack of rabbits in heat and use the characters you’ve already established for crying out loud! Bakugo for instance, he had a great character arc that culminated fantastically in the previous season! He’s an afterthought in this season! The conflict in My Hero Academia just isn’t palpable. Cutting up Deku's fingers and giving him a sunburn on his arm just isn’t good enough for me. Having All Might fall from grace is a given, but a good step in the right direction but that’s not enough to hold things over for much longer. There is no tension in this series, it’s only a step-up from shows like Fairy Tail that tout friendship and love as a badge of honor. Nothing of significant consequence happens in this show’s story, and Season 4 perhaps the worst offender of that notion to date. In itself, the entire concept of having these kids do work-study/interning for agencies that will very likely throw them in perilous situations is just asinine to me. The series made it a point of conflict in the past to highlight the school's reckless abandon for security as a fundamental flaw in the system, so why leave these kids to handle these situations on their own when death is clearly a looming danger? I get that these kids are hot-shots with provisional licenses but why leave Mirio, Tamaki, Deku, Kirishima, etc. to their own devices when they are clearly dealing with literal Yakuza who are out for their heads at any given chance? For consistency’s sake, isn’t that an incredible oversight in terms of the school’s security policy? Does this piece of plastic essentially wipe the school’s hands clean of any responsibility if a death were to occur while a student is on assignment interning for an agency? You know, maybe it’s just the child murder renaissance we’re living in (I’m American if you couldn’t tell), but it’s not like Horikoshi has a limited roster to choose from. It’s a simple solution and admittedly would probably only put a bandaid on this series’ several chronic ailments, but having the guts to kill a major character from 1-A can be spun in a variety of ways. Imagine the fallout and backlash this would cause for the school. Imagine how Deku would internalize this. That’s an interesting conflict to work with, and as I already hammered down on, this show is in DESPERATE need of decent conflict and tension. Oh God, I haven’t even touched base with the villains yet. I have my reservations about Stain, his paper-thin platitudes, and the very obvious holes in his flawed ideology, but I could buy into his persona as a delusional loon with a few screws loose. Overhaul doesn’t really have much of an excuse. The dude comes in and kills one of Shigaraki’s goons (good, Shigaraki and the League of Villains get on my fucking nerves) and clearly carries himself with a menacing cool. Another notable aspect to his character is his overtly paradoxical ideology. So you’re telling me the guy considers Quirks a plague upon humanity (setting aside the fact that he himself heavily relies on his own Quirk) and his master plan is to create a vaccine as well as a vaccine for the vaccine...because Yakuza? Overhaul is a joke, to put it bluntly, and to further rub salt in the wound, he lets a loser like Shigaraki get the best of him. Gentle and La Brava have been both hated and lauded for their pitiable backstories and relatability. If it wasn’t made clear by La Brava spelling it out during their fight, Gentle is essentially a “this could’ve been you” character for Deku. Gentle lacked the aptitude and ambition to make the cut as a pro-hero and spirals into depression when he is ostracized from society after making a miscalculation. Listen, I appreciate the sentiment and under the supervision of a better writer, this very well could’ve been an effective dynamic, but does anyone really expect the thematic underpinnings of these two characters’ stories to significantly alter the trajectory of the story or Deku’s character? The story has already moved on without them like they never mattered. It’s like Horikoshi lacks the self-awareness to realize that these villains deeply undermine Deku as a character. I get such mixed messages as to what the point of these characters was because they only make Deku look like even more of a child of privilege. Was that the message he was trying to convey by introducing and disposing of these villains? That if you hit a rut in life but still have that fire in your belly to realize your dreams and “be a hero” maybe some venerable benefactor will literally drop from the heavens and bail you out? It’s depressing to think about. Fittingly, there were plenty of power-point reminiscent montage stills of characters just doing things, really dialed back my clock to high school when I would do the same thing. I guess that was the point since they’re in high school? But hey, at least Horikoshi’s designs are perdy to look at. I haven’t fully kept up on news as far as this season’s production schedule but it’s worth noting that this season was produced in tandem with a film (that I’ve yet to see) which apparently affected which animators were available to work on the TV series. Maybe my eye isn’t trained enough to catch the subtleties in the key-frames or perhaps my lack of investment in the manga makes this a point of contention that just flew over my head, but this season seemed pretty par for the course for the previous seasons. If there’s one thing I’ll say about Horikoshi, it’s that he’s a fantastic character designer and a pretty talented artist, even if the anime doesn’t properly translate his panel-work. Horikoshi has gone on record taking breaks for “research”, but in reality, I feel that research is really just to buy himself time to conjure more story. For lack of a better phrase, it really does just feel like he’s making shit up as he goes along or rehashing the same story with a shallow coat of paint. This season is so under-written that you could basically just read a list of a handful of notable bullet points and skip the entire thing without missing so much as a good action sequence. Perhaps I’m overthinking it, but to that end, I’d say that cutting this show slack is only doing a disservice to the countless number of well-wrought comic books and battle shonen to choose from in this modern era. Some may call this a predictable review, and to them I say, it’s only appropriate to fight fire with fire.

My hero academia, after having an explosion in its popularity while season 2 was airing, is arguably the most popular shounen right now that is not One Piece. And the hype is mostly deserved be it for having a well-balanced cast of characters, or for the fantastically animated and choreographed fights, the latter of which had a massive dip in quality this season. This entire season does not live up to the extreme hype perpetuated by the manga community. The animation is very stiff even relying on still frames at times; the characters feel like they haven’t progressed at all since the beginning of season3 even though some of them went through huge developments; the main antagonist, Overhaul, isn’t explored through introspection, and the potential he had is lost when reliance on flashbacks is preferred for the “justification” of his motives. Every season of MHA can be broken down into two sections, viz. the villains attacking UA, and the villains planning on attacking UA, and this season is no different. The season can be split into two parts – Overhaul arc, and the Cultural Festival arc. Herein lies the pacing problem of the show, the splitting of a season into two works for seasonal runtime but in reality, the actual plot, the story that it set out to tell, has been lost somewhere. It has been 88 episodes since the debut of the first episode and we have seen very little plot progression. The overhaul arc was unnecessarily long, eating up 17 episodes when it could’ve been truncated to 12. The said arc, though entertaining, did little for almost all characters, except Kirishima and Mirio, and was of even less import in the big scheme of things. For me the characters in MHA have always been the highlight. The characters are quintessential shounen characters but are imbued with subtle nuances and traits, but after witnessing them in this season I feel like they’re slowly regressing back to being just your average shounen protagonists and sidekicks. Bakugo for example, who had a change of personality in the preceding season, is more or less back to his previously angry self for no reason. Sure, there are changes to his prior disposition, but they don’t seem to follow up. Midoriya had some interesting moments in S3, for example the aftereffects of his fights with Muscular and Bakugo were enduring to watch, but this season he has reverted back to being the character who says “I want to become stronger” a lot. Kirishima and Mirio get some good character work done on them and I’m thankful for that. Kirishima’s backstory with Mina did feel like a plot device as we’ve almost never seen them interact as friends on any prior occasion, but suddenly it’s revealed that Mina was in the same middle school as Kirishima? I call BS. Sir Nighteye, Mirio’s mentor and All Might’s former sidekick is introduced this season, who had chosen Mirio to be the successor to All Might and was against the fact that All Might had passed on One for All to Midoriya. This leads to the development of some great character dynamics between Midoriya and Nighteye, which, unfortunately were only touched upon superficially. It had potential to lay solid groundwork for Midoriya’s development, but no such task is undertaken by the author. One unfounded complaint I’ve heard about this season is that only a few characters get the focus while the rest are discarded which is a problem only if you see it as one. Other characters do get the spotlight at various instances in the previous seasons, but the seasonal nature of the show makes it seem like characters are forgotten at times. Take the Chimera Ant Arc in Hunter x Hunter for example. In this arc two of the main protagonists are not given any screen time for 60 straight episodes and no one batted an eye. As for the main antagonist this season, Overhaul, was neither exceptional nor bad, he was just OK. He didn’t stand out as much as Stain did, but he felt like a rehashed version of him. I liked Overhaul aka Chisaki as a character, but his motivations are baseless and his ‘means justify the end’ scream hypocrisy. He proclaims that quirks are diseases and should not be allowed to transfer on the next generation, but at the same time invents drugs to increase the potency of one’s quirk. Speaking of antagonists, it doesn’t feel like the main antagonist of the series, Shigaraki Tomura, has done much progressing since the beginning of the series. I really hope he gets some major role in the upcoming seasons, because I’m honestly starting to get tired of him. At least he’s stopped scratching his neck and being pissed about anything and everything, which is a plus, I guess. One of the most disappointing aspects of this season has been the lackluster animation. The fights don’t have the fluidity they possessed in the earlier seasons. For the climax of one of the biggest fights this season, Mirio vs Overhaul, we get an amazing slideshow which anyone could’ve made given they had access to the manga, photoshop and MS Powerpoint. They totally made up for it in the succeeding fight, but the stagnant animation and lack of music towards the climax of the previously mentioned fight really takes away much of the poignancy off the payoff. The animation is by no means bad, but it’s not what I’ve come to expect form My Hero Academia. I hope they’ll fix it in the Blu-ray. The music is great as always. I wasn’t a fan of either the first or the second opening and ending songs, but that’s just me. Rest of the music, though misused at times, was great. For me, this season of MHA has been the weakest season yet. I’m more disappointed in the writing and pacing in this season than I am in the animation.

Boku no Hero Academia 4 was one of the most underwhelming of the series I’ve seen yet but also the most exciting season I’ve seen yet. The transition between Season 3 and Season 4 was mainly the cause of the first arc being underwhelming and awkward to even begin with. Despite this, the series was still able to barely push out of the boulder it trapped itself in and put momentum into it. Despite the first arc being called dragged out by many people, I would beg to differ. The first arc may not have been as straightforward as how a shounen anime should have been,I believe it was the right choice to have done it this way. The grief Midoriya and the others felt, the stress and effort they were put under when strategizing for this invasion were all build-up to the climax of the arc. They poured all their effort into strategizing for the invasion and it portrays how both sides were going to deal with the opposing parties. The determination and grit Lemillion and Deku held wouldn’t have been portrayed well enough without the so-called “unnecessary drag”. Eri wasn’t the only one suffering, everybody was. It was the right move to have portrayed that. Putting the considerably unstable and controversial first arc aside, we reached the second arc—the School Festival Arc. Well, basically my favorite arc every anime that ever had it. However, I really liked how Boku no Hero Academia moved with this arc. Believe me or not, I’m not a big fan of battle shounen. That also goes to show that I’m not the biggest fan of Boku no Hero Academia either. However, one thing that caught my attention the most is the festival arcs. They do exceptionally well in that factor, and this School Festival arc allowed me to reassure myself with that claim. In the Sports Festival, they were able to portray and develop the students of Class 1A. One of the notable ones would be Todoroki, his backstory heavily portrayed who he is now, and his battle with Midoriya changed him. There are a lot more I could talk about it but this is not the right review, so I’ll hold back my words and use it for a more appropriate occasion. Now back to the School Festival, I loved how this time they portrayed and developed the more underrated characters, one of them especially is Jirou—best girl. She felt unappreciated and this was the perfect time for her to shine. But most importantly, this arc’s main focus wasn’t just about having fun, it was also to make a certain girl smile again. To get her out of the self-deprecation she is in and the stress she’s put herself under, just to see Eri’s precious smile again was something that just made me go, “TAKE MY MONEY“. I’ve been there before, emotionally scarred and ended up being a self-deprecating freak. People may find her smiling again being trivial and some may not even be concerned about it, but to me, I treasure it a lot. Being able to stand up again and face humanity is a great feat. We also had a small follow up with Todoroki and the rest about their licensing exam, which also gave us a quick outlook on what’s happening to the world. My favorite one being quirks getting more and more complex. Reason? It’s realistic, just like how humans constantly evolve, get smarter and make more complex things; Quirks constantly evolve and start to give itself more and more variety, with the result being those children. This can potentially be an arc in the future and I’m curious to see how they deal with it. Overall, Boku no Hero Academia Season 4 has its share of flaws, one thing I think they’ll still have to work on is transitioning. However besides that, the OP and EDs are as great as ever, the characters are still as fun as ever. And most importantly, you’ll have a blast watching it! On a side note, stay healthy, stay at home and keep watching anime!

The annual tradition continues and that means, we have another season of hero and villains in this franchise we should all be familiar with by now: My Hero Academia. With the expanding roster, this is a franchise that has been adding its legacy to catch up to the manga at every chance it gets. But with all the chances it has cashed on, isn’t it ironic that the more we see this show, the weaker it gets? As someone who has been following this anime from the very beginning back in 2016, this season hit me like a hammer on the hand. And that’s nota pleasant feeling. We start out with a seemingly long recap event episode because the season decided it’s suitable to retell the plot most fans are familiar with. Shounen adaptations are known for this cliché but My Hero Academia seems to let the narrative run its mouth with no shame. Nonetheless, we are soon given the circumstances of a new threat in the form of a character named Overhaul. He leads a group known as the Eight Precepts of Death and acts as one of the major antagonists this season. What he has is an ambition, a personal goal this season to wipe out individuals with quirks. This seemingly goal is driven by his deep desire to reform the world and in essence, allow him to rule with dominance. The first half of the season deals with this looming threat in society as his ideals and plans clashes with the heroes. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll realize that My Hero Academia consists of a large cast of heroes made up of unique individuals with special abilities. Among the main cast is a young boy named Deku and up to this season, he has evolved into a confident hero with an identity. He’s making a name of himself in both the public and underworld for his deeds and even earned the respect of powerful heroes such as All Might. In this season, he also catches the attention of Nighteye, an intimidating pro hero with great intelligence but also one shrouded with mystery. And as the season progresses, Deku once again gets caught up into complicated affairs with events of the dark side. We soon meet Eri, a young girl who is an absolute essential to Overhaul’s grand plans. Eri’s innocence and vulnerability shows that Overhaul is willingly to do anything to make his dream come true. Unfortunately, she becomes a trapped animal just waiting to be used like an experimental weapon. A main objective involves the heroes trying to prevent Overhaul’s plans from succeeding and also free Eri from her cage. But how should the audience judge Eri? On the surface level, she’s a vulnerable girl with a dark past. It doesn’t take long for us to realize that she is fearful not just for society but herself. The quirk she possesses causes great psychological distress to the point that she is socially withdrawn from people. That is…until she meets Deku. Fate seems to designate him to change Eri’s future of becoming an experimental weapon. Deku’s ambition to help Eri see the light and rebuilding her life is a complicated process. It takes time, commitment, and is a personal challenge for Eri. Given her age, she’s at the stage in life where there are limitless choices. If she makes the wrong choices, she could become a person worse she is now. But of course, Deku is there to guide her to make the right choices. That’s right, this season has this theme about choices in which characters follow their paths. It’s a recycled concept since the beginning and honestly, Season 4 doesn’t step up to the plate with its storytelling. Even with returning characters such as Toga, Twice, Eijiro, All Might, Fat Gum, and others getting some occasional spotlight, the show never seems to take risks to be more different from its previous seasons. In respect, it’s easy to feel bored when watching this season with the oversaturated character cast. In some cases, it injects elements of humor with comedic episodes. These include the heroes interacting with kids or character gags such as Bakugo’s short temper. But is that what the fans really want? Honestly, it’s an ambiguous question but after running over three seasons, My Hero Academia feels like it’s overstayed its welcome. Let’s face it, the show took its hero elements to the point where there’s not much more it can expand on. Or at least from face value, this became a season that’s hard to get excited about. There are fans that have said this season had potential to be the best one but to me, it’s far from the truth. Maybe if you’re a hardcore fan of the franchise, this could be like a Christmas present. But for most people, My Hero Academia Season 4 seems more like a show for fans to see what else is really new rather than what to get excited for. Sure, there are some new characters introduced but they don’t make a heavy impact in the show together. The biggest culprit is Eri, an underdeveloped character that needs more time to really appreciate. Likewise, you’re probably not going come out of this season with a memorable quote besides the iconic ‘Plus Ultra’. With four seasons and a fifth one announced for future broadcasting, this is a franchise that I think people needs to start keeping their hype in check. I used to really enjoy the previous seasons but this sequel has showed me that it contains haunting weaknesses. And while I do appreciate this series for making the hero theme more popular for the anime medium, time has done its damage in the creativity realm. That is to say, you can certainly watch season 4 and it has its moments. But getting excited about it? That’s sadly a bit out of reach.