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General Info:
Series Name: Boku no Hero Academia (My Hero Academia) - 僕のヒーローアカデミア
Year of Serialization: 2014
Author(s): Horikoshi Kouhei
Artist(s): Horikoshi Kouhei
Genre(s): Action, Comedy, School Life, Shounen, Supernatural
Current Status: Ongoing
Moment of Reviewing: 55th chapter
Other Formats: /
Year of Serialization: 2014
Author(s): Horikoshi Kouhei
Artist(s): Horikoshi Kouhei
Genre(s): Action, Comedy, School Life, Shounen, Supernatural
Current Status: Ongoing
Moment of Reviewing: 55th chapter
Other Formats: /
Series Summary:
Izuku Midoriya is a timid boy with no confidence that gets bullied and the reason for this all is the exact same one: he is quirkless. Quirks are superpowers and in this day and age over 80% of the world population has one. It all started with a single Chinese baby that was born and during the span of a few generations the phenomenon occurred all around the world. The result was that the entire human society underwent a drastic metamorphosis, centering around these quirks. The most important innovation was that of the creation of the hero-profession. By now people without quirks have become extremely rare and stigmatized, which makes Midoriya's dream of becoming a hero nearly impossible. To make matters worse his childhood friend, and also his primary bully, brims with confidence because of his powerful quirk. By chance however Midoriya encounters All Might, the most powerful hero in the world, and he accidentally finds out that he has a severe injury that makes him unable to use his quirk for more than a few hours a day and that he currently has reached his limit. Right at that point a villain attacks Bakugou, the bully, and without a second thought Midoriya tries to save him despite it meaning certain death. This made All Might elaborate again on what it means to be a hero as Midoriya told him about his situation and he still jumped in. All Might then pushed his body beyond its limits and saved both of them. In the aftermath All Might had made a decision: he would tell Midoriya about the nature of his quirk, One for All. It's rather special in that it can be transferred once to another person, who then inherits the power of all the previous wielders. All Might had been searching for ages for a successor and finally found him. The problem however is that the quirk is immensely powerful, so to make Midoriya learn to control it, he enrolled him in the most prestigious hero academy of Japan. What follows is the story of how Midoriya tries to master One for All and this while being thrown head first into the world of twisted villains and ferocious rivals with only one purpose: becoming the next symbol of peace.
A while ago I was just browsing the internet and I stumbled upon a short fan made comic with Naruto, Ichigo and Luffy where Naruto said something to a kid I didn't recognize, that it was now up to him. After that you saw Naruto leaving with Luffy talking about how big the kid would become. There was also a panel with a picture that was inspired by the iconic Team 7 picture, only this time Team 7 consists out of a young Luffy, Naruto and Ichigo with Goku as their teacher. Obviously this comic was meant to represent the passing of the torch in the world of manga. The Big Three, Naruto and One Piece in particular, got strongly inspired by Dragonball and this comic implies that they on their turn are inspiring the next generation and the unknown character in particular. Not long after that I decided to read Boku no Hero Academia and I suddenly came to the realization that Midoriya was the unknown character and that the thought that this series is going to be the next generation standard-bearer was very well possible.
Boku no Hero Academia is what you best could describe as an archetypical Shonen manga, which means it has by default all the elements to make it. The main character is a somewhat anti-social and weak person with a minority complex, but with the ambition of become the best there is and he lives in a world filled to the brim with superpowers. The comparison with Naruto is almost identical, though the big difference lies in the fact that he has a brain and not the usual idiot with a big mouth. This has even become a running gag throughout the series that whenever he needs to prepare something, the starts formulating detailed plans using notes he has been making during his entire life. In the end this series is like One-Punch Man meats One Piece. Just like in OPM the entire verse is based around the rather traditional superhero-concept (flashy costumes, weird names, sidekicks etc.), however unlike in OPM it's not meant as one huge parody. This is where the comparison with OP comes in as it gives off that same vibe. There are countless of colorful characters with weird personalities and even weirder abilities and looks. This somewhat child-like appearance of villains and heroes is one of the reasons as why OP gained such popularity. The author even specifically stated that he reads OP and even sent once an artwork that got published in one of the volumes long before he himself became a mangaka.
That Boku no Hero Academia is a rather traditional series and is similar to OP, is something that might scare away some people as one of the recurrent critics of people who don't like OP, is that it appears to childish. That might be so, but in the end it's undeniable that this formula works. That this series is gaining rapidly popularity despite only having been serialized for one year, is once again a testimony of that. It still however is very different on three points.
The first one is the artwork. As said before just like Oda the author likes to make colorful characters. His drawing style though is what I can best describe as being more spiky and rectangular while that of Oda is much more fluid and curvy. For example many characters have hair that's overly spiked, their limbs look like they're made out of straight lines and their fingertips look more square than round. The cloths also get strongly emphasized resulting in them being borderline caricature. This is often already the case when people wear 'normal' cloths, but it counts even more when they wear their heroes outfit. There's a character that has his two lower arms covered in two huge grenades and another in a complete space suit. This ridiculous outfits is where the series strongly resembles OPM.
Secondly Oda has created a world with an enormous depth. However to accomplish that he had to take his time and build up the story slowly. The first chapters/arcs of most series are often also meant to get you into it and only afterwards the real story begins. This is not the case here, Boku no Hero Academia is very quick-paced. But as a result it lacks the depth One Piece has, the feeling you get that there's an entire world out there is lacking. The academy Midoriya joined, is the most prestigious one in Japan. He gets in with no real issues and then in his class you have a series of characters that don't look particularly special. Quite rapidly their class also gains popularity and several characters noticed quite quickly a connection between All Might and Midoriya, including several villains. This makes it sometimes feel rushed.
Lastly so far it misses the ability that causes that indescribable feeling that you know this is something special when you read. It's very easy to understand as why this series could potentially be the next big thing, but compared to OP or Naruto it still lacks that je ne sais quoi. As long as that feeling doesn't appear, even if it succeeds in becoming one of the leading manga series, it would just be a lesser version of the ones that came before it.
Nonetheless I have high hopes for Boku no Hero Academia, especially because it's still unclear what the 'Grand Plan' is. Every typical Shonen manga has that plan, but currently it's very unclear which direction the story will go. In the least it's a very entertaining manga where you can easily cruise through and if I would make list of the series that have the highest chance of becoming the Big 3's successor, it's definitely this one.
Boku no Hero Academia is what you best could describe as an archetypical Shonen manga, which means it has by default all the elements to make it. The main character is a somewhat anti-social and weak person with a minority complex, but with the ambition of become the best there is and he lives in a world filled to the brim with superpowers. The comparison with Naruto is almost identical, though the big difference lies in the fact that he has a brain and not the usual idiot with a big mouth. This has even become a running gag throughout the series that whenever he needs to prepare something, the starts formulating detailed plans using notes he has been making during his entire life. In the end this series is like One-Punch Man meats One Piece. Just like in OPM the entire verse is based around the rather traditional superhero-concept (flashy costumes, weird names, sidekicks etc.), however unlike in OPM it's not meant as one huge parody. This is where the comparison with OP comes in as it gives off that same vibe. There are countless of colorful characters with weird personalities and even weirder abilities and looks. This somewhat child-like appearance of villains and heroes is one of the reasons as why OP gained such popularity. The author even specifically stated that he reads OP and even sent once an artwork that got published in one of the volumes long before he himself became a mangaka.
That Boku no Hero Academia is a rather traditional series and is similar to OP, is something that might scare away some people as one of the recurrent critics of people who don't like OP, is that it appears to childish. That might be so, but in the end it's undeniable that this formula works. That this series is gaining rapidly popularity despite only having been serialized for one year, is once again a testimony of that. It still however is very different on three points.
The first one is the artwork. As said before just like Oda the author likes to make colorful characters. His drawing style though is what I can best describe as being more spiky and rectangular while that of Oda is much more fluid and curvy. For example many characters have hair that's overly spiked, their limbs look like they're made out of straight lines and their fingertips look more square than round. The cloths also get strongly emphasized resulting in them being borderline caricature. This is often already the case when people wear 'normal' cloths, but it counts even more when they wear their heroes outfit. There's a character that has his two lower arms covered in two huge grenades and another in a complete space suit. This ridiculous outfits is where the series strongly resembles OPM.
Secondly Oda has created a world with an enormous depth. However to accomplish that he had to take his time and build up the story slowly. The first chapters/arcs of most series are often also meant to get you into it and only afterwards the real story begins. This is not the case here, Boku no Hero Academia is very quick-paced. But as a result it lacks the depth One Piece has, the feeling you get that there's an entire world out there is lacking. The academy Midoriya joined, is the most prestigious one in Japan. He gets in with no real issues and then in his class you have a series of characters that don't look particularly special. Quite rapidly their class also gains popularity and several characters noticed quite quickly a connection between All Might and Midoriya, including several villains. This makes it sometimes feel rushed.
Lastly so far it misses the ability that causes that indescribable feeling that you know this is something special when you read. It's very easy to understand as why this series could potentially be the next big thing, but compared to OP or Naruto it still lacks that je ne sais quoi. As long as that feeling doesn't appear, even if it succeeds in becoming one of the leading manga series, it would just be a lesser version of the ones that came before it.
Nonetheless I have high hopes for Boku no Hero Academia, especially because it's still unclear what the 'Grand Plan' is. Every typical Shonen manga has that plan, but currently it's very unclear which direction the story will go. In the least it's a very entertaining manga where you can easily cruise through and if I would make list of the series that have the highest chance of becoming the Big 3's successor, it's definitely this one.
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- Reviewed by Caliburn
