) The Anime Otaku Survey #1: My Hero Academy · 11:52pm Apr 6th, 2018
I meant to get around to this delightful treat several days ago, but due to the extenuating circumstances of being laid off from my job, my mind has been a little preoccupied. It's funny how one can be so hard at working their job only to find themselves suddenly working just as hard to work harder still.
But I digress.
With My Hero Academia's third season just around the corner -- tomorrow, in fact, if I recall correctly -- I believe this is truly the best way to kick off my anime review series. And boy did I pick one hell of an anime to start off with! From its action to its breathtaking storytelling and characterization, I could not gem down until I had been through all of its released content, and it has easily landed itself as my favorite anime of all time. And here's why!
If you've ever watched Dragon Ball Z or any fighting anime like it, you know one of the main detractors about their fighting sequence's lies in the nature of how their designed. Typically, you'll find one or two stunning fights and that's usually enough to carry a fighting anime series for a long time.
The rest of the time, however, you'll find the fights take on the approach of ramping up the characters' powers and stakes with each new season. From a narrative standpoint, this makes sense. You have to add onto whatever abilities a character has, otherwise you get protagonists that feel static over a long series like Bleach or Naruto. And with those new abilities, they need higher stakes to keep the story engaging.
The problem with this stance on writing is that the writers can take a very simplistic approach to the whole formula. Protagonist and villain bashes heads, protagonist loses fight, he gets stronger/better abilities, then he comes back to bash his head against villain again and wins. Or some variation of that approach. And typically what the result is two opponents just throw everything at each other until the stronger one wins, and not any real strategy is implemented into the battles.
I don't want to say that My Hero Academy throws the formula away entirely, but it certainly does not take the simplistic approach of bashing two opponents together. It truly stands out to me among every other fighting anime I've seen up to today for the dynamics of all the characters' attributes going into their fights. Unlike most fighting anime where only one or two fights really stand out, there isn't a single fight in this anime that doesn't stand out to me.
There's a very good reason for this. You can tell they put a lot of thought into each of these battles and ask what they mean to the characters. The tactics and strategies that play into the fights are tailored to their characterization -- their mentality, aspirations, strengths and weakness, etc. When one character becomes stronger, it isn't through obtaining some bogus training methods or adding some power-ups out of nowhere for the sake of moving the plot forward. No, the characters get stronger by taking whatever existing powers they already have and learning how to implement them in new ways. The effect this has on the viewer is giving them a real measure of just how much all the characters are growing, and seeing them finding ways to overcome their weaknesses is real satisfying.
There is one particular character I'd like to portray in this review here, but I'll try to keep any spoilers out of it for your sake so that you can experience it for yourself. Going into more details about the dynamics of strategies that play into every fight, Bakugo stands out to me pretty well. Being the main rival of the anime, he's a ruthless student hero who executes his plan without delay.
He adapts his abilities to suit the type of opponent he's facing with uncanny effectiveness. He's driven to defeat his opponents as quickly as possible because he consistently feels shortsighted because of Deku, our leading protagonist, who made it into UA academy alongside him. Before they joined, no one in their middle school had ever gone to the academy in the entire history of it's existence because only 2% even get accepted into the academy. Adding insult to injury, Deku hadn't even presented with powers beforehand, which is something that is all but required to get in.
Every time Deku earns a victory, he feels that he is falling further and further behind, and he tries to make up for this by forcing circumstances in his favor and ultimately coming out of it unsatisfied because he never gets his satisfaction of indisputably being the number one hero. This defines his strategy in every single fight he's in. This anime tailors the fights all the other character's are in with similar style, and every encounter I watch is a refreshing experience.
I feel like I could go on and on about the merits of this show. The visuals and special effects, for example are simply stunning, providing a flourish as a sort of 'icing on the cake' to this anime's events.
I find myself hard-pressed to find any meaningful constructive criticism where this anime could improve. Most of the time, I can find something that could have been done differently even in critically acclaimed animes such as Full Metal Alchemist or Death Note. I so rarely give out scores in anything this high, and you will likely not see this come out of me again for quite sometime because I am so hesitant to say "This story/film/game is perfect!" And I honestly don't feel like artificially inflating this show's qualities.
That is why I am giving this anime the masterful score of 10/10!
Score:
Concept: 10/10
Storytelling: 10/10
Visuals/Soundtrack: 10/10
Characterization: 10/10
Subjective: 10/10
Final Score: 10/10
If you haven't watched this anime yet and are interested, the premiere of season 3 airs tomorrow, so this is the perfect chance to get your anime on. If you've watched My Hero Academy, what were your thoughts on it? And if there is any specific anime you'd like me to review about, be sure to let me know in the comments before.
Do a review on Hellsing Ultimate