Readers have now had the opportunity to sit with the My Hero Academia ending for over a week since the author and illustrator Kohei Horikoshi’s manga series concluded. While some had hoped that the controversy regarding the ending in both, the fandom itself and the general anime community, would have subsided, it unfortunately isn’t the case.
In fact, it’s become clear to many that the My Hero Academia ending, in many ways, parallels what the series was known for overall in its mixed-bag status. While the conclusion to Horikoshi’s superhero story has negative and positive aspects, it is a major letdown overall for its mistreatment of protagonist Izuku “Deku” Midoriya.
My Hero Academia ending in review: Follow through on a core theme, Deku’s growth, and a promise are the positives
Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
Admittedly, the positives of the My Hero Academia ending are some strong ones, with arguably the strongest being a follow-through on its overarching theme that anyone can be a hero. This is further demonstrated by how Deku’s presentation and qualification of his story change as the manga progresses. At first, it was about how he became the greatest hero, but then it became about how he and his classmates became the greatest heroes.
This transitions into the manga’s conclusive line of “This is the tale of how we’ll keep reaching out to help for all time.” This clearly demonstrates both Deku’s personal growth, and the evolution of his understanding of the term “hero.”
The latter point is further emphasized by providing a full circle moment, driving home that Deku has been a hero since the day he ran out to save Bakugo, and in turn, inspired All Might.
On the former, Deku comes to realize that holding out a hand and reaching out to help is what’s truly heroic by the time of the My Hero Academia ending. At the start of the series, he felt that this simply wasn’t enough and that he needed a Quirk to be a true hero.
By the end, it’s clear that he realizes that he can still be a hero whether he’s a Pro Hero or not, even changing how he describes the tale of his life to reflect this learned lesson.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
This is further emphasized by the fact that he found heroism in the mundane aspects of life, which is also emphasized by his choice of career as a teacher. This also provides a nice reflection of All Might’s journey. Both start out as Quirkless young men with heroic spirits, but falter in the belief that they can help or change society. Each then receives All For One, becoming the Symbol of Peace of their respective times and driving back or defeating evil.
Each of them then finds a successor, or in Deku’s case, successors with his being his classmates going on to be successful Pro Heroes as seen in the My Hero Academia ending. Yet neither simply leaves things to the next generation, each choosing to become a teacher to help their successors and continue being a hero in the manner described above.
Each is even rewarded for this by receiving a support item, allowing them to find a way to regain their original heroism and continue to be both heroic and a true Pro Hero. While there are some specific discrepancies, the story of each largely follows the same beats.
Yet this reflection still drives home that each is the ultimate One For All users, All Might used it to nearly defeat All For One, while the latter finished the job and fully brought out the Quirk's true potential.
A final high point of the My Hero Academia ending is the aforementioned ending line. In addition to the positive connotations discussed above, it’s proven true by the general focus on Class A.
Nearly all of them are contributing in some major way to society, and those who don’t get a specific focus appear in the final spread. Yuga Aoyama and Hitoshi Shinso specifically embody this given the trials and tribulations they had to overcome to stand side-by-side with the others.
My Hero Academia ending in review: A mishandling of Deku and others, and half-baked ideas are the negatives
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
Unfortunately, there are many more issues with the manga’s conclusion than there are positives. One of the most apparent is the fact that Deku can neither have nor eat his cake in the sense of his two main goals. The first was to have a Quirk, which he gave up in a final last-ditch effort to save Tomura Shigaraki, which was his second goal.
Infuriatingly, however, Horikoshi chooses to have Deku fail despite this major sacrifice, with Shigaraki dying in the end. While this would’ve been acceptable if the payoff justified it, this simply wasn’t the case, with the ultimate conclusion easily reachable with one or the other.
While there’s surely an approach that justifies both sacrifices, the depth and complexity of how the series’ themes are handled by the My Hero Academia ending doesn’t do so.
Speaking of Shigaraki, Horikoshi also includes him in the ending by nature of being what, for lack of a better term, is obviously a Star Wars Force Ghost-esque afterlife appearance. While Horikoshi’s love for George Lucas’ film franchise is well known by fans, this shoehorning in of a post-mortem appearance by Shigaraki only serves to muddy the waters.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
The lack of clarity on exactly how Shigaraki appears in the My Hero Academia ending best illustrates this. Is Shigaraki a Vestige? If he is a Vestige, how is Deku seeing him if One For All is gone? If One For All isn’t gone, will it ever fully disappear? Can the Quirk come back? Or is Deku just hallucinating?
Even if he is just hallucinating, why kill Shigaraki off to bring him back for a cameo in which he has no agency to grow as a person like Toya Todoroki, Lady Nagant, and others got the chance to? Both Shigaraki not being a Vestige and Deku not hallucinating is the worst outcome, as it implies he’s a ghost. This in turn highlights the complete lack of setup for such a reveal throughout the entire series up to this point.
While this may be a nitpick, it deserves to be called out for what it is; a hasty referential inclusion for which the potential fallout and resultant recontextualization of past events was not properly thought out beforehand, if thought of at all. This half-baked idea approach serves to highlight the major issues with the My Hero Academia ending, and even Deku himself isn’t safe.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
The most half-baked idea relating to Deku that is present in the series’ ending is his one-off line about how he’s unable to see his friends very often because of their respective careers. Inherently, this line is confusing, as it served no real purpose and only confused fans both in the spoiler process and upon official release. If anything, the line detracts from the characterization of other Class A students by nature of Hawks’ sole line in chapter 430.
Hawks essentially confirms that the future he envisioned where Pro Heroes have free time is what has come to pass by the time of the My Hero Academia ending. However, if this is the case, then why is it so hard for the Class A students to work around Deku’s more rigorous and cemented schedule as a teacher?
The only logical reconciliation of these two lines is that the Class A students simply don’t care enough to make time for him, inherently regressing their characterizations on the whole. The fact that all 21 of them are sent to handle a simple landslide in the final panel of the series further proves that this is a world where Pro Heroes have free time. In turn, this further proves how contradictory, confusing, and unnecessary such an inclusion was.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
One area where this time in the My Hero Academia ending may have been better spent is an additional focus on deuteragonist Katsuki Bakugo and tritagonist Shoto Todoroki. For one, it would’ve been helpful to learn specifically what they’ve been up to and achieved that allowed them to become such high-ranking Pro Heroes in this new era.
There’s also the fact that these two members of the series’ central trio were generally not focused on enough in the epilogue. While Shoto did get his own chapter focused on the Todoroki family’s storyline, his relative lack of presence and mention in the series’ final issue is concerning given his title.
This also goes for Bakugo, who arguably only suffers more due to receiving a third of an issue’s worth of focus in the epilogue, which was also split with All Might and Deku. Again, considering that the pair are the deuteragonist and tritagonist of the story only further intensifies how disappointing this approach to the conclusion of their journeys is. Yet one silver lining is that, in reality, Deku didn’t exactly get the best treatment from the My Hero Academia ending either.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
To continue on the lack of followthrough for plotlines and character statuses, the series’ sole truly implied relationship in Deku and Ochako Uraraka is left hanging. While a ship confirmation isn’t strictly necessary, it would have been just as easy for Horikoshi to somehow work this confirmation in as it was to avoid it altogether.
There’s also the abandoned plotline of Deku reaching 100% power of One For All as All Might did, with the My Hero Academia ending confirming this will never happen. However, Horikoshi gets something of a pass here considering the direction he took the series and Deku’s use of the Quirk at roughly the midway point. Nevertheless, however, it remains an unresolved plotline that deserves to be addressed.
Speaking of outright abandoned plotlines, fans never got to meet or see Deku’s dad Hisashi Midoriya despite Horikoshi promising to have him appear by the end at one point. It’s a simple and relatively inconsequential plotline, but nevertheless, one which fans were looking forward to and likewise let down by the lack of followthrough on.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
Unfortunately, even some of the positives that the My Hero Academia ending have their negatives. The biggest of them is Deku’s inspiration for becoming a teacher, which he didn’t receive from All Might or Shota Aizawa, but instead by Mawata Fuwa’s appearance and words in the epilogue.
While it’s emphasized that Aizawa is the root of this revelation, the focus on Fuwa is how Deku realized this is extremely mishandled. Even if Horikoshi didn’t want to have All Might or Aizawa specifically and directly spell it out for Deku, Eri would’ve been a great way to achieve this.
After all, Aizawa was able to become her caretaker upon losing his Quirk’s functionality, in turn becoming another one of her heroes despite functionally lacking a Quirk and being professionally retired.
There’s also the fact that Deku’s behavior during the My Hero Academia ending’s eight-year time-skip contradicts the idea that he fully understands that anyone can be a hero. This is largely emphasized by the fact that he seemingly made no effort to maintain his Pro Hero status after losing his Quirk.
As far as fans can tell, he didn’t work out, train in a martial art, improve his reflexes and reaction times, or do anything else that would allow him to be a Pro Hero.
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
This is emphasized at multiple points in the series, with Mirio Togata’s skirmish with Overhaul being a key example. Despite fully losing his Quirk, Mirio was still able to fight one of the series’ most powerful villains and Quirks for several minutes with no support items.
Overhaul even had to resort to dirty tricks in the end to defeat Mirio, proving that Mirio was a legitimate threat that the Quirked villain couldn’t handle.
Hero Killer Stain also emphasizes this, being able to hold off both Tenya Iida and a 20% Full Cowling Deku at the same time without using his paralysis Quirk to keep up with them. If Stain was able to train his strength, stamina, and reflexes up to this point, then surely there’s nothing stopping Deku from doing the same.
Even the Vigilantes spinoff proves this, with key character Knuckleduster having no Quirk, but still regularly defeating Quirked villains with ease.
My Hero Academia chapter ending in review: Deku suffers the most from Horikoshi’s choices
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
All of this culminates in Deku being severely mistreated and mishandled by Horikoshi and his half-baked ideas for the My Hero Academia ending. While there are aspects of the ending that highlight Deku’s growth, there are others that suggest that deep down, he hasn’t changed at all and still doubts his ability to be a hero.
His hesitation to accept the support item gift from All Might in chapter 430 further emphasizes this, and also further contradicts this idea of growth.
Deku is also seemingly finding inspiration from the wrong places at worst, and at best is completely ignoring the people around him who prove he can be truly heroic in a mundane way. This wishy-washiness partially kneecaps the idea that Deku needed to lose both One For All and Shigaraki for the series’ conclusion. In the end, Deku learned nothing from sacrificing his Quirk, his dream, and also had no tangible success or reward to show for that choice.
Plotlines in the My Hero Academia ending which clearly weren’t thought out or planned out don’t help matters either. The line about not having seen his friends and the inclusion of the “Shigaraki Force Ghost,” for lack of a better term, especially emphasize this. Both of these points either create more problems than they solve or implicitly introduce more plotlines than they reasonably and definitively answer.
Combined with the lack of follow through on Deku’s goals, relationship with Uraraka, and his absent father, this all creates an ending to his story which is not wholly satisfactory. There are bright spots that serve to tie together both the series’ overarching message and themes with Deku’s journey, and these work extremely well. Yet on the whole, it’s clear Horikoshi didn’t have a truly clear and specific vision in mind for the conclusion to his manga overall, and Deku’s tale.
My Hero Academia ending in review: Final thoughts on Deku's story
My Hero Academia ending in review (Image via BONES)
One of the biggest criticisms levied towards Horikoshi’s manga series throughout its 10-year serialization was that it was a mixed bag of jumbled ideas. There were some great concepts and some not-so-great ones. Some of the positives were satisfactorily explored, and others were infuriatingly not.
In this way, the My Hero Academia ending serves as a microcosm of the series overall. There is potential for greatness in almost every plot point present in chapter 430, with some requiring slight changes to approach and others requiring much larger ones. Yet despite this potential, Deku’s tale ends disappointingly and frustratingly, reflecting how many feel about Horikoshi’s flagship manga series and shonen staple overall.
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