“#FEATURE: My Hero Academia is Returning to Its Ensemble Roots Next Season!”
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Why It Works? You all ready for the return of My Hero Academia? It feels like it’s been ages since we last saw Midoriya and his fellow students. With only a month or so until the spring season, I’m getting more and more excited for My Hero Academia’s triumphant return. So what do we have to look forward to in Season 5?
【#ヒロアカ 5期キービジュアルが来た!】
3月27日(土)放送スタート『僕のヒーローアカデミア』TVアニメ5期のキービジュアル解禁!
「雄英ヒーロー科1年A組vsB組対抗戦編」迫る!!毎週土曜夕方5:30 読売テレビ 日本テレビ系全国29局ネットで放送!https://t.co/38fnMWroQq#heroaca_a pic.twitter.com/07eq04Sxkq
— 僕のヒーローアカデミア "ヒロアカ"アニメ公式 (@heroaca_anime) February 14, 2021
Just looking at the above key visual should indicate one great thing about Season 5: My Hero Academia is returning to its ensemble roots. Though My Hero Academia is blessed with a wide variety of would-be heroes, not all of its arcs take advantage of that fact. The battles against Overhaul and Gentle Criminal ultimately came down to Deku himself, while his friends were either oblivious or watching from the sidelines. It’s fun to watch Deku kick butt, but it’s even more fun when he’s collaborating with his classmates to do so!
For Season 5, it’s clear that ensemble coordination will be needed from the start. We’ll be returning to Class 1-A’s scholastic pursuits, through a training exercise that forces the class to break into small groups and collaborate to defeat groups of their fellow students. In a setting like that, it’s simply not possible for Midoriya to steal all the thunder, meaning many of 1-A’s less-acclaimed heroes will get a chance to shine. As we’ve seen in the Athletic Festival and Final Exam arcs, My Hero Academia is often at its best when it’s celebrating 1-A’s collective strength.
Beyond simply starring more heroes, I’m most excited to see My Hero Academia embracing a cooperative, tactics-driven approach to combat. The show’s Athletic Festival arc still stands as my favorite arc, and one major reason for that was how interesting it was to see powers actually combined together or contrasted in groups against each other. The fundamental promise of My Hero Academia is that these powers don’t stand alone; matter creation can be combined with tape-slinging, Dr. Doolittle reconnaissance can inform a barrage of sound waves, and a punch can be combined with, er, maybe a kick or something.
This mix-and-match approach vastly increases the potential complexity of My Hero Academia’s battles and encourages heroes to think of lateral solutions, learn to mitigate their weaknesses with others’ strengths and combine proficiencies to absurd collective effects. Through this training arc, I’m looking forward to seeing Class 1-A's students once again forced to think of not just how to use their powers, but how to use each other to perform superpowered tactical miracles.
Also, Class 1-B is back! It’s been a while since we saw the students of 1-B in action — in fact, their last major appearance was during the training arc way back at the beginning of Season 3. But while 1-A has evolved in all sorts of ways in that interim period, we’ve mostly just seen 1-B in social contexts, divorced from actual combat. With Season 5, their long absence will, at last, be corrected, as they face off against 1-A in squads and show off their own tactical coordination. I mean c’mon, they’ve got like, a mushroom-themed girl and that guy with a word balloon for a head and a girl who’s literally a pony. I need to see what they can do!
On the whole, it looks like Season 5 will be roaring out the gate, with its first arc embodying most of my favorite things about the show as a whole. The diversity of personalities and powers across its cast, the rush of seeing those abilities bounce off each other, the tactical richness of group battles between distinctly gifted teams … it’s all the core, crunchy action stuff that makes My Hero Academia stand out. I’ve been waiting for too long to see these classes collide, and I’m eager to see it in motion!
What are you all excited for in the face-off between 1-A and 1-B? Let us know in the comments!
Nick Creamer has been writing about cartoons for too many years now and is always ready to cry about Madoka. You can find more of his work at his blog Wrong Every Time, or follow him on Twitter.
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