WARNING: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS!
Alright, alright; I'm sure you might be thinking "Really? My Hero Academia? What does this have to do with monsters?!", and it's not without merit. There's a ton of other shows, anime or otherwise, that I could do articles on that actually revolve around creepy creatures, and would probably be more fitting for a blog like this.
However, I've chosen to do My Hero Academia for two reasons:
For starters, I've very recently started watching it to see what all the fuss is about. I have to admit, I think it might be a bit overhyped, especially compared to stuff like Jojo or Gurren Lagann, which is more my speed. Even still though, I am having a lot of fun with the show so far, and I can see why it has such a devoted fanbase.
Moreso, however, I was surprised to see how many monstrous looking characters, heroic or otherwise, are in this anime! I thought it was mostly going to be standard humanoid looking guys, and it kind of is, but there are definitely a lot of beastly folks running around too.
Sure, there are more fitting anime to talk about when it comes to monsters or horror, but I see no reason why my blog has to be strictly creatures from monster or horror stuff. Monsters can be found everywhere!
The second reason is that, at the time of writing, I'll be going to Anime Blues Con in Memphis in a few days, and I plan on doing an article on my experiences there. (don't worry, I'll keep it almost entirely monster-themed) It's pretty much the only time of year I get to experience happiness and time away from my terrible relatives, so it'll be nice to write about. Weeeeee!!!!
I figure a super-popular Japanese cartoon would be a good prelude to that.
Something to note is that I'm a very recent newcomer to this series. I'm only on the second season of the anime and I haven't touched the manga at all, so I may get some stuff wrong. I would highly recommend seeing this as something written from the perspective of an outsider of the fandom.
ANYWAY!
Giant Villain....?
Apparently this guy doesn't have an official name yet, so we're just going with what the fan wiki calls him....actually, maybe not. "Giant Villain" isn't that fun of a name, in my opinion; so I'm gonna call him "Mr. Musclepants".
So....uh, "Mr. Musclepants" here comes from a world where at least 80% of the human population gained superpowers, which essentially means that both superheroes and supervillains are part of every day life, and many of these said heroes start off in a high school where they get education and training for their career as "pro heroes", government-recognized superheroes that get paid to do their stuff.
So basically, My Hero Academia is "Reverse X-Men", taking place in a world where mutant powers (here called "Quirks") are the norm, and it's the ones without powers that are prejudiced against. (something that's unfortunately not touched upon much in the show, which is a shame because I think it'd be interesting stuff)
Now, with that other, hamfisted introduction of mine out of the way, Mr. Musclepants only appears briefly in the show before he's thwarted by a couple of heroes. For this reason, there isn't really much to him. I like his design a lot though. He looks like the love child of a pissed-off Moomin and a great white shark. I kind of wish he would get more development because I think a villain like this could be a lot of fun!
This is unfortunately another villain that doesn't have an official name that I'm aware of, so we're just gonna call him "JizzerWizard69" becau--
LOOK I NEVER SAID THIS BLOG WAS GONNA HAVE GENIUS-LEVEL COMEDY OKAY
Fortunately, unlike Mr. Musclepants, JizzerWizard69 actually does at least have a couple of episodes where he's the main bad guy, and he's pretty damn menacing throughout the arc. Having recently been captured by the pro hero All Might (in a nutshell: the show's version of Superman), he was accidentally released after main protagonist and overstimulated fanboy Midoriya (aka "Deku") decided he needed to bother him to answer an unhealthy amount of questions.
Unsurprisingly, it might have been a bad idea to bug All Might while he was doing hero work.
....and the reason for that is pretty obvious just by taking a quick glance at the picture above. Holy shit. This might be the absolute worst way to die by a slime monster. Not even The Blob can match this. Sure, being acidified or drowning in greasy monster goo is bad, but imagine the cause of your death not only being suffocation by slime, but that same slime essentially violating you like in a tentacle porn. Christ. This has got to be in the top twenty worst ways to die in an anime, minimum.
Not only that, but his design manages to be pretty unsettling as well. It's hard for any inhuman monster with contrarily human-like teeth and eyes to not look creepy, and to put it on a slime monster of all things is a pretty ghastly image that raises a lot of questions that probably have very unnerving answers.
Yeesh, am I sure this isn't a horror anime? WizzerJizard96 came in at the start of the show, and I just described it like something that wouldn't be out of place in Silent Hill or the original Quake.
Koji Koda
Well, thankfully for the students at U.A. high school, not all of the "monstrous" looking characters are bad guys. In fact, and rather refreshingly, in My Hero Academia, it's about half-and-half. For every villain who looks the part, there's probably a good-hearted individual who looks like someone who should be a threatening baddie, but in reality just wants to do the right thing; and sweetie pie Koji here is one of the best examples.
Even his Quirk seems like something that would belong to a more conventionally heroic looking good guy; having the power to talk to animals! Moreso, he's never really seen using it to talk to particularly dangerous animals, it's usually stuff like common birds or forest animals.
Just...oh my god, look at this absolute cutie. Not only is he a good guy, he's as far removed from being a bad guy as possible. There are protagonists in this show that are far more mean-spirited and spiteful than this guy has been or ever will be. (cough BAKUGO cough) All this sweet, innocent boy wants to do is hang out in nature and keep people safe.
I love him. I love him to absolute death. You hardcore anime fans can have your blonde-haired-explodey meanies, this is the student I'm rooting for to become a pro hero the most. Even Deku, bless his soul, isn't as pure and good as this saint among saints.
Oh, and he's piss-terrified of bugs, but he uses his Quirk to talk to them anyway when his allies are in trouble because he's an amazing friend like that. He's like the superhero version of Courage the cowardly dog; always looking out for his loved ones even when he's about to shit himself.
Koji is perfect in every way imaginable and if anyone dares hurt him then they will have to fistfight me to the death. With or without Quirks.
Chizome Akaguro (Stain)
Of course, not all the "monsters" in this show are monsters in the sense of being beastly in appearance.....though before you think "oh jeez, are we really doing the HUMANS ARE THE REAL MONSTERS!!!!! thing on this blog", I assure you I'm not. This is about Stain basically being a slasher villain for superheroes. I mean, I did a whole article on a game about slasher villains, so why not?
Coincidentally though, "humans are the real monsters" isn't too far off from this guy's life philosophy. Although it's less "humans are the real monsters" and more "superheroes are the real bad guys".
Indeed, Stain has become fed up with how heroes have strayed off what he believes to be true heroism and thinks that everyone should act more like All Might; completely selfless, not just saving the day for cash, and working for no other reason than to protect innocent people. It could be safely argued (and indeed is in-canon by the main protagonists) that these are fairly valid points....though his motives? Well, not so much.
That part where I said "he's a slasher villain but for superheroes"? Yeah, that's not at all hyperbolic. Stain here hates almost all superheroes except for maybe All Might and Deku (and even that's up for debate) for not working for 100% altruistic reasons. So naturally, his solution is to go out at night in less populated areas and slaughter them.
Turns out, he's pretty damn good at it too. Not only is he fast as hell, tenacious, and a master swordsman, he also has a Quirk that allows him to completely immobilize his opponents for a few minutes which he accomplishes by.....
....ingesting their blood. Often by licking it off of his sword.
Well, at least it's not as perverse as the sludge villain.
I also really like the way this guy is drawn, especially in his original manga appearances. I'm usually not into ninjas as a character archetype, but I dig how gnarly and sketchy his design is. He gives me some very strong "Sam Kieth meets Kevin Eastman" vibes, which wouldn't surprise me too much if that was intentional, given what a big fan of American comic books the creator of this series is.
Some Overhyped Harley Quinn Wannabe That Weirdos Spank Their Monkey to Despite Being Underage and Midnight Being Way Better
Tomura Shigaraki
One of the main villains of the show, if not the main villain, and a fan favorite! Indeed, there's quite a bit to like about this total creep. The first thing many people will notice is his affinity for hands. I don't know if they have any plot or thematic significance, but it does make for a delightfully over-the-top design, very likely being a parody of all those edgy anime villains that grab their face with their hands to show how CRAZY!!!!!!111!!!! they are.
That being said though, it's kind of a double-edged sword for me. On the one hand, I love goofy shit like this. Anything that aims to be "over-the-top but still cool in its own way" is always fun. On the other hand, I don't think Tomura actually does anything super interesting with those hands. His Quirk involves crumbling people into dust by mere touch, which is cool and all, but if I saw this guy without any prior knowledge other than him being from a world full of superhumans, I would have guessed his ability was to actually use those hands to do his dirty work, like evil versions of Thing from The Addams Family, which I think would have been a lot more fun.
I mean, just imagine what could have been!
Ah well, as much of a wasted opportunity as that may have been, he does at least make up for it with that lovely smile of his.
Habuko Mongoose
If there's any one character that could rival Koji for the title of either "most pure" or "most adorable" on the show, Habuko might be it. The fact she's a snake already makes her cute as a button!
Oh shut up. Snakes are cute as hell. Don't @ me.
My first exposure to this character was actually before my recent binge-watching of the series, from a clip from one of the OVAs that was posted to Tumblr, and I honestly thought she was one of the bad guys studying at a rival school (I'm actually kind of surprised there isn't a school for supervillains in this show, at least none that I'm aware of, seems like a neat idea!), but nope. She's as good as good can be.
First off, can I just say how wonderful it is to see a snake character that ISN'T at all evil or malicious?! Sure, there are others like her, but snakes still get a bad rep despite being both important animals for the ecosystem and far less threatening than people make them out to be, so this is all a wonderful change of pace.
To be fair, she's not completely innocent. She makes her introduction by "stalking" one of the secondary characters, Tsuyu (aka Froppy, the frog girl you probably heard about on Tumblr!), even using her power to paralyze people for a few seconds on her.....but she isn't doing it for any evil reasons.
Instead, poor Habuko here is doing it merely because she's shy as hell and really bad at making friends. She isn't stalking Tsuyu, but rather just trying to start a conversation with her, but doing a pretty bad job of it, and probably only uses her paralyzing Quirk to get out of a potentially awkward situation.
Eventually though, Habuko finally gathers her strength and asks Tsuyu if she'd be interested in being friends, and in a super happy twist; it works out! They become besties during middle school and eventually meet up again during a school visit, still as lovable as the two ever were.
It truly is a match made in Heaven. A shy, innocent snake girl and a sweet, friendly frog girl. Two herpetiles with a friendship as strong as All Might's Detroit Smash. Can this get its own spin-off show please? I mean, you can't honestly tell me it wouldn't be a mega-hit with the fans! Tsuyu is popular as hell even outside the MHA fanbase! It would be an absolute behemoth in the ratings! DO IT ALREADY
Nomu
If you've been aching for a truly monstrous monster in this article, then Nomu has you covered.....although Jizze--ahem, Sludge Villain might have filled that niche already, but hey; the more the merrier!
Speaking of which, one of the best things about Nomu is that he's not alone in his efforts to cause trouble. Yup, Nomu isn't so much a singular character as he is a species.
These handsome fellows were created by the League of Villains to take out All Might, and later would also go after Stain for him trying to take out League member Tomura. Both efforts would be thwarted by pro heroes....but not easily.
Even All Might, who, for emphasis, is basically Superman in terms of strength and speed, had a lot of trouble taking out just one of these guys. In one of the best and most iconic fight scenes in the entire show, it took pretty much every bit of the man's power to incapacitate him.
One of the reasons for this is his Quirk: Shock Absorption, which lets him take an absolutely stupid amount of punishment before he gives in. It's only until All Might unleashes a massive flurry of full-strength punches à la Star Platinum that his Quirk is finally rendered useless.
And if all that wasn't bad enough, Nomu also matches All Might's strength and speed due to him having some of his DNA. Oh yeah, did I mention Nomu are also genetic experiments created by the League? Yeah, the League of Villains is basically Umbrella Corporation if it was run by a superhuman Lex Luthor.
Apparently Nomu are also unique in that they can also carry multiple Quirks, something that's almost unheard of in the world of My Hero Academia. It seems that having more than one Quirk can do some pretty nasty stuff to your body, for reasons that you can probably guess by seeing those pictures above.
Another, somewhat less apparent weakness, is that Nomu aren't terribly smart. Having that many Quirks forced on you can also turn you into a rampaging beast, stripped of any human thought or emotion, so talking to these things is difficult, if not impossible. I'd imagine this would make Nomu fairly hard to control on the League's part.
Even with these weaknesses though, Nomu are bad news for any pro hero.
Well, I think that covers most of it. There's more characters from this anime I want to talk about, and I'll probably cover them in future articles, but for now, I'm going to leave with one more character. Someone I feel needs absolutely not one word written about him to show you how amazing he is.
GODZILLO!!!!!!!!
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