My Hero Academia: Two Heroes – I’m still a child at heart

I guess this is the part that I say that I am a still a chuunibyou. Being an anime fan for so long has nothing to do that. There are plenty of mature series that play with themes in more ways than “let’s add blood here to it’s no longer shonen” thing.  I have a side of myself that likes watching giant monsters destroy cities and getting hyped by shonen action series too. I’m twenty-nine and I feel like I am confessing my sins to a priest or talking about my problems to a psychologist, though I am writing a blog post. Does that make all of you either a psychologist or a priest. Each of you choose what you are. Anyway, I still watch Dragon Ball Super on Toonami every Saturday and enjoy it for more reasons then nostalgia and I had a blast watching the My Hero Academia movie last Thursday.

My Hero Academia: Two Heroes is a shonen jump film. If you all know what that means, then I don’t have to say much else. If you don’t, that means the movie is a non-canon story, a villain that is flat and you won’t very anywhere else, added interactions and costumes for the cast that you might not see in the show, action scenes and powers that you won’t see in the official canon either (though this movie has a way around it sort of), and characters that you won’t see anywhere ese. I haven’t watched a lot of shonen jump films, but I have seen enough of them to know how they work. The problem is with all that is I like the characters this movie introduced, and I want to see them again at some point. Sad that it probably won’t happen though.  Two Heroes isn’t any different from all sorts of other shonen series, but it has the heart and soul of My Hero Academia behind it. That’s a lot more then what you can say for other shonen jump movies I think. I was yelling in excitement and crying at the moments this film wanted me too. This film had the audience and me in its grasp and I just let it take me where it wanted me to.

Before I get anywhere else, I should probably talk about the audience that watched this film with me. This is the most filled out that I’ve seen any movie theater in a while. On that level of all the Star Wars and Marvel film audiences that I have seen in recent years. The difference is how passionate and into the show everybody was. There was a female All Might cosplay in the audience and there were chants of “Plus Ultra” before the film started. It was incredibly obvious that the people behind this show loved it just as much as I do. That’s the perfect environment of watching a film like this and I am glad I was here for it. I do wish that The Night is Short, and Walk on Girl and Perfect Blue had the same audience kind of audience size and energy, but what can you do? The worst part of watching this show dubbed (the dub is great by the way), is that audience was laughing over a lot of the show’s dialogue from time to time. Passion is forgivable though. It’s fine, these people were a lot of fun and so positive.

I was in full fanboy mode for this movie. There were so many great things that I enjoyed. Seeing the crowd around All Might in the beginning part of the film isn’t something that we see often, so that was one of the best moments ever. Seeing a lot of the cast dressed up in formal clothes, including Bakugo, was a lot of fun, and the action stuff was more amazing then the show’s best animated moments. Also, I really like the villain’s Magneto powers because we haven’t seen how metal manipulation works in this show’s universe compared to other powers. I feel like the X-Men movies were limited by a lot of live action things, but this anime film used everything anime to its advantage here. Lastly, I liked seeing All Might and Deku work together in that that Batman and Robin situation that you don’t see anywhere else in the franchise. That was the most hype moment ever and it looked as amazing as it felt. So yeah, it’s a movie. Of course, the action scenes are going to be incredible. If they weren’t, what would be the point. Still, the best part to me is that the show introduced new cast members specifically for this movie that I want to see somewhere in the story’s canon. They were well developed and had backstories that you can get into. Please let them show up somewhere.

So, this is the part that I talk about flaws, right? I kind of don’t want to. Yes, I was thinking how imperfect this film was on my way home from that theater. You know, that moment when I was outside of the hype and the fantastic moment of my life this movie provided. Yes, the beginning of the film, which was set up and a recap for people who haven’t watched MHA, was slow. Yes, the reason why the gang who showed up was dressed up in formal wear was kind of questionable. Yes, some of the cast were left out and just shown in hotel rooms waiting for the event that is going the happen next day (which I think is an interesting world building thing actually). Yes, the actual villain was more of a reason for our cast to unite together then being a character in his own right. I will probably admit all the problems that you will mention to me, but I loved what I watched from Two Heroes. I felt like a kid watching Saturday morning cartoons again and if something can do that for me, then I can’t help but love it. My Hero Academia: Two Heroes is a fun time. If you are a fan of this show, please watch it when you get the chance to. Maybe it will make you feel the same way.