My Hero Academia (Episode 83) – Gold Tips Imperial
It’s Saturday, but everyone is working on their parts for the big performance at the school festival. Mirio shows up with Eri and asks Midoriya to accompany them as they tour the school. Meanwhile, Gentle is finalising his next plan!
What happened?
The dance group of Class 1A continue to practice their moves. Midoriya is still wildly out of step with everyone else and could use the extra practice, but then Mirio shows up with Eri. Principal Nezo has approved Eri’s visit, but also recommended that she come on a quieter day to get used to the place as she’s been hidden away for so long. Midoriya joins them as they tour the school, meeting some of class 1B, Mei Hatsumi and the support team, and finally Nejire before heading to the canteen. Later that evening, Momo makes the group some special tea that her mother sent her to help them calm down before the big day. Gentle Criminal, however, also has plans for the big day and runs through them with La Brava and then takes a moment to thank her for joining him.
What was your favourite element?
I honestly don’t have one. I’ve been saying for a little while that I’m not on board with this arc and this episode really solidified that stance. With the exception of the brief appearance of Mei Hatsume, I have never been so bored watching an episode of My Hero Academia in my life. It completely baffles me how things could have gone so completely wrong with this series. The first season completely blew me away and the second was just as good. I loved the first movie and enjoyed most of season three. Then, coming into this season, I had read the Overhaul arc of the manga and was really excited, but it just fell flat and I’ve really struggled to get motivated to even watch it.
What have you learnt?
You see it fairly often where a series starts to lose momentum. It can happen anytime, but for me, it appears to occur after a fairly serious arc. For My Hero Academia, that was All Might facing off against All for One. I say this because I feel like all of the events in the first and second season were building towards this moment. It wasn’t the be-all of every arc, but it was present. Since then, it feels like the series has lost a bit of direction and hasn’t been able to solidify exactly where it’s going. It reminds me of the first season of Heroes which completely blew me away. The second season didn’t have the same direction and magic and consequently failed to live up to its predecessor. This season almost feels like someone trying to force a sequel onto a great movie when it didn’t need one or wasn’t planned to have one.
Other reviews in the series
Manga
Anime
- Season Four
- Episode 64 – The Scoop on U.A. Class 1-A
- Episode 65 – Overhaul
- Episode 66 – Boy Meets…
- Episode 67 – Fighting Fate
- Episode 68 – Let’s Go, Gutsy Red Riot
- Episode 69 – An Unpleasant Talk
- Episode 70 – GO!!
- Episode 71 – Suneater of the Big Three
- Episode 72 – Red Riot
- Episode 73 – Temp Squad
- Episode 74 – Lemillion
- Episode 75 – Unforeseen Hope
- Episode 76 – Infinite 100%
- Episode 77 – Bright Future
- Episode 78 – Smoldering Flames
- Episode 79 – Win Those Kids’ Hearts
- Episode 80 – Relief for License Trainees
- Episode 81 – School Festival
- Episode 82 – Prepping for the School Festival Is the Funnest Part
- Episode 83 – Gold Tips Imperial
- Episode 84 – Deku vs. Gentle Criminal
- Episode 85 – School Festival Start!!
- Episode 86 – Let It Flow! School Festival!
- Episode 87 – Japanese Hero Billboard Chart
- Episode 88 – His Start
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I really enjoyed the School Festival arc in the manga, emphasise on ‘in the manga’. Not watched any of the anime episodes yet. I’m going to try bingeing the whole arc once its all aired, see if that improves the pacing that killed the anime’s ‘Overhaul’ arc.
All the reactions I’ve been reading to season 4 have had me reevaluating the manga a bit, and while I still get a great deal of enjoyment out of all the arcs, everything from the U.A. Sports Festival to All Might’s last stand still feels like the peak of this series. The arcs since then have their moments and I can see how they’ve all built to where the manga is now (which has the potential to top All Might’s fight with All for One, but we’ll see how that goes), but there’s definitely been a lack of cohesion between the arcs that the previous arcs didn’t suffer from. From the beginning through to the battle at Kamino felt like one story. Everything since has been good stories, but they feel a bit more separated from one another, at least until the current arc in the manga. Then again that does play into my theory that All Might’s final battle was the end of Act 1 and the manga is currently at the end of Act 2.
Definitely. It’s as if Hirokoshi had the story planned out until All Might’s fight with All for One as that really did feel like one story. Since then, he’s just been tacking on new ideas and arcs without necessarily having a cohesive plan in place.
I do wonder if bingeing is the way to go. I watched season one, two and half of season three in about a week and the emotional impact was far greater than anything I’ve experienced in this season.
I will most likely watch season five, but I’m pretty certain I’ll wait for it to be over so I can binge it.