My Hero Academia 158 Review: Overhaul's Origins

My Hero Academia, Chapter 158: Chisaki's Abnormal Compassion

I didn't review the previous chapter because it's honestly a lot of the same thing with the previous chapter. Overhaul makes a bit of a bad guy monologue, Midoriya resolves to protect Eri, the two have a bit of a power up. Kinda cool that Eri can immediately fix all of Midoriya's broken bones to allow him to use 100%, but on the other hand this fight has been going on forever -- and one thing that Boku no Hero Academia's previous arcs cannot be accused of is prolonging fights more than it should. And for me, this fight certainly has been.

It's not that I don't enjoy the artwork -- I certainly do. But the pacing has been dragged on and on, and we end with this chapter where Midoriya finally whacks Overhaul in the face with a 100% punch, seemingly and hopefully ending the battle. The 'big picture' that Overhaul gives us with his backstory, about how he wants to basically supply both sides of the villain-vs-hero war and how the previous yakuza boss disapproved of that kind of is a bit too basic for my liking, I think, and ends up turning Overhaul from a unique villain to kind of a run-of-the-mill profiteer. I dunno. The fact that it all ends with a generic "my burning spirit can change the futureeeee" shonen stuff is also kind of cringe-inducing, and if that was what we're going for then I really wished we didn't have Nighteye's prophecy of a death.

Oh well, at least this fight is hopefully over.