My Hero Academia‘s manga has focused on Shigaraki and the League of Villains for its latest arc, and series creator Kohei Horikoshi has shown a whole new side of the villain as each chapter has revealed more and more of Shigaraki’s origin story. After previously alluding to some of the same elements of Midoriya’s struggles as a child, the latest chapter of the series has made one of the most direct connections between the two yet.
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Chapter 238 of the series revealed a young Shigaraki’s home life with his family, and implies that he could have become a hero much like Midoriya if his family were more encouraging of his heroic desires. But the major connection comes when Shigaraki sees a photo of his grandmother, Nana Shimura, for the first time, and he looks exactly look a young Midoriya.
Chapter 238 explores Shigaraki’s young life and reveals that, like Midoriya, Shigaraki had no yet developed a quirk by age five. And like Midoriya, Shigaraki was obssessed with becoming a hero and had been playing. But his father, who had been emotionally scarred from his mother’s abandonment, had forbidden the talk of heroes in his house.
Shigaraki’s narration noted that, like Midoriya, he had only wanted to hear “one thing” from his family at the time, but they failed him in that respect. When he sees a photo of his heroic grandmother, his face lights up in very much the same way Midoriya’s young self lit up when seeing photos of All Might. But unlike Midoriya’s supportive mother, Shigaraki’s family was not as helpful and his father punished him for seeing the photo of Nana Shimura.
As Chapter 119 comes to an end, there’s a hint that Shigaraki begins to evolve into his future villainous self. After his father beat him in front of the rest of his family, Shigaraki instead becomes furious and begins to hate everyone. With all of these allusions to Midoriya’s positive upbringing, this holds a striking mirror up to Shigaraki and suggests that he could have been a good hero had all of this not happened.
There have been parallels between the two before as both of them have become successors to All Might and All For One’s missions, but now it’s been made clear that the hearts of the two share a much deeper connection. And it’s a heartbreaking one.
My Hero Academia was created by Kohei Horikoshi and has been running in Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump since July 2014. The story follows Izuku Midoriya, who lives in a world where everyone has powers, even though he was born without them. Dreaming to become a superhero anyway, he’s eventually scouted by the world’s best hero All Might and enrolls in a school for professional heroes. The series has been licensed by Viz Media for an English language release since 2015. My Hero Academia is gearing up for an even bigger end of 2019 with a new film in theaters later this year too.
