My Hero Academia Animator Shares Adorable Midoriya, Bakugo Art

My Hero Academia‘s anime is readying for one of its biggest years yet as both the fourth season of the series and a brand new movie are releasing in Japan later this year. One of the major reasons the anime has been such a huge success with fans is thanks to the work of Yoshihiko Umakoshi, who’s played a key role in bringing the previous seasons to life through either key animation or character design work.

Umakoshi recently shared a new take on Midoriya and Bakugo at the latest Comiket junket in Japan, and it sees the two burgeoning rival heroes sitting on a bench in an adorable way…but also seems very familiar.

This art has a very heartwarming parallel, too, as it hearkens back to famous pieces seen in both the original manga and anime. As highlighted by @aitakimochi on Twitter, Bakugo and Midoriya sitting on a bench is reminiscent of the now iconic image of Midoriya and All Might sitting on the same kind of bench in their hero gear. This was later reflected in the anime, before All Might lost his One For All ability completely.

Although Umakoshi is seemingly not be contributing to the fourth season of the anime, fans will see his work again in the new movie, My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising. Like this new art suggests as Midoriya and Bakugo take on this iconic bench image, the new film will be focusing on Midoriya and Bakugo as they try and grow into the heroes needed to fill the void left by All Might.

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 both a fourth season of the anime and second big anime film.