My Hero Academia Fans Are Concerned About One Villain’s Dub Title

With My Hero Academia‘s latest episode officially wrapping up the Remedial Course sub arc, the next episode will kickstart the final arc for the fourth season, Culture Festival. This arc will see Izuku Midoriya and the rest of Class 1-A trying their best to make the most of a new festival to ease the tensions at U.A. Academy. But this won’t be the only thing Midoriya and the others will be worrying about as there will be dangerous new villains making their presence known during the height of the celebration. But their names are giving fans some worry.

Due to the nature of translation Japanese material for an English audience (and the various cultural and linguistic differences that come with it), some elements are shifted differently than what fans are used to. While the main villain, Gentle, will most likely be fine in this transition, fans are beginning to worry about how the English productions will handle the name of his sidekick, La Brava, in the anime.

As pointed out by the official English translator for Viz Media’s release of My Hero Academia, Caleb Cook, fans are concerned that some of the anime’s info for La Brava translates her name to “Love Lover” when compared to the manga’s official data book entry of the name. So there might be some issues when bringing her to the West in the anime.

As Cook has previously pointed out, La Brava’s name has katakana that can be read as “La Baruba” (La Brava) or “Love Lover,” and he ultimately went with La Brava as the young villain’s name is also a reference to the noir novel “La Brava.” But the anime team’s localization might go a different route. With the English translations being a mandate from the original studio, it’s out of their hands in the first place. So now all fans can do is wait until these characters make their debut in the West officially!

Which name would you prefer, La Brava or Love Lover? Does it matter to you? Let us know your thoughts in the comments or talk to me directly about all things anime and other cool things @Valdezology on Twitter!

My Hero Academia was created by Kohei Horikoshi for Shueisha’s Weekly Shonen Jump in 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.