New My Hero Academia Villain Draws Comparisons to DC’s Harley Quinn

My Hero Academia manga chapter 312 serves as the full-fledged debut of a powerful new villain named Lady Nagant. She’s a former hero who became disillusioned with the pro hero code and killed one of her fellow heroes as a result; Nagant was left to rot away in the supermax Tartarus prison until she was sprung by All For One’s jailbreak. All For One specifically wanted Lady Nagant and her unrivaled abilities as a sniper for one specific job: hunting down and capturing Izuku Midoriya. So far, My Hero Academia fans are loving Lady Nagant, but some fans suspect that she is also the series’ ode to DC’s Harley Quinn!

Lady Nagant’s unique quirk allows her to transform her right arm into a high-caliber sniper rifle, and also twist strands of her hair into unique and powerful forms of ammunition. Even though My Hero Academia’s manga is drawn in black-and-white, Deku’s internal monologue reveals that he recognizes Nagant’s “Ammunition mad of pink and dark-blue fibers…” If you’re a comic fan, it doesn’t take a deductive genius to realize that Lady Nagant’s unique hair coloring has one main direct comparison: DC’s Harley Quinn!

My Hero Academia creator Kohei Horikoshi well-known (and unabashed) for his love of DC and Marvel superheroes, as well as other popular genre franchises like Star Wars. Horikoshi is also infamous for sneaking references to different popular characters, places, and storylines from these other franchises into My Hero Academia‘s manga. Fans read each chapter with a keen eye for Easter egg references that Horikoshi has buried in the names and/or visuals, and Lady Nagant has been chock-full of them.

In addition to her Harley Quinn hairstyle, Lady Nagant’s name is also a reference to the Mosin-Nagant rifle that was used in WWII; her unique skill of curving her sniper bullet around a building to strike at Deku was lifted right out of Angelina Jolie’s Wanted movie. With those kinds of deep cuts, the Harley Quinn reference seems almost too obvious.

My Hero Academia releases new chapters weekly Free in Shonen Jump Magazine. Season 5 of the anime streams new episodes weekly on Funimation and Hulu.