English Dub Season Review: My Hero Academia Season Two

GO INSANE!

Of all the shocking properties that Adult Swim passed on for its Toonami lineup, I was really taken back by the fact that My Hero Academia wasn’t on there. Adult Swim’s action-toon lineup has done a decent job of shepherding the major titles from Funimation for first-run with the anime stream service usually getting the next day stream. Attack on Titan, Dragon Ball Super, and Lupin the Third are examples of this strategy, but how the hell did Adult Swim NOT make a deal to put My Hero Academia on their network?

It could be that Funimation knew what they had here and didn’t want to. If that’s the case…smart move on their part because My Hero Academia Season Two was stellar. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, there might not be another franchise in the world that produces fight scenes with such voracity and emotion than My Hero Academia. The production of these scenes is excellent by Bones with exquisite details coming in different art direction categories like shadowing, action direction, and overtly dramatic choreography that requires a towel off after the initial viewing.

Voice acting should also be given a big ol’ kudos, with Chris Sabat not only being able to produce solid dubs but he’s also a pretty damn good actor himself in the role of All Might. Justin Briner does a rather excellent job as “Izuku”, delivering an almost “Morty-like” performance but with still enough conviction to remind you that he voices the most important character in the franchise. With all that said, with this episode being named after Katsuki, how can we not acknowledge the breath-taking performance by Cliff Chapin in his role as “Bakugo”.  Cliff shows such raw emotion as Bakugo that I think Funimation’s gotta figure out a way to start getting Emmy consideration because Cliff blows a lot of the mainstream competition away.

There are some slight hangups in the series. Like every good anime you get flashback episodes, convolutions in the plot arcs, and other standard anime tropes, but the dialogue and character designs are so gripping that you can usually get past the not-great episodes by just sitting in awe and soaking in the experience before we’re rushed back into the 75 mph fight scenes. The second season of My Hero Academia is an absolute gem and should NOT be missed.