English Dub Review: My Hero Academia “Early Bird”

Overview:

Bakugo shows how much he’s grown but how he won’t compromise on who he is. Everyone works together well as a team. Class B Gets absolutely destroyed 4-0, they will learn a lot from the defeat.

Our Take:

Bakugo can be a loudmouthed bastard but he sure stays true to himself. If he wasn’t an ass all the time he would probably be everyone’s number one. Trust me I am aware he usually leads all the popularity polls. Just saying the margin would be even wider if he wasn’t mean so much. There’s even a part where he tells Deku to get out of his way to which Deku retorts “I’m not even in front of you, so I don’t know what you mean…”

Just a heads up, a majority of this will be gushing about Bakugo’s character development and Clifford Chapin’s portrayal of our favorite angry boi. Bakugo actually used teamwork and in the past hasn’t cared about protecting anyone. His primary goal has always been to defeat villains. So when they show a scene of him telling his teammates “If you’re in danger, I will protect you and if I’m in danger you sure as hell better protect me.” I shed a tear seeing how much that boy has grown.

I know this role can’t be easy on Clifford’s vocal cords but I appreciate the work he puts in. It was the first role I heard him in and for the most part, it is pretty unique among his other work. He’s really great at screaming and yelling, and I always laugh when I hear him say “Deku! You nerd!”

I was a little disappointed by how quick and one-sided the match was because I have enjoyed seeing more of Class B. I especially wanted to see Tokage and her lizard quirk. She was one of the other students to get in on recommendations like Todoroki and Momo, so she’s a big deal. To be fair she actually did get some time to shine but the rest of her team didn’t really get to do much other than be a hindrance here and there. Tokage’s defeat here really reminded me of Momo’s arc in season two.

This episode was a masterpiece, I love seeing characters evolve. You can tell Deku is rubbing off on Bakugo a bit as he is starting to realize where he could improve. I would kind of like to see Deku act a bit more like Bakugo at times. With Deku saying he is going to be the bait and the confidence he is showing maybe next week he will be a bit more like him. This was such a great episode, I can’t believe people are calling this show boring. This is quality character storytelling.