My Hero Academia: Why Shigaraki Is The Perfect Villain

gamerant.com:

This article contains spoilers for the current season of My Hero Academia.

Shonen anime has produced no shortage of iconic villains over the years, from Lord Frieza in Dragon Ball Z to Dio Brando in Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure to Marshall D. Teach of One Piece fame. But in recent years, the main antagonist of one of the biggest modern shonen series has risen up to take his place as one of the most compelling, fascinating, and downright terrifying shonen villains in all of anime — Tomura Shigaraki from My Hero Academia.

My Hero Academia is, true to its name, a superhero series first and foremost, following the adventures of Izuku “Deku” Midoriya as he trains to become the world’s greatest hero. Deku’s fought plenty of deadly villains over the course of the manga and its anime adaptation — villains like the hero-killing ideologue Stain, the sadistic brute Muscular, and the ruthless yakuza boss Overhaul. But every great superhero needs a truly legendary supervillain as their arch-nemesis, and in this case, that villain is Tomura Shigaraki.

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Shigaraki was the first major villain to appear in the series, making his debut in the latter half of the anime’s first season. He was presented as the leader of the League of Villains, the main enemy faction of the series — but despite providing Deku’s first fight with real supervillains, Shigaraki didn’t come off as particularly intimidating in his initial appearance. Instead of a cunning evil mastermind, he was immature, arrogant, and short-tempered. Compared to his level-headed right-hand man Kurogiri or the monstrous genetic experiment Nomu, Shigaraki himself posed little threat to the heroes by