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My Hero Academia Final Season Ep 2 Review

Back when the My Hero Academia manga was still running, a big question was about the fate of All Might: would he live or would he die? Sir Nighteye’s Quirk had him convinced that the hero would die if he continued down his path. However, he had said the same about Deku during the fight with Overhaul, and Deku proved him wrong. There were, in fact, moments in the final battle where I thought All Might wasn’t going to make it. They had been building throughout his fight with All for One, but it was at this point that the fears really hit their peak. All for One is just that strong a villain!

Stain Goes Out Like a Badass

This entire episode can be summed in one answer: All Might keeps getting lucky breaks. By this point, his armor and AI are both spent. He’s used up every trick in the book, and he knows that continuing to fight will lead to his death. But being who he is, he keeps on fighting anyway to buy Midoriya more time. He keeps gambling on All for One’s hatred for him overriding his sense of urgency to distract him, but even that has a limit. However, that’s when he gets the first of several breaks when Stain jumps in to save him.

Stain is not a good person, by any stretch of the imagination. He hates evil as much as most heroes do, but he was so jaded by people becoming heroes for fame and fortune that he thought the only solution was to kill the fakes. But despite his twisted nature, he does believe in heroes, and will applaud when he sees people being truly heroic. Plus, when All Might was doubting himself, it was Stain who gave him the pep talk he needed. Stain is not a good person, and he knows that he’s going to Hell when he dies. But that’s not going to stop him from helping the heroes one last time.

I won’t lie when I that I loved how Stain managed to turn the tables on All for One, however briefly it might have been. Conversely, I was equally saddened to see this final gambit fail, and end with All for One killing Stain. The man may have been a killer, but I still respected his belief in true heroism. And dying at the hands of the biggest villain in the story is a pretty good way to go out of this life.

Bakugo Comes in to Save the Day!

Despite no longer being in any shape to fight, All Might refuses to take the L. And thankfully, All for One’s ego compels him to drag the hero with him just so he can show off his broken body to the world. Once again, that almost costs All for One as it gives him another opening to try and take him out. Unfortunately, that also doesn’t work. And neither does the last-minute save by Star and Stripes squadron. For a minute, it actually looks like All Might might die, with even the episode title grimly noting this is the end of an era.

But then, we get a deus ex machina. Bakugo re-enters the fray.

Some fans have taken issue with how Horikoshi initially chose to end MHA, and part of it is how Bakugo escaped certain death. It looked like Bakugo was going to die when Shigaraki ran him through, and had he done so, that would have been legendary. I’m happy that he survived, but I also don’t like how it takes away the emotional weight of what happened. However, what he ends up doing next will more than make up for it. Trust me when I say that what happens next is Bakugo’s finest moment.

Then again, the next episode is already out, so I don’t need you to trust me. I would like to end things, though, by mentioning how much I love the final ED for the series. It’s a recollection of the entire series in notebook form, and I think that it’s the perfect way to encapsulate the series. It’s come so far after all these years. Go beyond, PLUS ULTRA!

I Give “The End of an Era, and the Beginning” a 4/5

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