REVIEW: ‘My Hero Academia: Memories’ Expands The Series’ Past

With the stage set for the vaunted shonen anime to deliver the long-awaited rematch between All For One and the heroes, studio bones’ My Hero Academia: Memories looks back at the past to recap some of the series’ most crucial moments and expand upon our knowledge of some of its huge cast of characters.

Told in four parts, My Hero Academia: Memories focuses each entry on a central character(s). Izuku Midoriya, All Might, and Tomura Shigaraki all take center stage in an installment. The fourth entry splits time between other UA students like Bakugo, Uraka, and Todoroki. This approach keeps the mini-series focused largely on the core narrative of the series while allowing some time for the supporting players to get highlighted.

Many of the central moments of the series’ previous six seasons are explored. From Midoriya’s first steps as the newest bearer of One For All to the resurrection of Shigaraki, many of the hardest-hitting moments from the franchise get revised here. These moments are wonderfully edited to maximize their effect, allowing viewers to relive the power and agony the series has always delivered.

With six seasons to explore, and many phenomenal moments held therein, it would’ve been easy for My Hero Academia: Memories to be an extra-long recap episode and nothing more. Even the most devoted fans could use a refresher concerning the series’ long-running narrative. But this project opts to go the extra mile, expanding on some of its past, and fleshing out the struggle between All For One and One For All. Several expanded looks at the narrative’s history give viewers a fuller understanding of the motivations and characters that have inspired the current heroes and villains.

The character who gets the most love from these expanded moments is All Might’s master, Nana Shimura. While viewers have always been told Shimura’s importance to the plot, My Hero Academia: Memories shows why she was so important. It demonstrates her impact on All Might and how much she inspires him to shine brightly. All Might’s dream of being the Symbol of Peace initially caught Shimura’s eye. But it’s clear that Shimura’s kind tutelage forever altered the smiling titan All Might would become.

In the most dramatic expanded moment, we see the last time All Might saw his master. As Gran Torino carries away the future Number One hero, he cries out to his master as she squares off with All For One. With a monstrous version of her foe surrounding her, Shimura said goodbye to her protege, telling him, “Now it’s your turn.” This reveal adds a layer of weight to what was already one of the hardest-hitting moments in the series. All Might’s words to Deku after his final battle with All For One were the same as his master’s. This revelation layers another meaning onto the tear-inducing scene.

The final touch to My Hero Academia: Memories is its choice of intros and outtros. Rather than making original openings and closings for the series, each entry showcases a pair of previously used versions. This feels like the right choice for what the mini-series strives to accomplish. MHA has always had fantastic openings, and opting to use a selection of them pulls the viewer back to the past. Each selection also helps indicate where much of each episode’s focus will lie, hinting at what the viewer can expect to revisit with each entry.

My Hero Academia: Memories is an excellent way to prime returning fans for the series’ seventh season. Not many anime have the weight and narrative density to make such a substantial project worth investing in. MHA does though, and the care put into how the material is presented here highlights how much the narrative matters to the show. So if you need a reminder of the biggest plot beats and character histories before plunging into the seventh season, this is a fantastic way to get the information.

My Hero Academia: Memories is streaming now on Crunchyroll.