MANGA REVIEW | "My Hero Academia: Vigilantes" - Volume Eleven
When a hero fails to be what he claims to be, it’s only going to lead them towards a path of villainy. My Hero Academia did this awhile back with Gentle Criminal, a wannabe hero whose problematic powers had him go towards the dark side. But for the most part, Gentle Criminal was a humorous look at such a situation. Vigilantes’s O’Clock II, on the other hand, is a terrifying look at what happens when heroes turn into villains!
Volume Eleven of My Hero Academia: Vigilantes starts where the last volume ended, as Pop Step (in Bee Pop mode) has been shot while The Crawler has her in his arms. It leads to a battle between the egotistical O’Clock II, who aims to take down Bee Pop in order to make his image look good. But when Endeavor shows up — along with another adult hero — O’Clock II’s plans literally go up in flames! And in the aftermath, O’Clock II becomes something else entirely.
After Pop Step is placed in custody, The Crawler has a one-to-one with the now-deformed O’Clock II. In this moment, it’s very easy to see the parallels between O’Clock II and Harvey Dent. A sense of justice transforms into a taste for vengeance, as O’Clock II aims to kill both Pop Step and The Crawler in a speech that will give any reader the chills. This is a moment where a great supervillain can emerge, and writer Hideyuki Furuhashi hits the nail on the head with its delivery!
The second half of this volume of Vigilantes goes into a flashback involving Knuckleduster’s original persona! An underground ring of illegal fighting against Quirk users leads him to fight one-on-one with The Rapper. But when a certain rabbit-eared hero-in-the-making comes to put up her dukes, chaos arrives in the form of a mysterious gas. Some people lose their Quirks, while others transform into something monstrous.
Despite it being a pretty action-packed flashback, I can’t help but feel like it has stolen some of the steam of the first half. We were just getting acquainted with the new villain while Pop Step is in the hospital, and this trip back in time kind of stalls the hype. Thankfully, it does lead to some back story context being unveiled, not to mention some impressive fight visuals from illustrator Betten Court. (And yes, he deserves all of the damn respect for his hard work on it!)
Evil in its most wicked form is now finally starting to take shape in My Hero Academia: Vigilantes. O’Clock II’s disturbing turn places a big bullseye on both The Crawler and Pop Step, not to mention the rest of the city. We got a taste of what he could do as a villain via his faux heroic ways, so one hopes we’ll see him go full baddy next time around. Until then, Vigilantes has all of its cards ready to play, as it awaits for the proper time to show the audience its hand.
FINAL GRADE:
Promotional consideration provided by Chantelle Sturt of VIZ Media
