There is an unspoken rule within the anime community that states “Nothing is canon unless it is in the source material.” In most cases, source material is referring to the manga, though it could also be referencing the databooks, or any light novels the mangaka has written. Because the stories of movies and OVAs tend to not be written by the author they are rejected. However, there are two anime films that challenged this belief.Dragon Ball Z Battle of Godsis the first anime feature film to be considered canon by the fanbase because the entire movie was written by Akira Toriyama even though the events never happened in the manga.
Then, years laterDemon Slayer Mugen Trainwas releasedand this movie captured events of the Manga and turned them into a feature film, thus making it impossible to consider the movie as filler or even skip it and continue the source material. These two movies have sparked a new debate amongst the anime community, one which has no clear answer. Are theHero Academiamovies canon? Kohei Horikoshi makes several references to the events of the movies within the source material, without showing them in the manga. Thus, many fans will accept pieces of the information but reject others.
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Two Heroes
In an interview, Kohei Horikoshi stated, “I always wanted to include a chapter about All Might’s past, or rather, I thought that I definitely NEED to write about his past. In the movie, the young All Might is shown studying abroad in America, and I thought this might not be something that could be brought up anymore in the actual manga story up until now, so I saw the movie as a chance to present this.” The opening sequence of theMy Hero Academiamovie opens with All Might in the states trying to stop a pair of villains who were escaping after a bank robbery.
A young girl is shown in the car with her sister and then All Might arrive and protects her. That little girl is later revealed to be a major character in My Hero Academia manga. Starts & Stripes is the number one hero in the USA and when she comes to Japan and fights Shigiraki she ends up having a flashback to that very scene which took place in the movie.
There’s more though. In the same interview, Horikoshi later said “Of course, without a doubt,the movie and manga are adjoined, and the movie’s story is connected to the manga story that happens after it.” This was stated years before the events with Stars and Stripe, but this quote is interesting as the movie is now shown to be directly connected to the manga chapters with her introduction.
This is even more interesting when you consider Melissa Shield’s character. The gauntlet she makes in the movie is worn by Deku in chapters 310, and she appears not only in the side series My Hero Academia Smash but also in the manga one shot that came out along with the movie. Speaking of, each of the movies have a special one shot that accompanied them, and should those chapters be considered source material?
Heroes Rising
The second movie is a bit trickier as it pertains to canon source material. As previously stated there is a one-shot manga that is meant to set the stage for the movie. It shows Nine’s mindset and how he ended up going to the doctor to seek bodily enhancement and power. It shows how he was given more quirks and the connection between him, the villains, and Shigiraki.
This information is not really explained in the movie, where it just begins with him being picked up by the villains and the heroes trying to stop them. Its shown later in the manga, as he references wishing to destroy everything, an image of Nine in the bottom left corner in chapter 222. This is relevant also because in the one-shot previously mentioned Nine says something similar in stating that everything must be destroyed.
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The most controversial part of the second movie is in the final battle.Deku gives Bakugo One For Allso the two of them can work together to beat Nine. Yet after the battle, even though Deku passed the quirk to him, Bakugo loses all memories of having it, and Deku is allowed to keep the quirk through mysterious circumstances. Without proper explanation, this seems to be a plothole and fans consider it just a fanservice edition, so we can see double One For All in the final scene. However, this is in fact not a plothole. In an interview, Horikoshi stated, “By the way, due to the length of the movie we weren’t able to show all of it, but there’s a reason none of One For All’s power was left with Bakugo.
In the timeline where the movie is, the will of the predecessors has started to interfere with things. The will of One For All, a power All Might doesn’t even know, is in motion and that’s how it ended up that way.” Horikoshi has given fans an in-lore reason as to how Deku was able to pass on the quirk and not only does it align with the current story in the manga, but it also wouldexplain the events of Chapter 362where Bakugo is talking to vestige All Might. This is something that should only be possible if he was/is a holder of One For All, which if true ties into the fight in the second movie.
World Heroes' Mission
As for the third movie, this is the only movie the anime makes reference to. Episode 107 of the anime has Ryuku Tatsuma, the number 10 hero, hero’s agency actually face off with villains of the movie. The villains inWorld Heroes' Missionare using a drug known as trigger to boost their quirks, and Ryuku is stopping a shipment from leaving Japan to get to them. Whiletrigger plays a major role in theVigilantesmanga, this is one of only two times the drug is mentioned in the main series (The first was during the Overhaul Arc). Outside the anime this movie got a special one shot manga where Deku, Bakugo, and Todoroki fight Endeavor to get permission to go on the mission, and another one shot where they are boarding the plane. In Manga chapter 328, the number one heroes of Egypt and France make an appearance and both of these characters were in the film.
Ultimately, whether fans are searching within the anime, manga, side stories, or even interviews by Horikoshi himself, all evidence points to these stories being canon. They fit within the timeline set within the manga and are referenced in some form in the source material. The most important question to ask however is if accepting these stories into canon is relevant. While it’s nice to acknowledge the events of these films,they have very little to almost no bearingon the story of the manga. Even if canon, the films are isolated incidents or events which just so happen to involve the protagonist ofMy Hero Academia. This is why, in the end, it’s up to the reader if they will allow these stories to be considered canon.
If accepting the events that take place in the story as canon enhances your experience as a reader, feel free to do so. There is nothing within the main story that conflicts, and it could add more personality, depth, and intrigue to characters that otherwise lack screen time or relevance. On the other hand, if you are a fan who only wants to read the main story of the manga, those events won’t get in the way of your enjoyment. Not acknowledging them will not result in missing context or understanding of the main series. The main series is about the students ofUA versus the League of Villainsand the movies do not move that story along. What they add is canon world-building and more character development and it’s those aspects which make it so easy to consider canon.
