So what's a class to do while stuck in their dorms?
Mirio Togata of UA's Big Three has a solution. He brings over a new state-of-the-art card game for them to playtest for the next party, with the play cards all based on them and other heroes.
In a holographic showdown of UA Heores Battle, who will come out on top?
- Asshole Victim: Mineta and his Grape Juice card both suffer thanks to his perverted tendencies during the game. Ashido has no problem kicking him down because she and the others girls believe he deserves it.
- Big Anime Eyes: All of the characters portrayed in the game possess large cartoonish eyes, except for Hatsume.
- Bottle Episode: Class 1-A are stuck in the Heights Alliance dormitories, so the episode has them playtest the card game.
- Butt-Monkey: Poor Sero's card gets defeated immediately every single time it's played.
- The Cameo: Yo Shindo, aka Grand, makes an appearance as a support card; even though he's part of Ketsubutsu High and not UA.
- Card Battle Game: UA Heroes Battle is a game featuring all of Class 1-A as the main cards, while other heroes are used as one-time EX/Support cards. Like their real world selves, the characters all have their strengths and weaknesses, requiring players to make the best luck and strategy with what they use.
- Continuity Nod:
- The demonstration of the card battle resembles how Mei Hatsume humiliated Tenya Iida back at the UA Sports Festival in Season 2. Her character even uses Ingenium as a subject, which aggravates Iida.
- Midoriya wins his match after using a Shoto card on the Tail Man one. His opponent, the real Ojiro notices how this quick turnaround mirrors the first combat training back in Season 1.
- Hagakure uses Anima to best Sato's Present Mic via bugs and insects, similar to how Jiro and Kota pass their exam against Present Mic in Season 2.
- Downer Ending: Played for Laughs. After Midoriya and Bakugo's battles end with two consecutive draws, an irate Bakugo takes his rage out on the battle board in explosive fashion. According to Midoriya, this results in Aizawa later permanently banning Class 1-A from playing any card games.
- Holographic Terminal: The "battle board" for the card game is able to display a pocket environment and the characters fight inside when their cards are played. Present Mic is used as an AI Color Commentator during the battles.
- Interquel: Also a Prequel as it takes place in Season 5, between the Joint Training and both Endeavor Agency and Meta Liberation Army arcs.
- Because of this placement, only Bakugo knows about Midoriya's "One For All" at the time. For everyone else in class 1-A, Midoriya's Quirk is still called "Super Power".
- Jerkass Has a Point: Bakugo destroying the battle board in rage from another draw is uncalled for, but he's not wrong about calling out the weird mechanic for the All Might card forfeiting for a dog card.
- Lighter and Softer: Because this OVA is an interquel of Season 5, the harrowing events of Season 6's Paranormal Liberation War arc and its effects that follow haven't occurred yet.
- Loophole Abuse:
- Mineta invokes a rule that his team of boys face Ashido's team of girls in a match where they are only allowed to use cards based on their gender. Since there aren't much main cards with female characters, they make use of support cards like Mt. Lady, much to the boys' shock.
- Bakugou draws an All Might card while Midoriya draws a card of an ordinary dog with no quirks at all. How does Midoriya win against such impossible odds? He doesn't, but All Might's heroic attitude has him "take the dog to their owner" instead of attacking, leading to another double Ring Out and draw.
- Oh, Crap!: Bakugo and Midoriya's own cards are evenly matched to the point of running out of time in their one-on-one battle, but what annoys them is that they believe these are not updated to their recent development.
- Sore Loser: While Bakugou doesn't actually lose, he refuses to accept a pair of draws against Midoriya, with the second draw more ridiculous as described in the Loophole Abuse. He destroys the battle board in a fit of rage.
