Spoilers are off. You Have Been Warned!
My Hero Academia is fond of deconstructing the tropes it utilizes, being a Cliché Storm; particularly tropes otherwise freely utilized in action-based media:
Shonen and Superhero Tropes
- Bystander Syndrome: Justified since it’s enforced due to highly restrictive Quirk regulation laws. Even if someone has the Quirk for a situation they won't be able to help if they lack a hero license. And if they do use their Quirk they'll either be labeled a villain or vigilante so most seek to stay out of trouble. While this mentality is supposed to keep people safe from Quirk misusage and getting civilians endangered it’s actually caused more harm than good. Mainly, had someone other than All For One stepped in to help a young Tenko Shimura after (partially) accidentally killing his family the plot would've been very different.
- Everyone Is a Super:
- While 80% of the population does have superpowers only a small percentage of them have powers that are powerful and practical enough for superhero work, especially when abilities can be as varied and random as they are in this series. Most Quirks are either hard to use or useless in fights such as Inko's minor Telekinesis, Daikaku Miyagi’s mundane horns or David Shield's extra-flexible fingers. Even a sizeable number of students and pros had to train extensively to find practical uses for their powers such as Best Jeanist and Fiber Master, Eraser Head and Erasure quirk and Mirio and Permiation.
- The series also shows how just about everyone having superpowers means they can often be in the wrong hands. Aside from villains the most obvious examples of superpowers being in the wrong hands, the remedial testing arc and Izuku's childhood show how chaotic and dangerous things can get when it includes children since with very few exceptions Quirks develop when one is 4 years old. Kids with strong Quirks can be particularly monstrous due to having power but little to no maturity or empathy. Furthermore, as Shigaraki and Eri demonstrated some children's powers have been outright deadly to people unlucky enough to be around them when their Quirks first activated because they had no idea how to control them. There is even an In-Universe Conspiracy Theory that the innate ability of Quirks to strengthen over generations and combine to form new powers will eventually result in society being destroyed when its population ends up consisting of people with Quirks too powerful to control.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: After the Paranormal Liberation War ends with many cities destroyed and escaped criminals running rampant alongside the villains, public opinion of heroes plummets. Most of society hurls nothing but criticism and insults at them, continuously blaming them for the country’s ruined state. While some like Endeavor endure and keep fighting most simply retire rather than risk their lives in significantly more dangerous environments only to be hated. Even some such as Death Arms who keep going at first eventually get worn down by negativity, retiring due to severe stress and low morale.
- Intangibility: As shown by Mirio, this ability which is often a Story-Breaker Power is one of the hardest to use. Becoming intangible, Mirio becomes unable to breathe, hear or see since he’s intangible to air, sound and light, even falling through the floor if his feet become intangible. Aside from the clear emotional scarring and how fatally dangerous this can be it’s only useful because Mirio dedicated his life to training with and mastering it.
- I Work Alone:
- During the Hero License Exam, Todoroki, Bakugo and Yoarashi attempt to do this. It results in all of them failing with the explanation that their inability to work together is damaging to the generations of heroes focused on unity and teamwork that the Hero Public Safety Commission is attempting to create as compensation for All Might's retirement. In particular, Yoarashi and Todoroki stopping to deal with their personal issues during the fight against Gang Orca almost gets Shindo killed and them brutally reprimanded by Midoriya.
- Following the battle with the Paranormal Liberation Army run by the League of Villains, Midoriya becomes a One-Man Army working with the remaining pros to help defeat them and protect his classmates. Eventually he drops even that and goes it alone, causing his mental and physical states to get worse while also pushing himself to the point of exhaustion. By the time his classmates find him he's barely holding it together and so determined to protect them he tries to get away, forcing them to capture him so he doesn't get hurt or die.
- Mass Super-Empowering Event: When Quirks first began appearing among the population over a century ago the transition was not smooth, especially since nobody knows why or how it was happening in the first place. The cultural backlash, prejudice against the people who first got Quirks and resulting violence was so profound that humanity technologically and socially regressed to the point many people believe commercial space travel would have already been mastered by the time the series began if Quirks never existed.
- Me's a Crowd: As demonstrated by Twice this power can have disastrous consequences if abused. With the ability to create clones of not only himself but also of other people he’s incredibly useful to the League of Villains. Yet as his backstory shows each clone has its own form of autonomy and when he created a bunch of clones of himself to use as slaves and extra muscle each one believed itself to be the original. Since each one didn't like the thought of being ordered around this caused a massive fight to the death amongst them that lead to the current Twice being the only survivor. This caused his psyche to fracture and collapse on itself to the point where he's not even sure if he's the original Twice or a clone that killed his own creator and his own Quirk threatens to "split" himself if any part of his body is left unexposed by his costume.
- One Person, One Power: Each person, barring very few exceptions has one Quirk which gives one power and/or a highly connected subset of powers such as Tsuyu's frog Quirk. This means each Quirk user is essentially a baseline human outside of any powers. This can lead to Crippling Overspecialization where a power is useless in a given situation like Mt. Lady's size enhancement in a closed-off area, leaving them no opportunities to use them. It also means that most only need to think of a single counter to make their opponent functionally powerless such as Mineta holding his breath to avoid Midnight's Knock Out Gas or Tokoyami becoming an essentially mundane teenager in bright light. This also means that unlike most superhero works mundane weapons are still dangerous to Pro Heroes with even someone as powerful as Tamaki Amakiji being vulnerable to getting shot and Uraraka and Tsuyu vulnerable to being stabbed because their powers don't prevent weapon-related injuries. Rock Lock, a hero with the ability to freeze things in place and powerful enough to counter a Trigger-using Mimic almost dies when Toga sneak attacks and stabs him in the back.
- Passing the Torch: There’s a recurring theme of successors receiving the problems of their predecessors and the stress and tribulations of having to live up to the examples set for them.
- Midoriya inherited One for All from All Might but it's incredibly destructive and he doesn't have the natural aptitude for it while All Might "had" a natural aptitude for it and therefore can't optimally train him. So the poor kid spends lengthy amounts of time in the hospital and has almost completely ruined his arms.
- The holders of One for All were also handed down an immense responsibility and danger. The immense power also came with the ire of its pursuer All for One and his efforts to eradicate the line meant most holders had to hand One for All down as they died to avoid it dying as well. Izuku doesn't have to fight All for One because All Might used up the last of his power to defeat him but he does have a monumental job of trying to fill in the last guy's shoes.
- Unfortunately, All for One’s followers, specifically Shigaraki continue targeting Izuku in their leader’s absence and he himself makes a Great Escape from his Hellhole Prison, ensuring Izuku has to put up with the danger regardless.
- All Might eventually reveals that for the most part the passing down of One For All was a spur-of-the-moment decision made by the dying users, who chose whichever heroes were nearby at the time of their deaths. All Might via Nana Shimura and Midoriya via All Might are the only ones whose predecessors specifically chose and trained them before handing them the power.
- Shoto Todoroki is a heroic Laser-Guided Tyke-Bomb meant to surpass All Might as the #1 Hero because his father, the #2 Hero Endeavor, never could. The efforts involved in breeding Todoroki have left misery in their wake, with Todoroki heavily scarred over one eye and his mother in a mental hospital.
- Tenya Iida is asked to carry on the Ingenium name from his brother but the circumstances of the original Ingenium's retirement were so traumatic Iida initially can't accept the name and the responsibility he views in it and later nearly gets himself killed in a failed revenge attempt.
- Also, heroes are not the only ones able to pass the torch. All For One takes advantage of a traumatized Shigaraki to pass down his powers so One For All will be taken by him. Even further deconstructed later when it's shown that All For One can mind control Shigaraki via said Quirk. Why else would a selfish villain willingly pass on their powers if not to grant themselves some kind of advantage and/or control over the new user?
- Personality Powers: A number of characters in the series have Quirks that reflect their personalities such as Bakugo's explosive personality matching his Quirk. In the Meta Liberation Army arc this idea is deconstructed when Curious brings up another In-Universe belief that many people are actually changed by their Quirks, meaning they develop interests and personalities as a result of their Quirk having a biological effect on their being. She points out that Toga’s Quirk led her to have a natural attraction and admiration for blood as well as a drive from a young age to try consuming it. That behavior was repressed by her parents and society at large, forcing her to try containing herself for years in regards to her feelings for blood. When her bloodthirstiness finally exploded upon seeing a boy drenched in blood after a fight she went off the rails and became a Serial Killer. Curious mentions this might not have happened had society been different and taken care of her properly since it was literally a part of her that nobody understood.
- Superpowerful Genetics:
- As mentioned above there’s an In-Universe suggestion that the ability of Quirks to strengthen over generations and combine to form new powers will result in the world being destroyed by Quirks too powerful for their users to control. This is given clout by the children in the remedial exam who have unusually strong and esoteric powers allowing them to cause a great deal of trouble.
- Quirks being genetic has led to “Quirk Marriages” where a couple marries to produce a child with a stronger power. Endeavor's worst acts were motivated by the knowledge of producing a superior heir via the impregnation of a woman with a complimentary Quirk if he just kept trying.
- Superpower Lottery: Hawks had an incredibly strong Quirk at a young age and was practically forced to enter the heroics field when he publicly demonstrated it. He still wanted to be a hero but notes he wasn't really given a choice.
- Talking the Monster to Death: Because the League of Villains accepted Twice while the rest of society failed him for most of his life Hawks’s genuine attempts to help him turn his life around instead comes across as Condescending Compassion and further enrages the distressed villain. In the end Hawks is ultimately forced to kill Twice.
- Training from Hell: In most of the series this is usually either Played for Laughs or used to improve trainees. But Shoto was subjected to it since at least five years of age and it was shown to be a horrible experience that broke him mentally.
Other Tropes
- Always in Class One: As the series goes on the other classes at U.A. quickly grew envious and resentful of Class 1-A, due to a combination of both the media attention they get but also because all major villain attacks happen when at least some of the 1-A students were involved (USJ, Stain, Training Camp). This also affects their grades. Compared to them, Class 1-B have better grades and better overall cohesion, not to mention only one of them had to take extra lessons during the Training Camp (Monoma) and all of them have earned their Provisional Licenses. On the other hand, Class 1-A is lagging behind from being at the center of the plot, with five taking extra lessons during the Training Camp (Kirishima, Sero, Ashido, Sato, and Kaminari) and two of their students have failed the Provisional License Exam (Todoroki and Bakugo). In this case, being at the center of the plot often means being hospitalized or otherwise taken out of class, and it's even outright stated that part of the reasonnote Class 1-B did better at the second portion of the Provisional Exam is because the attack on the USJ interrupted what was going to be Class 1-A's rescue training.
- Ambiguously Human: Society decayed when Quirks appeared, with the definition of human becoming loose and fear breaking out in everyone. And Chapter 220 shows that there's still discrimination against people with Mutation-type Quirks (like Spinner of the LoV) with groups that are basically The Klan roaming about.
- Daddy Had a Good Reason for Abandoning You: Following the murder of her husband, and before her death at the hands of All for One, Nana Shimura gave up her son Kotaro for his protection as she feared that he might be targeted by AFO in order to get to her. While certainly well-meaning, the formative age at which he was given up left Kotaro with severe abandonment issues, and he was left unable to come to terms with his mother's sacrifice. This caused him to develop a deep hatred for the idea of heroes, believing that they care more about upholding the idea of justice and saving complete strangers than taking care of their families and those dear to them. His unresolved issues left him a stern and very cold husband and father, and he forbid any and all discussion of heroes in his house, with his physically violent tendencies being a factor in developing young Tenko's mental issues.
- Evil Is Cool: With the figure of Stain it shows how damaging the concept can be to society, particularly young people as Stain goes from a semi-obscure and shadowy villain to a household name overnight. His visage and message is broadcast all over the media and merchandise is even produced and sold at malls. Since the attention Stain gets from the media encourages troubled people such as Himiko and Dabi to become full-time villains this essentially leads to a type of criminal renaissance. This is troublesome because, even if villains are cool they’re still people who hurt innocents, shown when Kaminari praised Stain's coolness, failing to realize he just praised the man who permanently crippled his schoolmate’s brother right in front of said him until he’s called out on it. Ironically, despite Stain himself having nothing to do with it some of his adherents go on to wreck society during the Paranormal Liberation War out of a desire to undo the fake hero society Stain crusaded against.
- Kirk Summation and "The Reason You Suck" Speech: As the series progresses it gradually becomes clear many who turned to villainy are not immoral lunatics but rather collections of broken people who wound up driven to it after being failed by society in one form or another. Needless to say, attempts to lecture them by the heroes usually end up coming across as Condescending Compassion at best and Dehumanization at worst. More often than not (such as during the confrontation between Twice and Hawks) this results in alienating the villains further.
- Stronger with Age: One for All getting stronger over time has resulted in it being unusable at 100% for the current user and its boosting other Quirks such as Black Whip has also made them too powerful to comfortably use. Because of this Midoriya's first breakthrough with Quirk usage was about how to properly hold back. It also means that much of the information the previous wielders had become lost when the Quirk becomes stronger, leading to the sources of help available being unable to offer much help beyond what they knew about the Quirks in the past.
- Undying Loyalty: Gigantomachia's obsession with his All for One hinders his decision making greatly. He idolizes his boss so much that he will drop everything just to hear his voice and his desire to only give his boss the best means that he puts Shigaraki through hell even though he is All for One's chosen successor because Gigantomachia does not view him as worthy of the title. His recent return to the final battle also shows he has limits, especially if taken for granted; All For One's callous betrayal of him is so profoundly shattering for Gigantomachia that all of his devotion swings hard into pure hatred for his master, being willing to go so far as to align with the heroes to destroy his master once and for all.]]
- Willfully Weak: Due to the trauma he was put through as a child Todoroki refuses to use his flame powers to spite his father, aiming to become a pro with only his ice powers. While portrayed sympathetically, he maintains this even in the Tournament Arc, wherein during his fight with Midoriya he begins losing a fight he otherwise would have win at full power. Midoriya calls him out on this, telling him while he cannot understand his trauma, holding back and purposely weakening himself in a tournament where everyone is giving it their all is a slap to the others faces, especially since he gradually starts losing. This inspires him to use his powers from then on, but he still has to deal with the trauma.
