Navel Gazing – ‘My Hero Academia 3rd Season’ Episode 18 Review

What’s the show? My Hero Academia 3rd Season, Episode 18.

So what happens in this episode? Does the licensing exam finally finish? What kind of show do you think this is, son? Part one of it comes to an end but there’s still another whole part of the exam! This is shonen anime, son!

Stop calling me “son”. Sorry…

Okay so do our intrepid Class 1-A students pass? Unfortunately, yes.

Almost like there was no real threat to them passing at all!

Wait, what do you mean “unfortunately”? Aren’t you supposed to be rooting for them? I don’t like shows where everyone on the main cast succeeds; it eliminated a lot of the tension from the narratives, and for a narrative that’s already pretty low-stakes (this is an exam after all—nobody is in any real mortal danger) that’s kind of irritating.

So you wish some of them failed? I’m not asking for a massive culling, just one or two here and there. At the very least it’d make it more believable. Though there is still another part of the exam before anyone’s ~actually~ qualified so I’ll save my real belly-aching for then—assuming it’s a repeat performance of this outcome.

Is there at least some good action and character moments to be had? The action is good, nothing remarkable, same kind of goes for the character development—but then again this episode focuses a lot on characters I sort of don’t care about that much so that’s to be expected.

Oh do tell! Well it’s no secret I’m not the biggest fan of Bakugo, they attempt to soften him here ever so-slightly and whatever—I’m sure there are a lot of people out there who loved the little interaction between him and Midoriya but I still don’t like the angry hot-head. It’s going to take a lot more than just not shouting for once to reform a bully.

I bet this got some shippers happy, did nothing for me though.

Who else? I had to look up his name, that oughta show you how much I don’t care about the guy, but Aoyama a.k.a flamboyant boy who shoots lasers out of his belly button proves again how much low-teir hero he is. And the show tries… something I’m not quite sure what that 5 second flashback to his childhood actually achieved but somehow I feel he belongs in Class 1-A less than Mineta and that’s saying something. I mean Mineta actually competently traps opponents in this episode whereas Aoyama just gives up, fires his navel laser into the sky and inadvertently becomes a beacon for the other 1-A heroes to rush in and help him and Tenya. I’m not saying he’s completely without utility as a support hero maybe, but he absolutely does not deserve to be in Class 1-A.

Not sure if it was the intent but I was laughing my ass of at this.

Harsh. So overall what did you think of the episode? It’s probably one of the weaker episodes from this season—especially after last week. I think the next test, which revolves around saving people could be interesting but I’m just hoping it’s not too drawn out or at the very least gives us some good character development thrown in!

Previous My Hero Academia Reviews:

If you liked my post and want to support my content, please consider supporting my Patreon page, or donating by buying me a coffee on Ko-fi!

Author: Cactus Matt

I love anime and more recently manga too. What else do I need to write here? View all posts by Cactus Matt

Share this:

Like this:

Related

Author: Cactus Matt

Leave a Reply Cancel reply