My Hero Academia: Two Heroes

If I were to gush with enthusiasm and award five stars, it would probably only be for the very end of this movie, the last battle. It is beautifully dramatic, colorful, and quite emotional. Simply put, it has everything I would have expected from a hero movie. However, I did not find the rest of the movie super cool, plus ultra or anything that would make it stand out as exceptional. After all, the message of what it means to be a hero and pass the torch to a new generation permeates throughout the original anime series, so it is not anything that new or unexpected in this movie. In other words, once again I am getting only what I have become used to, once again, quite successfully, I have been persuaded to buy into these ideas, even though the same ideas are often repeated (within the My Hero Academia universe), and so I am not so keen on it this time around. However, as an addition to the anime series and a reiteration of all that, I was eventually willing to accept it. Of course, I did not find it that entertaining at the beginning. Sure, the setting of I-Island was quite interesting, however, I found all those "random" encounters like "Hey, it is Bakugo here, wow, are you here too?" rather maddening. Fortunately, the movie gradually improved after that. The tower ambush felt like I was watching the first Die Hard movie for a while, even though it was not half as action-packed as I would have liked. Sure, the young protagonists have no permissions yet, so they tend to avoid confrontations, although, in all honesty, I thought there could have been more fight scenes - after all, they are what I expect from a shonen - even though the conclusion saves the day... What about the surprising twists? I did not find the first one (who was behind the robbery) that surprising, I was expecting something like that. However, the second twist (who was really behind it all) got me, I actually liked it and it was a nice wink to the fans of the show, and a good reason why the movie was released after certain events in the third season had been aired. So, in the end, I personally thought that the movie had a weak beginning and worked up to a great finish. It is a must for true aficionados of the anime series, and action anime in general, and it is all wrapped up in a nice and appealing package with a soundtrack that was very well put together - 8/10. (02/10/2019)