My Hero Academia Volume 14: “Overhaul” (Chapters 119 through 128) Manga Review
Major Spoilers are included in this manga review. Please read with caution.
On August 3, 2020, I started and finished reading My Hero Academia’s Volume 14. The beginning of this volume was the conclusion to the anime’s season 3 while the second half set-up the beginning of season 4. I’m getting closer to catching up to where the anime series ended. Reading the manga series—more accurately, the physical volume books—has been a wonderful experience that I will cherish for the rest of my life.
I appreciate you all for keeping it reading with me these last couple weeks. It’s been an honor and a privilege writing these My Hero Academia manga reviews. I couldn’t have done it without your continued support. For those interested in my other My Hero Academia reviews, the link is here. Now let’s dive into this Volume 14: “Overhaul” manga review:
Synopsis: Written and drawn by Kohei Horikoshi, the main series follows Izuku Midoriya—nicknamed Deku—and his dream to become a hero someday. In a world where 80% of the superhuman society had powers—dubbed Quirks in this series—the dream to become a superhero became way more common. Sadly enough, Deku fell into the 20% category, effectively making him average—or Quirkless. After a fateful encounter with the number one hero All Might though, Deku’s fate changes forever.
Volume 14 concludes the “meaningless fight” between Deku and Bakugo in the opening chapters, an important event that redefined their relationship and furthered their character developments. For the first time in their lives, they reached an understanding and somewhat talked things out during this fight. Bakugo expressed his fears and insecurities regarding his role in All Might’s retirement, and Deku expressed why he always admired Bakugo—seeing him as the image of victory—despite his rival’s foul behavior. The artwork for their battle was also pretty outstanding.
After the anime rival fight was over, the volume continued to explore a new group of villains making their move, the top three students—Mirio Togata, Nejire Hado, and Tamaki Amajiki—at U.A. High, and the work-study programs—similar to the internships—starting for Class 1-A. There was a lot of important stuff going on into this volume.
The idea of school versus real-life hero experience continued in this volume, directly addressed by Mirio when he emphasized the importance of the work studies and making connections with other hero agencies to further their hero careers. There was also a scene when All Might and the Principal discussed how Mirio was doing mediocre when it came to his schoolwork despite being one of the best heroes at U.A. High.
Going off this school versus real-life hero experience idea further, this concept also made teachers—like All Might—forget the student heroes are children too. All Might realized he put too much on Bakugo and apologized for the overwhelming pressure. There was a fine line between being overprotective and allowing these kids to go into dangerous hero situations.
Let’s talk about the villain Overhaul next. There was a chapter dedicated to his introduction and meeting with the League of Villains, putting Tomura Shigaraki’s leadership into question. Shigaraki is the villain successor to All For One, similar to Deku being All Might’s successor, but he has little to no experience when it came to pursuing his goal and purpose for the villain organization. Overhaul called Tomura Shigaraki out for this lack of foresight and offered to have the villains join him instead.
Speaking of foresight, the volume introduced Sir Nighteye, All Might’s former sidekick with a Foresight Quirk, being able to see a person’s future and next moves. Unlike most Pro Heroes who somewhat liked Deku as a person at the very least, Sir Nighteye openly disapproved of Deku because he wanted a different successor—Mirio Togata—to take up the One For All mantle. Mirio Togata had a work study with Sir Nighteye and helped Deku through the front door, wanting to help out a fellow student get a work study.
Overall, I enjoyed this volume and the new characters we were introduced to. I would highly recommend picking up your own copies of this manga book. My Hero Academia seriously gets better and better with each passing volume. I’m excited to reexperience what happens next in Volume 15. Let’s keep it reading! PLUS ULTRA!