Boku no Hero Academia brings up the question: Well, it's honestly a question with no solid answer as character designs can be done in a range of different ways, and whether one chooses to it subtly or not is the choice of the creator themselves. Boku no Hero Academia does it in such an on-the-nose way, I could not help but find it hilarious the first time I ever saw the characters from the show before even watching the show itself! If you want an example of what I think is subtle character design, take Mob from Mob Psycho 100. You look at this photo, and already, you know mostly everything about Mob: He's a shy but kind boy with a heart of gold who's only trying his best. Honestly, Midoriya is the same in that aspect. I look at someone like Bakugou, and I lose my absolute shit. Gosh. Can you tell Bakugou is a hot-headed, egotistical loud boy that has removed the word "chill" from his vocabulary altogether? Can you tell from looking at these images that maybe, just maybe, he might be a bit angry sometimes? Then his hero outfit makes it even funnier! He's literally the walking embodiment of an explosion. His hair itself looks like an EXPLOSION. If you can't understand why I find this so funny, then go back to the episode where his hair gets combed down by Best Jeanist. Imagine if the first time you saw Bakugou...it was THIS photo. It doesn't hold the raw chaotic energy his explosion hair does, and it definitely shows the right character design is important. But I can't help but look at Bakugou and think the creator just envisioned a walking grenade while he was making him. Kaminari is another one that makes me laugh, only because if the spiky blond hair itself wasn't obvious enough, he also has a single brown stripe, which is something another electric yellow creature shares, which I am so sure had to be done on purpose. I look at Kaminari and I feel like the creator is fucking with me. All he needed were the red circles and I would have been fucking done. TAPE BOY. T A P E B O I His hair looks like TORN TAPE. His ELBOWS are literally sticky tape dispensers! And his hero costume is the funniest fucking thing I have seen to date. (Although, I don't know why his teeth are like that, and if anyone does then feel free to enlighten me.) Can you tell? Can you tell she's a frog? Can you tell that she's a frog, possibly of the green variety? By far the BEST one the B E S T one is Todoroki. Oh, you thought Zuko from Avatar was a bit too obvious? WELL Todoroki takes Zuko's design and makes it look like nothing! Jeez, I wonder what Todoroki's power is! Can you tell? Can you tell what his power is? Can you tell from looking at him? Then I wonder what his character is. Could he be... SCARRED, maybe? Maybe emotionally, but also PHYSICALLY? Todoroki's character design is so obnoxiously obvious that I couldn't help but laugh out loud upon seeing him. Like, he looks cool, and there is no denying that, but the half-half thing was so fucking funny to me at first I could not take him seriously. The scar on top of it is like adding glitter to confetti, or adding a cherry on top of an already cherry-filled cake, and I truly cannot get enough of this lad. Wait, I forgot about his dad! (*wheezing*) I FORGOT ABOUT HIS DAD (*dying*) Now, don't get me wrong, Boku no Hero Academia does character design well, it just doesn't do it subtly. Using Mob Psycho 100 as an example again, it's like if I took Reagan (who's a con man in the show) and gave him greasy hair, pimp sunglasses, and a bunch of gold rings. Can you see what I'm getting at here? Granted, Boku no Hero Academia is in a world where they have quirks that are physical, but the whiplash I get upon seeing characters like Midoriya and Uraraka beside Tokoyami and Todoroki is so funny that I can't NOT talk about it! It's like that one scene where Midoriya made his hero costume for the first time, and All Might saw it, and it was so obviously inspired from All Might that All Might could not help but laugh at it. This is exactly how I feel when I look at the characters and the character designs of each character in this show, because it's just...it's just, so, so funnily done. I just..cannot... ...express... ...how... how hard I laughed when I first saw Todoroki, and I didn't even know who he was. But...I already did because... (*laugh*) just look at him! (*voice strained from laughing*) oh my god Boku no Hero Academia is a good show. I'm not shitting on it at all, but I just thought someone needed to bring to light how fucking funny the... the character designs were, and I have nothing else to say apart from this. Uh, so, thanks for the...for watching this...shit post, and I'll leave you to your day. Farewell.
