My Hero Academia season 7 leaks raise questions about the anime's pacing

Modified May 04, 2024 15:47 GMT

My Hero Academia season 7 leaks rasie questions about the anime — My Hero Academia season 7 leaks raise questions about the anime's pacing (Image via BONES)

Earlier this week, fans saw the first episode of My Hero Academia season 7 leak in varying capacity, mainly via photos of certain moments from the premiere episode.

This included shots of the opening and ending theme, as well as leaked scenes of Star & Stripe versus TomurAFO, and an apparent confirmation on the exact chapters the first installment will adapt.

These My Hero Academia season 7 leaks continued on throughout the day, bringing even more exciting early information regarding what to expect from one of the series’ likely final seasons. While these leaks were mostly extensions of those above which were initially reported, they did reveal some intriguing aspects of the upcoming season.

More specifically, one shot from one of My Hero Academia season 7’s thematic sequences has fans questioning exactly how much the coming production will adapt from the source material. If the leaks are to be believed, it’s suggested that this could indeed be the final full television anime season of the series all things considered.

Disclaimer: Spoilers below for both the original My Hero Academia manga series and the upcoming 7th season of the anime. Readers’ discretion is requested.

My Hero Academia season 7 could bring viewers to the final stage of Deku & Shigaraki’s final fight

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As seen over recent weeks in author and illustrator Kohei Horikoshi’s original manga series, the ongoing final fight of Izuku “Deku” Midoriya versus Tomura Shigaraki eventually brought them to Mt. Fuji.

Coincidentally, or rather not-so coincidentally, the latest leaked screenshot from My Hero Academia season 7 features a shot of Mt. Fuji in one of the season’s thematic sequences.

While this is far from confirmation that the seventh season will take viewers up to this point in their final, deciding conflict, it does heavily suggest that this will be the case. Animation studio BONES has taken a similar approach to other events from recent seasons, foreshadowing these future developments in both anime-original scenes and thematic sequences.

However, reaching this point during My Hero Academia season 7 would require a very fast adaptation pace from BONES for the seventh season, needing to cover roughly 80 chapters in the season’s reported 25 episodes.

While certainly possible considering how many fight scenes are present in these 80 chapters, it would likely still require some cuts or rushed sequences throughout.

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This has in turn led to speculation from fans on what could be cut or skimped out on in order to get there, again considering that BONES seems to be setting up reaching that point in season 7.

Many point to the focus on Mezo Shoji as one likely casualty, as well as the Ochaco Uraraka versus Himiko Toga fight as another potential loss for progression’s sake.

That being said, it’s much more likely that BONES is setting up events which will be included in the anime’s eighth season rather than season 7. The quick pace they’d need to maintain to reach this point suggests this, as does the fact that reaching the Mt. Fuji waypoint may not leave enough material for an eighth season.

However, this in turn raises questions about a potential movie finale for the anime series rather than an eighth television season. In any case, this is all speculative as of this article’s writing, with the aforementioned season 7 leaks yet to be verified by official sources.

Thankfully, fans will be able to verify themselves once season 7 begins premiering this coming Saturday, May 4, 2024 in Japan.