My Hero Academia might be about quirk-wielding heroes and supervillains, but at the root of it, it portrays real human struggles. It’s not a black-and-white world where all heroes are good while all villains are evil. Kohei Horikoshi based a lot of the world on his own experiences as well as the society we live in.
In an interview, Horikoshi opened up about the fond memories he carries from his childhood and how they have been incorporated into the story. Further, he even revealed how his alienation at a young age inspired a certain character.
The Scene in My Hero Academia that Made Kohei Horikoshi Cry While Creating it
Within the series as well as the world outside of it, My Hero Academia characters feel very real and have human emotions. In an interview, Kohei Horikoshi was asked if he had implemented any of his own experiences into the story or if there were instances in which his personal experiences influenced the story’s script or scenes.
Kohei Horikoshi, to his credit, claimed that there are so many instances that it’s hard to count. He began by iterating a specific scene in volume 11 of My Hero Academia in which a scene of a younger Deku was showcased with his mother. In the scene, Deku’s mom sits in a room and yelps, “Help me!” and Deku rushes inside while saying, “I am here!”. It is an extremely adorable scene, and it turns out it was influenced by the relationship between Horikoshi and his mother.
I actually used to do this exact same thing with my mom when I was younger, and we played at the park’s playgrounds. We called it the “King of the Jungle.” My mom would go inside the jungle gym at the playground and say, “Please save me, Leo,” which is the name that I used to call myself when we played this together.
Horikoshi was filled with nostalgia as he remembered how he pretended to be Leo with his mom at the playground. He wanted to incorporate it into the story.
As a reader, it’s probably a scene that does not hold much meaning, but as for me, I cried while writing that scene.
It is visible that Kohei Horikoshi’s inclusion of this specific scene held a lot of meaning for him, as he must have looked back at the fond memories of his childhood while writing it.
Kohei Horikoshi’s Alienation in School Inspired Tamaki’s Predicament
Another experience that the author incorporated into the story was featured in volume 16 of My Hero Academia, in which Tamaki transferred schools. Tamaki Amajiki, or the Suneater, was a student of Class 3-A as well as a part of The Big 3 who stood atop the entire student body in terms of strength.
However, the character is extremely shy, depressed, introverted, and aloof. When Tamaki transferred to a new school as a third grader, he lacked the courage to integrate himself. He could not make any friends until Mirio approached him. This was inspired by Kohei Horikoshi’s own experience while transferring to a different middle school, where he felt alienated and alone.
Since this school was outside of where I went to elementary school, I knew no one at all. Everyone else was already in their own groups and knew each other, but I was the loner, and it was a really sad time for me (laughs).
But the silver lining to the story is that Horikoshi, too, had a friend like Mirio who had told him that he wasn’t a bad person. He helped the author’s younger self feel included. The author hopes that fans of Tamaki like the information by associating it with the creator’s memory.
You can read My Hero Academia on Viz Media and watch the anime on Crunchyroll.
