Summary
The following contains spoilers for My Hero Academia Chapter 383, “Meek Spirits”.
My Hero Academiacharactershave some of the most weird and wonderful character designs, and often they live up to their own names. Author Kohei Horikoshi’s inspiration being western comics is evident in the series and a lot of work went into the current look and feel of the series.
While it’s quite obvious that no author ever settles on the first design they come up with, Horikoshi’s preliminary character designs for the majority of his characters communicate entirely different personalities, and one of the most pervasive changes is in the character design of fan-beloved character Mina Ashido. How different would the character be if her original design made it intoMy Hero Academia? Let’s have a look.
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Appearance and Personality
Mina Ashido (Hero Name:Pinky |Quirk:Acid) is cheery, loud and hyperactive, reflecting the kind of energy and vitality seen in characters like Eijiro Kirishima. She is fun-loving, easygoing and athletic, and doesn’t perform very well when it comes to academics. She is also courageous in times of panic. She’s a bit of a romantic, harbouring a vested interest in the love lives of her classmates. She is a teenager of average height and has an athletic build; in addition to pink skin, short slightly curved horns, black sclerae and golden irises – an appearance that is reminiscent of common conceptions of demons. As such, she falls underthe category of Heteromorph; people in the My Hero Academia universe whose Quirks have brought about significant phenotypical characteristics. Her Quirk, Acid, enables her to secret an acidic substance from her skin, and she has some of the highest levels of control and understanding of her own Quirk in Class 1-A. While it can be used both offensively and defensively due to her ability to control the viscosity and other aspects of her secretions, Mina ensures that the product is not lethal. Her hair is also pink and quite curly but not as much as Deku’s hair, and this hides much of the length of the horns protruding from her skull.
The Original
A sketch of the original concept for Mina Ashido features a lankier version of the character with longer, spiralling horns that curl inward to form what could almost be a heart-shape above her head. She also had longer hair that maintained its curly texture, but with less volume. She is much leaner in this design, and sports a constant toothy grin similar to that of Shinji Hirako fromBLEACH– a tell-tale sign of a mischievous but also somewhat enigmatic character design. She also had permablush circles similar to a character like Ed fromCowboy Bebop,a trait commonly associated with cute characters. Another character that is much closer to this design would be Sayaka Kanamori fromKeep Your Hands Off Eizouken!, who is much more deadpan, sardonic and more of a cynical character. It’s possible that instead of her easygoing and happy-go-lucky vibe was altered from what could have beenmore of a “tsukkomi”– the “wise guy” usually paired with a “dunce” (“boke"in Japanese), albeit with an unmistakable goofiness. Horikoshi supposedly dropped this design in favour of the one seen in the series because the curly horns were difficult to draw; however, there is no account of what Mina could have been like as far as personality goes.
Updates
In Chapter 383 ofMy Hero Academia, which falls under the Final War arc, the death and destruction, coupled with the rampaging Gigantomachia forces Mina to steel her resolve more than ever before. She no longer wants to fail at protecting the things she loves, and with much training behind her, she unleashes a variant of the Acidman technique that coats her body in a layer of protective acid. Acidman Alma launches an extremely corrosive torrent of acid towards the target; acid so corrosive it eats through Gigantomachia’s tough hide. The awakening of this ability causes Mina’s horns to elongate, and one of her sclerae becomes white. In this form, she becomes integral to the subjugation of Gigantomachia with the help of Hitoshi Shinso’s mind control Quirk.
Mina’s athleticism is central to much of her Quirk usage, and judging from the appearance of the original design, a different kind of application may have been intended for Mina. Seeing that she can create a sticky substance to use when climbing and such, the original Mina may have made even more sense as a hero with a highly specialized Quirk capable of high offense and defense while having a more pragmatic, rather than proactive approach to various emergencies. While fear has kept Mina from developing her offensive capabilities, the previous design probably would haveembarked on a different journeythan the one we know, who was heavily traumatized by Gigantomachia and awakened in order to defeat him.
My Hero Academiais available to stream onCrunchyroll.
The My Hero Academiamanga is available onVIZ Media’s online platform, with chapter 400 set to arrive on September 19.
