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This is, in many ways, the year of My Hero Academia. Not only are we getting the final season of the hit anime but Bones is bringing us the anime adaptation of My Hero Academia: Vigilantes. The spinoff manga shows the world of unlicensed heroes trying to keep the streets safe from villains. The first full trailer for My Hero Academia: Vigilantes has dropped and brought the visceral feel that made the manga stand out from Deku’s story.

Not only is the first full trailer out, but we’ve also got a release date for My Hero Academia: Vigilantes. The first episode airs on April 7, 2025. The series follows Koichi Haimawari as he uses his underwhelming quirk to fight crime as an unlicensed hero. He’s joined by Pop Step, an idol-themed hero, and Knuckleduster, a fighter with hero-level attack power but none of the restraint. Together, they take on villains while trying to avoid the licensed heroes who see them as acting outside of the law.

The trailer drops a few familiar faces for fans, including All Might and Eraserhead, but the focus is very clearly on Koichi as he settles into his role as a vigilante hero with Knuckleduster as his mentor. The parallels between All Might’s relationship with Deku are clear from the start, but there is a decidedly more violent feel to the action in My Hero Academia: Vigilantes. Where All Might is out to protect people as a hero, Knuckleduster is in it to punish villains and his actions feel more brutal as a result.

The first episode of My Hero Academia: Vigilantes is out on April 7, 2025 with new episodes following weekly.

Each week, Popverse's resident anime expert Trent Cannon runs down the latest and, dare we say "greatest," in anime and manga in Popverse Jump. Some recent columns have included... 

• Why the finales of My Hero Academia, Jujutsu Kaisen, and One Piece feel like the end of an era in manga
• Why is One Piece more popular now that the anime is 25 years old? We asked around and found out
• Dan Da Dan is weird, profoundly inappropriate, and the perfect anime this season
• Why One Piece's Monkey D. Luffy is the perfect anime hero for the dark times ahead
• 40 years after its debut, Dragon Ball is a pop culture force like few others
• Dan Da Dan's most emotionally devastating sequence proves that sometimes words aren't necessary
• Gnosia, the "Among Us meets Everything Everywhere All at Once" visual novel is getting an anime adaptation that needs to be as weird as possible
• Assassination Classroom is a Shonen anime well worth revisiting, ten years on
• Sony is making big moves to own the anime industry by buying Kadokawa, publisher of Oshi no Ko, Sword Art Online, and Konosuba
• 2025 is the year One Punch Man season 3 finally adapts the cosmically weird Monster Association Arc and I can't wait