Case 1: Naruto - I'll become the strongest Ninja ever *rasengan!*
Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
Case 2: Bleach - I'll become the strongest Soul Reaper ever *getsuga tenshou!*
Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
Case 3: One Piece - I'll become the strongest Pirate ever *gomu gomu no!*
Wash. Rinse. Repeat.
Case 4: My Hero Academia - I'll become the strongest Hero ever *detroit smash!*

It's the same old wine, now in a fancy new shining bottle. Standard main characters. Standard side-characters. Standard villains. Standard relationships. Standard power-ups. Standard plot. To justify this critique further, I encourage you to do a little thought experiment for me. Replace the Hero world with Ninjas, substitute Midoriya, Bakugo, All-Might and Akatsuki with Naruto, Sasuke, Jiraya and Villains respectively. Ta-daa! New manga series!

This isn't to say that the mere presence of these shounen tropes makes Boku no Hero Academia so mediocre. Far from it. If that was to be the case, then we wouldn't have so many versions of Shakespeare's Hamlet. What makes this series mediocre is that the author doesn't attempt to do anything new with his characters. It sticks to the power-ups and plot developments as if it was being written by an AI machine-learning robot. There is zero sense of anything exciting or new that would make a reader sit up and say "now, that's interesting!" The only place where the author did attempt to do so is with the character of Endeavor - a flawed superhero who seeks redemption. Sadly, given that this is a shounen-manga aimed at 12-18 year old boys - Endeavor is and will remain a side character not getting as much focus as I would have liked.

I understand the popularity of this manga amongst the current young readers who haven't either read or are still exploring older shounen canon like Naruto, Bleach, Shaman King, Hunter x Hunter, Rurouni Kenshin etc. However, as an older reader who has read and watched these series - I can safely attest that (as of chapter 275), there is absolutely nothing in My Hero Academia that is uniquely original or which hasn't been already been attempted in past shounen manga. The only positive aspect of this series as compared to older series is that it is well executed, highly polished and has an excellent marketing push from the Shueisha execs who are desperately trying to recreate the next money-spinner franchise given that the Naruto, Bleach and Gintama franchises are over.

This standard manga deserves a standard rating: 5/10.