My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising -- the second feature film in the My Hero Academia franchise -- is set to arrive in just a matter of days. Ahead of the sequel's release on Dec. 20, director Kenji Nagasaki has revealed the original idea for the film's subtitle -- and why it was ultimately changed to Heroes Rising.
In a recent interview (shared by Twitter user @aitaikimochi), Nagasaki was asked why exactly the film's team settled on the title. "Actually, we initially wanted to call the movie 'ONE FOR ALL' since we were going to show each individual character fighting together, but this isn't a story about the quirk 'One for All,'" he revealed. "The story focuses on the entire Class 1A members, so we decided on the word 'Rising.'"
While on the topic, Nagasaki also spoke to working with Kohei Horikoshi -- creator of the original My Hero Academia manga and the supervisor on Heroes Rising. "Horikoshi-sensei told us that he liked the character 'Nine' the most," he shared. "He seems to be very interested in Nine's character."
From there, the director revealed a bit more about the character of Nine -- whom Horikoshi seems to be particularly fond of. "Nine is strong on the outside, but his body contains many secrets," Nagasaki explained. "His character has a very intense background. pay specific attention tonine as the villain as well as how the two original characters in the movie, Mahoro and Katsuma, interact with the character from the series. Horikoshi-sense also gave us some key script lines to be put in the movie."
My Hero Academia Season 4 began airing on Oct. 12. My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising releases on Dec. 20 in Japan, though information regarding the film's North American release is not currently available.