One of the things that My Hero Academia is best known for is its student-mentor relationships, the best example being Deku and All Might, whose bond was carefully fleshed out over the course of the entire series. That said, besides Deku and All Might, My Hero Academia also has one other touching mentor relationship, this being Aizawa and Hitoshi Shinso. The bond between these two especially shines in the series’ epilogue through a subtle yet touching detail of Shinso’s adult makeover, and the series’ creator just confirmed as much.
In the recently released fanbook titled My Hero Academia: Ultra Age, Kohei Horikoshi was asked whether the reason for Shinso’s longer hair in Chapter 431 was related to Aizawa. Horikoshi confirmed that Shinso did indeed grow out his hair because he looks up to Aizawa, with his response in the fanbook reading, “Yes, it’s out of respect for Aizawa.” Interestingly, in his response, Horikoshi also adds that he intended to have long-haired Shinso make his debut much earlier in My Hero Academia during the U.A. Traitor Arc. The exact moment Horikoshi is referring to is at the end of Chapter 340, where Shinso’s hair does seem a bit longer than usual, but as Horikoshi claimed, due to Shinso being featured upside down, it wasn’t all too clear at the time. Horikoshi said in the fanbook, “Actually, in Volume 34, I wanted to show his long hair already, but the pose I drew had him upside down, so it was unclear.”
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Aizawa and Shinso Are Still My Hero Academia’s Second-Best Student-Mentor Duo
When first introduced in My Hero Academia, Shinso certainly grabbed a lot of eyeballs, mostly due to his very interesting quirk, Brainwashing. Though Shinso did not win any accolades at the time of the Sports Festival, he definitely did leave his mark on fans as well as those around him within the series, proving that he possessed much more potential. Aizawa in particular quickly became a mentor figure to Shinso, teaching him how to make the most of his quirk in battle and how to use it to best support his fellow teammates. The fact that Shinso’s quirk was not well suited for battle was something that Aizawa and Shinso would only bond over even further, with Shinso echoing many of young Aizawa’s own anxieties about becoming a pro-hero.
It’s safe to say that Aizawa has had quite a strong influence over Shinso since then, with the effects of his mentorship most clearly showing up in Shinso’s combat abilities and his similar use of a long cloth scarf as a capturing weapon, just like Aizawa. Now with the longer hair as seen in Chapter 431 of My Hero Academia, Shinso has all but become Aizawa’s successor and the spitting image of him, complete with the long hair and the bags under his eyes. More than anything, it’s really sweet that Shinso came to respect Aizawa so greatly to the point of emulating him down to his long hair. As far as role models go in My Hero Academia, All Might is a fine choice, but Shoto Aizawa isn’t a bad pick either.
HT: @aitaikimochi on X.
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