By now, My Hero Academia fans have gotten to terms with who the UA traitor is. The anime has explained the why of Yuga Aoyama's betrayal, complete with his backstory of being born Quirkless and his parents imploring All For One for aid. Anime fans now know what this betrayal means for the Aoyama family and what it means for Yuga's personal arc going forward, but there's still the matter of what this betrayal plot means for the My Hero Academia anime as a whole.

The UA traitor reveal is a major plot twist that not only resolves the years-long mystery of who UA's traitor was, but also helps the anime further deconstruct the pro hero industry that was once glorified as the apex of human society. Yuga's betrayal serves a similar purpose that Endeavor's abuse toward his family does, but it's not just for the sake of drama and provoking viewers. Yuga's betrayal is good for My Hero Academia because it calls good and evil into question while still hanging onto shonen values of trust, hope, and friendship. These have been core values of My Hero Academia since its first season, and not even betrayal will change that for long.

My Hero Academia Was Overdue to Disrupt the Heroes' Sense of Unity

Teamwork Always Has Its Limits In Action Anime

The power of friendship and teamwork are staples in shonen anime, and fans can usually take it for granted that a shonen anime's heroes will trust and rely on one another in every battle. Shonen characters usually enjoy a strong sense of unity that creates a stabilizing element in the anime, and no matter what threats arrive, the heroes will always face it together and risk falling together.

Fans can point to countless examples, from all of the Hidden Leaf Village facing the Six Paths of Pain in Naruto to the Hashira and Tanjiro's team preparing to face Muzan together in Demon Slayer's endgame, and My Hero Academia usually operates this way, too. Hundreds of hero students and pro-heroes united to face the Paranomal Liberation Front in My Hero Academia Season 6, but by now, that unity is falling apart, as plotlines like Dark Deku and Yuga's betrayal show.

Such plot twists are perfect for MHA because they shake things up in an alarming and meaningful way, directly attacking the unity that anime fans usually take for granted. It's bad enough when the united heroes face threats like Tomura Shigaraki and All For One, but if the heroes turn on one another or abandon each other, the situation is ten times worse, and the heroes end up with two substantial problems on their hands.

In many ways, My Hero Academia's narrative has moved on from the idyllic, stable era of All Might and into a scary era of danger and uncertainty, and Yuga's betrayal is a major example of that. Nothing can be taken for granted any longer, not even class 1-A's wholesome sense of unity. First, the Dark Deku storyline disrupted class 1-A's togetherness and bonds of trust, and then Yuga's betrayal did the same, but with even more serious implications.

Yuga's Betrayal Helped My Hero Academia Deconstruct Pro Heroes Further

Pro Heroes Aren't the Saints They Claim to Be

The first few episodes of My Hero Academia's 7th season were dominated first by Star and Stripe's great battle against Tomura Shigaraki, and then Yuga's betrayal came along. Star's death and Yuga's betrayal proved that absolutely anything could happen in this uncertain new era, and all bets were off. The heroes couldn't even trust each other any longer, which not only helped shake up the status quo in the anime but also helped deconstruct the idea of perfect superheroes in this future society.

For generations, pro-heroes were put on a pedestal as the ultimate defenders of society who set a good personal example for all, but over time, MHA tore that idea apart. In fact, that ended up becoming one of the anime's most important themes ,and Yuga did his part, which is why his betrayal was such an important part of Season 7.

My Hero Academia's pro heroes were revealed as shallow, self-serving, or even abusive over time, with some heroes being more guilty of this than others. Endeavor was one of the first examples, channeling his frustration at All Might into his Quirk marriage to produce the perfect heir. Endeavor mistreated his family for years, pressuring them into creating a wunderkind child that could surpass All Might, and that's simply not the personal example that heroes are meant to set.

Thus, Endeavor's quest for redemption and a chance to atone. Also, Stain the hero killer noted that many pro heroes were in it just for the fame and money rather than lofty idealism, which further weakened the image of pro heroes. Finally, Yuga's betrayal shattered the industry's illusion of perfect honesty and trust, with Yuga being an unwilling agent of All For One who operated not for the good of all, but to protect his own parents.

Anime fans wouldn't call My Hero Academia a fully subversive series, but it does have elements of that, and for good reasons. In this anime universe, the idea of having pro-heroes run society has become highly problematic, because having heroes rule society created some grim paradoxes and a humanitarian crisis that caped crusaders cannot solve on their own. This society pressures people too much to be born with the "right" Quirks, and Quirkless people are shamed, too.

Thus, people with no Quirks or the wrong Quirks are marginalized as unwanted others or criminals in the making, and that is exactly why Yuga's parents made a deal with All For One the supervillain to give their Quirkless son a superpower. A truly humanitarian society would accept Yuga and people like him as human beings just as they are, not as "incomplete" beings with nothing to offer.

Yuga's Betrayal Joins the Overall Trend of Subversive Hero Narratives

Heroes Are Flawed Beings, No Matter Their Capes

While My Hero Academia is not primarily a subversive anime series, the fact remains that subversion has become a major trend in anime, right alongside Western fiction. Subversive narratives help viewers question existing ideas and narratives, auditing them to see what holds up and what doesn't. Subversion can help refresh certain tropes and genres in unpredictable ways while also being bracingly honest about humanity itself.

To inspire consumers and make them feel good about themselves and the world, fiction usually shows humanity at its best, at least with its heroes. Protagonists are inspiring examples for all, but if this is taken too far, then it may come off as naive or overly simplistic. So, these seemingly perfect heroes and the systems they represent are subverted, providing a more balanced and honest look at these heroes.

The deep-rooted flaws of hero society in My Hero Academia is a great example of that, creating a system where people like the Aoyamas make deals with villains to avoid the stigmas that hero society created, which led to Yuga's highly thematic betrayal of UA. Pro heroes like Endeavor are flawed human beings after all, no matter their costumes and powers, and even law-abiding citizens like Mr. and Mrs. Aoyama have it in themselves to betray society for selfish reasons, sometimes out of desperation. Older shonen series are often more optimistic and straightforward about how glorious heroes can be, but even they had hints of subversion, and now that trend is ramping up.

Yuga Aoyama and Endeavor deconstruct the idea of superheroes in sharp ways, which makes it oddly similar to The Boys in broad strokes. Not many of the characters can be compared directly, though fans might find some parallels between Endeavor and the twisted Superman-esque Homelander, who often abuses his position for personal gain. Subversion like this can also be found in series like Chainsaw Man, which are billed as subversive anime series.

Normally, monster hunters would be some of the noblest people in society, risking their lives to protect everyone from dangerous creatures to preserve peace, but Chainsaw Man's protagonists are all deeply flawed and trouble people who fight more inner demons than they do devils.

Thus, Yuga's betrayal was perfect for My Hero Academia to serve as the capstone for the series' accelerating trend of tearing apart the seemingly perfect pro hero system, but there is still hope. No matter Yuga's betrayal or even Endeavor's abuses, the most important part is that hope and trust still survive. Deku and his classmates have forgiven Yuga and will work with him to take All For One down, because the point isn't just that people make mistakes — they can move and be better. It's said that to err is to be human, and Endeavor and Yuga are indeed quite human, regardless of their heroic capes.