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Hit manga My Hero Academia removed in China over war crimes reference
A villain’s name references Japanese biowarfare black-ops Unit 731 that experimented on and killed thousands of Chinese and Koreans in WWII
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This article originally appeared on ABACUS
Japanese anime series My Hero Academia has been immensely popular in China. The country is home to countless fans of the manga and anime, which are available on Tencent’s and Bilibili’s platforms. But now the show’s popularity is in jeopardy because of a secret villain whose name references a World War II biowarfare black operation.
In the latest chapter published in the weekly Shonen Jump manga magazine, My Hero Academia reveals the name of a major villain to be Maruta Shiga. Maruta was a Japanese code name for victims of human experimentation during World War II, which killed thousands of Chinese and Korean people.
The apparent reference was immediately highlighted by fans because Maruta Shiga is a mad scientist who also experiments on humans. Subsequently, the character’s surname came into question as a possible reference to Shigella, an E coli.-like germ famously discovered by Japanese bacteriologist Kiyoshi Shiga.
Since the backlash, Tencent and Bilibili have removed the manga from their platforms. Bilibili confirmed the manga was removed “in accordance with China's policies” but didn’t elaborate further. Tencent didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Some anime episodes remain available but got hit with a deluge of negative reviews. On Weibo, posts related to the incident have more than 15 million views, with more than 6,000 posts and comments published over 12 hours.
Chinese fans aren’t the only ones who are upset, either. Some Korean manga fans were similarly outraged.
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