Spin-offs often come with the expectation that they're mere money-grabs, cynical exercises in milking popular franchises. Plenty of popular shonen manga receive short-lived spin-offs, most often comedic or episodic in nature, and they're rarely essential reads, even for die-hard franchise fans. The recently-concluded My Hero Academia manga spawned multiple such spin-offs, but only one (so far) has been popular enough to score its own anime adaptation: Vigilantes.

Vigilantes breaks the spin-off mold by shattering expectations, at times rivaling or even exceeding its progenitor manga. For a long time, as I followed both MHA and Vigilantes as they were published chapter-by-chapter on the Shonen Jump app, I often found myself more thoroughly engaged in the story of Koichi and his scrappy band of vigilantes rather than that of Deku and his classmates.

What helps set Vigilantes apart is how although it's very clearly set in the same world as the parent series, featuring many of the same characters, it forges its own path while simultaneously managing to enrich the original. As a prequel, set some years before Deku and pals' admission to UA's Hero Course, Vigilantes frequently features such adult heroes as Ingenium, Midnight, Best Jeanist, Fat Gum, Endeavor, and even All Might, in the prime of their crime-fighting careers. This is more than mere fan-service – sometimes significant chunks of entire volumes are spent fleshing out main series characters' backstories, though always in service of Vigilantes' propulsive plot. Grumpy future teacher Shota Aizawa (Eraser Head) is practically a secondary protagonist he appears so often, developing a begrudging working relationship with Koichi.

Whereas the main series eventually grows to encompass world-shattering threats, Vigilantes is almost always focused on the street-level reality of vigilante life. Think of Vigilantes as the equivalent of the MCU's Defenders series, like Daredevil, as opposed to MHA's eventual big Avengers-esque blowout. The entirety of MHA's main series takes place almost completely within the timespan of a single academic year, but Vigilantes first sees Koichi as a new college student, before eventual graduation and the start of his “proper” adult life three years later. There's profound character growth here, not only amongst the central trio of characters, but also many of the colorful supporting characters pleasingly evolve and develop with time and experience.

Koichi (known as The Crawler) begins the series as an altruistic young man who missed his chance to apply for hero school, exercising his altruistic muscles by volunteering to clean the streets and discipline troublemakers in his local neighbourhood. His quirk lets him slide around the streets on all fours, giving him surprising maneuverability. Mostly it's useful for quickly escaping trouble, though. He meets high school girl Kazuho Haneyama whose secret identity is “independent idol” Pop Step; her high-jumping quirk facilitates her guerilla street idol performances. Together, they team up to fight small-time crime along with Knuckleduster, a gruff middle-aged man who likes to beat criminals to within an inch of their lives. He takes on a mentor role for Koichi and Pop, as he also secretly investigates an underground drug smuggling organization. The drug in question is “Trigger,” a compound that temporarily enhances quirks, up to the point of forcing them to run out of control, causing the emergence of “instant villains”. While this plot initially seems to resolve within the first few volumes, repercussions reverberate throughout the rest of the series, right up until the intense climax.

Vigilantes can be split into roughly three main “arcs,” with Spring 2025's first anime season adapting the first arc, up until halfway through volume four. Readers wishing to read the manga following season one can start with chapter 31. I expect the second season to cover the entirety of the second arc, which finishes halfway through volume eight, though I could see it adapting up to volume nine's exceptionally cruel cliffhanger ending. From volume ten onwards, the story really takes off with a final arc that rivals MHA's in terms of sheer intensity. While the stakes aren't as world-ending, they're still profoundly life-altering for Koichi and friends.

Creators Hideyuki Furuhashi and Betten Court frequently write about their creative process in the little interstitial pages between chapters, and these paragraphs offer great nuggets of background information. For example, Koichi is deliberately modeled after MHA's Deku, at least in terms of costume design (he wears an All Might hoodie with flappy ear-like appendages). Also much like Deku, Koichi learns to refine and strengthen his quirk with experience. Except this isn't in a controlled classroom environment, but from fighting thugs and monstrous creatures on the mean streets. By the end of the series, Koichi is a formidable force of nature, driven to surge past his limits by desperate circumstances. It's really exciting and rewarding to see how he grows, in ways that both reflect his character and make a lot of logical sense.

Pop Step's role as a vigilante takes a back step after the first arc, as she mostly focuses on her idol career. It's a shame, as she's absolutely adorable in her costume, and her bright, peppy vigilante personality brings a lot of charm to the story. Her role in the final arc may be controversial for some readers, as she's essentially taken out of commission entirely, acting primarily as a motivator for Koichi, which is more than a little disappointing, even if it makes sense from a narrative perspective.

Knuckleduster also disappears from the page for great extended periods, though the creators state they needed to do this to allow Koichi time to develop. He's a great character though, a lot like Batman but without the billions of dollars of disposable income. His backstory is both tragic and compelling, as is his twisted relationship to the story's main antagonist. It's hard to talk about Vigilantes' villains without entering deep spoiler territory, especially considering their direct relation to the villains in MHA. We get some revelations here about All For One's creepy Nomu creations that do feel a like massive, unnecessary retcons, but as MHA creator Horikoshi looks to have been quite closely involved with Vigilantes' production, it's hard to say for sure. Mostly the ties to MHA's continuity are organic, and although not essential to enjoyment of the main series, are a treat for long-time fans.

Whether Vigilantes truly stands alone is hard to say. It tells an excellent story that only becomes more exciting and intense as it progresses, while also being extremely funny in places. Characters like Captain Celebrity are hilarious, and even develop extra, unexpected facets as time progresses. Later volumes do rely heavily on appearances from MHA's adult heroes though, and may not be quite as impactful for readers unfamiliar with the main series.

Artist Betten Court does a great job homaging Horikoshi's art style, while still making the series his own. His art is ecognisably “MHA” in aesthetics, from facial expressions, to some of the more outlandish creature designs, but never feels like a cheap knockoff. His art is attractive and clean, and always extremely easy to follow, which is important in such an action-heavy manga. Likewise writer Furuhashi really knows how to make long-term planning pay off, especially in the final arc, which brings together so many characters and themes from earlier chapters very skillfully.

I'm hyped for the upcoming (as of this writing) anime adaptation's second season. There are some amazing events coming up that will rival the best parts of MHA's anime, as long as they're animated with the care and attention that I'm sure studio BONES will lavish on them. I was sad to reach the end of Vigilantes' relatively short fifteen-volume run (MHA has forty-two volumes, in comparison), but it has a good ending that's worth persevering for. MHA has always been about more than just superheroes duking it out against supervillains, and Vigilantes continues its legacy of examining the sociological consequences of a society full of superpowered individuals, but from a different perspective. While I wouldn't want MHA's universe to become as grossly complex and newbie-unfriendly as the Marvel and DC comic universes that inspired it, I'd love there to be more MHA spin-offs of this caliber. Vigilantes proves it's a wonderfully well-realized universe with fertile ground for so many more manga-flavored superhero stories to be germinated.