Ever since its inception My Hero Academia Shigaraki Tomura has acted as the main antagonist to our young heroes. While his goal was to kill All Might initially, just like the rest of the villains in League of Villains, it undergoes a significant change as the series progresses. He is shown to have a warped personality and doesn’t care a bit about the lives of others, murdering innocents at will.

While he was more like a pawn at the start of the series, acting on the wishes of his master and mentor All For One, his character undergoes tremendous development in the later stages of My Hero Academia, setting him on the path to become a Villain that could send chills down the spine of someone like Endeavour.

The change in Shigaraki comes after All For One is captured, and then later when he confronts and accepts his past. So what exactly is this sad backstory of Shigaraki Tomura that made him go down a dark path?

Shigaraki Tomura’s Sad Backstory In My Hero Academia:

As we all know Shigaraki is the grandson of the 7th user of One For All, Nana Shimura (who was also All Might’s mentor). His real name is Tenko Shimura, and he was born to Kotaro and Nao Shimura, Kotaro being Nana’s son. Believing that her status as a great hero would only put her son’s life at risk, Nana Shimura raised Kotaro, i.e Tenko’s father, in a strict environment to ensure his safety. She would rarely come up to meet him and showed him little to almost no attention/affection.

Her reasons to do so wasn’t something very light either. She had All For One in tow, looking for an oppurtunity to kill her. He could easily have used Tenko’s father as a leverage against her. While Nana Shimura had valid reasons to act cold towards her son, Kotaro as a kid he felt ignored and developed a hatred towards his mother and heroes in general. This hatred only grew over time. His cynicism would manifest every time anything went against him. He raised his family in a Hero hating environment. It made him a bitter person to the core.

This bitterness would often project out as harsh words and physical abuse towards his kids. Kotaro would beat up his kids for even the tiniest of mistakes which any normal father would have taken as a joke. This mentally scarred a young Tenko Shimura and made him despise his father.

Tenko as a child was thought to be quirkless but he still had various physical changes going on in his body. During this time, his mother and grandmother(not Nana Shimura) would always be there with him along with his sister and her dog whom Tenko loved very dearly.

Once while playing, Tenko’s sister Hana found a picture of their father with their grandmother who was Hero. When their father found out about it, it enraged him so much that he beat Tenko to a pulp. baby Tenko was looking towards his mother, grandmother and sister to come protect him but to no avail. They could only look on in horror at what was happening.

After getting beaten, Tenko went to their family dog for comfort and that’s when his Decay Quirk got activated and he accidentally killed the dog. Tenko had no idea what was happening as he saw his dog decay. That’s when Hana comes out to apologise to him for not standing up to their father. However she is horridied after she saw the act her brother had committed. In his fit of panic and confusion Tenko grabbed his sister hand to tell her that it was an accident, and ends up killing her too. When his grandmother and mother found and they went to help him but Tenko accidentally killed them too.

Later when his father came to the scene, Tenko ran to him wishing he would console him. We have to realise that Shigaraki was just a young boy who was scared and confused at what had happened. But seeing what he had done, Shigaraki’s father grabbed garden tools to protect himself. Realising that his father did not care for him, Tenko gives in to his hatred went with the full intent to kill him and finished the job. This gave him a weird sense of satisfaction. This sense of satsifaction is a prime turning point in Shigaraki’s route to being a villain.

The next few days Tenko spent his life on streets. People on the streets thought that some Hero would help the kid but nobody came. This led to Tenko being found by All For One who blamed his misery on the society and further fanned the hero hatred in Tenko’s heart. All for One, later named him Tomura from the word Tomurau meaning To Mourn and gave him the surname Shigaraki as that was his own surname. Thus, he ended up adopting Tomura in his League of Villains and as his own son, preparing him to take over the organization once he was ready.

During this time, The Doctor, Kyudai Guraki, gave Tomura the hands of his family as a gift and a reminder of his past and the betrayal of the society. Later on as he grew up Tomura suppressed these memories of his and had completely forgotten about them until recently. When the memories resurfaced Shigaraki puts them behind and walks forward with newfound conviction to become the most feared villain in the current arc of My Hero Academia.

Such is the story of “The Sad Legacy” the 7th user of One for all, Nana Shimura, left behind. She unwittedly ended up creating of the world’s most powerful and dangerous villain.

What do you think of Tomura Shigaraki’s backstory? Is his hatred from the society justified considering his sad past? Let us know your opinions in the comments section!