Crunchyroll botches My Hero Academia season 8 premiere weekend with hours-long delay and missing subtitles

Expectant My Hero Academia fans were left disappointed after the final season's premiere arrived hours late on the anime streamer.

Despite being listed for a release at the ungodly hour of 2:30 AM Pacific/5:30 AM Eastern, the first episode of My Hero Academia season 8 didn't show up for subscribers until some 10 hours later. Confusingly, the episode did appear on Prime Video's Crunchyroll channel at the correct time.

To make matters worse, some viewers were left without English subtitles for the Japanese-language version of the premiere episode – a situation that was only rectified later and was described by one as "embarrassing."

In previous months, there have been complaints about Crunchyroll's new subtitle typeface and even a mistake in a German subtitle that made a reference to 'ChatGPT' in its copy. Recently, Crunchyroll CEO Rahul Parini told Forbes that Crunchyroll "is not considering AI in the creative process."

My Hero Academia season 8 is all set to bring the superhero anime to a close across the next 12 episodes. That's not the end of the franchise, however – spin-off My Hero Academia: Vigilantes season 2 is set to hit our screens in January 2026.

Even though we're deep into the fall season, you might already be casting a glance towards winter. In January alone, My Hero Academia: Vigilantes is joined by heavy hitters such as Jujutsu Kaisen season 3, Frieren: Beyond Journey's End season 2, and the final episodes of Fire Force season 3.

For more, check out our complete guide to new anime. Need something fresh to watch? Here are our picks for the best anime on Crunchyroll.