#AFO critical

[sapphic-agent]

Just noting something regarding your ask regarding nobody saying Kotaro to be abusive.

Considering All For One's involvement with his life and family, and considering All For One's shtick of every misfortune comes from me, I wouldn't be surprised if he said and pushed Kotaro to be abusive. It wouldn't surprise me at least.

Yeah because for some reason AFO is way too obsessed with Nana's family💀 Like my guy, you already killed her and her husband and made her son an orphan, can you leave them alone?

I think it was implied during the Final War that he did do this in some way? Idk I haven't read it. But honestly, I feel like it makes AFO more pathetic. Like him opportunistically picking a battered Tenko off the streets under the guise of helping him seems more evil and manipulative than him planning the whole thing out.

I'm pretty sure this is a retcon btw. In the early parts of MHA, AFO felt more like a genuine mentor to Tomura. Like he wanted Tomura to come into his own power as a villain. Him always planning to take Tomura's body makes his early characterization feel inconsistent. Idk maybe it's just me

[doodlegirl1998]

I saw your ask about how you would change MHA and want to add...AFO should be utterly pathetic.

Yes. I love evil mastermind as much the next guy. But AFO is a loser, look he has a powerful quirk and could have taken down the world but he instead figgle his tumbs and pines over Yoichi.

(The final villains should have been Redestro and HC)

Like the man is such loser...if I see any fic where he is a competent villain...I will think is an oc.

But let me ask you this: aside fron how loser AFO is, have you noticed how the world in mha seems to be a dystopia?

Hi @mikeellee 👋,

My issue with AFO is essentially this, he was built up by Hori at the beginning as someone who was meant to be the big bad, intimidating, powerful and a real threat to the heroes.

Yet later in the series he makes some of the most dumbass and infuriating decisions and reactions. I'll give some examples:

Screwing Shiggy's potential as a threatening villain in his own right? - AFO's fault.

AFO getting scared by a first year (Tokoyami and Dark Shadow) and getting strange PTSD off Bakugou? What the fuck was that Hori?!

Staying in Tartarus and waiting for Shig to get him out even though he could bust out at anytime himself? Lazy motherfucker.

Getting tricked by first year's including the UA traitor, who he didn't think to secure the loyalty of somehow? Like I don't know by making Yuuga explode like we just saw him do to Nagant? Yeah AFO didn't think to do that apparently...

I can find pathetic AFO funny and can laugh about it at times however an reflective issue of that on the story is this : If AFO becomes a pathetic villain by extension all the OFA holders 1 - 8 (including All Might become pathetic too.) Because if he is pathetic it shouldn't take 8/9 generations of OFA holders to end him.

As for your next point -

The main villains should be ReDestro and the HPSC. I can see where you're coming from and I think it would be a more interesting story if they were bigger villians. Many themes and ideas would tie organically here

1) ReDestro could have a quirk marriage of his own to carry on and strengthen his / his families legacy. (A good idea you gave to me in our private messages. This would fit his character.)

2) Geten being a Himura would tie in organically here as well as having him parallel Endeavor's lust for power/ attitude.

It would tie more into the world building of MHA and "heroic corruption" that Hori tells us off but never shows (bar Endeavor whose pathetic redemption undermines that anyway.)

And the final point - is MHA as a dystopia?

So a Dystopia is defined as this on Google

'An imagined state or society in which there is great suffering or injustice, typically one that is totalitarian or post-apocalyptic.'

Hmmm. Yes I can see where you are coming from. I would definitely say that Hori wanted to set it up as the heroic industry / society being corrupt and flawed initially and Deku / his peers to be the one to change that before he pivoted hard away from this angle and the systemic issues go ignored.

Quirkless Discrimination? Unexplored / unresolved.

Mutant Discrimination? Barely given the focus it deserved.

HPSC corruption? Destroyed by a ReDestro clone so they're now a non issue except when Hori wants us to feel sympathy for Hawks or Nagant.

Quirk marriages/ corrupt heroes like Endeavor? Well a 'hero' like that could easily happen again because he received no consequence for being an abusive POS or engaging in a quirk marriage. Also the ranking system remains in place so someone else abusive, powerful and equally driven could occur again.

Do you feel how infuriated I am with all this? Why waste this set up like this, Hori?!

[villainsandvictimsalliance]

A reminder that Spinner canonically compares himself to Dabi and feels inferior to the rest of the League of Villains.

Part of the reason he allowed AFO to manipulate him is because he wanted to be reliable, as in he wanted to be stronger to be of use to Tomura. So again, he's canonically kinda jealous not only of Dabi's quirk, but of him as a person.

[draconnet81]

So in the manga, AFO throws Hawks away;

While in the anime, he just lets go of him.

mha _ season 7 _ episode 18 (156)

[nyc3]

@mikeellee @kite2013

As you both notice, it's kind of funny how the interactions of Dr Garaki with both Nine and Shigaraki are such different in the way the scientist treats them (despite both are just lab rats in the end).

Because see how Garaki openly insults, disrespects and laughs of Shigaraki ideas in front of his supposed friends.

Garaki probably felt almost insulted for having to keep the game going just because AFO wants Shigaraki to have this illusion of free choice, when in reality he's just a kid which they still have in the palm of their hand.

Even after MVA when Garaki shows a bit more of tolerancy to Shigaraki for mantain the illusion, in the inside he still makes fun of him because obviously he's the only person to really know Shigaraki is just a vessel playing to be the super villain.

But then we have his interview with Nine...

Notice how the aptitude and demeanor of the doctor is completely the opposite of what we saw with Shigaraki.

Despite obviously he's offering Nine be part of a shady experiment, he acts strangely polite and even shows a bit of curiosity when Nine expose his motives to be part in the experiment.

But also, Garaki thinks Nine is a dangerous individual despite in theory he should be the one in control of the situation and unlike in Shigaraki's case, Nine is alone in front of the doctor.

The biggest difference on how Garaki view Nine and Shigaraki, is that in the first case he sees a real man with strong convictions and an indomitable will who could actually change the curse of the world if he's given the chance.

This is my headcanon, but I think Garaki saw in Nine's eyes the closet to AFO in spirit and convictions (and it's interesting how both of them have the same white/silver eyes, coincidende?).

But for Shigaraki?

He only sees a dumb kid who doesn't even understand the situation he's in. A more obvious puppet who can be used the way he likes.

Shigaraki never had any chance with Garaki.

Oh I forgot to mention, but it's also funny as hell how the doctor shows more respect to Dabi in their private conversations than he does with Shigaraki in the same situation.

This happens because just like Nine, Dabi was a dangerous person who can't be controled so easily by him. So at least it gives him a bit more of respect by the crazy doctor.

[teapetal44]

All For One should have stayed on the sidelines as a character after Kamino. His evolvement in everything after that significantly weakens the story. Building up Tomura as his protégé, framing him as the next symbol of evil, and then pulling the rug under everyone’s feet, is the worst writing decision Hori has ever made. In concept, All For One failing at passing the torch to Tomura is good, because it directly  parallels All Might and his mentorship to Izuku. Unlike All For One, Toshinori was aware the younger generation needed to take up the mantle. All For One is a selfish and controlling person, it makes perfect sense for him to be unable to give up his power to someone else. But in execution it falls apart the moment All For One continues to force himself upon the narrative, continues to serve as the big bad. All For One’s inability to pass the torch and Tomura as a main antagonist can co-exist without weakening the themes of the story.  

Like, imagine how cool it would have been if All for One was destroyed by Tomura after he tried taking control over his body and mind. Tomura realizes his master is holding him back from achieving his full potential and his goal, the thing he literally lives and fights for. Triumph over his master would be Tomura’s final step to becoming the new symbol of evil and his self-liberation. Then, he would truly be free of everything holding him back. AFO, the puppeteer, the man always one step ahead of everyone else, would be conquered by the very same person he molded – he planted the seed, but at last, what grows is out of his control. In a sense, he would be punished by the story for failing at passing the torch and Tomura would be cemented as the final antagonist, and his journey would feel satisfying.

All though, I see why Horikoshi didn’t write it like that – cause that would require giving Tomura actual autonomy as a character. Something he actively avoids doing every chance he gets. It’s easier to have a character who is crafted to be evil by one powerful bad man before he was even born, than to portray an abused child failed by a fundamentally corrupt society that values consumerism over actually helping those in need, who ended up in the hands of the powerful bad man because the child slipped through the cracks of said society. MHA conveys to the viewer that there are no bad systems, only bad people within the established systems.

Tomura couldn’t own his conception, nor his heroic goals, not even his abuse. Nothing ever happened to him because of society as a whole or because life is cruel and merciless. It happened because Anime-Satan said so.

[deadboyswalking]

One of the most heartwarming implications about MHA's ending: if Eri, sweet little Eri-chan, had grown all the way to adulthood (or even her late teens) under Overhaul's control, Deku and every other hero would've been totally fine with putting her in the ground and calling it a victory 💖

[bibibbon]

I have mentioned how Izu is single out in his own story in many ways but...can I say how bk is the root of all the problems the manga has? Yes, even the Tododrama.

"but bk didn't abused the Todos" True, it was Endy...but the blame still goes to BK bc in a story where HE can mistreated, abuse and try to kill the MC OF THE STORY and no one baits an eye ...why the tododrama would be different?

If Izu has to look up to his abuser and call him cute nicknames...why Endy wouldnt center himself as "mea culpa" and take the spotlight in the narrative of the Todorokis?

It's all a domino effect.

Hori constructed a narrative and even framed as BK's actions aren't that bad. People thought it was funny.

"lol typical BK" as he says smth cruel to Izu or you know, tries to kill him.

People start to ship him back the day...with Izu. People were saying "wait for his character development/redemption" and well...it became a question of what BK feels, not Izu.

Doesn't that feels similar ?

Who cares what Toya or Shoto feels? It's more important to know what Endy is feeling.

If the mc of this story can be abused and no one bait an eye(be in the story or in the fandom at large) why people are shocked the Tododrama is being like that?

Its absolutely consistent with how MHA is since day 1. The victim deserves nothing and the abuser has a pity me party.

Hi @mikeellee 👋

Well sure bakugo definitely has a huge influence but it's not bakugo himself that directly caused the todoroki family drama and neither would I label it as such.

I get the point that it's characters like bakugo that are the root cause for a lot of societies problems!! I also agree with this sentiment.

I think that there is also evidence for this since bakugo shares a lot of paralleling imagery or just parallels with horrible characters like Enji todoroki and All for one. I remember one of @sapphic-agent posts that talked about bakugo and his lack of a main villain was because he was his own villain. Bakugo is the prototype for one of the worst types of people that exist in MHA society and it's worse that his previous behaviour goes unpunished. This is also another parallel that he has with enji todoroki. I would like to say Iam surprised but Iam not.

I think it's interesting how horikoshi managed to simply normalise bakugo's abusive, aggressive and rash behaviour and even turn it into what some may call an enjoyable gag for the readers to see and go "classic bakugo" or some other type of excuse.

So yes if bakugo can do it other characters can do it that meaning enji and AFO who got away with a lot heck afo was somehow even humanised?!?!?!?!

I can never understand canon BKDK shippers like Iam sorry but what do they see in that. Izuku literally has no agency or autonomy here it completely sucks and its toxic as heck. Also it's very ooc considering that bakugo hates Izuku's guts and has only recently started to act civil towards him. Also bakugo never went through a proper redemption so I don't see the appeal. I think that a lot of shippers may ignore these factors which is where fanon and a much more healthier version of BKDK comes in but I still hate it tbh 🤷‍♀️.

Yes classic hori somehow managed to turn his story into one where the abusers are always praised and the victims are either always perfect little angles that forgive and forget everything or spiteful and vengeful with the urge to burn society down.

[delawaredetroit]

Not being able to understand another person who isn't hurting you is not an excuse for making their life a living hell for a decade. Bakugou would have been well within his rights to avoid Izuku if he was unnerved by him or their values just couldn't align. And if he just pushed Izuku down in the sandbox and told Izuku he couldn't play with them anymore, Bakugou would still be a little brat but nobody reasonable would be calling him abusive.

But that isn't what happened. Even from Bakugou's own words, he actively beat Izuku down again and again. Because he one-sidedly decided Izuku was looking down on him without ever speaking about it, he terrorized an already marginalized person. This isn't about whether Bakugou should have liked or gotten along with Izuku. It's about Bakugou believing he had the right to violently suppress the people around him that didn't fit into his narrative.

Bakugou clearly had deeply rooted insecurities that needed addressed that weren't handled by the people around him because in their society, physical strength is extrapolated to strength in all instances. But that in no way excuses the harm he committed towards others.

[sapphic-agent]

Alright, so the leaks.

@ The AFO battle was just...??? What in the Hell??? That's literally all I have to say to it because the only way to get rid of AFO is to turn him into a fucking baby and have Bakugo fight said baby. It was the most ridiculous thing, that I just laughed at it. Because what the Hell????????? Minus that, I'm glad he's gone so we can FINALLY focus on Izuku VS Shigaraki.

Which, I have to ask, how in the HELL did Shigaraki tell Danger Sense?? Like, is it because AFO is dead now and Shigaraki can have, like- full access to the quirk(s) within OFA?? I just HOPE it's not a dumb thing like fucking jean heart and exploding blood over here. But I will say, it's nice to finally have some stakes again with Shigaraki being able to just destroy a city within just a week and him having Danger Sense, now. ....I just hope Izuku VS. Shigaraki is like the most epic fight we see while Izuku is weirdly side lined via the whole AFO VS Bakugo... thing.

The ONLY way to salvage MHA is to give us a kick ass Izuku vs Shigaraki fight. Maybe then I'll think about forgiving Horikoshi.

AFO turning into a baby is one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen in a manga. And not even the kind of bizarre that's, "Oh that's so cool and creative" the kind of bizarre that's, "Well that was fucking weird." Also pretty insensitive to have Bakugou of all people fight him in that form considering what's been happening in the world lately. There was just no reason for it.

(AFO in general was such a let down. When he was first introduced he was a calm and collected master manipulator. Later chapters changed that into him just being a child who never grew up throwing a temper tantrum. This was the guy that ruled Japan's underbelly for 200 years, killed almost every OFA user, and chronically injured ALL MIGHT. And you mean to tell me that this was underneath that? Just a pathetic child? Freaking Dad For One fics gave him more personality and seriousness than that)

I'm gonna assume Shigaraki has full access to AFO now. That would make the most sense, not that Hori's known for doing that

[justatalkingface]

Let's talk about the Nomu and the Remnants

So, among all the other fuck fuck games Hori played with late-game MHA, I don't think anyone has really... picked up on just what implications he's made when it comes to Remnants.

You see, once upon a time, Remnants only existed because OFA let them, kept them, empowered them. Even when it wasn't really expanded on at the time, the fact that Izuku had them was a sign of his Heroic Mandate (TM) and Destiny(TM), it was something unique to him, something that even All Might didn't have. But... you know, now AFO is just filled with a screaming chorus of those he has damned or something.

Let's... let's ignore the general clusterfuck of AFO for this, and just... all the late game stuff. Let's just talk about one thing: the fact that he has Remnants, and the fact they've been trying to talk to (murder) him.

And first off, that's a big retcon, because even if the OFA Remnants didn't want to murder their users, I'm pretty damn sure they'd want to talk to them all the same, and yet somehow only Izuku noticed, even before the clusterfuck of the extra Quirks kicked in.

But even that's not the point, that's just an appetizer. Because the thing is? The Quirks AFO is holding aren't the only Quirks he's taken, far from it.

There are the Quirks he's given to various people throughout the years, subordinates, would be supporters and probably some random people he wanted to torture.

The Nomu he's made, experimented on for decades.

Hell, all the Quirks he and Dr. Diablo Ex Machina have made (somehow) throughout this time.

That's hundreds, maybe thousand, of Quirks. Millions potentially, if we're looking at the copies and trying to get a number out of the vague 'and then we invented a whole new science just to fuck other people over' bit. And according to this late game stuff? Every single one of them is host to the mental copy of the person they were stolen from (or cloned from, presumably). And outside of a few exceptions, (vanishingly few; while there were people in the past, and in rare occasions the present, who didn't want their Quirks... the magic dream copy in the Quirk would still have their Quirk. For them, the problem hasn't gone away at all! Maybe some of the reason they hated it is gone, but even at best they're still bearing that thing they've always hated... and that's not even getting into people who just... hated them, or thought they were wrong. Or were afraid of hurting someone... only to be given to someone who doesn't share those same concerns, or even the same level of restraint they had. Even though the actual person got what they wanted, there's a copy of them that is still in hell, and knows they're never going to escape it, because they are their own nightmare.) every single Quirk was stolen by force. Every single one of the remnants in these people are just... suffering, and for all intents and purposes will remain that way, until the person bearing them dies.

And all of that? All of that doesn't get into the Nomus. The largely brain dead living corpses made smashing together likely Quirks with the same energy of a child trying to force together Legos, even before whatever process happens to condition them into being loyal. What the hell does that do to a mind? Do they stay separate? Do they... blend together? Does the body/dominant mind/most powerful Quirk just get implanted with memories and desires of complete strangers?

Every single one of those exposed brain monstrosities is a walking, talking torture device filled with damned souls of some unknown number, and who even knows about how much is in the High Ends.

Hell, what about the copied Quirks? Do they retain the full knowledge of who they were? Or does each copy... lose something, each in generation away from the original? Do they realize that they're missing some fundamental portion of themselves, that they're not real?

I'm pretty damn sure that this, like so many things, is something that just happened because Hori didn't think it through, because this is horrifying on levels it's hard to comprehend. It's a level of human suffering on the level of you'd get from the Dark Eldar in WH40K, and on both Hori and AFO's parts, it's entirely accidental. And yet, I don't think there's one part of this that isn't canon compliant, that there's nothing to disprove the idea that, somewhere in Aoyoma, there's some poor sod that was shoved in there, that inside AFO there's a copy of Eri.

Just... just something I want people to think about, because I don't want to be the only one.

[dirt-apple-productions]

I guess Toga and Tenko were really better off with AFO. At least AFO didn’t kill them or encourage them to kill themselves.

[stillness-in-green]

sorry, didn't see the answer until today. thank you for that but I mean proving AFO wrong that Tenko is filled with hatred and destroying and no one can accept him. we know thats a lie now but Tenko still dies?

Hey again, anon. So, I went back and tried to fit this follow-up context into your original ask—answered here for anyone who wants to look over it again.  My initial answer was based on you meaning that AFO should have been “proven wrong” in his assertions about human frailty and how, once someone has been rejected by society and become a Villain, there’s no way for them to come back.  Reconsidering your issue (that Deku killing Shigaraki doesn’t prove AFO wrong) with the knowledge that what you meant was him saying Shigaraki is only capable of hating and destroying things…

I guess in the end I don’t think the story believes AFO is wrong about that either? I mean, obviously he was, back when he first told those words to at-the-time-still-Tenko. But now? Not so much, at least in the author's eyes.

Below, if you want to subject yourself to my reasoning again, you can follow along as I talk myself through getting to that quite jaded conclusion.  My apologies if I misunderstand or misrepresent you again anywhere along the way!  Admittedly, based on my experience with the fandom and what names we choose to use in talking about the characters, I suspect we’re coming at them from radically different positions, but my position is the one I’ve got to offer you. Please know that, to whatever extent we might disagree on how much "Shigaraki Tomura" was ever a legitimate persona, we are united in our opinion that Deku should have done more for him if the story was serious about him being the Greatest Hero.

......

So, okay, the biggest issue with asserting that Shigaraki has any kind of moral core or personality independent of his AFO-instilled hatred/destructiveness is that the best arguments for it all revolve around the League and how Shigaraki wants to be their “Hero,” how that’s contiguous with his personality even from when he was “Tenko” because both fit a pattern of reaching out to the outcasts that everyone else around them ignores or mistreats.

I believed that too!  I still do, in fact!  I want to be clear that I think Shigaraki still has legitimate grievances and that his desire to make a world in which Villains will be happier is still, in its own way, noble and true!

But.

But that glorious spread where Tomura says that even if every bit of his hatred is smashed, he’ll still keep going because he has to be a Hero for the Villains that need him?  That spread comes before the montage showing AFO’s involvement in the Shimuras’ lives from before Tenko was even born.  And part of that montage is the absolutely buffoonish reveal that AFO even influenced Tenko’s sense of heroism by leaning on Tomo and Mikkun (the aforementioned outcasts) to encourage him to be a Hero.  I tend to assume that the two of them were from one of Ujiko’s orphanages—I can’t imagine how else AFO would be in a position to give two random children direct orders!—but whatever the case, it means that even Tenko’s draw towards standing up for outcasts is something influenced by All For One.

If you take that away, what else is left?  I could pick a few little traits here and there, but ultimately, what Shigaraki comes back to in the end, in that very last conversation with Deku in the shared mindspace, is destruction.  He pursued it to the end, his last expressed regret is that he couldn’t carry it out, and his final messages to ally and enemy alike revolve around the destruction he sought—telling Spinner he died fighting for it and telling Deku that it’s up to him and his whether any of what he destroyed actually stays destroyed.

To me, that suggests that the manga does believe that Shigaraki Tomura was, ultimately, an existence that could only destroy, and the fact that some of what he targeted deserved to be destroyed doesn’t negate the fact that he was still ultimately defined by the destructiveness that AFO meticulously crafted him to embody.  Even Deku seems to think that, in the end!

Like, really working through the timeline here?  Deku did want to believe that the Crying Child indicated that Shigaraki had some drive other than destructiveness at his core.  One of the (vanishingly rare) times he actually spoke to Shigaraki during their fight was his refutation of Shigaraki’s claims that he’d successfully devoured The Crying Child and thus transcended his humanity.

Running on the desperate certainty that Shigaraki was wrong/lying, Deku smashes his way into Shigaraki’s core and metaphorically uproots his hatred and psychically holds his hands, and Shigaraki still says that even so, the Villains still need him…  And if it ended there, maybe we could say that AFO was “wrong” in the sense you describe—that while the method Shigaraki uses to Be A Hero For Villains is warped by AFO’s influence, his desire to be that Hero is genuinely his own.  But then we get That Reveal, and even the parts of Tenko that seemed to predate AFO are revealed to be just another aspect of AFO’s machinations—Tenko’s heroism, his sense of injustice, even his very existence, all are indelibly stamped with AFO’s mark.

After that reveal, Deku never again pushes back against claims that Shigaraki can only destroy.  He never pushes back on AFO’s claims of authorship of Shigaraki’s life; he never tries to encourage Shigaraki by insisting that his bonds to the League are real regardless of how AFO raised him.  Heck, he never even suggests Shigaraki still has the chance to figure out who Tenko could be as long as he can break AFO's hold and reject his teaching. No, Deku just…accepts AFO's premise, apparently.

And so I come back to the same conclusion I did before: Deku is angry at All For One, but he does not disagree with All For One.

I genuinely think that, as far as the narrative is concerned, the tragedy of Shigaraki’s ending is thus:

Anyone Shimura Tenko was or could have been was overwritten by All For One’s grooming long ago.  Maybe this could have been prevented if things had gone differently—if Nana had beaten AFO, if someone like Deku had been there to intervene the day of the tragedy, if someone on the street had reached out to him before AFO—but as it stands, Shigaraki Tomura is too far gone to save.[See Note]  Deku can end the monster that was behind it all and try to honor the victims that Shigaraki’s actions brought to light by changing the world that created them for the better, but he cannot save Shimura Tenko because Shimura Tenko was lost long before he and Midoriya Izuku ever met.

(Note: One of those "Maybe If..."s the story dangles is Spinner taking some ill-defined step to help his friend, but my opinions are that disingenuous suggestion are just a long string of profanity. Suffice to say, if Shigaraki could still have been "saved" all the way up to the start of the second war, then the Heroes bear way more responsibility for failing to do so than Spinner ever could, and Deku is even more of a fuckwit for not arguing with AFO's assertions that Tomura is nothing but what AFO made of him.)

Of course we wanted more than that.  Of course we wanted Deku to do more than that!  We spent all that time watching Shigaraki grow and bond with the League—why, if the only reason for that growth and those bonds was to prepare him as a vessel for AFO?  We watched Deku resolve to try to save and/or understand Shigaraki’s heart no matter what—why, if everything in that heart was written in someone else’s hand?

The story told us that the best heroes always manage to both win and save, and that we were reading the story of how Deku becomes the best hero—why, if the story was only going to conclude that Shigaraki’s death at Deku’s hand was inevitable because the harm All For One did was impossible for either of them to overcome?

And to me, at least, that’s why Shigaraki’s death and Deku’s role in it feel so wrong: not for the in-universe reason that Deku and Shigaraki don’t disprove/disavow AFO’s claims, but for the meta reason that My Hero Academia lied to us and wasted our goddamn time.  It spent over two hundred chapters building up Shigaraki Tomura—as a villain, yes, but also as a victim, a friend, an enemy, an ally, someone who existed in the world he was rebelling against—only to then turn around and spend its remaining two hundred chapters tearing him back down to nothing and then telling us that’s all he ever was anyway.

All For One killed that crying child a long time ago, and all Deku can do is wipe away his tears and then wave him goodbye. 

By punching him to death.

It’s hard to imagine a bleaker outcome for the “Tenko” that started Horikoshi’s whole career as a mangaka, but I guess that’s what happens when your chosen career brutalizes you so badly that you come to define a Hero as someone who helps people endure their suffering instead of saving them from it.

...…

...Uh.  So, this got pretty bleak itself in the end.  Sorry, anon, everyone.  I write that way to get my point across, and I’m no little bit bitter about the whole thing myself, but ultimately, I just want to remind everyone that the story is over.  I’m not going to try to turn this whole thing into a positivity post all the way at the end, but just embrace that much: your obligation to care about the things Horikoshi wrote—to the extent that that obligation ever existed—is fulfilled.  If you hate the ending, well, so do I.  But now and forever, we and everyone else can go and do what-the-hell-ever we want to do with the characters and world that Horikoshi left us.

I hope we do.  I’ll be rooting for us!

[medusasea]

AFO's Evilness is Ridiculous

Usually I don't mind villains who are pure and/or inherently evil , I like Aku from Samurai Jack. However, with AFO in particular, him being born evil seems out of place, and not just because he and his brother were able to survive on their own since they were babies. Morals are jubjective, and while there are plenty of moral rule I agree with and I totally agree Afo had to be defeated, given the life he had: living in a time where people with quirks were discriminated against, having to fend for himself, having almost 0 support from others, it all seems like everyone who walked in his shoes would turn to villainy, or at least turn out very badly. Despite of this, I am not entirely against AFO being inherently evil, since the plot could've still made sense. However, not only does AFO being inherently evil contradict his characterization pre body snatching subplot, where he seemed to genuinely care about Tomura as his successor, as evidenced by AFO's inner monologue in the prison, but the manga falt out shows that AFO wasn't 100% evil when he lamented about losing his brother again.

I must admit that fictional sociopaths tend to not be realistic, but when it comes to emotional empathy, they tend to be quite realistic or at least consistent for their fictional world. They tend to feel little to no empathy and desire for human connection. In AFO's case, he missed his brother so much, he searched for him for centuries and he feels like nothing without his brother. Now, fiction does not have to represent realistic mental disorders or give villains mental disorders. Perhaps AFO isn't really a sociopath, but even for fictional standards i don't see how he would be able to feel such a deep connection towards his brother, albeit an unhealthy one, yet also not just inherently evil, but over the top evil. He didn't just corrupt Tomura after finding him, he manipulated all the events in his life and tricked him that he will become his successor. AFO also largely shaped Chisaki and copied his quirk in the past I personally don't think this was Horikoshi's plan all along. While I considerthe plot twist of AFO manipulating Tomura's life, at least we knew from the start that AFO was a bad influence on him, at least there is a hint of this twist, with the at the time unknown man who got Tenko back to his house turning out to have been AFO all along. It wasn't well written, but at least there were some attempts to make it believable, albeit dumb ones. With Chisaki not only was there no hint he ever had anything to do with AFO or Garaki, but considering his hatred for quirks it begs the question why the supervillain who is all about getting more quirks would influence Chisaki to hate them? It's even more counterproductive than his plan with Tomura.

There is also AFO making tons of stupid decisions and outright murdering or attempting to murder followers for petty reasons, when he was build up as a calculated mastermind who knows how to get people to like him. You could argue that the vast majority of abusers often treat their victims well, yet also treat the cruelly in other instances, but AFO comes across as a manchild who shoots himself in the foot all the time. AFO being a manipulative abuser who doesn't really care about his followers only for his behavior to bit him in the ass could've worked if he was more pragmatic, subtle and not childish (or at least not as childish as in canon). The reason why some other over the top evil villains work, is because they are way more of a genuine threat and/or have other qualities that make them entertaining, like for instance being funny, both of which on't really apply to AFO, not since he escaped Tartarus at least. Even minor villains form saturday morning cartoons are more intimidating and/or more entertaining.

[nyc3]

I love this fan translation of Nine's origin chapter way more than the official. More specifically the first line of dialogue:

"Storms calm my heart" just sound much more powerful in context and express a lot more of Nine as a character, and how he find comfort on storms and by extension his own power.

In case you wonder how the official translation is, here's the same page just colored:

The 2nd part of the dialogue also sounds great in the official translation, in a sense the line is more raw than ambiguous. But that's not bad at all.

Whatever it is the official or fan translation, it's certainly amazing how much we can learn of Nine in just a single page of manga and how much Horikoshi was able to tell us about him in so less.

Oh boy, what could have been if Nine was a permanent part of the main story.

[jacksonseymour13]

How come this Fandom doesn't hate any other characters besides AFO and Endeavor. Like am I supposed to sympathize with genociders because they were abused? Fuck that. It gets really old seeing the same tired post that "Endeavor bad because he hurt family" or "AFO bad because he durr evil" like spice it up a little and actually criticize the awfully written villains like Dabi and Shigaraki that show completely shuffles their characterization every season. The notion you have to scapegoat Endeavor and AFO because everybody else is doing is pathetic. Why are we ignoring Bakugou? Somebody that told another person to take a swan dive off the roof, bud legit suicide baited somebody that was already struggling. You mean to tell me because it happened in season 1 it's irrelevant? How come Endeavor's abuse towards his family gets acknowledged more? It's in the past and the guy stopped fucking doing it!