#I know he's a fucking villain but dammit I can't help rooting for him

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 115: Hard-Boiled Villain Antics

Previously on BnHA: The provisional license exam concluded. Everyone from class 1-A passed except Todoroki and Bakugou. The exam committee announced there would be a special training course for the ones who failed, and they would then receive their licenses as well. They want all the students who made it to phase two of the exam to ultimately succeed because with All Might gone, the world needs as many quality heroes as it can get. The U.A. kids said their farewells to the other schools and prepared to board the bus home. Deku inquired about the weird girl from Shiketsu Academy and was told she had already left, and that furthermore she’d been acting strange for the last few days. We then learned that the girl, Camie, had actually been Toga in disguise, and that she has a shapeshifting quirk which allows her to take on others’ appearances once she drinks their blood. Oh, and. Now she has Deku’s.

Today on BnHA: We take a break from our intrepid hero hatchlings to check in with Twice from the League of Villains. He stares broodingly out the window like a noir character, listens to the news talk shit about Endeavor, watches a group of Tarantino tribute villains rob a store, and gets a phone call from the villain broker Giran. We learn that the League has temporarily split up and are recruiting to expand their organization. We also learn that Twice has more than a few screws loose, the reason being that when he was younger he used his duplication quirk to clone himself, only to have the clones all murder each other one by one until he was the last one standing. If that isn’t fucked up enough for you, perhaps I can interest you in the new villain introduced in this chapter, who goes by “Overhaul” and has a penchant for dismembering peeps. Or perhaps you’re more a fan of the classic villain, in which case the chapter ends with All Might meeting up with our old friend All for One, so, you know. Enjoy that.

(As always, all comments not marked with an ETA are my unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter. I��ve read up through chapter 151 now, so any ETAs will reflect that.)

who the fuck is this

he’s staring darkly out of his window and hating all the people he sees walking past

but also there’s a black speech bubble thinking the exact opposite. “I think it’s fantastic”

is this that Twice guy, maybe

I was wondering what you were up to, yes. good catch there

“THIS MAN STARTS HIS MORNINGS A LITTLE MORE HARD-BOILED THAN MOST.” yes, the really hardcore way to start your day is to hate people from windows

holy shit this ominous fucking chapter! right from the get go!

“unleashed.” and the text underneath: “a world where All Might is not coming”

I’m thinking it’s safe to say the villains are winding down from their little break

I’m so curious how Tomura is doing. prediction: still crazy

the narration is saying that the news networks and Internet are constantly buzzing with “idle chatter fanning the flames of anxiety”

jesus christ this is so similar to the real-world climate in the last few years. anxiety and fear-mongering

oh shit the newspeople are talking about Endeavor

depends on whether you’re the type who can accept assholes who beat their wife and kid

(I personally am not)

they’re being really polite about it, but they’re saying that you can’t help but contrast him against All Might

he’s “coarse”

“he just looks like an ordinary person pretending to be a superhuman” I’ll take it a step further; he looks like an asshole not even trying particularly hard to pretend he’s a nice guy. and yeah, he’s strong, but not even in the same realm that All Might was

oh my god it’s a list of top “Moogle” searches for Endeavor. this is the most 2010s shit I’ve ever seen in a manga omggggg

yeahhhh, public opinion is just not on this guy’s side. and good riddance

basically he’s become “the symbol of weakening heroes.” exactly. I feel like all these people must just be like, “is this really the best we can do now omg”

is Endeavor Donald fucking Trump

this is one of the best chapter openers I can recall reading in a long time. there��s something fascinating about watching a well-established fictional world get shaken up and seeing how the people of that world respond. it’s reminding me a little of the post-Goblet of Fire Harry Potter universe. and why do I have a feeling that by the time this series ends, we’ll have progressed all the way to Deathly Hallows in terms of grittiness

the narration is continuing and saying that just as All Might brought hope to everyday citizens, his presence was a curse to villains

and now that curse has been lifted, so “it’s no surprise at all that it’d turn out this way”

and it’s showing some guy robbing an ATM or something. not sure what he’s carrying, but anyways he’s busting through a wall looking happy and deranged

now a pro hero is showing up to stop him

but another villain is cracking the back of the hero’s head with a huge metal pipe

and two more villains are waiting over by their getaway truck

nice Tarantino reference there. bold and unsubtle and in-your-face

and the narration is talking about how villains are feeling more emboldened and more free to run around without fear of consequence. and that the more daring they get, the more villains they inspire in turn, and it goes on and on. “running a red light isn’t scary if everyone does it with you”

we’re seeing the exact same thing happen irl nowadays with racists and nazis and the alt-right and such, aren’t we. my escapist manga is really starting to hit close to home here

now Twice is getting a call from someone

isn’t this the guy who introduced Toga and Dabi to Tomura

damn, manga, you’re really going to make me go all the way back to like chapter sixty-something to check this. fine

yep, it is. chapter 68

he says that in the past two weeks there’s been a surge of black market requests for things like suits and related items

he says it’s all thanks to the League of Villains

really it’s thanks to one specific villain that did all the work and is now imprisoned though. just saying. though no doubt he won’t mind Tomura getting the credit

anyway so Twice is asking why the broker guy called him

probably cuz Toga got Deku’s blood, so now the gang is getting back together to hatch some more schemes

yep

so Twice is like yeah of course I heard, and the broker dude is like okay catch you later then

gotta say, I was already fond of Twice just as a funny and eccentric (you have no idea how much my brain struggled to find an adjective to use in place of “quirky” there, but needless to say I wouldn’t have been able to keep a straight face otherwise) character. but it’s pretty damn fascinating to witness his psyche on display now as well

apparently the League has been separated and scattered for a little while, both to lie low and to scout for more people to join the group

and now we’re cutting to Dabi and he’s just roasting some poor dudes alive

damn son

oh shit what’s happening to Twice

this guy is soooo weird

he says his quirk is “doubling.” “I make one into two”

okay. I don’t get it at all, but

-- WHOA

IS THIS THE FUCKING PRESTIGE OR WHAT. AND WASN’T THIS ALSO A PLOTLINE IN FUCKING CALVIN AND HOBBES

he says each of the clones claimed to be the real one (by “real” I assume “original”) and they started arguing and eventually they all killed each other

and he’s not sure even now whether he’s actually the “real” him

holy shit I would read an entire book about this guy. I want David Fincher to direct a movie about him

it seems like he’s not even really that evil, it’s just that he’s so crazy that the league was the only place he could find that would accept him. “what I was searching for were others who are just as crazy as I am”

I would read a spinoff manga about Twice and his existential nightmare of an existence, trufax. this is so compelling I almost forgot about the fact that we’re thirteen pages into this chapter and so far it’s been all villains and no U.A. kids

-- what the fuck

IS THAT THE GUY FROM EARLIER?? WHO ROBBED THE ATM???

(answer: yes, I just went back and looked)

WHY IS HIS FUCKING HEAD HERE?? IS THIS HIS QUIRK OR SOMETHING MORE HORRIFYING THAN THAT

farewell Reservoir Dogs. you had a brief and uneventful run culminating in THE MOST HORRIFYINGLY GRUESOME SCENE I’VE EVER SEEN SHOUNEN JUMP ALLOW IN THEIR FUCKING MAGAZINE. NOT ONLY WAS IT INDEED HIS FUCKING HEAD, I COUNT LIKE SEVEN OF HIS AND HIS FRIENDS’ OTHER BODY PARTS MORBIDLY STREWN ABOUT AND ROASTING ON THIS OPEN FUCKING FLAME. dude what the fuck

oh boy here we go

now his buddy in a raincoat -- and they all have the same plague doctor masks on btw -- is saying he took the money and let’s get out of here

he’s calling the “YOU GUYS HAVE AN ILLNESS” dude “Overhaul.” okay I’ll admit that’s a pretty badass villain name

and Twice is watching them all like, “oh. more maniacs”

so I’m guessing he’s going to recruit these guys lol

the narration says that both the heroes and villains’ sides have begun to undergo changes in appearance. well, we’ve seen a lot of the heroes’ side of things so far so I guess it’s nice to take a break from that and see what the villains have been up to

is this the prison??

OH SHIT!!!!!

WHAT IS HE DOING COMING OVER THERE TO TALK TO HIM OH MY GOD

“THE DISCUSSION WITH THE BIG BOSS IS ABOUT TO BEGIN” [FRANTICALLY CLICKS TO THE NEXT CHAPTER!!!]

-- except no, damn it, because I gotta check out the bonus page first :/

 bonus

...actually the bonus page is just Horikoshi being excited that there are now two spinoff series. apparently he’s a fan of Illegals. I do want to check that out (especially since he just said Eraserhead has a cameo in it omgggg), but like hell if you think I’m clicking away from this main story just yet. I still have 85 chapters to go and it’s not like things are exactly getting boring omg