#THIS IS HOW IT FEELS HORI

[moodyvoid]

Horikoshi: “Happy birthday, Shigaraki. I got you a gift.”

Shigaraki, opening the gift: “Pain and suffering?! Thanks!”

Shigaraki, throwing the gift in the ever-growing pile of pain and suffering that he’s already received.

[bakudekublogblog]

it almost feels a little fourth wall breaking for kacchan to be like “what about our shonen rivalry that will keep us inexplicably bound together forever, what possible relationship could we have if we don’t have the excuse of a rivalry to keep us together” like maybe I’m reaching but doesn’t it?? sort of beg the question

[chandralia]

so bkdk are gonna have to kiss is what you’re saying

[20001541]

with the way baby all for one is positioned here close to his mother's hand, do you think his mother was trying to reach out to him to comfort him shortly before she died?

I don't think he crawled to her either because he's laying on his back...

[kiisaes]

every now and again I think about bakugou's "aji fry" shirt in order to draw it, but I have just now connected the dots that he's wearing a food shirt, and a ridiculous one at that. it's like wearing a shirt with just the word "burger and fries" on it. I also like to think that the shirt comes in multiple colors but he purposefully chose black, bc the rest of his closet is black. insane. he claims he and deku aren't alike but he's JUST like deku and his silly "shirt" shirts

[bicheetopuff]

Pretty much all of my friends thought Izu/Ocha was implied at the end because Hori made Izuku call Ochako his hero and they were shown together in the snow together walking. Idk man, I think Hori's done a mistake writing things like this in the story if he didnt mean Izu/Ocha to be seen as a pairing.

[scarlettcryptid]

someone's probably already pointed this out already, but shigaraki said the same thing that bakugo said to deku before he was taken by the league:

ch. 82 bakugo: 来んな

ch. 416 shigaraki: 来るなあ

(don't come/stay back/stay away)

[usuimisaki]

How Do I (Not) Love Thee? Let Me Count the Ways

Gekkan Shoujo Nozaki-kun is insane. It’s a gag manga built on misunderstandings, mostly accomplished by the fact that the entire cast has two brain cells put together. The main joke of the manga is how everyone is always acting like they’re in a romantic relationship—without any of the romance. In the beginning, the joke was facilitated by the fact that Nozaki is always trying to simulate being in a romantic situation for research purposes for the shoujo manga that he writes, but then other characters got involved and they’re even more ridiculous than he is.

Horikashi

Omg, where do I begin?

Kashima constantly talks about how to get Hori to dote on her. For some reason, despite the advice of Sakura, Mikoshiba, and a drunk Hori himself, she can’t bring herself to go to club regularly. Hori should just go back to telling Kashima he likes her/giving her head pats/just kiss her already to properly motivate her.

Kashima has a rivalry with Nozaki since Hori said that Nozaki was his favorite kouhai, so Kashima gets angry when Hori gives Nozaki snacks or when she thinks Nozaki is going to text Hori before her. She also stole all of the head pats that Hori was going to give to Nozaki even though they were play acting.

Nevertheless, they do spend a lot of time together in club, and club members hilariously either get or misinterpret their dynamic. Like, they understand that Kashima wanted to show off her legs to get Hori’s attention since she might have been jealous of Hori liking a pair of legs in a picture (actually her legs).

On the other hand, when Hori freaking HUGGED Kashima to comfort her after she got upset, the drama club members just interpret this as ad-libbing.

They hang out together outside of club too, to the point that when they couldn’t even go HALF A DAY without talking without a) Kashima complaining about how painful it was and b) Hori going into shock. As a follow-up, Hori started meeting Kashima at the train station in the morning.

When Kashima went on a school trip, she texted Hori constantly.

When trying to make conversation with Mikoshiba before Mikoshiba knew Hori was the backgrounds guy, Mikoshiba thought the backgrounds buy was a Kashima stalker (once he knew that the backgrounds guy was Hori, he felt relieved)

Whenever anyone gets praised around Hori, he has to check to make sure that that person isn’t better than Kashima. He also realizes that Kashima is his ideal girl as well as guy.

When Kashima invades Hori’s personal space, he either responds by gazing at her beautiful face or noticing that her eyes are red.

Kashima, to the extent that she listens to anybody, listens to Hori. One notable example is when she passed the basketball to him when he said to EVEN THOUGH HE WAS ON THE OPPOSITE TEAM.

Hori went around telling Kashima (but also other people) that he liked/loved her for a while.

Hori actually likes listening to Kashima’s horrible singing, even though he knows it’s objectively bad. He even records it specifically so he can fall asleep to it at night. WTF?

Seowaka

These guys . . . these guys are almost as bad.

Technically, the reason Waka goes out with Seo so much is to spare his kouhais the pain of spending time with Seo, but that does translate into them going out a lot. At one point the basketball club tries to get Seo a boyfriend so she’ll be . . . less Seo-like, and in the end they just rely on Waka.

Waka got pretty upset when he thought that Seo had a boyfriend though (turned out to be Kashima).

Seo realized that she likes bullying Waka specifically.

Whenever Waka is NOT allowed to interact with Seo, such as when she accidentally had a card turned to not being bothered, he gets morose.

He also got morose when Seo didn’t text him while on the school trip.

He got morose when Seo didn’t hang to hang out with him right after she got back from the school trip.

It’s pretty established that he says he loves Lorelei (whom he doesn’t know is Seo), but even once he does know, he gives her all these gifts, like food and earrings.

But . . . the food is not a big deal considering Seo is always making Waka go out to buy her food anyway.

The whole interaction between Waka and Seo now that he knows she’s Lorelei is a little weird, since he’s said so many times that he loves Lorelai—but it seems more like the love for an idol instead of actual romantic love. The main change is that Waka now accepts Seo’s orders more willingly.

Waka told Seo that he liked her for some reason (to freak her out?) and it worked, but then he had to tell her it was a joke to make up with her since they had arranged to see a movie together. He sometimes still says it because he likes how freaked out she gets about it.

NozaChiyo (Sakuzaki)

Well, can’t leave out the title character. This is the only couple where one of them actually acknowledges their feelings as romantic. Lately they’ve been getting some air-time, with Nozaki actually reciprocating but in denial.

Even though Sakura’s confession doesn’t go anywhere romantic, she does become Nozaki’s mangaka assistant, which entails spending lots of time at his apartment. This is turned into a joke later on when Nozaki’s classmates invite her along to visit his place since everyone knows she has a massive crush on him and she has to pretend she’s never been there.

Even early on, Nozaki said that he’d be shocked if Sakura abandoned him (though the fact that Hori is more irreplaceable as a manga assistant is a frequent source of jealousy for Sakura).

Nozaki feeds Sakura a lot. It’s not like he doesn’t feed his other assistants, but he especially feeds Sakura, even outside of his apartment. Nozaki even realizes this, to the point that he tells Kashima that’s how they got close (prompting Kashima to feed Hori the notorious brandy cake)

Nozaki even made Sakura oven mitts for her cooking project (where she was baking cookies for him).

Nozaki (and Seo) got jealous when Sakura hugged the Wakamatsu doll Nozaki made for Seo (so he made a Sakura doll for her).

Nozaki really wanted to hold Sakura’s hand after she got “lost.” Of course Nozaki asked Kashima for advice about this and she told him it was a motherly feeling. I’m not sure if this actually counts since it’s actually romantic as opposed to non-romantic. I guess as long as there’s plausible deniability it counts.

Main vectors of romance-adjacent behavior

Spending stupid amounts of time together (but they could just be club buddies/coworkers).

Jealousy—I was going to say that Horikashi was an exception, but Kashima is jealous of Nozaki. Hori is annoyed at fangirls if they prevent Kashima from going to club.

Touch (this is mostly Horikashi, but Seo has started rubbing Waka’s head, but let us not forget that Sakura once sat in Nozaki’s lap—prompting Seo to do the same with Waka. Hori has given Kashima a lap-pillow a couple of times, once for Mikoshiba’s sake, and once during the king game)

Knowing a huge amount about the other person (Sakura is an acknowledged stalker, but Hori and Kashima come close)

Feeding (Nozaki, Kashima, and Waka)

Obedience (Kashima listens to Hori, Waka listens to Seo—Sakura and Nozaki actually have a mutually respectful relationship)

Telling them that they like them (Hori demotes this behavior by just telling everyone he likes them, Sakura’s confessions always go awry, and Waka as a joke)

Tolerating the other person’s terrible behavior (Waka obviously (poor kid has Stockholm Syndrome), Hori for Kashima’s singing (he kind of puts up with her other terrible behavior, but also smacks her for it), Sakura putting up with Nozaki’s eccentricities)

Other special treatment (Hori praising Kashima, Kashima hovering around Hori, Seo bullying Waka, Waka idolizing Lorelai but also thinking about Seo (as a troublemaker) a lot, Sakura for almost anything regarding Nozaki, Nozaki mothering Sakura)

Being cheered on by another member of the cast (everyone knows about Sakura’s crush, Mikoshiba is the biggest Horikashi supporter, and even Hori supports Seowaka for the sake of Nozaki’s manga)

[super-paper]

Hm.

[marimeeko]

I have a sudden, unsolicited opinion on the moment where Ochako admits that she fell in love with Izuku. Since it has been going around as one of those context-less, surface level articles on Google(I spotted it too)

So it's talking about the moment when Ochako is fighting Toga and she tells her that she fell in love with Izuku.

Does she use the exact wording? Yes.

Does that mean it's an end all declaration? Does it mean she is endgame with Izuku? I do not think so.

I don't think it's the final nail in the coffin to the argument for any other ship involving Izuku or Ochako. Here's why:

The admission is so anticlimactic.

We have known for a while that Ochako has complicated feelings about Izuku. We know that it has been a bit of a crush. And that has led to ANTICIPATION to see what becomes of those feelings.

But along the anticipation, we have also seen her going through some feelings of discomfort about the whole thing...unusual, for a supposed love interest of a Shonen manga!

So the audience has been waiting for a LONG time for something, anything, to happen between Ochako and Izuku that rewards that anticipation and that waffling on Ochakos part.

And for something like a supposed love confession, a line like "I fell in love with Izuku Midoriya", to heppen....

But NOT in a moment between Ochako and Izuku themselves, just also does not reward the anticipation that was built up.

She did not confirm and admit these feelings TO izuku. She admitted them to Himiko.

And that is the first time the audience hears her positively confirm that she had those feelings, blatantly.

But it TAKES AWAY from the actual relationship because Himiko received that confession...not Izuku.

We didn't get a charged confession between Ochako and Izuku. The relationship was STILL not mutually developed. It's still just a quality of Ochako, it says nothing about Izuku. The anticipation of Ochako having a crush, and changing, complicated feelings for Izuku and where that would eventually climax, where it would reach its peak for Ochako and Izuku both, instead is diverted. Kind of literally. Because it didn't happen at either chance they had to talk it out, to confess, she sent Izuku away when Himiko tried to trap him into a love discussion. She didnt bring it up before the war began even though they had such a calm moment to be able to do so. It didn't come out in the logical places. And now in the endgame, they have split up to fight different battles...Ochako has even exhausted everything she has right now to save Himiko and likely is out until we receive the wrap up.

So, the anticipation I mentioned, again, does not have a payout in the form of even a rushed battlefield confession because the two of them are fighting different battles.

Instead the audience is given the confirmation of "I fell in love with him" when he is not even present, when Ochako is not confessing to him or confronting him. It comes out with Toga, when she Is trying to reach out and level with her, it almost could read as a "I had a crush on the same boy" kind of statement. It comes out when saving Himiko is Ochakos main priority.

What I'm saying here is that Ochakos love confession for Izuku, which is usually a big deal in any story, is in the back seat to prioritize each of their other relationships and goals. Which is great that it is not forced upon us when there are bigger things happening, however it just does a disservice to the pairing itself when most of the feelings are expressed onesidedly, and an actual statement of love, if it's not even outdated because of changed feelings, means a lot less when it's not filling the gap between the two people in question. When the confession doesn't reach the other person.

(And I will go ahead and say that is kind of similar to how bkdk is right now as well, bc we have SO MUCH material on Katsukis side, about how he feels and how much he cares about Izuku, but not a lot on what Izuku feels or allows himself to feel about Katsuki. I will call that out as well.)

Like at this point, the best we could hope for, for Ochako and Izuku being a couple, is a very open note about it in the aftermath. Like maybe Ochako asks Izuku if he would like to get crepes with her. That's just enough given context clues to suggest to the audience that yes there are still some feelings there, she heard what he said about crepes and holding hands and took note of it, but also that Izuku himself is willing to explore those feelings as well. It would be Ochako finally choosing her feelings for Izuku, but without it being too sudden for Izuku to accept. This whole time we are not shown Izuku crushing on her at all it would be strange to have him suddenly initiate.

But anything more romantic and profound than that? Any dramatic reveal/confession of feelings, any chance for them to have a moment in the midst of war to have the "i love you" discussion? That has been bypassed time and time again. Horikoshi COULD HAVE WORKED IT IN, IF IT WERE A PRIORITY TO HAVE THEM ENDGAME. While no, romance doesn't have to be a priority in a Shonen, and Ochako has flipped the script on how she handles her feelings as a shonen love interest, Hori has demonstrated that threads and concepts of romance ARE part of his narrative.

And right now? Hot take, but the most romantic thread that Izuku, his main character, finds himself in, is whatever the hell is going on between him and Katsuki Bakugou.

You'd just think if the mc was going to be with a romantic partner, a girl, by the end of the story, something would have happened.

I feel like I'm going in circles past my point, but it boils down to Izuku not having any indication of interest in Ochako besides friendliness....the fact that the audience received confirmation of Ochako loving Izuku from her telling a 3rd party and NOT her subject, and the anticipation of that confession, built up for YEARS of this manga and animes run, of supposed feelings not really being paid off, if the two are meant to be the romantic end game. It also boils down to the fact that the anticipation of the confession had a CHANCE to occur with Izuku, the subject, multiple times. It boils down to again, ochako and Izukus relationship being romantic in anyway being little more than an after thought.

AND! it doesn't even guarantee that her feelings of love for him are still the same! We don't know for sure if she STILL loves Izuku!

So yeah. I hope this made sense, but it sure feels anticlimactic to have a love confession(supposedly) not even occur while the subject is present, where the audience can view it and celebrate that long awaited conclusion.

As always, these articles that pop up on Google leave a lot of context out, and are very face value. They saw Ochako say the L word and called it endgame. There is a reason I don't read them.

[angy-grrr]

thoughts:

Himiko Toga never chose a villain name because she has always been the monster and demon for others, internalizing it. But also because she isnt trying to be someone else, but proudly show herself and her love -AFO exploited this to reaffirm the previous, so she never even realized she could give her blood for others.

Ochako Uraraka's goal and arc isn't finished until we see a few main points: "who will save heroes?" A discussion about heroism and saving, and I wouldnt be too surprised if saving villains also come up here as a developed version of the first. They are all people, and that's what matters over their assigned roles. "Himiko Toga". Where is she? Ochako's arc can't be finished until we see or hear what ended up happening. "What does she feel about it all?" She needs a resolution and express her feelings, and with the hiding she has done recently I cant help but wonder even more about Himiko's state, as she is the person who makes Ochako feel safe enough to talk about her thoughts. And lastly"You like him, dont you?" What will happen with her love for Izuku? Is she going to hide it, confess, talk about it more with Himiko? I still think about "the reveal" during her fight with her, and her hair covering her whole face... It could be because she "needs" to tell and show her whole face to Izuku*. I would prefer it another way tho

*She said she admires Himiko for being able to say her feelings and love who she does with her whole face, if I remember correctly, while remembering an Izuku who is looking somewhere (someone?) else smiling. I believe its important that she doesnt have her face shown there, but we still dont have a clear reason why. Is she just not able to show that love to Himiko because she hasn't shown Izuku first? Is it because she no longer feels it? In the next panel she says shes now going to stop her, we can see her face, and her mouth is covered in blood. Is it because their battle was never about him? Because she is ashamed of those feelings? Because she doesn't want to engage in them?

With chapter 425 taking us by surprise because of her first interaction with Midoriya after the war, I prefer to think she has her hair covering her face because she still can't be honestly herself with him. Partially? Yes completely, but she can't tell him her feelings like with Himiko.

I hope she expresses her feelings to the class, to her parents, her friends, the civilians... but I really don't think a confession to him and him only would solve anything.

She doesn't want or can't chase him and his feelings like with Himiko; Izuku is acting weird, upset about many things, and she doesn't see that, im sure she would have tried to help if she actually knew. Even tho she looks around to find a crying Himiko, she doesn't try to do the same now, and in fact rejects it; she decided her feelings are not for him or others to see, at least at the moment.

So how does Hori plan to change this in such little time? Is Izuku going to chase after her, when thats what he has always done with everything he wants? Doesn't he deserve to be chased back? Doesnt she deserve the right to decide how much of herself she wants to reveal to him? Or mourn the loss in her own terms, in case Toga's dead or she thinks she is?

With her feelings for both Midoriya and Toga she has tried to put heroism first, focus only on that; with the first one because she fails at her goals and just blindly imitates him without finding herself, and the second one because she shouldn't feel that way and questions herself over those quite frequently.

I have no idea if Horikoshi plans to make her put her feelings first for him over heroism like she did with her -risking it and acting against what a hero "should" do so they can both just be Himiko Toga and Ochako Uraraka.

I have no idea, but it would make me so sad if he did.

EDIT:

In chapter 424 we see Shoto first in the hospital, when the narration explains things cant be as simple as Deku thought as a kid. Then Ochako appears, with her arm over her stomach probably thinking about her fight. It can't end so easily, and I wouldnt be surprised if chapter 427 or 428 was about them.

Fun thought: what if Himiko is the one about to see Spinner? jkjkjk. It could be cute tho.

[moodyvoid]

The fact that we only get to do this one more time has got me kinda sad, but also relieved 💀

[bakudekublogblog]

kacchan there is actually a way you and izuku can be together forever i have this crazy inventive solution for you it's called a marriage license

[problemswithbooks]

BNHA Ch. 429

So, I guess Toga is dead, and people are losing it.

I get why people liked her--she was actually queer, being pan/bisexual. She was representation for them and that's rare in shonen manga. But here's the thing--she was bad representation at best and insulting at worst. Nor do I think she was made queer because Hori really wanted to represent a queer girl. Himiko was always the author's poorly hidden fetish--she just was. She liked girls as much as boys because Hori wanted to draw a girl touching sexually on another girl. You can see this in how he draws her and Ochako in solo pics together.

I mean, people seem to understand this when it comes to Momo and her outfit being overly sexual or that both Himiko and Hagakure's Quirks either leave them naked or they have to be naked to use them. These are excuses to draw girls in a sexual manner. Himiko being into other girls is the same thing and that's the kindest interpretation.

Given how Himiko acts and her Quirk being heavily coded sexual desire, and therefore her use of it against someone unwilling being sexual assault, it could just being playing into harmful stereotypes of predatory gays.

As a queer person myself I just found Toga insulting. She was designed to be overly sexual and give the male author a female character that he could draw being suggestive with his other female characters. When he did flesh out her character, her backstory was eventually the trope/fear of straight people, that gay people will be so overcome with their lust that they end up sexually assaulting them.

In the end Ochako accepts this part of Toga and says she'll giver her blood forever, but as much as a lot of readers took that that as some deep lesbian confession, for me it really fell flat. Hori never really gave any of the main kids time to actually learn about their villain or show how that changed their minds toward them. Shoto only works because Touya is his brother (even though he admits he barely remembers him). But Ochako goes from not thinking of Toga at all pre-first war, to one thought about her during her speech, to suddenly caring about her so much she--given how Toga's quirk is coded, is willing to essentially fulfill Toga's kink for the rest of their lives.

It's weird and it comes out of nowhere. It's made even stranger because Toga doesn't actually change or show remorse for anything she did, which included personally hunting and murdering people before she joined the LOV. None of the death and destruction she is also partially responsible for is brought up either, something that Ochako was rightfully upset about during the first war when less people and property had been destroyed. Ochako just accepts everything about her suddenly and her past serious crimes are forgotten so they can cuddle and cry.

Am I shocked Toga died--a little. I didn't think Hori would have the guts to kill off a young girl character, especially one that he clearly got a lot of joy drawing in sexy poses. But at the same time, once he killed off Shigaraki and ended Touya's story with his slow death, I'm not surprised he went the same route with Toga.

This isn't Naruto--Hori isn't really kind to characters that do something wrong, especially if they don't try and change. Enji, Bakugo, Hawks, and Aoyama all sort of got punished for what they did. Enji is the worst off, being permanently crippled, missing an arm and burned everywhere. Bakugo's hand is damaged, his heart weaker, plus he feels bad that Izuku lost his Quirk so they can't compete the same way he wanted them to. Aoyama, despite doing way less wrong and even helping his class during the forest raid, still leaves school because he doesn't feel he earned being there yet. Hawks lost his Quirk and even though him running the HPSC could be seen as good for him, Hawks always wanted a break, but now he has one of the most time consuming and stressful jobs out there.

So, if this is what characters who actively did good things and even changed and fought to be better get, what would characters who never changed and never did anything positive for anyone but their friends/themselves get?

Before the last Arc started, when so many people said the LoV were 100% going to be redeemed I had doubts and always thought it wouldn't make sense with how the story presented redemption or treated other non-LoV villains in the past. That if the main LoV did get some happy ending where they were bffs with the main cast it would clash with how other characters had been treated.

That doesn't mean that I think how Shigaraki, Toga, and Touya ended up in the manga was well done. I think their endings fit far better then a last minute redemption would have, but at the same time you can feel how rushed everything has been since the end of the first war arc. Hori was done with this story months if not years ago, yet he was contractually obligated to finish it. Because of that I think he left out as much as possible. As much as I think he's written some pretty obsessive stuff, particularly towards women, I can't really fully blame him cutting corners or the story being shit at the end.

We know Manga authors, particularly those that work with Jump are treated like shit. That they suffer incredibly long hours at times not even getting to go home for days. We've gotten messages for Hori saying he's sick quite a few times. On top of that, weekly story telling is not a great way to tell a cohesive narrative. Ideas probably change week to week or at least month to month and you can't go back and change the last chapter no matter how much you need or want to. Then you remember he also gave a lot of ideas to the people who made the movies, which would also change his plans for how he wanted the main story to go.

The story is bad--it has been for a while, but I think a lot of people put their hopes on their favorite characters getting a happy ending, even when there were signs that probably wasn't going to be the case. I know how much it sucks when a character you love gets a shitty ending (Stain was my fav, but he got an absolute dogshit ending) but at least, knowing what I know about the industry I can't really blame Hori the way I see some other people doing. Criticize it, sure, but saying Hori hates his readers or is horrible writer isn't true. BNHA was popular for a reason--he's great with characters and the beginning of the story had some great pacing. We'll never know, but I wouldn't be surprised if BNHA could have been amazing if Hori had been treated better and the story hadn't needed a chapter every week.

If anything BNHA has taught me how much a story suffers when authors/artists are treated like crap and forced to work past burnout.

[20001541]

this line makes me wonder how long hori has had their backstory in mind, because in even in 193 afo states that yoichi was the only family he had left.

so I wonder if hori had their backstory in mind from the beginning or if he only had a vague idea of what their childhood looked like at this point.

I wouldn't be surprised if he did have their orphaned as babies backstory in mind here because the backstory explains so much of afo's behavior and the comic book they read was first mentioned here so he had to have some idea of how they stumbled across the comic that changed their lives at the very least ...

[vegetabletart]

Idk what prompted me to do these but I'm laughing so hard