#disclaimer: I have a lot of emotional investment in dadmight

[darkcircles4lyfe]

Death to All Might, Rebirth to Yagi Toshinori

So about All Might. I’ve been extremely wary of talking about what could happen to him because straight up saying “I don’t think he’s gonna die” is asking the universe to spite me. Plus it also feels like a room full of people turning to stare at me as if I said the Sun isn’t a star. Man has death flags everywhere, I know. 

But, okay, *Bill Nye voice* consider the following:

Mr. Yagi here, if he overheard everything, just received the final nail in the coffin on his career. His time as the symbol of peace is not only over, it was in fact partially responsible for the current state of things, since he once did so much on his own that his absence now makes heroes and civilians alike ill-prepared to cope. I think it was very apt for that one guy to be wearing an All Might shirt--he was acting as a mouthpiece for the latent societal problems embedded in All Might’s legacy. 

We know already that he’s been feeling useless. I love this scene and although I’m not gonna talk about it right this second, remember what Aizawa says about just “being here” being enough:

And we know from conversations with Inko that Toshinori is also reframed his purpose around looking after Izuku. But in the end, Izuku rejected his help, and it was his classmates instead who were able to save him. Now the very progress of humanity is rejecting him too. You may me wondering how on Earth I don’t see the logical conclusion of all this being his death. Hold on. It actually has a lot to do with the fact that we’re all expecting it. Nighteye himself saw it, and despite any contrary convictions anyone might have, the plot doesn’t seem to be veering away from that end. All Might Is Gonna Die, says absolutely everything. 

It’s occurring to me that I have previous experience with this kind of plotline that probably little to no one else in this fandom shares, being that I’ve read a certain book series in which the main character is told in no uncertain terms that he will die (no, I’m not talking about hp). The series in question is T*e Und*rland Chronicl*s (censoring so it doesn’t get put in their side of tumblr) and I’m sorry but I’m about to go on a shameless tangent about it and spoil the ending for you.

So in this series there is a prophecy in every book, each one having something to do with war and conflict, and so far all of them have been right. In the last book [mc] finds out that it’s prophesied that he will be killed. Lots of the things in the prophecies are convoluted and metaphorical, but no, this one literally says “when the [mc’s title] has been killed.” He spends the whole book coming to terms with this, and he gives into it, only to find himself waking up in the hospital instead. “Wow, plot twist. /s” you may be thinking, and yeah sure, the mc in a kids book survived, big shocker. But it doesn't end there. After the war, there are peace talks, but they escalate until the two sides are on the verge of declaring war again. And [mc], bless him, has just been caught in the middle of all of this the entire time. He’s sick as shit of fighting, of watching the suffering and death of people he cares about. He draws his sword against both of them angrily, gives a speech saying he won’t take a side, and then promptly breaks his sword across his knee: “There. [mc’s title in the prophecies] is dead. I killed him.” He’s giving a huge middle finger to everyone there, to the man who wrote the prophecies, to the entire fucked up culture of it all. And so something that was taken literally turns out to be metaphorical. That is, if you still believe in the prophecies at all.

Hopefully you’re catching my drift here. What I’m saying is, even though this other series has nothing to do with bnha, it goes to show sometimes it’s the most absolute certainties that are red herrings, and a “death” can consequently be a symbolic one. In All Might’s case, it could be the death of hero society and a rejection of his own past. In other words, character development for Toshinori himself that reflects on the way the world is changing, too. Also there’s the fact that the mc from that other series I’m trying not to name has an honorary title, and I’m imagining that role he occupied “dying” could correspond to something that amounts to, “All Might is dead. I (Yagi Toshinori) killed him.” 

And here’s another thing: we also have to ask ourselves what good a dead Toshinori is to Izuku, narratively speaking. Yes, Izuku has spent his whole life idolizing even the more toxic parts of All Might, and his idealized vision of his hero does need to “die.” But how about Toshinori as a father figure?  Izuku regretting that his last interaction with Toshinori was to reject his help may drive home the fact that he shouldn’t go off on his own, but at this point it’s kinda redundant. If anything it would negate some of the progress that was just made because it’d make him extra paranoid about losing other people too. To be honest, the whole “Uncle Ben” trope, the mentor/father figure who dies and gives the mc a reason to do better, is so tired. Experiencing the death of a loved one really doesn’t deserve to be romanticized like that. I might as well admit that I’m speaking from experience, and let me tell you, losing someone you love suddenly, when you weren’t around, and with unfinished business--it makes you paranoid as hell that it will happen again. It literally gives me nightmares. Y’all, I cannot stress enough that trauma does not equal character development. Granted, just because I know this doesn’t mean Horikoshi does, but in general he does seem to lead his characters toward healing.

Okay, back to the present. Toshinori is turning away from UA. He likely feels useless and rejected. We can infer that what happens next will involve Stain, and we have a couple of extra clues to go with it: Stain considers All Might a true hero, and has stated that he would let All Might kill him. And since Horikoshi loves his parallels, we also have this fight between Endeavor and this random villain who admires him so much that he wants to die by Endeavor’s hand:

This suggests a confrontation in which Stain challenges All Might to live up to himself as he once was, so that as a hero he can vanquish Stain and symbolically overcome society's perversion of that role. But based on what All Might has learned about the system he upheld, Stain is wrong. All Might is not a “true hero” in the sense that the societal issues Stain witnessed exist not in spite of All Might, but (in part) because of him, because he took too much of the responsibility for himself.

Stain probably had no idea about the personal cost of All Might’s lonely burden until after the fact. Maybe he’s seeing it now. So then perhaps the confrontation would be more about Stain claiming he’s just as fake as the rest. Either way, Toshinori has the opportunity to denounce himself and be rid of “All Might,”  to stop living in his own shadow. Nighteye’s vision has been defied before, and I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if the combination of society shifting + Toshinori’s own conviction is enough to do it again and work fate in his favor.

He is not All Might. He is Yagi Toshinori: quirkless, worn down, and directionless except for his dedication to Izuku. If he survives his interaction with Stain, he can resolve his imperfect mentorship by confessing about his shortcomings and simply supporting Izuku as a part of his family, not as his teacher (as Aizawa said, just “being there”). And that’s how you really get character development, for both of them. I mean, shit, imagine Toshinori straight up telling Izuku to stop calling him All Might.