#mha 298

[myheromedia]

Reflection

[thequietmanno1]

Thelreads, MHA 298, Replies Part 2

1) “Ok who the fuck left his bed into a random corner of a hallway? Because look at that shit, that place is too big to be a room.”- Given his role as a vital hero fighting against TomurAFO’s rampage for as long as he did, and the stalling that he and Izuku’s efforts produced against the widespread rampage he’d have unleashed otherwise, it’s not unreasonable to assume Bakugou got a personal hospital room to recover in, presumably the same as the other 1A students did as well. Of course, the other unspoken reason is that the class as a whole is now the second-most priority target on AFO’s list, right below Izuku himself… 2) “ALSO WERE YOU FUCKERS JUST HANGING OUT IN THE CORNER WAITING FOR HIM TO WAKE UP?”- I mean, not like they can go home anymore, not in these conditions. Leaving aside how unsafe the streets have become, it’d be leaving any one of the students open to being attacked by AFO’s minions in an effort to get to Izuku mentally whilst he’s trying to recover. The kids literally can’t leave the adult’s sight anymore, because there’s a psychopath out of their blood with a whole-ass army to command, so they’re effectively under siege in the hospital for now. (MHA ch 258)

3) “And here they are… The kids are marching towards the final battle, and even if they aren`t going to be directly at the front lines, we know its inevitable that they`ll see a lot of fighting.

They can`t escape the bloodshed unfortunately. There`s no saying how many of them will fall once this is over, but one thing is for sure, their innocence will not survive this.”- It did not. Despite their best efforts, the adults were unable to prevent the frontlines coming to them, and now, whilst the class overall seems to have not lost any members, the sheer loss of life and crippling injuries inflicted upon the adult heroes means that they might actually be the best fighting force of heroes left by now. Innocence is always a casualty of growing up, but it didn’t have to go like this. (MHA ch 259) 4) “Oh that we do, some more than others… Yeah, that was an horrible, horrible day for a lot of people, alright. Remember Ragdoll? Yeah, I haven`t forgotten about Ragdoll.”- And this day will be forever remembered as a far worse outcome than that, for all the heroes’ efforts and sincere attempts to minimise the bloodshed, AFO’s backup plans of Nomufying Tomura and Gigantomachia were simply too powerful for any of them to adequately contain, and now the chaos is in the streets and there’s nowhere safe to run anymore…

(MHA ch 259)

5) “Meanwhile, the whole class 1-A sans those two are posing for the sickest album of 2001, that or their funeral pic.”- They really got lucky to get away with their entire class still alive in the aftermath of this crisis. That said, the experienced adult heroes all having taken severe crippling injuries, died or otherwise had their numbers cut down means that they’re now the next line of defence between AFO and his plans to overrun the country and turn it into his criminal empire, and he has very much demonstrated that he won’t hesitate to kill any of them to get what he wants, especially Izuku. I’m worried the full class roster might not make it to the end of the story.

(MHA ch 263)

6) “Well, that would be easier if cementoss had sent the walls of the hotel in instead of out, but whatever, you guys prefer to risk yourself  you go ahead, but if any of the kids get hurt because of it I`ll be blaming you.”- If nothing else, the adult heroes at east ensured that the Villains went through them before they could get to the kids. It didn’t stop them in any way, because they’re just that monstrously powerful right now, but they laid down their lives to protect them before the kids could get seriously hurt. (MHA ch 263)

7) “Don`t worry Kaminari, the amount of death you`ll see today is nothing in comparison to all the death you`ll continue to see for the rest of your career as a hero. Hope you have a good therapist.”- Are you willing to bet money on that? Kaminari’s therapist is going to be working overtime not just with him, but all these traumatised kids. (MHA ch 279)

8) “Hey- It’s Gecko the Girl, long time no see… Also they are talking about monoma, who I forgot existed until this very moment and thus am now presuming is dead and buried alongside all those heroes back there.”- Monoma’s not dead yet, but I wouldn’t put good money on Vlad King still being around…and given that the adults are almost all entirely dead or broken, Momoma’s gonna be on the frontlines by necessity when the next big conflict happens… 9) “I mean, if Jeanist somehow came back, I don’t think being stabbed would put him down

unless you’re not an important character

you know

like Midnight

):  “- It helps that it was a fairly “thin” attack overall, with a clean, direct entry through Bakugou’s body, and relatively targeted. In contrast, imagine if he’s been hit with any of the massive blasts that AFO was unleashing at All Might in Kamino – there wouldn’t have been anything to treat afterwards.

10) “WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT GRAN TORINO HOW THE FLYING FUCK DID HE SURVIVED HE GOT FUCKING OBLITERATED AGAINST THE GROUND HIS SPINE WAS TURNED INTO FUCKING POWDER HOW IS HE STILL ALIVE HORIKOSHI”- Well, in Gran Torino’s case, it helps that the blow didn’t hit any of his lungs or heart- it just gouged straight through his intestines and out the other side. But you are correct about his spine taking a direct, shattering blow from that, which, given how his Quirk manifests, basically means his time as an active combat-capable hero is done. 11) “SHAME MIDNIGHT GOT SENT TO THE SHADOW REALM FOR THE UNFORGIVABLE SIN OF BEING A WOMAN I SUPPOSE”- Horikoshi undoubtedly does some amazing ladies as capable, interesting characters and combatants. That just makes it suck more when some of them bite the dust. 12) “I’M ASKING MYSELF THE SAME MIC, BUT YOUR GOD IS A CRUEL ONE. AND HERE I THOUGHT THAT FURUHASHI WAS THE ONE THAT WOULD BE DIFFICULT.”- And a reminder that Mic is still holding back on the news that Aizawa was the target in the attack that killed Shirokumo as well, just to spare his old friend some further grief after all that he’s suffered and lost in the war.

13) “Hell of a week this one isn’t it Zuko? You found out your brother is alive and he cares nothing about you but using your body to make your dad despair, your teacher gets killed before she can grade your papers, mineta continues alive and at large… truly some dark days”- Now the whole class gets to enjoy him in the angst trenches. Sure, he and Izuku are arguably in the muck deeper than the majority of them, but everybody’s been brought low by the events of the last week… and it’s only gonna continue downwards at this rate. 14) “…and I have a feeling the media outside is not there to praise you for almost dying to keep them alive (and in some cases actually dying for that) “- Frankly, I’m impressed by how well Horikoshi captured crowd mentality throughout this whole process. 15) “HORIKOSHI YOU FUCKING BASTARD YOU MADE MINA CRY I’M GOING TO HUNT YOU DOWN FOR SPORT YOU HEAR ME?”- We didn’t get to see it much, but Mina and some of the other girls were quite close to Midnight as a teacher, leaving aside the fact that several of them found her body. It’s…not gonna be easy to move past that. 16) “Yeah he also is dying over here dude, I tell you that”-  I mean, on the one hand, their demands are warranted, given the whole dirty laundry Dabi spilled, but on the other hand…the public needs some patience whilst Enji actually recovers from nearly dying out there, and so far, there’s not a lot of that going around. 17) “I didn’t even recalled that dude before this panel, but yeah, he was right on the money. I wonder if his quirk gave him some sort of light precognition, or if he was only accidentally correct.”-  Given that Dabi admitted he’d sent some of the villains after the Todoroki family (specifically Ending, but it’s also implied this guy too) it’s implied he told him or let him know the truth behind his real identity, and Starservant, being a homeless nobody with no real means of proving anything Dabi said or warning others appropriately (and a little bit crazy to start with), opted for a dramatic method of fighting Endevour in an effort to kill him before the number one hero became embroiled in a scandal, like Dabi wanted. Of course, Endevour just beat him and that played into Dabi’s plans anyway so… 18) “Oh hey there Hawks, so tell me, how’s your back going? That tan you got from Dabi was a bit brutal I tell you that.”- He’s no longer a fan of fried chicken meals anymore. 19) “You can’t win with Firepower, but perhaps you can win with Icepower, eh?

Sorry. Yeah I know, there’s no way to win against him on a straight battle. The only solution is a battle of attrition, make him spend all his power and die to his own flames. I’m afraid this is how Dabi is gonna go down, consumed by his own hatred.”-  However, that too would be a means of letting Dabi “win” in the end. Getting to go out on his terms, and no-one else’s, dying as a villain in a final blaze of glory as he scorns everything his father tried to create through killing his “masterpiece” before killing him too. In something of a parallel to Izuku’s wish to “save” Tomura, Shoto too now has a villain whom he wants to save, but who doesn’t want to be saved. 20) “I think that Toya would rather have you be the one to put him down rather than Endeavor. He can accept being killed by you, but he would never rest if Endeavor was the one to do so, unless Endeavor also died in the process.”- Actually, that’s inverted. As shown by Toya trying to self-immolate the both of them with flames hot enough to scorch Shoto, ecstatic to do so before Endeavour’s eyes, yet calling it off once he falls unconscious, he wants to die fighting Endeavour – burning himself up to nothing before his father’s eyes and forcing him to witness his insane son’s last moments as an unrepentant villain. In a way, he denies Shoto’s agency as a person unless it’s as a means of hurting their father with his death – he wants to kill“the masterpiece”, but he intends to out-live him only long enough to prove that he’s better than the successor his father chose before ending them both in his hellfire. 21) “HOW THE FUCK YOU TWO CAN’T STOP HIM YOU FUCKERS WHERE’S SERO HE COULD’VE TAPED HIM TO THE WALL”- Bakugou would have just dragged with wall with him. 22) “Yeah that’s what I would'e expected after the show he put up

Midoriya back to his roots by braking all bones in his body

Can’t wait for him to use his cast to punch AfO in the face”- Better hope the damage isn’t the kind that’ll handicap him in the next round, cause as we’ve seen, AFO will not play fair or let Izuku have a fair resting period. 23) “Things are truly going to hell right now in the country. An evil madman on the loose letting out dangerous criminals to do his evil bidding while the rich take advantage of the chaos to seize more power and slaving people under the guise of freeing them… Also things are not looking that bright in BNHA I tell you that.But, in both cases, the sun will rise again. As long as one good person still breaths, evil has not won. And they will fight to make sure that evil will not win no matter what.”- Fantasy can become our reality in both good and bad ways, it’s up to us to determine how it will turn out. @thelreads

[codenamesazanka]

We got along… more than I thought… bonded over games and stuff…

[class1akids]

So this is a genuine question that I hope comes across alright…

As a meta writer, what makes you so confident in knowing the themes of the manga and analyzing it? If you were to look at other analysis that are the opposite and show a different opinion, would you agree with it or now? So when it comes to the MHA ending, with what HK shows and how so many people expected the villains to die, which in the end they did, what made you so fixated on believing that HK was intending for them to live in the end only for him to switch it up. What if it was HK’s intention in the end?

I was on the side of believing the villains would live after seeing the meta blogs on Tumblr that have me hope. So my heart hurts to see what happened. The worst part is previously, I thought they would die but then became confident after reading so many analysis. Unfortunately turns out they did 😭

To be honest, the themes of a manga like BNHA are not that difficult, since Horikoshi is very "loud" about his set-ups. It's not subtle at all - he tends to emphasize his set-up panels and also repeat them several times.

I feel like the "saving villains" storyline was clearly set up with the following moments:

Hawks' attempt and failure at saving Twice

Toga asking "who are saved by heroes / are villains people too"?

Deku's line in 295 - "you looked like you needed saving"

Shoto's line in 298 - "he is me"

Deku in 305 "OFA is meant to save not to kill, I want to save that boy" - which becomes his "win condition"

a whole arc about understanding villains (supposedly)

Ch 342 - weirdo discussion and udon scene

Now, the ending tries to tell you that the villains were "saved" - at least their souls - but ask yourself the questions:

Are you convinced that the villains are truly saved?

Do you feel that there was a satisfying pay-off for the saving themes?

Do you feel like Deku delivered on the "greatest hero" promise?

Do you feel like the new generation did something profoundly different than the previous one and did it believably transform society?

If the pay-off just doesn't seem good enough, it's not because the meta writers did bad analysis, but it's because the writing fell apart in the 3rd act.

When you are in mid-story, it's hard to tell if the narrative is truly off the rails, or it just takes twists and turns. Up until Ch 422, there were ways for a pay-off with the LoV trio and there was a possibility for them to be truly saved. The way 423 ended so abruptly and the whole fandom was like "huh? this was the big finale?" shows that the themes were not implemented convincingly.

And the way Deku became the target of endless memes also shows that the readership did not feel convinced that he surpassed All Might in any meaningful way.

(fwiw, I stopped writing meta towards the end, when it became clear that Hori has failed to deliver the themes he set-up. There is no way to make good predictions on a narrative that has abandoned its themes).

[obsessive-dumpling]

I've taken a couple days to ruminate on episode 128 in comparison to chapter 298. Mainly because episode 128 has given me such mixed signals when it comes to studio Bones current objective.

In season four and five we saw a lot of bkdk scenes robbed completely or at least misportrayed in comparison to it's manga counter parts. And though I just made a whole post recently regarding the new found hope I had based on how Bones handled Katsuki Bakugo: Rising, the handling of this episode is beyond what I was anticipating.

Not only did they not cut bkdk scenes but they ADDED to them. In chapter 298, Bakugo does not wake up and whisper "Deku" and Sero does not put an emphasis on him remaining calm when hearing the news of Deku's condition. These are not completely off base, but they are /heavily emphasized/!

So what does this mean? We knew Bones was playing a long game when it came to season 4 and 5... But were they playing a longer game before that? With the existence of the new opening sequence AND these additional bkdk scenes at the same time, it makes me wonder...are they in on it? Is their lack of commentary on the bkdk dialogue NOT a dodge against bkdks but instead a dodge against mainstream? I've never considered this... But maybe it's time that we do.

[niks-minion]

Bakugou: where’s Deku?

Class 1a: mmm well, he’s still unconscious and...

Bakugou, rushing to his room while still in great pain probably: fucking nerd, I almost died for this?! I’ll kill him myself.

[slwtawn]

redraw bc holy shit

[minorheroics]

— "he's me. the me from before that day."

[hemijep]

Japan : hero's being overwhelmed by a large scale attack and a whole ass prison break in one day

The Rest of the World :

[seraphicghost]

rip 

[dabidabidahh]

I believe it

[thequietmanno1]

Thelreads, MHA 298, Replies Part 1

1) “Last time AfO breached into hell and simultaneously breached out of hell, and we had a few familiar faces, worn out faces, worn out places. Now let us see the next chapter of the collapse of the country’s society at the hands of an evil megalomaniac fuck, in Chapter 298: Sounds of Collapse. 

And also in the real world I suppose.”- And so the “fantasy” situation of this comic book has slowly started to become out reality. You gotta laugh at it, otherwise you’ll start crying, and that won’t help anybody.

2) “TWICE

TWICE

WE HAVE FLASHBACK WITH TWICE RIGHT OUT OF THE BAT

THAT’S TWICE THE AMOUNT OF PAIN I CAN HANDLE”- Even excluding Twice’s sheer one-person army deal, the versatility and strategic implications of his Quirk are so much that Hawks killing him really does mean that the heroes have a fighting chance at this point, otherwise he could do something like clone a bunch of Musculars or ReDestros and just have them pop up to cause chaos wherever. The heroes are overworked enough as it is, any more pressure and the whole system will implode.

3) …

“WAIT

WAIT A SECOND

OH GOD

TWICE

AND THAT WORD IN BOLD

THEY DIDN’T GOT THE REAL DESTRO DID THEY”-  Actually, no, they did get the real deal at the hospital. He was shown being beaten up and restrained by Edgehshot, with such damage that if he was a clone, he’d have melted by that point. However, the point is that, they weren’t expecting there to be two of ReDestro’s power level walking around at the same time, so whilst they had powerful enough heroes available to subdue him at the hospital, they were lacking when it came to this one at the Public Safety Commission. Whilst they planned to lure ReDestro away to increase the success at the vital hospital battlefield, they evidently underestimated how destructive and powerful Redestro can get (nobody having seen him fight against Tomura at Jaku) and so didn’t realise they needed more firepower than they had available before letting him into a room with such high-value targets.  4) “THEY DID MANAGE TO WORN HIM OUT ENOUGH HE’S STARTING TO MELT AWAY, BUT THAT’S THE LEAST OF OUR PROBLEMS.

IF DESTRO IS STILL OUT THERE, THEN THE VILLAINS HAVE DOUBLE THE COORDINATION, IT’S NO LONGER ONLY AFO TO LEAD THEM. 

JESUS CHRIST”- Actually, the issue lies in a different direction. The Public Safety Commission are basically the closest thing to a functioning government in hero society, and now that this ReDestro succeeded in going out in a massive, destructive blaze of glory that has killed or maimed multiple social leaders, including the head of the department in Mera’s arms there, it functionally means there isn’t anybody running the country anymore. The closest thing to order anymore is now in the hands of what heroes remain, and thanks to AFO’s efforts with the prisons, they’ve now got widespread chaos in the streets and nowhere to lock them up anymore, wearing themselves down further under their obligations to protect people whilst AFO kicks back and relaxes in the shadows. And even beyond that, without a government, who decides what defines a hero, legally speaking, in this hour of chaos? If a civilian takes up arms to protect people, in a destructive manner or not, are they a hero? Or will what “official” heroes remain be forced to contend against these “vigilantes” as well? 5) “Yeah, “Liberation”, sure. I remember what Geten was saying back when he fought against Dabi. How the idea is to overthrown society offering true freedom only so they can rule through might. Where’s the goddamn Charlie Chaplin speech again I feel this arc will be a bit close to reality.”-  And now they’re on the cusp of achieving that. There’s too few active heroes remaining and too many rampaging villains loose to act how they want – to say nothing of those who’ll be emboldened by this new state of affairs to act how they want to. If people want there to be peace, they’re gonna have to learn to fight for it themselves, using the new “freedom” they’ve been “gifted” by AFO.

6) “Man, that’s way too early I truly hate capitalism, making you have to grind for the evil overlords before the sun rose”- AFO knew his main advantage was that the heroes couldn’t imagine the sheer scope of his plans well enough to pre-empt them, so he’s made sure to strike whilst the iron’s hot, and undermine their best efforts to retaliate at the same time he’s maximising his security to sit back and plan his next move without interruption. 7) “Even Satan let the demons rest properly”- AFO’s worse than Satan, and he’s here to prove that to everybody.

(MHA ch 264) 8) “And here we have the Hall of Evilness, also used by HOA during the weekends. Yeah, guess y`all are slightly regretting trying to act a coup d`etat in your own country, right? Gonna be either jail or the chopping block, and oh boy, the number of cells is gonna run out soon…”- You were correct, but not for the reasons you expected… 9) “Oh god man, AfO is not even giving them time to breath, three prisons in less than two hours, jesus fuck”- Oh, you poor, naive soul. You though he was gonna stop at three? Like any bully with an advantage, AFO’s gonna keep on pressing it until something breaks. No more prisons. No more place to lock the villains up.  10) “Jesus fuck man

things are about to get… really difficult, to say the least.”- Take note of the numbers though. Seven prisons “liberated”. Only six of them had their occupants escape to the streets. At least one of those jails held the line and won the fight to keep the inmates corralled, even without any of the guards being “heroes” in their official line of work. (MHA ch 269)

11) “Although he might not even wait that long, we already saw that gigantomachia is just there, waiting for a signal… I think that we`re gonna see things got worse before they actually get way worse.”- Oh, much more worse than even that. AFO’s started the downwards plunge of society, and he doesn’t intend to stop until it’s all rock-bottom for everybody. (MHA ch 285)

12) “Boy Uraraka’s parents are gonna be fucking loaded once this all is done. Christ, her family, is gonna be living like royalty.”- That’s only true if we have a functioning society and economy to pay them for the work. At this point, the government may as well not exist anymore, and japan is controlled by whomever has the most power – the Wild West of superpowers. (MHA ch 296)

13) “Now I do hope you guys have cells available for all those people, because jesus is there a lot of folks there that can’t be allowed to roam free.”- Well, er….they did have cells…. (MHA 296) 14) “Alright alright, time for Vigila- no wait, I messed up. It’s BNHA time, why did I thought about Vigilantes? Maybe it has been a while, and I haven’t been able to finish the first chapter of the fanfiction because life is too chaotic.”- You may have been thinking about Vigilantes because, given the similarities between the dramatic widespread destruction from the climatic fighting and the loss of several leading figures from this fighting, everybody may soon be forced to become an illegal hero who’s trying to do the right thing, even if their “job” doesn’t technically exist anymore. 15) “It really fucks you up to be reminded that all that happened in a 24-hours period. All this arc, the whole fight against Shigaraki and Machia, the chaos starting to unfold, all that, was a bit over a day at most.”- That old chestnut about “One Bad Day” now holds true more than ever. All those nameless civilians who’ll be affected by the fallout of this, how many of them do you think will take action to defend themselves that would fall under the heading of “villain” in the before times?

16) “Yeah Spinner, and I’d love to see you turn against AfO since he aims to overthrow Shigaraki. Kill him for your king, show your loyaty!”- Well, that’s the whole problem, isn’t it? Spinner can’t kill AFO (power levels aside) without killing Tomura too – a permanent hostage against any “disloyal” actions taken by his underlings and friends, because no matter how much of him is subdued and assimilated into TomurAFO, there’s still a part of him that remains the leader he swore to follow to the end. Spinner doesn’t have the means to wedge aside Tomura from AFO inside his head, so his old course of action is to follow “Tomura’s” goals at present, because it’s close enough to what his friend wanted before the procedure…but that doesn’t mean he’s happy about this “victory” either. 17) “This is truly out of hand. At least one of them is a potato-faced fuck that can barely fight, that one we can just double-tap with a revolver and get over with, the Shigaraki one is the problem, because honestly, there is no way to save him, and there’s no way to stop him.He truly is the End of all, even for himself.”- The two of them are a combined problem now. Beforehand, Tomura was inheriting AFO’s “will” like Izuku did All Might’s, but now that that’s literally happened, the two are merging into a singular entity that dominates the narrative as the main “enemy”…but both of them individually split the role between “antagonist” and “villain” in different ways. 

@thelreads

[tekuo]

momo's red-rimmed eyes i-

[collisiondiscourse]

“if you die, i’ll kill you bastard.”

-

made this right after seeing ch 298. im absolutely broken. shattered. cant wait to have more pain thrown in my face right after this <3 ALSO THIS IS MY FIRST ANIMATION-ISH PLS DONT YELL AT ME IF IT SUCKS

(reblogs>likes) DO NOT REPOST

[balaroo]

"He doesn't care about Izuku!!!" Okay babe, next excuse pls 💅

[niks-minion]