#one more chapter to the end of this arc

[kyouka-supremacy]

I think we should just bring back Wungo Wednesday and start a fandom collective anime rewatch

[buttercupshands]

wait a minute

stop.

stop it.

[anominous-user]

triple threat end card but with the honkai inpact trio. and also bald TT.

[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.

[future-island-egghead]

Muse of Violence, Warrior of Science.

To the ordinary, everyday genius scientist-for-hire with a heart too big for her own good, we raise our sake cups.

You gave us food. You tried to protect us. You gave your life to ensure we'd all live on. Just lending a hand.

You knew it would end like this. We all knew it would end like this, and yet you still did it. And you did it to protect the friends you had made and the family you had left. And you did it all on your own terms, smiling all the way to the afterlife, knowing your will would be inherited by those you saved.

Clone or Machine or Satellite or Daughter. It matters not what you were. Because you went out like a true member of those who carry the will of D.

Thanks for everything, Atlas. For a satellite representing rage and violence, you had the biggest heart of any of them.

[longagoitwastuesday]

Every day I am haunted by the fact JJK could be amazing but it will be just idk Bleach or something

[kanansdume]

The Mandalorian switched from writing a story following the arc of Ice Age (2002) to writing a story following the arc of Shazam (2019) in-between seasons 2 and 3, and this is why a perfectly satisfying ending to a two season miniseries got ruined.

[discjude]

Yeah this is about right (as always my thoughts are in the tags so there's actually kei content there lmao)

[sskk-manifesto]

Ep 6!!!

[blerghie]

i love the orv webnovel comments. the moments where everyone goes from "ugh the yaoi fangirls are ruining the story" to "ok maybe the yaoi fangirls had a point" are the highlights of my day

[lululeighsworld]

rereading green witch arc (im too excited!! ;uuu;) and i genuinely forgot how hilarious the intro to these two were. like i wonder who readers pictured 'master sullivan' being from the loud shouting and the boots and the short fair hair until they got to the reveal on the last page

[waywardsalt]

need to remind myself that while damien only has one arc focused on him in post-ph so far, there’s like only a handful of actual arcs planned rn and his is probably currently the most detailed and interesting of them

[skrunksthatwunk]

not my dad not liking moral orel season 3 🤭🤭🤭that's so embarrassing for him (<- he's not wrong for feeling that way but i think it's like 60% because he doesn't like it when art gets weird and that's so so tragic for him)

[andthebubbles]

reading earlier chapters of my own fic like it's sustenance

[fivekrystalpetals]

this story doesn't exist for me beyond this point in Retrace 92:

everyone is back home safe, the world is saved and they have another tea party, The End!

[fluffypurpleglitterdemon]

There really is an entire arc of flashback after the "Did Xie Lian stab his shitty cousin's stolen mortal body fatally or not" cliffhanger xD It's very important stuff being flashbacked to, and a lot of it so far is regarding Qi Rong and thus is relevant information for the present-day confrontation, but it's still so funny to me! Don't worry about whether Xie Lian is going to kill a random mortal in front of their kid because Qi Rong pushed him past his breaking point, it's now time to talk about what happened Eight Hundred Years Ago!