The More I Think About It, The Lamer It Would Be If AFO Was Just A Bad Guy , It Doesnt Really Fit The

The more I think about it, the lamer it would be if AFO was just a “bad guy” ™, it doesn’t really fit the dlow of the story either. Sure there are people who’s motives aren’t shows to the reader or understood by Izuku, but if we’re really finally going to a point of: marking people as villains is a bad thing and society needs to change, that should include AFO.

So I propose a solution for the ending of AFOs ark that sets Tenko free of him, but doesn’t make him “just” the worst villain of them all.

AFO is clearly connected to his brother, this is the one thing we know about him on a personal rather than a professional (I want to be the evil overlord) level. There is a clear possessiveness about it and Yoichi is obviously a victim of his brother, but what if Izuku and Tenko worked together to deal with the relationship betwen them and the connection between AFO and OFA. At some point Shigaraki Tomura will have to split from Shigaraki [AFO] again, freeing him from AFO, but that doesn’t solve the issue of AFOs presence. While I absolutly believe Tomura would kill him, I think that Tenko would still want to be a real hero who’s first notion isn’t killing.

Izuku states he became the greatest hero and huge parts of heroism are sacrifice, so what if Izuku just gives up OFA, gives it to Tenko, because Izuku is at the point where he understands, that he wants to save everyone, but he personally can’t save everyone, that there are things he can’t do. So someone else will have to step in. That someone being Tenko.

Now depending on whether or not AFO is currently still in Tenkos body would give different versions of the outcome, but I’d say for practicality they are completly split. And Tenko goes and gives OFA back to AFO, uniting the quirks and the brothers again.

An image of Tenko getting backed up by the pervious users of OFA, especially Yoichi and Nana to hand the quirk over to AFO, knowing that Tomura will kill AFO afterwards.

AFO gets reunited with OFA, the brothers get reunited AFO gets one final moment of what he wanted to give him somewhat peace, but Yoichi doesn’t have to stay with his abusive brother, the other users of OFA don’t have to stay with their killer because Tomura ends it, killing AFO his father figure just like he killed his father. 

This was entirely inspired by this discussion by @haleigh-sloth​ and @mettywiththenotes. Also I want god like Tenko, just complelty overpowered, more than ever with AFO and OFA in one person, even if it’s just for a moment. And it would be fitting if Izuku starts and ends the manga quirkless, because you don’t need a qurik to be a hero.

So I don’t know if you will see this @eva-white-11, because I can’t tag you, but you inspired me to do this entire post about Tokoyami, so this is for you and everybody else who loves him. Also this ended up with me noticing some wonderful writing parallels with Tokoyami and Hawks that I had to put in here. This is neither pro nor anti Hawks, this is simply an analysis of what is given.

I talked about quirk discrimination in regards of Spinner plenty and I have called Tokoyami “non-threatening”, to which I got asked how I can think that he’d be seen like that, seeing as ravens and crows are generally regarded as a bad thing and Dark Shadow is very demonic.

While both birds are associated with a lot of positive traits, such as intelligence, adaptability, partnership, foresight and transformation they are also often regarded as something sinister in the western world. Especially in the association with the famous plague masks they tend to be seen as a sign of death.

This is in stark contrast to Japanese culture, where crows are seen as something positive. Aside from the fact that the crows are playing a huge part in keeping cities rodent free, which is notable mentioned in Tokyo the mythological creature of the Yatagarasu (eight-span-crow) has a very positive background.

The three-legged crow is a creature that appears in multiple mythologies through East Asia, the Japanese Yatagarasu is a sign of rebirth, heaven, rejuvenation and divine intervention. Seeing as they clean up after death, especially being seen on battlefields eating the dead, which not only is a sign of the battle ending and something new beginning, it has also the practical effect that the bodies of the dead are being broken down preventing potential health threats to the living.

Tokoyami’s name comes from Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto a deity with similar heavenly background, to be precise: the moon. The name Tsukuyomi having meanings as “moon bow” or “moonlit night” “looking, watching” even “reading”. Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto is the brother of Amaterasu, the sun goddess of Shinto, and to cut a long story short: he killed another goddess, his sister got angry so she moved to another part of the sky, splitting night and day. And looking at Tokoyami’s actual spelling we get “everlasting darkness”, which fits rather well with the deity and his quirk.

His first name Fumikage’s spelling also litereally means “step, to walk through shadow”, being a direct recall to both darkness and his quirk Dark Shadow.

So Tokoyami’s name is based on the darkness, the night and the moon, but in natural manner, rather than a threatening one.

If we’re looking at Dark Shadow he’s often associated with the Enerna, a monster made of smoke and darkness that can take human form that was most likely born from the imagination of Toriyama Sekien, but that generally fits Dark Shadow rather well. And Toriyama Sekien works are known to have great influence of the public view on mythological creatures, even though his works were mostly parodic.

And because HK is a huge Marvel & DC fan, I’m going to mention Raven from DC and Venom from Marvel real quick.

Raven is a young heroine from DC Comics, usually part of the Teen Titans, which has to keep control over her powers because they otherwise can get very dangerous if unleashed. Aside from the power similarity she also has a very dark, Goth appearance, can have her body taken over while she sleeps and obviously has a direct bird relation through her name.

Venom an Anti-Hero from Marvel on the other hand is a symbiont mostly partnered with Eddie Brook, although he’s had quite a few other hosts including Peter Parker and notably Flash Thompson. In both cases there is a deep emotional connection between Venom/Eddie and Dark Shadow/Tokoyami and both can be a direct life threat to other, especially if their host is attacked.

All in all I think in bnha Japan Tokoyami has a far more positive view through his appearance as if he lived in the bnha western world, seeing as in our real world crows are seen as something darker in contrast to Japan.

Tokoyami seems more like a “night crow”, something new, something from above, something better, but instead of the sun, the light he is in the dark, the night, the shadows, but that doesn’t make him bad at all.

This would be a direct contrast to Hawks, who stands for light and the Icarus tale of flying to close to the sun.

Hawks is out in daylight with his sunny demeanor, flying like a bird wanting to be free like one. But behind this is a very dark history of abuse from his parents, of the hero commission using him and of the very controlled murder of Twice.

This is a direct contrast to Tokoyami. He is more grounded because of Dark Shadow, because he has to be careful, he needs to keep control over his powers because he could accidentally hurt someone if Dark Shadow went rouge, as seen in the forest. He is the one who saves Hawks; he kept the PLF at bay and fought Re-Destro all because he kept control over Dark Shadow.

Hawks did not lose control over himself when he killed Twice, which was on purpose, he used control something that is essential to his student and savior Tokoyami to take a life, and this is just a wonderful contrast between the two of them.

Hawks took Tokoyami in as a student because “they are both birds”, but Tokoyami is the next generation of Hakws, a better version, all while being in the dark shadows in contrast to flying into the sun.

Oh and apparently he got called a Myna in the light novels, which depending on who it came from might be a huge insult or a great meta joke, because some mynas are considered talking birds, aka they can reproduce sounds, including human speech (so far only seen in captivity).

Thinking about how possum carry their children on their back.

I thought this was supposed to be the incorrect bnha villains

Toga: Apparently your social filter is controlled by your frontal lobe and that deteriorates as you get older.

Toga, looking at Dabi: You’re going to be a NIGHTMARE

I can’t give insight from a poc perspective, but from a writing perspective the following tips could be useful:

-it’s fine, especially in kids books that things like racism don’t exist in completly fantasy settings. Imagine being a kid again, escaping into those magical worlds. Usually it’s better if they don’t confront you with what you have to deal with in real life, any kid deserves to get sucked into a wonderful magical world where this doesn’t exist.

But if for whatever reason you think racism should be a thing, here’s some things:

-If it’s important for your story in some way may it be character related or a worldbuiling thing (it’s just being our world with magic in it, that explains itself) then there should be a good reason for it. Going from out world: Eurasia has a history of: the lighter the skin, the less you are in the sun to work, therefore you must be rich and higher set. Recently parts of Europe have changed to tan skin being prefered, because it means you have time to spend sunbathing, going the opposite way. In huge parts of Africa white people are hated because of colonisation. If you have racism in a completly fictinal setting you need an explanation for it, be creative or take inspiration from our world.

-look up reddit threads or any forum that deal with racism, they usually have perfect first hand knowledge for you, youtube comments under tiktok compliations about race have a lot of shared stories too

-specfically see if you can find anything from that age, because at the age of 12 there is a wide gap in active knowledge on everything. young people and kids are hard to write, especially if they are at the age of hitting puberty, if you have any in your family see what they know about the world, go from there. But also general development is all over the place at that age and so your character might be more or less aware of racism, depening on the type of racism (see point below)

-racism in this world is very different from country to country, the US are very known for it, but for example Europe has a more silent racism where people aren’t as open as most americans about it, but they still say very racist things behind people’s backs, choose a form you can work with

-if it’s a going from out world into a magical world story the difference could be that skin color isn’t important in the magical world. Something your character could be drawn towards, overseeing other issues in this magical world at first

-if you can find teacher forums in that age group you might find useful information, but I have to give a trigger warning because some teachers go into the job because they can abuse power there

-there is probably something you faced in your life that others attacked you for in some way that was in no way something you have control over (looks, sexuality, gender, etc.) get that feeling, it’s not the same, but it’s the closest you can get. -if you already have something planned, write a scene where racism is features, give it to a poc, or even better multiple that have experienced racism to read. If they tell you it’s not even close, scrap it. Even research can’t get you to completly understand something so big and if you can’t even grasp it it’s going to be very offensive to read for people who actually experienced it.

WRITING POC IN CHILDREN'S FANTASY

I've been wondering about this for a while, and I would really love to hear from any people of colour who would be kind enough to help: if you're writing a fantasy book for kids (roughly 12 years of age) with protagonists of colour, how much do you think racism should play a role? I know it's generally seen as a cop out in adult fiction to create a fantasy world where there's "no such thing as racism", but how would you advise someone trying to write inclusively for all kids?

I'd be really grateful for any advice, or reblogs if you think some of your followers might be able to help me.

This is all I ever wanted, it’ so beautiful!

@sethmacenzie

I wanted to keep it brief, but then I felt like it was too simple and I ended up going overboard anyway.