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Do you remember the incident with the bird?

Many believed that Himiko killed the bird

but in reality the bird was already dead when she found it.

What if, just like the bird, the incident with Saito it was a misunderstanding?

We never see Himiko stab Saito with the cutter, we only see Himiko with the cutter in her hand

so we can assume that she attacked him... or she just found Saito injured on the floor and Himiko just grabbed the cutter already bloody and when he saw the bloody wound, Himiko couldn't hold back any more and took the opportunity to suck Saito's blood.

It must be remembered that Saito was fighting with another classmate,

so said classmate could have been the one who attacked Saito with the cutter and Himiko simply found him already injured on the ground with the already bloody cutter.

Because what we see with Himiko with the cutter is what people think she did

but what actually happened was that Saito was already injured, Himiko only took advantage of the situation to suck his blood.

I've been thinking about something and it's that both the Hero Society and All for One, the main villain and antagonist of My Hero Academia, see the world in the same way as the villains of Medaka Box.

In Medaka Box, its antagonists and even the main protagonist herself, Medaka, feel that they have to live only as roles in a story and they are defeated by Zenkichi, a normal boy, for the simple fact that he treats them as people and not by their roles or archetypes.

What I'm getting at with this is that Hero Society judges its citizens according to the quirk they are born with (they call those with a powerful or flashy quirk heroes, those with a nasty or dangerous quirk they call villains, and those who do not have quirks simply look down on them) and treat them under character archetypes (heroes are required to be perfect and save all the people on the planet at the expense of their physical and emotional health, those who have unpleasant quirks are treated as villains who must be stopped at all costs without being offered the opportunity to rehabilitate, being imprisoned without a trial at best and killed at worst and the quirkless simply treat them as extras who have no importance). It is thanks to this way of thinking that Hero Society has that Bakugo, Endeavor, Hawks and others acquire a quite toxic mentality and got away with their abuses and it is even thanks to the society that All Might believed he had to solve the problems. everyone's problems alone and the citizens became dependent on the heroes causing bystander syndrome and people like Tomura and the League were discriminated against for their gifts and no one did anything to help them or show them that there is another way to solve things without reaching to violence and quirkless people they treat them as useless all the time and mistreat them whenever they can.

On the other hand, AFO lives with the role of the main villain of a story (he wants to be the Ultimate Lord Demon) and wants others to live in that narrative. He sees the world from a story point of view and sees others by archetypes (he sees Tomura and the League in general as villains because of their powers, he sees any wielder of One for All as the main protagonist who is destined to face him, see anyone who isn't a villain or a One for All wielder as an extra).

The reason everyone in the League became violent is because everyone has dehumanized them by seeing them as villain archetypes and not broken people who urgently need help. Heroes are also dehumanized because they are seen as perfect beings who have to be powerful and do all the work, forgetting that they are humans who make mistakes, who need help and who cannot do everything alone. Quirkless are still people who can contribute in other ways and deserve to be treated with kindness and respect like anyone else.

For Hero Society to improve, everyone has to stop seeing people as character archetypes because of their quirks and see them as people and give them real support.

With AFO's past we understand why he is obsessed with family, it is because he sees family as people who are his who will always love him and be by his side.

That's why AFO hates Kudo for "causing" the death of Yoichi, his only family.

That's why he hates Nana and Endeavor because they have what he always wanted but they choose to put it aside in favor of their work as heroes (although Nana did it because AFO didn't give her another option).

And if DFO theory is true, AFO hates All Might for taking Izuku away from him and for passing on his dream to his son, and by extension, encouraging him to live (what AFO believes) a life full of loneliness and suffering because for AFO the heroes always suffer and are alone, hence why he tells Izuku that he chose a thorny path, while for AFO, the villains have carte blanche to do whatever they want and have followers (they aren't alone).

I don't know about you but with chapter 407 I feel like AFO is like Eren Jaeger and Cinder Fall: a traumatized person who has had a series of horrible things happen to him who prefers to be seen as a monster because that gives him control over his own life than admitting that he is a victim who never had control of anything that happened to him in his life.

It's quite curious how AFO is more yandere than Himiko in the sense that AFO, unlike Himiko, does everything a yandere would do:

-He is possessive of Yoichi.

-He is aggressive towards anyone who hurts Yoichi.

-He locked Yoichi in a vault.

-He got angry with Yoichi for abandoning him.

-He hates Kudo for "taking" Yoichi away from him and for "causing" his death. He literally said that if Yoichi couldn't be his then he wouldn't be anyone's and accidentally killed him out of jealousy.

-He is obsessed with getting Yoichi back. Literally the entire plan he's made for years to get One for All is to "get" Yoichi back.

While Himiko wants to become Ochako and be Izuku's girlfriend because she perceives them as the type of person that she is not and wants to be in addition to the fact that she never showed possessiveness, obsession and jealousy with Twice and the League.

I'm glad someone finally said it, what happens is that people excuse Satoru because he's handsome. The truth is that what Satoru did to Megumi is the same thing that AFO did to Tenko only less exaggerated.

So I was genuinely surprised last week when we were finally shown Megumi's mental state inside Sukuna and he was predictably at his lowest point ever, and instead of sympathy from the fans most of the responses on twitter I saw were people mocking him.

Which I am going to assume comes from a misunderstanding as his character. You see Megumi doesn't fit into the role of the black haired supporting protagonist / rival well. He's not Sasuke, he's not Uryu Ishida, he's not Yuno but he's not meant to be a rival or even a typical shonen character who's progress is only measured by a series of power ups. Megumi is perhaps one of the most subtly written characters in the manga, and perhaps he's hard to sympathize with because he doesn't fit into easy to udnerstand shonen tropes. Which is why I will try to explain his arc below and why Jujutsu Kaisen does it like no other manga currently running.

1. Meet Potential Man

Let me introduce you to the worst meme on twitter.

Megumi's inability to live up to his potential to reach his full power as a sorcerer is probably his biggest flaw, one that is rightfully called out by the narrative again and again, but apparently an intentionally written character flaw is bad writing.

It's covered in Gojo's "Swing for the fences" speech.

Gojo notices Megumi bunt in the baseball game and decides to confront him about it later. He highlights that while bunting is alright in baseball, and it's good to sacrifice yourself so your teammates can advance in a team sport that being a sorcerer is a solo sport. No matter what Megumi is going to reach a point where he's forced to fight alone, and instead of trying to push himself to be as strong as he can be he intentionally limits himself to cooperate with the sorcerers around him.

Basically, the opposite of Gojo who literally cannot fight with other sorcerers because he won't be able to fight at full strength as they just get in the way.

It's not just that Megumi can't use the ten shadows to its full potential, something pointed out by Sukuna, and then later again by Gojo, it's also that he always prioritizes either the group or someone else above himself when trying to decide how to act. Megumi is a semi-decent strategist so this is not necessarily a bad thing, but because of Megumi's tendency to care more about trying to live up to other people's expectations towards him, and what other people need of him rather than his own needs he doesn't have the attitude necessary for sorcery, especially since the strongest sorcerers don't take others into account at all and act like living calamities.

Megumi doesn't look at himself, he looks at the people around him. He judges himself based on what the people around him want from him, not what he wants. This is going to be a continual theme in his arc.

Sukuna is a living calamity, the definition of the attitude a strong sorcerer has, Gojo Satoru wields sorcerery only for himself, and is a sorcerer because he finds exorcising curses and using his god given talents to be fun for him.

Megumi's reason for fighting, his self worth, are all much, much less than the strongest characters in this series which is why he continually fails to live up to his potential. It's not because Gege is not good at writing or Megumi is a disappointing character, but rather he's been written as someone with tremendous potential under the pressure to live up to that potential but who continually fails to do so. Megumi's low self-esteem, low self-worth, and lack of self-identity explains both his failure to progress as a sorcerer something that requires selfishness and self-identity to reach greater heights in, but also his tendency to pick the suicide option with Mahoraga because Megumi genuinely believes compared to the others even just his classmates his life is simply worth less.

So potential man, is an intentionally written character flaw already called out in canon. The more interesting question is why does Megumi fail to live up to his potential.

2. Meet The Original Potential Man

So, I said that Megumi is not like a lot of characters in Shonen Jump but that doesn't mean he's entirely unique. To help explain Megumi's inability to live up to his potential I thought it would be helpful to compare him to a character he's clearly inspired by.

Killua Zoldyck, is the deuteragonist of a manga called hunter x hunter. You may have heard of it, Gege certainly has. Killua is born into a family of assassins who all have supernatural powers. The assassins inflict incredibly harsh training on their children from birth in order to raise them into assassins because their potential as assassins is all that matters. They also start with a "Z".

Killua is apparently the most talented Zen'in... I mean Zoldyck of this generation, though he's still young so he's weaker than his father and brother he's expected to easily surpass them one. Which is why Killua's family has already decided for him that he's going to be the next one to take over the family, Killua's opinion doesn't matter. Illumi and Silva are both setting him up for success by forcing their "help" upon him. Several other members of the family even point out that Killua probably doesn't have the attitude to be the head of the family, but what does it matter when he's got such great talent?

Killua is a complicated victim. He's a victim of many things, familial abuse is the most obvious one because the Zoldyck have a nasty habit of torturing their children, but the less obvious one is grooming. Not in a sexual sense, but rather the adults in Killua's life have decided to use their authority over him to manipulate him into becoming what they want him to be - the next head of the family.

What's insidious about this is the Zoldyck's don't just torture or beat Killua into submission, they will use any tool in their arsenal, familial love, emotional blackmail, threats, all to undermine Killua's agency and choices in order to make him not only do what they want to do but make him think he has to grow into the person they want him to.

Grooming not in a sexual sense, but definitely in a psychological sense, an adult using their authority as an adult over a child and their maturity to manipulate that child into becoming what they want them to be instead of letting that child grow naturally. When it's used in a sexual sense it's when an adult establishes a connection with a minor, and then uses that connection in the long-term to manipulate them into having a relationship and lower the child's inhibition. Think of that, but without the sexual part - an adult using their relationship with a child often in a long-term manipulation to lower the child's inhibitions and make them more malleable and raise them to do what you want them to do.

Killua has not been sexually groomed, but he has been groomed by both his parents and his brother to make him more suggestible to becoming the family head which is something he explicitly does not want to do. Not only did Killua's family only raise him for the purpose of becoming an assassin and taking over the family one day (raising him as a child into an adult, his emotional maturity, his health and well being are all secondary priorities to what Killua can do for his family) they also manipulate him into thinking he has no choice other than being an assassin.

Killua is a kid put through extremely harsh training from a young age, to do a horrible job that is being an assassin that doesn't let him make normal friends or have a normal life. On top of the physical abuse he's already endured, whenever he expresses a desire to do something else in his life, his parents send Illumi to emotionally manipulate him into thinking that not only is he a natural born killer, and therefore a bad person who deserves all the abuse he's been put through, to further convince him that his only path forward is to be an assassin.

Killua is a character who has a lot of power, but little agency. Agency, in fiction is the ability a character has to take action and make decisions for themselves. Despite Killua starting as a more powerful and more savvy character than Gon, he has little agency and is often very passive. He doesn't act, he reacts. Even running away from his family is a reaction. We don't really see what he wants in life, we just know that he looked at his family and went "NOT THAT". However, his entire identity is still formed in response to his family's abuse. Even when he gets farther away from them, Killua doesn't really do what he wants, he does what Gon wants, and follows around Gon.

However, it's very understandable why Killua doesn't act with a lot of agency, when Killua does try to make decisions his family always shows up to undermine him and make another attempt to emotionally manipulate him into doing what they want. It's not always Illumi showing up to spook him. Silva pretends to be a loving dad for five minutes and has a heart to heart conversation with his son, and lets his son go adventuring with his friends but that too is a manipulation. He only did so to make sure Killua would eventually come back, by giving Killua more positive memories that would make it harder to make the decision to leave the family.

With the extent that Killua's family goes to sabotage any decision he makes, it's no wonder Killua is so passive and afraid to make his own decisions. It's almost like a character flaw he's gotta work on.

Now here's where I'm going to blow your minds. Megumi is an incredibly similar character to Killua, they are both the victims of longterm grooming however people don't like to acknowledge Megumi's victimhood. That's because in Killua's case, his abuser looks and acts like this.

Killua's abuser Illumi is a creepy guy who looks like the girl from the grudge, telling him he's not allowed to make friends and giving off such rancid vibes that he's obviously a bad guy. Whereas, Megumi's groomer this this guy.

Gojo Satoru who is one of the most popular characters in the series, and who also gives speeches about how he wants to let children be able to live out their youths, which is why it's hard for the fandom to see that he has taken advantage of Megumi and stolen his youth away from him pretty much the same way that Silva / Illumi has for Killua.

Megumi, like Killua has no choice in who he wants to be when he grows up, or what kind of person he wants to grow into. Megumi, like Killua has been groomed for a young age and forced into an incredibly dangerous and life threatening job that he does not want to do, that denies him the chance of a normal life, and that does not really allow him to make many friends. Megumi is railroaded onto this path, not by his choice, but by Toji's choice, and later Gojo's choice... because he has potential. Megumi like Killua cannot leave his family and stop being a sorcerer, otherwise his little sister who is the only family member he cares about will be hurt.

Gojo doesn't show up with an evil aura looking like the grudge girl and telling Megumi that he doesn't have the right to make friends, and that he's inherently evil and a puppet that only exists to kill people though so it's harder to tell that Megumi is a victim of the same kind of grooming that has hurt Killua so thoroughly.

This is what I mean when I say a lot of Megumi's characterization flies over your head because his victimization is written really subtly. Gojo does the same thing that Illumi / Silva does to Killua, he may seem like a stand up guy compared to those two but Megumi has about as much choice about what he can do with his life that Killua has.

Not all grooming is Illumi showing up with his spooky eyes to intimidate and coerce Killua into submission. Silva shows up to give Killua the first fatherly talk he had in his life, and lets him go from the mansion.... not because he realized he was wrong for restricting Killua's life choices and giving him no choice but to become heir.

No, it was a ploy to guilt trip him into coming back because he knew if he held Killua there by force he'd just run away the next chance he got. Fear and intimidation wasn't working at keeping Killua in line, so they switched to love instead.

Gojo can encourage Megumi to make friends, let him hang out and spend time with Itadori, even honor his wish to save Itadori and in the end still be manipulating him into becoming a sorcerer and not letting Megumi choose what he wants to do with his life. Gojo just prefers the carrot to the stick.

This is something the databooks confirm, that Gojo hunts prospects like Yuta, Yuji and Megumi not out of the goodness of his heart, but because they are talented students he can recruit to his cause with the added bonus that by appearing as their savior, they "owe" him.

Megumi is also a character lacking in agency, he is someone who's had no agency his entire life and what little agency he did have was stolen away from him by the adults in his life.

Let's analyze Megumi's situation for a second. As soon as Megumama dies, Toji gives up on the idea of fatherhood entirely, and decides to sell his son, literally, like in the sense of human trafficking to be raised by the highly abusive Zen'in Clan.

However, before the deal could be completed his father died in the middle of a mission. Megumi apparently saw his father so little that he didn't recognize him on coming face to face with him years alter, which says a lot about what kind of role Toji played in Megumi's life before he was outright abandoned.

Not only does Megumi believe his father just left him to run away with his new wife (Megumi's stepmother and the mother of Tsumiki) but now he and Tsumiki had to live together in a household without supervision for an indeterminate amount of time and watch their money slowly run out.

When it looks like they're about to start starving, Gojo Satoru shows up to save the day.... or not.

Gojo seems like he's offering Megumi a choice, but it's a loaded one. There's no choice in this scenario where Megumi gets to be a normal kid. The option of calling social services so this orphaned child does not starve doesn't occur to him.

Megumi's options are a) go to the Zen'in Clan and be a sorcerer where Tsumiki will be abused, or b) be a sorcerer under me where Tsumiki will be safe. The unspoken part is that if Megumi rejects his offer not only will he just let the Zen'in Take him, he'll also probably just let Megumi starve. Megumi the uh six or so year old child at this point has to sign away the rest of his life as a sorcerer, and work in order to earn money to eat.

No adult is taking care of Megumi, no one is raising him, even the food and shelter Megumi is given comes with a price tag that he has to pay back by being a Jujutsu Sorcerer and attending Jujutsu High as a teenager. Gojo even kind of subtly uses Tsumiki as a hostage to get Megumi to join with his agenda, because his offer isn't really much better than the Zen'ins but he needs Megumi on his side because he needs to raise kids to be future allies to his political agenda.

At the tender age of six Megumi signed his life away to be a sorcerer and he hasn't looked back since. Considering his severe behavioral problems getting into fights constantly at school, I think it's safe to say Megumi is about as reluctant to be a sorcerer as Killua is an assassin.

Honestly, if Megumi had phrased it like this:

"I'm so tired of being a sorcerer, I just want to be a kid."

Megumi would have a lot more fans, and Gojo would have a lot of explaining to do, but I think the brilliance of Megumi's grooming is that it's not really as blatant as Killua's. Megumi doesn't talk out loud about how he wants to be a normal kid, he's just angry at the whole world, and prone to fits of violence because he's mentall unwell.

Another way in which he parallels Killua, by the way.

Megumi does not talk about his lost childhood out loud. Instead of knowing his thoughts on the matter, instead we are shown his behavior, the effects of having his childhood taken away from him and how unstable it makes him and left to ponder as the audience what Megumi himself thinks of this.

The same way that Illumi steals all of Killua's agency away, robbing him of the chance to be anything other than what the Zoldycks want him to be, so to does Gojo. It's just instead of Gojo using the stick, he uses the carrot. He is Megumi's benefactor, he's the savior, for whose help Megumi owes him, sort of like repaying a loan with interest.

Gojo tries to shape Megumi into Gojo Satoru 2.0. Or maybe a second Geto. That's more likely as it's Geto defection which inspires Gojo to go looking for him after neglecting to do anything about Megumi until a year after finding out about his existence. Gojo says that Megumi is going to have to work hard or else he'll be left behind, just days after Geto had left him behind. Megumi is helped by Gojo, he is protected from the clans by Gojo, he has been taken on missions alongside Gojo his entire life, Maki even refers to Megumi as a treasure that was raised carefully by him.

Gojo invests a lot of time and effort into Megumi and because of that Megumi is expected to "perform." However, he doesn't.

That's the thing, Megumi is supposed to be either Gojo or Geto 2.0 but he just can't be. THe reason why again is Agency. If Killua is limited because of his inability to decide for himself, then so to is Megumi b/c Nen and Cursed Technique Development both depend on things like imagination, ego and self-image to raise them up to their full potential.

However, Gojo has shot himself in the foot with regards to Megumi. Becoming a Jujutsu Sorcerer requires a strong identity, but Gojo by sabotaging Megumi's agency and ability to decide for himself every step of the way has robbed Megumi of the chance to form that strong identity.

Megumi, just like Killua has no sense of self and instead both judges himself according to others, how he meets their expectations, how he measures up to them - he also glorifies others while constantly putting himself down.

Megumi doesn't give speeches about how Yuji is like pure light, but he also refuses to let Yuji out of his sight post Shibuya, and even says it'd be better to be killed by Sukuna alongside Yuji if Sukuna does take over.

In the Chimera Ant Arc Killua defines all of his self-worth around being useful to Gon, and beats himself up for not being able to measure up to him - because Killua has no sense of self his selfhood has always been undermined by his family who wanted to make him more suggestible to what they wanted.

Megumi is flippant with his own life and very willing to lay down his life for another's sake, because Megumi has very little agency in his life and has been taught by both Gojo and his circumstances that he himself and what he wants does not matter. Megumi doesn't fight fate, and fight for what he wants because he's already been shot in the kneecaps by both Toji's abandonment, and Gojo Satoru, and he's having a difficult time just trying to stand with bullets in his knees.

Maybe, the reason Megumi is so willing to risk his life to summon Mahoraga and sacrifice himself if he thinks it will help his allies is because Megumi has been forced into a job where he's gonig to be expected to sacrifice his life for the greater good since the tender age of six years old and therefore everything in life has conspired to tell him his life is worth less than others.

Yuji isn't the first person in story to think of himself as a cog, that's Megumi. He doesn't even need Shibuya to beat him down to accept the cog mindset, Megumi is already there at the beginning of the story.

I think a lot of misunderstanding of Megumi's character comes from the fact that his grooming is more subtle and insidious, and not as blatant as Killua's, and also that it's done by a character well-liked by the fandom. However, if Megumi has all the same symptoms of Killua then it's logical to deduce that they share the same trauma

Even Megumi's summoning of Mahoraga has a tie to Killua.

There's a pattern of KIllua running away from stronger opponent that's established in HXH that's eventually revealed to be because of a needle that Illumi inserted directly into Killua's brain to mind control him to run if he faced someone that was too much of a threat.

Obviously, that's just continuing the metaphor of the fact that Killua isn't able to believe in himself to face people who are stronger, because Illumi has been constantly putting him down his entire life.

Isn't this essentially what Megumi does as well?

When Megumi is faced with an opponent that's too strong or a hopeless situation, instead of running like Killua he summons Mahoraga. He does this because he doesn't believe in his ability to surpass his limits and fight, because he doesn't believe in himself or his own potential.

When is actually able to think more freely and picture a version of himself who can surpass his limits and who can do these things - these are the moments he is shown to grow.

Megumi however, for the most part isn't free. He can't think of himself as free and he can't free himself, because not only does he still have no choice about what he wants to do with his life (even if he becomes the msot powerful sorcerer in the world Gojo won't let him quit, he's gotta pay off those student loans), but he's also internalized the idea that he's not free. Not only has Gojo raised him to be a cog, Megumi has also accepted the fact that he is a cog and what he wants does not matter - the most he can do is hope that his actions will protect the people he loves and give them a little bit of happiness.

Megumi doesn't need a needle in his brain to control him and make him run away from fights and more obedient, because Megumi has already done all of that to himself with the toxic and self-harming ideas he's internalized.

Megumi and Killua having given up on themselves, try to make others happy, the same people they put on pedestals in order to make themselves feel even worse in comparison.

However, from this point Megumi and Killuas arcs go in opposite directions. You see after the Chimera Ant Arc when Killua hits his lowest point and his codependent friendship with Gon is exposed for what it is, Killua returns home in order to try and rescue his sister Alluka who is probably the reason he ran away in the first place.

Alluka and Tsumiki are both at the start of the story taken away from Killua and Megumi respectively, and with them the only genuine familial affection they ever enjoyed in their lives is taken too.

However, Alluka and Tsumiki are inversions. Alluka finds her freedom and agency, and Killua is able to reform his connection with his sister by accepting both pats of her, Alluka and Nanika. Afterwards the two of them finally leave their family home together and go off on a journey together.

If Alluka finds her personhood, Tsumiki remains a plot device. She never awakens from her coma, she's possessed instead and then murdered.

Now, here is where I point out how unfair the audience is being to Megumi. If you're a hunter x hunter fan remember all the character development that Killua gained by reforging his relationship with Alluka, how much confidence it gave him to connect to the one person who's even unconditionally loved him as a family member.

Now imagine that Alluka is brutally butchered right in front of him, and Killua has a first person point of view, because somehow in this scenario Illumi used a needle to mind control him into killing Alluka.

Do you really think Killua would be able to stand after that?

Sukuna is really just the last in line of a long line of people who've stolen Megumi's agency away from him, in order to benefit themselves. Sukuna even saw the same "potential" in Megumi that Gojo did.

Sukuna physically posessing Megumi's body, is just what both the Zen'in Clan, and Gojo Satoru have been trying to do to him in the most literal way possible. Gojo wants to remake Megumi into Gojo Satoru 2.0 with no regards to who Megumi is as a person, what Megumi's wants and needs are. No he just wants to raise someone as strong as him and pass the burden of protecting society onto Megumi, this starving orphan Gojo decided to exploit.

People have always used Megumi as a puppet for their own agenda, Naobito wanted to make him the head of the Zen'in Clan because he had the technique, Gojo wanted him to become the next strongest sorcerer / Gojo Satoru and also to replace the elders with Gojo's political agenda. They all want Megumi's "potential" for themselves to use to their own ends. Sukuna just takes what Gojo did one step further by literally stealing Megumi's body away from him and using him as a literal puppet instead of a metaphorical one. Gojo took Megumi's childhood by making him work as a sorcerer, Sukuna kills the physical embodiment of Megumi's childhood innocence by murdering Tsumiki, the only thing Megumi had in his life besides being a sorcerer, his only family, the only person he grew up with in his childhood years, the only person who loved him for who he was.

Megumi coped with what Gojo did to him the same way Killua did, by building himself around his use to others, and by building his identity around protecting others but now that's all gone. Tsumiki is gone, Megumi is trying to kill his friends, and he's already butchered Gojo Satoru.

Yet the fans are surprised that Megumi doesn't immediately get back on his feet.

However, and this my slightly optimistic ending to the post. Perhaps, Megumi is going the complete opposite of Killua, because what Megumi needed to learn was not to grow strong and confident enough to protect his sister but to learn to fight for himself.

At this point Megumi has nothing else left. It's sink of swim. He either develops a strong enough identity to regain control of his body and push Sukuna out, or he loses and the anti-Sukuna team will just have to resort to killing Megumi along with Sukuna.

Even in that case.

Megumi not being saved by Yuji is a good thing.

Because a victim who gets rescued by a hero still has no agency.

Megumi told Yuji that he needs to start by "saving me."

However, it might just be the opposite. Before Megumi can save anyone else, before he can become a protector, he has to find his own power and save himself. He has to both accept thathe's someone worthy of salvation, and at the same time he can't just passively accept the hand that Yuji's offered to him he has to actively be the one to break free of Sukuna and save himself.

Megumi can't become the strongest sorcerer by becoming the next Gojo Satoru or being what Gojo or Sukuna wants him to be. THe only way Megumi can become the strongest, is by being himself.

Hi @nemovanilla ! This is in reference to one of the tags on this post.

Sorry for taking a while to elaborate. I was gonna just explain in a reply but realized the way I explain things is always longer than it needs to be so I figured I respond in its own post. So anyways…

Contents:

I: Nighteye’s unwillingness to admit when he’s wrong

II: Deku’s unwillingness to just accept fate

III: The power of willpower and conviction

IV: Changing fate

V: Conclusion

I: Nighteye’s unwillingness to admit when he’s wrong

So if you’ve followed me for a while, you already know I don’t like Nighteye that much. However, I’ll admit that overtime I realized that I really wasn’t supposed to like him.

He’s overly cynical and critical of Deku despite the fact that he’s just a teenager. A major part of his character is that once he had something in mind, he’d run with it. His word is law to him and it annoyed the shit out of me. But you can’t really blame him because that’s the nature of his quirk. As All Might said, his foresight has never been wrong.

Once he had set in his mind that All Might was going to die, and needed a successor to pass OFA to (despite it not being his decision) he found Mirio and just clung to him. He even admits to himself on his death bed that he only initially took in Mirio for the sake of convincing All Might to make him his successor.

Because of that, he refused to have faith in Deku as All Mights successor and it took him all the up to the day he died to see what All Mights saw in Deku. It was the first time someone had ever proven him wrong.

II: Deku’s unwillingness to just accept fate

Since chapter one, Deku has proved time and time again that he refuses to accept circumstances that he deems unfair no matter how unrealistic his success would be. For example:

-Saving Katsuki from the sludge villain. He had no way of defending himself yet he still ran to save him when no one else would, influencing All Mights actions. If Izuku hadn’t done anything, everyone probably just would’ve stood by idly while watching a middle schooler die.

-Saving Uraraka from the one pointers at the entrance exam. While Uraraka most likely wouldn’t have died cuz she had the means to save herself, Deku still forced himself to do something about it, regardless of being too scared to move just a moment before.

-Convincing Todoroki to take control of his own fate at the sports festival by using both his left and right side.

-Hunting down Iida before he could kill Stain and somehow beating him despite most pros failing to do so.

Saving Kota from Muscular, Katsuki from AFO, Eri from Chisaki, the list goes on. But all of that to say that despite odds being against him in all of these circumstances, he persevered out of pure stubbornness and his unwavering conviction to save as many people as he can.

So, when All Might explained to Deku that he was destined to die, the first thing Deku did was try to figure out how he can change that. Initially it sounds like grief ridden denial but it later takes on a new meaning.

(I find this entire conversation almost ironic. All Might accepts that his fate has already been decided and Deku rebuttals by saying that he’ll be by his side to change said fate. But, throughout the entire final arc, Deku hasn’t even spoken to All Might. He was by someone else’s side (figuratively) changing All Mights fate.)

III: The power of willpower and conviction

So, in the Hassaikai raid:

This is when we start to realize the true meaning of Nighteyes character. The entire point of his character is to be proven wrong (in my opinion).

He represents the expectation of typical shonen tropes and he actively tries to enforce those stereotypes ever since he’s introduced in the story with beliefs similar to “the strongest heroes successor should already slightly stronger than the average person with light hair and light eyes,” hence why he clung to Mirio so much. Mirio fits the “my power is a curse but I’m admirable because I worked really hard to control it” trope and while one can argue that Deku fits this trope too, I don’t think he does. Deku has never viewed OFA as cursed. He’s always considered it a blessing. Controlling OFA took less than a hundred chapters and he was never looked down upon for it.

Oh and don’t forget “the mentors untimely death to further character development for the mc.” If anything, Katsuki took over that one. (Can katsuki be considered a mentor, technically? Since Deku always looked up to him so much and learned from him more than he learned from anyone else? This is a genuine question, pls help)

Those are major ingredients for the shonen formula and, according to Nighteye, that’s fate. Things that are destined to happen in a shonen manga because that’s what always happens in a shonen manga.

By his and most shonen readers standards, Mirio, Katsuki, or Todoroki should’ve been the mc to declare your run of the mill shonen comic book. But they’re not. Fate was changed and stereotypes were pushed already by Deku’s mere existence. He’s fought his whole life against people who didn’t believe in him and Nighteye was no different.

He had to continue proving his haters wrong and being told that he can’t do something furthers his willpower to help people no matter the cost (not that that’s entirely healthy but, you know.)

People that know Deku have seen time and time again that he reaches his goals no matter how steep the hill might be. He never ceases to surprise people (I think Uraraka said something similar at some point but I can’t remember when) so the people around him that know him on the surface, have faith in him.

And according to Nighteye, that’s all they needed.

IV: Changing Fate

Nighteyes foresight changed because Deku and co. refused to lay down and accept fate so, they fought it instead. And won. Deku proved to Nighteye that All Mights fate could be changed.

Skipping ahead to the final war arc, All Might is fighting that villain that was destined to follow through on All Mights unspeakably gruesome death. He starts looking back on his life as he waits for it to happen. People watching the broadcast just accepted that he was about to die.

However…

Remember what was said about faith? Yeah Izuku holds a lot of that in Katsuki. As for a character, other than Izuku (and Dabi but this ain’t about him), with enough will and conviction to change his own fate in order to change his mentors? I can’t think of anyone else but Katsuki.

(The panel of Eraserhead at the press conference after Katsuki was kidnapped was supposed to go here but I ran out of space so I’ll just give the quote: “Any lapse in his behavior is my failing. Still… he behaved that way at the sports festival because he has such strong convictions and ideals… more than anyone, he pursues the title of top hero with everything he’s got. If the villains have mistaken that for a weakness… then their thought process is indeed superficial.”)

Thus, Nighteye’s foresight was changed.

Izuku proved that All Mights fate could be changed, and Katsuki was the one who changed it.

V: Conclusion

This post probably could’ve been a lot shorter and summed up in only a few paragraphs but, where’s the fun in that? I honestly really wanted to talk about it in depth because I find this part of the narrative so poetic and beautiful.

In the Hassaikai arc, everyone had to believe in Deku. In this arc, all Katsuki needed was for Deku to believe in him. Making Deku’s faith in Katsuki just as strong as everyone’s faith in him.

It just kinda reminds me how bnha is really just a parody of shonen manga, calling out really dumb tropes time and time again by referencing western superhero media that’s been pushing away these same tropes for decades now.

Anyways, I hope this is a good enough elaboration lmao. If I keep typing, this post will end up being too long.

Some things y’all need to remember about Hawks

1. Yes he killed twice, but he literally tried every other option BUT doing that and got severely injured and nearly got killed himself because of that. He couldn’t capture Twice and fight off Dabi at the same time. If he was the assassin y’all make him out to be he wouldn’t have tried to reason with him or capture him, he would’ve just taken him out. But Hawks didn’t do that, because he cared about Twice. And that’s what made what happened so heartbreaking, Twice was the only person Hawks actually told some of his true motives/desires, he wanted to be free, he didn’t want to live in a cage, but he showed just how much he’s still in that cage by killing him

2. HE IS A VICTIM OF CHILD ABUSE YOU FUCKS!! I find the Endeavor apologism and the people excusing his abuse because he’s trying to “do better now” just as upsetting as y’all do, but just because Hawks isn’t yet showing any negative feelings about the whole thing doesn’t mean he doesn’t have any, Endeavor was his idol and finding out he was abusive like the father he “saved” Hawks from should’ve rocked his world, but that wasn’t shown. Neither was any turmoil about what he did to Twice post battle. Maybe it will be shown later, maybe it won’t, but don’t presume what you haven’t yet seen. Hawks whole thing is that he’s a spy, he knows how to hide his emotions and what he’s really thinking, if anything he’s likely a master of compartmentalization, it’s what he was trained to do

3. He was groomed by the HPSC since he was around 7 years old, the organization which is now confirmed to be very corrupt and willing to do some fucked up shit in the name of the “greater good” and “maintaining order” and being raised by those people is going to have an effect on his mindset. In baby Hawks’ eyes they were his saviors. And he was a little boy, he was in no way able to have enough maturity to make the kind of decision the HPSC asked of him, and it’s just one of the fucked up things that’s happened to him. And despite all of that he still doesn’t follow their orders blindly, he tries to get around them and find other ways, he didn’t let any civilians die during the high end attack despite having approval for that and then there’s the whole thing with twice I explained earlier. Despite the hpsc’s best efforts Hawks isn’t their trained hunting bird

4. His relationship with Lady Nagant. I am upset as you all are by that potato head mouth breather blowing her up. But Hawks catching her isn’t misogynistic. He’s a hero, he wants to save people, it doesn’t matter the gender of the person or who they were to him he would’ve still caught them. Yes, Lady Nagant is likely going to be used to help develop Hawks’ character, but it was established a few chapters ago that her and Hawks were connected, she was his “senpai” idk why y’all are surprised. And most likely Lady Nagant isn’t going to die. Hawks catching her dead body isn’t as impactful. Also Overhaul is there for a reason. It’s very likely in my mind that he’ll somehow be able to use his quirk again and heal her. I am as fearful as the rest of you of her being tossed aside. But I’ll save judgement on what Hori does with Nagant until the next couple of chapters come out. Lady Nagant got the story we wanted for Hawks and I think that’s very cool (and very sexy of her). And I’m crossing my fingers that Lady Nagant might bring out the emotions Hawks has yet to show on how he feels about everything that’s going on. Because you can’t tell me he doesn’t have any

-

Overall, it’s okay to dislike Hawks’ character, but don’t hate him for the same reasons you love Shigaraki or Dabi or Lady Nagant. Hawks, Shigaraki, and Dabi were all victims of child abuse. Adding on Lady Nagant, they were all products of child grooming. They’re all victims of hero society, no matter what side they’re on

What’s your guess to the year? Keep in mind that Tiger was born on a leap year and Hawks said that quirks have been around for the past 2 centuries.

Incredibly belated answer on this, but it, uh, turned into a project. Because of course it did. Hope you find the result interesting, anon!

To get started, the Tiger thing is easy to look up, which I did, but does anyone have a citation for this Hawks line?  I feel sure I would have remembered it; it’s exactly the kind of worldbuilding detail my HeroAca chat would have jumped all over.  On the other hand, we might not have heard about it if it was in e.g. the World Heroes’ Mission movie or TUM or something.  (To be clear, if that is the case, I’m probably going to disregard it.  Vigilantes is the only spin-off in my heart, and I certainly value it above the material the anime sees fit to thoughtlessly tack on.)

That aside, I did actually hammer out a timeline for myself back in 2020, in which I set BNHA’s current action (designated as Deku starting UA) as kicking off in 2180, with the glowing baby born somewhere around 1980.  I peppered the time between with significant births, deaths and events, generally giving myself an unofficial “these dates rounded to the nearest five years” sort of leeway.

Back in 2020, however, we hadn’t yet had that Oji Atsuhiro reveal, nor the tidbit about Shinomori being, at eighteen years, the second-longest bearer of One For All.  I’ve been needing to revise for a while now, being something of a pedant about my MLA timeline, so this ask was a good opportunity to revisit it.

Hit the jump to join me on a ~magical number-crunching adventure~!

Note that this is a cleaned-up and formatted version of what started life as me brainstorming and hypothesizing until I arrived at my conclusion.  It has a few detours and cul-de-sacs because I was working it out as I went.  If you just want the TLDR, it’s as follows: 

Having considered all the new evidence, I would put the glowing baby’s birth circa 1985 and Deku’s freshman year in 2139.

    Front-End Dating

Let’s look at the beginning of the timeline first, as it’s the one that involves somewhat more guesswork.  There are a few reference points in looking at the timeframe for the glowing baby, if you’re willing to get unbelievably anal about worldbuilding details Horikoshi may or may not have even thought about.  I am absolutely willing to be that person, so when I first started ironing this all out, there were two hard dates I went looking for right off the bat: the invention of the taser, and the first Japanese publication of Marvel comics.

Point 1: Tasers

The existence of tasers is mentioned in a stray comment during Deku’s dream flashback to All For One and Yoichi: the quirkless man who gains a spike quirk from AFO is mentioned as carrying one for self-defense.  Tasers were invented in 1993, ergo, that scene must have taken place sometime after 1993.

It’s possible—even probable—that the scene could take place significantly after 1993, for two reasons.  First, we don’t know how long it took quirks and the chaos they brought with them to become widespread.  If it took decades for the world to realize what it was dealing with, the taser could have existed for years before the scene in question.  There’s also the matter of the technological crash brought on by quirks.  If said crash took place over an extended period of time during which tasers were still in development, it’s possible that they wouldn’t have been completed until sometime after 1993, taking even longer to reach civilian/black market availability.

Could the advent of quirks have sped up the development of the taser, answering the suddenly widespread demand for a self-defense/less lethal police weapon?  I could see it, but it would be a departure from what we’re told about other technological developments in that period.  it’s also worth noting that the very first taser available for sale, circa 1976, used gunpowder as its propellant, leading to it being classified as a firearm.  It’s therefore unlikely that Japan, with its extremely stringent gun laws, would have had much access to it at all that far back.  The 1993 date refers to the modern, non-firearm electric taser.  1976 is an interesting date, though, as I’ll discuss in the next section.

The taser gives us a starting point.  Assuming that its development wasn’t an aberration in a time of collapsing norms, the OFA scene post-dating it must be likewise post-1993.    

Point 2:  Japanese Publication of Marvel Characters

If you look at the narration about the origin of quirks in Chapter 1, you find a handful of silhouettes, fictional characters who represent the “fantasy” that became “reality.”  Since the narration is delivered by Midoriya, not an omniscient narrator, we can assume that those media properties did exist in-universe and, further, that all of them were viewed as fantastical prior to the advent of quirks.  Therefore, even the newest of those characters must have first publication dates that predate the Advent.

Of the lot of them, the Marvel characters are the newest.(1)  Spider-Man’s first appearance was in 1962; Wolverine’s (if the figure with the sideburns and claws is intended to be Wolverine) in 1974.  Marvel comics were even being localized and published in Japan by the early 70s, which would have begun familiarizing at least some people with those particular “fantasy” characters by that time.  Ergo, quirks must not have come about before the mid-1970s.

Knowing that also helps shore up the taser point by keeping the historical timeline on track up at least through its initial 1976 creation.    

Heretofore Unnumbered Point 3: The Technology Crash

My last consideration when I was originally running the numbers was the developmental crash brought about by the Advent.  Specifically, the world of My Hero Academia generally reflects a modern-ish Japan, so I default to wanting modern technology—and modern social reforms—to still feel modern to the characters.  Thus, the point at which society stopped developing needed to predate the full flush of the Digital Revolution, which really began to hit its stride in the mid-to-late-80s.  It could perhaps be the case that some developments were brand new and subsequently lost along the way, or simply never reached their full potential due to the spreading chaos of mysterious superpowers, but modern digital technology needed to not exist in any widespread form prior to the bottom falling out.

That’s my working window for the start: The glowing baby should be born no earlier than the late 1970s, the world should be recognizing the danger and starting to turn its attention towards the new problem by the late 1980s, slowing the development of other technology, but with total collapse not yet having come about by the early 1990s.

That’s the front end.  Before I get to the back end, let’s look at the middle: How long after the glowing baby’s birth was All For One’s?    

Bridging the Gap

The Shigaraki Brothers & Captain Hero

All For One provides an immediately accessible reference point for the timeline at large.  He’s over a century old, so quirks must be so as well.  However, we can assume that he isn’t past or closing in on two centuries, else that’s how Gran Torino, in talking about him, would have described him.  Whatever AFO’s age is, it needs to be something that’s in keeping with that estimation.

One thing to emphasize here is that we don’t know how long it took quirks to become a widespread, fully acknowledged issue.  If they started appearing all over the world in large numbers within a matter of months, that makes my calculations different than if it took years for enough quirks to surface in enough countries for them to become the subject of widespread panic.

Another thing that’s unclear is whether the brothers are themselves in the first generation—and therefore that they grew up watching the world spiral out of control—or whether quirks had already existed for quite some time before they were born, and they never knew anything but that widespread chaos.

One thing that gives us a lens on those issues is Yoichi’s beloved Captain Hero comic.  While the Captain could be from any number of periods in which that image of an American-style superhero exists, the Demon Lord is a bit more specific.

Particularly in Japanese media, that fantasy Demon Lord (Ma-oh/Maou) archetype was basically invented wholecloth by Dragon Quest, especially Dragon Quest III and its villain Zoma.  DQ3 came out in 1988 and had manga tie-ins in print that same year, therefore we can assume that comics inspired by this type of villain have to post-date 1988.

The Captain Hero comics are also another example of a piece of media described by a character (AFO) as “fantasy” that is now being reflected in “reality.”  Because of that fantasy/reality proviso, we can further assume that heroes as a job class didn’t exist at the time of the manga’s publication—which would make sense, since AFO in the dream flashback highlighted that the world was totally without order, whereas heroes being codified were a sign of the chaos beginning to settle somewhat, so obviously they wouldn’t have existed at the time of the flashback.

This gives us a somewhat limited window.  If the comics can’t predate 1988, but I still want to stick to my guns on the, “Panic about quirks superceded the nascent Digital Revolution,” qualifier, it pretty much dictates that the world was in full-tilt collapse by the end of the 90s.  This also lets me scrape by on my taser window of 1993.

In any case, seeing as Captain Hero depicts a pre-quirk vision of popular J-fantasy, to say the least, the comic’s fairly retro by the time the brothers are talking about it as adults.  I might even go so far as to say that they probably weren’t new-new when the brothers were reading them as kids.  They have the feel of something old, like maybe a collection the brothers’ father owned, or that they bought on the cheap somewhere just to have some meager entertainment in their lives.

Where does all that leave us, then?  I would probably call the Captain Hero comics something that came out in the late 80s/early 90s, some publisher’s attempt to capitalize on Dragon Quest’s popularity and those American superhero comics that had been floating around the edges of the zeitgeist for a decade or so.  They were probably published right in that nebulous period when the glowing baby had been born, and there was growing unease with the mysterious powers popping up around the world, but since there wasn’t yet a mass panic, entertainment companies were still trafficking in a lot of their usual fare; elsewhere, the taser reached mass market readiness.

Then, the bottom dropped out.  Media pivoted to be about what meta-abilities were and what they meant; old-fashioned things like Hero vs. Demon Lord comics plummeted in popularity and wound up in bargain bins(2) or put into storage.  In this fashion, some of them eventually find their way into Yoichi’s hands.  If he or his big brother actually bought them, they’re probably no more than a few years old—say maybe 3-5, which would put Yoichi reading them in the mid-to-late 90s.  If they’re something of Yoichi’s parents’, and AFO and Yoichi were born quite some time after the glowing baby, that could make the comics older, anywhere from a decade (if Dad was still around collecting when the brothers were very young) to closer to 30 or 40 years, if Dad bought them in his own childhood and just held onto them).

For myself, I prefer a read that the collapse was pretty fresh when the brothers were growing up, and some math further down the line in this analysis has led me to the conclusion that AFO and Yoichi were pretty early in the history of quirks, meaning that the collapse had to be pretty rapid in order for both of those things to be true.(3)  That being the case, let’s go with the more conservative read and say those comics were less than a decade old when the brothers picked them up.  That, then, leads to the next part of this analysis: How old are the brothers?    

Back-End Dating

I’d peg AFO as being in his early 30s during the flashback, and Yoichi in his late 20s; I assume that at that point, both of them were still appearing as their natural age,(4) which gives us AFO as 30-something during the events of dream sequence when he forces the quirk on his younger brother—the genesis of One For All.    

One For All’s Age

I’m going to jump around somewhat here, broadly working backwards, but circling around as necessary and tallying as I go.

Bearer 9, Deku

Easy-peasy.  Deku has carried OFA for a year and change—he received it in late February and the manga is currently in late spring/early summer of the following year.

Running tally for age of OFA: 1 year.    

Bearer 8, All Might

All Might has carried OFA for 40-ish years—possibly a few more, but not so many that Yoichi, talking about this in Chapter 304, would be better suited to say, “For over 40 years, Yagi maintained his grip on One For All,” instead of simply, “For 40 years, (...).”  All Might’s in his mid-to-late 50s now; he was still in school when he got it from Nana.  He was possibly in middle school when they first met, judging by his uniform, but presumably he wouldn't have been able to go to UA without it, so he must have had it by the time he started there at 15.  He was clearly seeing himself in Deku, so it wouldn’t surprise me if he was exactly 14 when he met Nana, and 15 when he got OFA just in time for entrance exams.

Running tally for age of OFA: 41 years.    

Bearer 7, Nana

Nana carried it for at least a few years, but we've never been explicitly told which she got first, OFA or her husband and kid.  You can make a good guess if you do the math, though, so here's some math+guessing:

The mothers in the series whose ages we know (the mothers of Deku, Bakugou, Tsuyu and Jirou) all had their first child in their early-to-mid-20s.(5)  Let's assume Nana was the same and put her at, say, 24 when Kotarou was born.  He then died at 32 (having turned so only recently), meaning that, had she survived, she would have been around 56 at the time of his death.  Tacking on the time since the Shimura Massacre using Shigaraki's age, that would put Nana at 72 today.    

All Might, again, got the quirk ~40 years ago; if he was echoing his own experience in the way he raised Deku, he would have been 15 at the time.  That would have made Nana 32—and Kotarou 8—at the time she gave Toshinori OFA.  She was killed when he was 18, his senior year.

Kotarou looks noticeably younger than 8 when we see him as a kid being given up.  He looks much closer to Tenko's ago, or his obvious parallel Kouta's, those ages being 5 and 6 respectively.  So I think we can assume Nana gave up Kotarou at least a few years before giving Toshinori OFA, which would certainly explain her surety, in the letter, that the fight would be the death of her.  If Kotarou was, say, 6, that’d make Nana 30 at the time she gave him up.    

We don't have any further idea how long Nana was carrying OFA herself before the transfer, only that it was less time than Shinomori, and not long enough to start taking a heavy toll on her(6) despite her being several iterations down the line from him.  I would guess it was fewer than 10 years, as 10 would put her at only 22 when receiving it, and I would tend to think that she wouldn't have had a kid if she'd known the full extent of what she was dealing with—she obviously saw the state En was in when he passed it on, after all.    

So, let's assume she'd already been a hero, trained and licensed, and already married with a young son when she came across En and didn't realize the extent of what she was getting herself into.  Some time between Kotarou's birth and turning let's-call-it-6, she takes the quirk, gets the world’s worst wake-up call when her husband is killed, and gives Kotarou up to the state.

Let's say it takes a year or two to realize the full extent of excrement you've stepped in with AFO.  Two years with a mysterious new quirk she got off a dying stranger before the mess led her to give up her son (at 30) would put her at getting the quirk at 28, when Kotarou was 4ish.  If she gave Toshinori the quirk around 32, that means she would have carried OFA around 4 years.

Running tally for age of OFA: 45 years.    

Bearers 6+5, En and Banjou (Take One)

En and Banjo are big question marks.  We have no idea how long they each carried OFA, other than, again, "for less time than Shinomori."  So to start narrowing down a timeframe for them, let me look to something else: heroism in general.

We know that Banjo, two bearers previously to Nana, was a professional hero—Lariat.  Heroism, then, must have existed in his era.    

We don't know specifically how long Pro Heroes have been established in Japan, but we can make at least one educated guess: Harima Oji was active when, quote, "the present system was just beginning to settle into place."  Thus, heroism has been around for the generations following him, as well as some years prior to his own vantage point.  That factoid gives us four generations (his child, grandchild, great-grandchild, and finally his great-great-grandchild, Sako Atsuhiro) plus however many of Harima’s own years heroes have existed for.  

A generation is usually considered around 25 years, which tracks with the known parental ages in the series.  So if the stretch of time between Harima's child's birth to Sako's birth can be estimated to 75 years, plus Mr. Compress's age of 32, that means it's been at least 108 years since Harima's child was born.  We don't know when said child was born relative to his criminal activity—maybe Harima had already become a father by the time he was thieving; maybe the family came later.  Let's just round it to 110 years that we can say with relative confidence included heroes in them.    

Heroes have existed for at least/around 110 years.  Our estimate of OFA's lifespan, meanwhile, currently stands at 45 years.  As noted earlier, it seems pretty apparent that heroes did not exist at the time One For All was first created; AFO’s climb to the top happened in those early chaotic years before the legislation of heroism.  So that leaves us at least 65 years we need to fill between Nana getting OFA and the very first licensed hero, and then an uncertain number of years between that first licensing and OFA’s creation.

Keep that 65-year figure in mind; we’ll be using it going forward.  For now, let's put a pin in En and Banjo and move on.    

Bearer 4, Shinomori

Shinomori is easy.  He carried OFA for 18 years, and says his own times were awful—he must, then, have been much closer to those chaotic years (which would track with Shinomori’s direct successor Banjo saying that the Japan Deku’s sojourning in post-Jakku reminds him of his own time).  18 years off our remaining 65 leaves us with 47 years OFA must have existed such that it at least parallels (and ideally predates) the Hero Institution.

Running tally for age of OFA: 63 years.    

Bearers 2+1, [?] and Yoichi

Skipping Bearer 3, another big mystery, for a moment, if AFO would rather his brother be dead than free, and if AFO wanted to both take back that power and take some really horrible revenge for stealing his brother away, I'd be shocked if Yoichi and Strawberry Bakugou made it as much as a decade between them.  Let's call it a decade for ease of rounding, though, and add 10 years to our tally.

Running tally for age of OFA:  73 years.    

This brings us down to the three bearers we have the least information on: #3, Banjo and En.  We still have 37 years to account for to get us in the ballpark of that Year 1 of Heroism, and more would, again, be welcome, as I assume the first hero didn’t get sworn in on the very eve of OFA’s creation.  (It might be thematic, but it runs you square into Destro and the original MLA, and evidence I’ll go over later would put them later in the timeline.)

Moving on, let’s take a brief aside to consider the vestiges’ appearances.  It might seem likely that none of the early bearers carried OFA for very long, given that they all look the same in the OFA mindscape as they do in the scene where 2nd and 3rd kick down the vault door hiding Yoichi, suggesting they died without having the chance to get significantly, obviously older than they were in that moment.

On the other hand, we don’t know enough about quirk metaphysics to say that the appearance of the vestiges would match their living appearances.  Given that we know there's a certain amount of connection between All Might and his vestige, it could be that the vestiges mirror their living selves' appearances until the end.  We can't really call Vestige Might definitive, though, because he's the only one that isn't a quirk vestige, but rather just an impression of All Might's (literal) personality.

Perhaps, then, the others’ appearances are imprinted when they're first incorporated into One For All and then they just stick that way?  Or is it more about their self-image, the age they tend to think of themselves as being?  Or is it the age that marked the most important part of their lives with OFA?  The lines beneath Nana’s eyes kind of come and go, but they’ve never been consistent enough that I’d call them a definitive sign that the vestiges’ appearances are fluid.

Deku’s fluctuating appearance—both how much he’s covered in mist and even his age, as shown when he talks about how he wants to save the little boy he felt inside Tomura’s rage—would seem to point towards a fluid manifestation, but Deku also can’t be considered definitive because he, like All Might, is both still alive and not appearing in the mindscape via his quirk, because he doesn’t natively have one.

So comparing the bearers’ appearances in flashbacks versus their mindscape selves is a dead-end.  What else do we have?    

Bearer 5, Banjo (Take Two)

I might guess that since All For One seems to have largely lost track of the bearers during Shinomori's time—seeing as he died of "old age," rather than at AFO's hand—it's possible that Banjo had a very good run before AFO caught up to him.  OFA was weaker back then, so the effect it had on Banjo's power levels might not have been so noticeable in a sea of heroes that it jumped out right away, especially with Yoichi's "voice" still being ill-formed.  Banjo's also by far the oldest looking of the lot, give or take Shinomori's difficult-to-measure signs of age.  That being the case, let's give Banjo 15 years—fewer than Shinomori, but long enough to take a good chunk out of our remaining span.

Running tally for age of OFA: 88 years.    

Bearers 6+3, En and [?] (Take Two+A Tweak to Nana’s Numbers)

That takes us down to 22 years to split between En and Mr. Fa Jin to get us to the bare minimum point where heroism would be brand new circa OFA's creation.  It's pretty much a toss-up, how one imagines that going.  My last point of evidence to consider, then, is Banjo’s statement that AFO tried to steal OFA from both him and En, and it didn't work.  They clearly survived to pass on the power, however, and not to anyone under AFO's direct control.  So, is it possible that, by this point, AFO was coming to understand that he couldn't just neatly steal OFA?  That he needed to adjust factors somehow?

That being the case, while I expect he would have tried to keep Banjo and En around (the better to have them available to test out new methods on!), he might not have been in full search-and-destroy mode, because he didn't have a solution yet, so it didn’t really hurt him to let OFA's bearers run about for a while, meaning En could have had a pretty good stretch of time with the power.  Heck, that might even have had an effect on the amount of time Nana had as well!  I estimated two years between getting the power and realizing the extent of her danger, but if AFO was in full cat-playing-with-its-food mode by then, it might well have been longer.

On the other hand, if AFO lost track of Fa Jin-san such that he was able to pass OFA to Shinomori without being detected, it would seem he slipped AFO's net as well, so he could also have had a pretty solid run.

Twenty-two years left, but En—if his appearance is even remotely relevant—is the clear youngest outside of Izuku, and I don’t see him and Banjou having a senpai/kohai relationship if En was a literal child at the time.  So to avoid having to hang too much time on him, let's wick a year or two back to Nana, reflecting that perhaps AFO’s danger was not quite so immediately apparent as I first supposed, and make her OFA run 6 years instead of 4.

Running tally for age of OFA: 90 years.    

That gives us 20 years remaining between En and 3rd that we know need to exist to get them back to even Harima Oji's time.

Let’s go ahead and assume that En was at least 18 when he got the power from Banjou—while we can imagine situations outside of official, professional relationships, Banjou was a hero, and En called him senpai, so the Occam’s Razor explanation is that En was also a licensed hero when they were forming that relationship.  If En was a licensed hero, he’d need to be old enough to be issued that license.  Even if he didn’t go to a hero school—that many years in the past, did hero schools even exist?—I have to think he’d need to be at least 18.  And we see how old he looked at the time of his death: exactly the same way he does in the mindscape.  I’d guess he’s around the same age as e.g. the twenty-somethings in the League, so at best I’d call him 25 at the time of his death, giving him a maximum possible run of 7 years.

That leaves Fa Jin-san 13 years with OFA to meet my scaffolded-out-into-thin-air bare minimum.

Running tally for age of OFA: 110 years.    

So, OFA has to be at least 110 years old to even get the point of its creation back to Harima Oji, and that’s reachable while staying within the bounds of what we know.  I personally still think it’s still a bit on the short side, however.  Again, the OFA dream very much gave the impression that AFO was running around attracting the masses in the full-tilt chaos years, not the ones where the Hero System had already been adopted and was beginning to settle.  So let's bump it back 10 more years—before Harima, and anywhere between that same 10 years to only a few years prior to Destro and the original Meta Liberation Army, depending on how contemporaneous Harima and Destro were.  We can scratch those 10 years together from, for example, stretches of months (like Deku’s three months on top of his base year) that the above analysis is too broad-strokes to cover, as well as granting an extra year or two here and there to bearers whose numbers we can only guess at.

FINAL TALLY FOR AGE OF ONE FOR ALL: 120 years.    

Shigaraki Yoichi and AFO’s Ages (Interim Answer)

Recall that I estimated Yoichi at the time of the dream as being in his late 20s.  Tack that onto our age of OFA, and we get just a bit shy of 150 years from the time of Yoichi's birth to Izuku entering UA.  This would make AFO a few years over 150—over 100, but not so close to 200 that you’d expect Gran Torino to say that instead.    

Putting It Together

I estimated the Captain Hero comics as being from late 80s/early 90s and supposed that they were less than a decade old when Yoichi and AFO first picked them up.  Chapter 333 gives us a quick flashback from AFO to Yoichi reading them; Yoichi in that panel looks less than 10 years old himself.  So let’s ballpark the comic and Yoichi as being around the same age and put their publication and Yoichi’s birth in 1990.  Adding on the previous ballpark of “a bit shy of 150 years” to get from Yoichi’s birth to today, that puts us at “a bit shy of 2140”—or of 2141 for the manga’s current events!

Now we can use Tiger’s age+birthday to settle on a final number.  Tiger’s birthday is, as stated, February 29th—he’s already had his birthday for the year and is currently 32.  If 2141 were exactly correct, that’d put him being born in 2109—not a leap year.  Luckily, the estimation is “a bit shy of 2141,” so let’s bump that birth year back by one to have him being born in the nearest leap year of 2108.  32 years later, he and we find ourselves in…

|| The current year is 2140, with Deku’s first year at UA being 2139. ||    

Going back to the beginning, then, to try and backdate the glowing baby, my suppositions are as follows: 

 •   AFO and Yoichi are from relatively early in the Advent period, within the group of people deemed the first generation.      •   “A generation” can be ballparked to 25 years.      •   Yoichi was born in 1990.  Being of the same generation as the glowing baby means his birth needs to be within 25 years of the baby’s birth.  25 years back from Yoichi’s birth would put us in 1965, which is much too early, so it must be a narrower window.        o We also know All For One is younger than the growing baby, if possibly by very little.  If AFO is 3-5 years older than Yoichi (again, early 30s versus late 20s in the flashback dream), that’d put him being born sometime in 1985 to 1987.        o I don’t want to push the baby’s birth any further than 1985—the collapse being rapid means I need to keep it as close as I can to my taser datum in 1993—but let’s aim for a middle way and call AFO 4 years older than Yoichi, born in 1986.  That puts us with a final analysis of…

|| The glowing baby was born in 1985.  Quirks are 155 years old. ||    

Checking My Math With Doc Ujiko

If AFO is currently 154, then even assuming Ujiko’s Life Force quirk had a retroactive effect, AFO should look in his mid-70s, which he clearly doesn’t.  However, I’ve long figured that AFO had to have been running on a life-extension quirk of some kind even before he met Ujiko.  Even just working with what’s explicit in the manga, he looked more or less the same when he fought All Might as he did when he fought Nana 40 years prior, and more or less the same as that when he created One For All far longer prior still!  A simple “2 years lived=1 year aged quirk” wouldn’t explain that continuity of appearance, and AFO certainly doesn’t seem to suffer from Ujiko’s reduced vitality.

Also, Ujiko is, per Mic, over 120 (thus presumably under 130).  He presented his Paranormal Singularity Theory to the world 70 years ago, during a time when the world was “struggling to end the turmoil and reclaim peace.”  Assuming my numbers are right, 70 years ago would put AFO at 84 years old.  One For All would have been created 50 years prior.  This makes AFO around 30 years older than Ujiko.(7)    

A (New) Finalized Rough Timeline

Note: Years are estimated, favoring five-year increments for ease of calculation.  Most events could be tweaked earlier or later by a year or two.  It does not include the One For All bearers; recall that I wedged in an extra decade to their time, to be distributed in chunks of months or more generous year allotments than my first pass.  Not having specifically divvied out those years, they’re not represented below.

1985:  The glowing baby is born

1986:  The child who will become All For One is born.

1990:  Shigaraki Yoichi is born.

~2015:  The child who will later call himself Garaki Kyudai is born.

2020: One For All is created.

~2032:  Harima Oji’s child is born.

2070:  Soon-to-Be-Garaki Kyudai presents his Paranormal Singularity Theory.

~~~generations pass~~~

2139:  Midoriya Izuku receives One For All; begins first year at UA.

2140:  Manga current events.

...Et voilà!

P.S. If the Hawks line turns out to be in the main canon, I will cry. And then I will do my best to adjust this accordingly.

-------------------------------

1:  Of the ones I could identify, at least.  Others include Superman, Ultra Man, Devilman, Kikkaider, etc.

2:  Entertainingly enough, this would offer a parallel between Yoichi clinging to his reduced-price comics and young Takami Keigo with his clearance-bin Endeavor plush.  Sometimes, it’s not what a thing is, it’s what the thing represents that makes all the difference.

3:  Specifically, I’d initially wanted AFO and Yoichi to be at least in the second full generation, with the collapse happening gradually over the course of the first generation and accelerating into full meltdown as the second generation began to appear.  I would later roughly define a generation as being 25 years, however, and a 25-year gap between the glowing baby and AFO proved to be flatly irreconcilable with the math that came out of backdating One For All and the history of professional heroism.

4:  Since Yoichi was never under the effects of an anti-aging quirk, if AFO already had one back then and Yoichi didn’t, Yoichi would have appeared to be the elder of the two.  That Yoichi still looked younger suggests that, if there was an anti-aging quirk on the table at that time, it was still very new.  More likely, though, AFO simply hadn’t found one yet.

5: In order: 26, 22, 26, and 21.

6:  At worst, she looks to have just started developing lines beneath her eyes, visible in some of the scenes of her towards the very end of her life and not present in her younger days.

7: Ujiko would have been in the vicinity of 55 at the time, and thus physically appearing merely in his upper 20s.  About the same age Yoichi was, way back when…

Hawks, Spinner, Their Heteromorphic Influence and How Society Views Mutants (featuring Quirk Exception theory)

Something I’ve realized about the heteromorphs of BNHA is that there’s a distinct difference in reaction to our very own Heteromorph Representation - that being Hawks and Spinner

See, when Hawks was introduced, we see instantly that he’s a mutant. He has wings (and maybe some kind of eye thing going on but idrk what that is)

But he’s never actually seen as some kind of inspiration for heteromorphs, is he? Like as far as I can remember, he’s never had some mutant come up to him and say he’s an inspiration for representing heteromorphs by becoming the Number 2 Hero

In fact, nobody really seems to talk about him in a Representation For Mutants way. Every time we see him with fans, he’s mostly regarded for his looks rather than what he is. The fans are even petting his feathers as he addresses others about autographs

And there’s that one heteromorph girl in the crowd with the phone scene, but apart from that, we can’t see any other mutants in the crowd

And while Hori could have just not shown us Hawks’ effect on people his kind yet, it makes me think about the difference between his influence and Spinner’s influence

Hawks is a heteromorph. Ideally, he should be seen as a step-up for the mutant race, right?

But here’s the thing, the thing that is so important between both of these characters

See, Hawks doesn’t look “ugly”. Lets think about the possibilities that Hawks could have had for a wing quirk related to birds; He could have had a beak, clawed feet, he could have had feathers sprouting around his body, he could have even squawked and chirped like a bird. But he doesn’t do any of that at all, and he has none of those features

Hawks isn’t “ugly”, because he doesn’t look like the standard heteromorph, the kind that have extra limbs pointing out, the kind that look the wrong side of odd, or, say, even the kind with scales over his skin

But you know who does? Spinner

Spinner is “ugly”. His heteromorph body is covered in scales and there’s no escaping that. As much as he wants to, he can’t hide those scales unless he does a full body cover-up like Compress, and I doubt that he’d even want to

And, see, that’s the difference - Hawks isn’t “ugly” so he gets away with fame, popularity, shrieking fans (and murder). Spinner is “ugly” and he’s been discriminated against since he was a child

Spinner KNOWS what it’s like to be abused over who he is, to be discriminated against, to be scorned from the world so much so that he didn’t even want to go outside anymore

Hawks, as far as we know, hasn’t had any kind of discrimination over him, and I suspect that’s because he “passes” as a human being

Hawks only has wings on his back, and eye thingies that make him look stylish. Apart from that, he’s literally a human man. And thats pleasing to the eye, right? Hori created him as someone who is “nice to look at”

Spinner though? Spinner has scales covering the whole of his body. Spinner has a beak. Spinner has claws. He’s been discriminated against for the way he looks. He’s not “nice to look at”.

 And the thing is, nobody has said anything about Hawks’ placement in the ranks as a representation for heteromorphs because of this I think. At least, it isn’t shown to us that mutants look to him for inspiration. Hawks looks “normal” so he’s basically a human, right?

But Spinner? Spinner created a movement. He has inspired fellow heteromorphs, just like him who don’t have “conventionally attractive” features, to rise up and start rebelling. They even dress like him!

There’s a big big difference in how Spinner and Hawks influence mutants, and it’s incredibly important to acknowledge this difference, because its an example for how heteromorphs are treated

Miruko for example! Miruko is a mutant with a rabbit’s kick. She has bunny ears and a tail. It’s assumed, as well, that she has bunny feet. But she “passes” as human

The ears and bunny tail could be seen as sexy (Hori draws her as a part of fanservice but you think I haven’t seen you people thirst for her and her bunny rabbit look? I see you fandom. Don’t think I don’t), the feet are just feet (as in they aren’t important and can be ignored), and apart from those, she’s literally a human person. She covers up her feet as well, obviously for armor, but it’s one way that it doesn’t seem that much of a problem and adds to her “sexy image”

And when we think about it, a lot of the heteromorph Hero kids are quite “conventionally attractive” too. Tokoyami does have a bird head, but he mostly has a human body. Mina is just pink with black eyes and cute lil horns. Ojiro is a whole ass human with a tail. Tsuyu has more human attributes than frog. Kouda doesn’t have any features sticking out and he just looks like a shy lil boy. Shouji does have his multiple arms, but he’s been seen to keep them down and make them look more like one arm, and apparently, his face is the scariest. And what does he do? He covers his face up

All of these kids “pass”. They look mostly human. Does it matter if they actually are human? No, but does it matter that they look mostly human? Yes. Definitely

And this is why Hawks really isn’t that much of a “representation” of mutants, because he only has his wings, he’s mostly human, and because of that, he looks attractive

One example I want to bring up is Ryukyu as well. While she isn’t a heteromorph, her quirk allows her to turn into a big dragon, and I think that could also tie in with how she is viewed

Because it makes me wonder if a quirk that turns you INTO something is an exception in the publics eyes. I could definitely see that being something they would let slip, because outside of her quirk, she’s “attractive” and human

But I want to briefly touch on how she covers her eye with a big mask. Because it’s not just a hero costume thing, it’s a civilian thing for her too

And it makes me wonder if, like Shouji, she’s covering a mutant part of herself to “pass”. I have no evidence for this, and it could easily just be simple character design, but it’s something to think about. Focusing more on her quirk though, the dragon could be seen as “ugly”, and if in another universe where she was a dragon heteromorph, I can see her being not as popular as she is now

Because look at this

She says “I’m honestly not sure I deserve this…” and you know what? That makes me think about how, without her human form, she would be a heteromorph. She would be seen as “ugly”. But because of her human form, she’s “normal” and “attractive”, and circling back to the eye-covering thing, she’s possibly covering a part of her body to pass

She even fell a rank. It makes me think, why? When she’s so useful, when she becomes so big but doesn’t do any damage to the surrounding area she’s in? (And when she took a role in the War Arc with trying to stop Shiggy but that happened later. It does show how useful and incredible she is though). There’s a lot in this scene that makes me think about why she fell a rank, and her reaction to being in the top 10. That scene has always been quite interesting to me

(This Ryukyu part is mostly just speculation, so don’t take it too seriously as solid evidence for this analysis. Who knows, Hori could reveal something about her or focus on other things, but it does make me think a lot about her character)

The same thing could be said for Amajiki, who is human but can acquire all sorts of features to defeat an opponent (cows hoof, squid tentacles, chicken feet etc etc). His quirk could have an effect on the public similar to how Ryukyu is seen; as an exception. This is only speculation though, based off the Quirk Exception theory.

Fully circling back tho to Hawks and Spinner, I focus on these two more because they are both people who have had a great impact on the story. They are also very opposite sides of heteromorphic features.

And it makes me think about how someone like Hawks got into the HC so easily and was given his own agency at such a young age possibly because of that privilege. While Spinner is someone who hit the bottom of the barrel and was hated by everyone, to the point where he couldn’t stand it any longer and left

He became part of the League Of Villains and became friends with people who appreciate him for who he is. While Hawks doesn’t even have a “who he is”, because he has an entire persona, and mostly acts as someone popular and on duty, never seeming to relax

Actually, the only time he relaxes, as in puts the persona down, is when he’s threatening Twice. And maybe when he was smiling at Nagant (I’ve seen a lot of people talk about how that was a Real Smile, and I think they are right to an extent) but apart from that, he never puts everything down. In his job, he can’t do. He always has to be on duty and working

One last thing to note as well is that this

is Hawks beta design. I think I remember Hori said that he asked for advice about this design and the response wasn’t exactly negative but it wasn’t that positive either. But when he introduced the Hawks design we have today, his staff loved it and so Hori decided to go for that one. I think I also remember him saying something along the lines of “I chose this design over the beta design to make him nicer to look at.” (Please take this with a pinch of salt because I’m not sure if thats exactly what he said or not)

I wonder how differently things would have been if this was the final design for him

Regardless, Spinner and Hawks have a lot of influence over people, and yet have two very separate reactions from citizens and other heteromorphs. It’s very interesting to think about, and it makes me wonder if Hori will focus on this at some point

It’s certainly relevant, and it’s definitely something to think on

Thank you for reading!

This analysis is dedicated to @villainsandvictimsalliance because they made this post and it got my brain gears working lol. Idk if this is what you were talking about in your post, but regardless, you inspired me to write about this, so thank you for that!

I don’t know if Hawks has made any actual dent in heteromorph representation or anything, or if he ever will, but from what I remember, he’s hasn’t really elicited any reaction within the mutant world, so I thought I’d talk about it

There is the possibility of such a thing as Mutant Solidarity I think, similar to Quirk Solidarity, but maybe its just reserved for those who are on the same level as mutant i.e. a squid person seeing an octopus person hero or smthg

There is the slight possibility of him and Miruko having had an impact, which I would love, but when I saw your post, I mostly thought about Spinner and Hawks and how they conflict each other in terms of who they are and as mutants. So I hope you don’t mind that lol

EDIT: okay so apparently I have to actually say this, but I don’t think Spinner is actually ugly. This wasn’t about me saying my opinion on their looks. From what I’ve gathered, a lot of mutants seem to be judged on how they look and I’m under the impression that maybe this has to do with how much discrimination some characters may get. I mean Twice wasn’t mutant but he still got judged on his looks and ended up in a really bad position, so who’s to say those with mutant features don’t get the same or even worse treatment? Again, this hasn’t been shown to us, but sometimes I do look at the Hero kids with heteromorphic features and see a pretty stark contrast between those like Spinner and other heteromorphs and the Hero kids who got into UA of all places. It just makes me think about how the world of BNHA works, and I think its something to consider when looking at new characters or even characters we already know. Thats also why I used quotations for ugly and attractive, because its not about if they actually ARE ugly or attractive, its how I think society could view them. Same with how I used quotations for the word Pass because I don’t like thinking about how some characters are more accepted than others, but its the way that I can see Hero society operating in that shallow kind of way, y'know? Anyway. Little disclaimer at the end here because I just wanted to make it clear why I wrote it the way I did, and not cause any confusion

IMPORTANT UPDATE!

@sanssa​ had some great comments about stuff that I didn’t get to go in depth about or just straight up didn’t mention in the analysis, and imo explained it better than I ever could!👏👏👏

This very interesting post by @haleigh-sloth on how Shouto doesn’t voice his victimhood got me thinking - and maybe somewhere deep down he feels like he doesn’t deserve to view himself as a victim. After all - his birth was the final straw that tore the family apart. He was the masterpiece - the end goal that somehow justified the means in Endeavor’s eyes. 

It just stands out to me how Shouto - who fiercely asserts to the outside world that he’s not his father, that he’s different - when it comes to his family, he says things like this:

“my and my father’s prisoner”, “direct your rage at us”. 

He’s basically putting himself in the same box as Endeavor vis-à-vis Rei and Touya - like he’s sharing in Endeavor’s sin by the fact of his existence. 

And it’s just so sad to me - but I guess with Shouto having been treated his whole life as an extension, a property of Endeavor, it makes sense that these boundaries become blurry. A sense of self doesn’t develop overnight - especially not for someone who spent his childhood in extreme isolation, deprived of familial and social bonds, playtime and other opportunities that are essential for children to grow an independent identity.

So I feel like this could be a reason why Shouto has a hard time with recognising his own victimhood.

Ok, I really really love this page. I love the recall to Endeavor figuring out his mission as No 1 during the remedial class, watching Shouto with the kids, not being above everyone in a different world in a powerful demonstration of strength, but simply sharing the joys and comfort of his quirk. 

Keep reading

Looking at all of the takes this chapter, and I thought about this Tokyo Ghoul quote that Eto Yoshimura wrote in her book “Dear Kafka”

"That time, so that no one (not even Father) would notice, I secretly rewrote the summary.

What cannot change can only be broken. 

This is so to me, who left behind everything necessary inside the womb."

(There’s also this translation, which I think fits better into what AFO’s character, even if there are only a few words that were changed: “Then I, hidden from everyone (particularly father), stealthily rewrote the outline. Things that cannot be changed, can only be broken. From the view of I, who left all needed things in the womb.”)

And how this quote in a way truly summarizes, especially the last line, the way All for One thinks of himself and a way we, the audience, can view the way he thinks of himself. For example, the first line can be used in reference to how he changed the summary of the comic books him and Yoichi read together, in order to better fit his own wishes and desires. He doesn't accept the fact that Hero had defeated the Villain in the end, and decides to simply stop reading when the villain had won and become the Demon King, hereby rewriting the summary of the book to fit his own needs and desires. (So in that context, it should be "(not even Brother) would notice", but we'll let it slide this time for the sake of coherence) He then tries to LARP that twisted idea and that's how you end up with the current AFO, a man who thinks of himself to be the Demon King of comic books, and does what ever he possibly can to bring that reality of the summary of the comic books he rewrote.

I think the second line of the quote also is an indication of the way AFO thinks. To the core he doesn't believe that people cannot change, evidenced by the way he reacts when Lady Nagant is now fighting on the side of the heroes and when he starts losing to what he defines as a ''bunch of extras". He does not anticipate people to step outside of the lines that he drew around them and when they do go outside of those ideas and change (you know how people do) he throws tantrums and and refuses to acknowledge the fact that each person has their own autonomy and character, far beyond any neat little box he has put them into. And what he cannot change he wants to break. He wanted to break Yoichi by forcefully bestowing a quirk onto him, he wanted to break Tomura by grooming and manipulating him for the majority of his life into believing that he was simply born evil, and he wants to break all of the "extras" such as Stain, Jiro, Hawks, and Bakugou who go against the stereotypes he has placed them into, because to him these people can not change their so called "true nature", and therefore can only be broken.

Lastly, the third line, which I have been waiting impatiently to get to. I think this last line, truly shows the way AFO thinks of himself. In the chapter, All For One is shown to have cannibalized his mother as soon as he was born, and has been described as someone who simply took from others, without any regard, because he thought that anyone who could not give him *something* was useless. One could say that this is an indication of how All For One was evil from his birth, and therefore has no redeeming qualities. BUT this is My Hero Academia, good sir, where everyone is human. While framed in a horror like and grim way, it important to look past that and see the AFO/Yoichi backstory through the lens of BNHA's themes, which are all about humanizing villains and are against dehumanization in general. Imagine being newborn with a dead mother with no source of nutrition, and you have to eat her. You grow up with no one to protect your child self, no name, no sense of identity, no social security net, no one to help you differentiate between right and wrong, you are constantly being hunted for simply existing, and you are responsible for someone who is far weaker than you and have to find ways to protect yourself and him as well. So, of course you are going to grow up twisted, with disturbing ideals and cruel habits. But AFO and a lot of the MHA fandom doesn't see those factors, or refuse to acknowledge them. That's why I think this third line really displays AFO's mindset how he thinks he was evil from the womb. All things necessary to interact and engage with the world in a healthy way, such as the ability to show affection, to be caring, to be understanding, to have the methods of socialization, and have a acceptance of the autonomy of other individuals, and to be able to face and understand you own feelings in general, are abilities that have to be learned, they don't simply come to you in dream at night. But All for One does not think that, rather he refuses to humanize himself, and continues to play the role of the Demon King in the story he is trying to write, forever convinced that he was born like that from his mother's womb.

In summary, I think this quote from Eto Yoshimura really provides insight into the character AFO is and what he thinks of himself. He rewrote the summary of the comic books him and Yoichi read together, he doesn't believe that people can be changed, only be broken into what he wants them to be, and that he truly believes he has been evil from the very beginning, and any kind of "humanlike" trait he could have, was all left behind in his mother's womb.

@/non-bee-knees

Okay! So, I just went and got everything on Present Mic, minus the Anime, and now I’m ready to dive into my boy and aspects of his personality. And the first part I’m diving at—his passivity. More directly, how he handles conflict.

This is a trait that’s usually overlooked when talking about Present Mic and his character. However, when looking at characters it’s important to look at how they deal with conflict. It shows who they are and what they’re willing to take before enough is enough.

Keep reading

[bnha S6 spoilers]

Y’all I’m-

I’ve been procrastinating on the bnha anime and been binging fanfics instead (mostly Hawks-centric because I’m obsessed)

And how is it that I just find out from a random clip of his fight against Twice and Dabi that he tried to save Twice from Dabi’s flames?????

Like there’s a lot of fics about his guilt or the study of morality or the Commission’s abuse and stuff, but why is no one talking about how Hawks was still trying to be a hero despite saying he deals with cases fast to not dwell on emotion?

And then we can go on to interpret Dabi’s dialogue after that? Like??

(Or maybe I just haven’t seen any yet, hmu if u know any good ones)

Two halves of a whole

So we're all aware of the running joke that Izuku does not remember the iconic river scene,

This one right here. The one that Katsuki is constantly referring back to as "the moment where it all went wrong" and being all dramatic about. His core memory of Izuku being a hero.

But I raise you this... Katsuki does not remember this scene,

This is the scene where a young Katsuki has just finished winning a fight against some older kids that were being bullies.

The scene that is Izuku flashes back to when thinking about Katsuki's heroic nature.

Because Katsuki does not remember a time when he stood up to Bullies instead of being one.

I agree with both of the above; in fact, this is one of central themes in bnha (and most popular hero/villain stories like Marvel and DC) imo.

I rmb coming across a post once that said smth along the lines of:

The difference between a hero and a villain is not their Tragic Backstory, but the way they deal with it. Where a villain says “all these bad things happened to me, therefore it must happen to other ppl too” (see: Dabi, Shigaraki, etc), a hero says “all these bad things happened to me, therefore I must do my best to stop it from happening to other ppl” (see: Deku, All Might)

The interesting part starts, ofc, when the lines start to blur, then the argument shifts to the balance between character driven (internal) and environment driven (external). And that’s where the character/ perspective building, juxtaposition and background story all come into play.

(see: Deku/Shigaraki - given hope by mentor after rejected by society, Hawks/Dabi - abusive upbringing, Hitoshi/Himiko - villainous quirks, etc.)

Which is why I find OP’s use of “tragic” to describe the LoV so fitting, because traditional Aristotelean tragedy held a strong focus on fate. And it’s often a fine mix and balance between the character’s choice and predetermined fate that leads to their ultimate demise-

And if I get started on that tangent I may just never stop, so, that is my dweeb TEDtalk for the day, pls and thank u loll

It's gotten me thinking how it's so tragic it is that the league of villians are ostracized from society and their own families reject them simply for things beyond their control. (Touya's fire quirk incompatibility, Toga's need for blood) They've never been shown empathy so why would they empthatize with those who are blessed by the system? While they are forced to rot in the streets those with "socially acceptable" quirks get to thrive.

And it's beautifully written how these feelings of ostracism cause them anger and cause them pain all because all of them just wanted to love. Like Mary Shelley said "I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy one, I will indulge the other."

Their "love" turns to loathing and drives them to madness. Touya loved his father and he was his no1 hero but if the no 1 hero beats his wife and abuses his kids what about the rest? Society has driven them insane then it hates them for being ugly victims too. If they were dead or passive it would've been convenient. Hawks calls twice unlucky before killing him and he refutes it in his last moments as Toga embraces him. He wasn't unlucky, he was just never accepted by those around him and he finally found that acceptance within the league. He says he lived a fulfilling life because he got to love them.

I just wished we got to see things from the villains perspectives more. MHA would've been much darker and grittier that way but I'm atleast glad we got their side of the story too. Love and rejection have always been a central theme of the league, they're almost inseparable.

[intro]

Bakugou is a prideful, arrogant person. He holds himself to the highest standard; he is the best and everyone else is simply below him. Everything he has ever done was in pursuit of being number one, shining above the rest. He has to have a perfect victory, he has to be a perfect student, he has to win to save.

He pushes and pushes and won’t let anyone see his weaknesses or his insecurities. He can never lose, he can never fail, he can never show that he regrets or hesitates or that he hasn’t thought everything through. He must never be vulnerable in every sense of the word.

Then why is he standing in the rain.

To apologize shouldn’t be a sacrifice, but it is for Bakugou. To pour his feelings, to admit his wrong, to let down all of the walls he has built and be vulnerable. And in front of his whole class.

He is willing to sacrifice his pride, to fully sacrifice any superiority he could have, to bare his soul and even risk rejection. Because he knows Midoriya is more important. Because he wants him to come home, he wants him to know his true feelings, because he wants things to change. 

Because Midoriya has changed him. Midoriya has opened his eyes; by showing him he’s allowed to be open, that his feelings should be expressed, that he has so much to learn, and so much of that was learned through Midoriya just existing.

He isn’t sacrificing his safety frivolously because he’s expected to as a hero; he is doing it because he has grown. He is doing it because he has finally admitted to himself that he wants Midoriya to be with him and safe.

So I will sacrifice this for you. Not because it will change anything, as much as I want that I know that I can’t just fix all the wrong with just this. And I am willing to do as much as it takes to earn your forgiveness. But I don’t need that from you, not now and not ever if you don’t want that, I just need you to rest. I did so much wrong. And I am sorry for everything. You don’t have to do this alone. Lean on us. You are so strong and being supported doesn’t discount that. You’ve taught me that. 

I hate the rain. But I will brave it for you. 

He would do everything in his power, admit so many things, just to get Midoriya to take care of himself. We see him being the most vulnerable he has ever been in front of people that aren’t Midoriya. He does so much completely out of character, all in pursuit of being there for Midoriya. 

For Izuku.

He finally gets over himself and finally tells Midoriya the feelings he has felt for so long.

He lets go of this idea he is inherently better and finally acknowledges that his hatred for Midoriya has always been about his own shortcomings and insecurities. But he still wants to be better, they are still rivals. He isn’t going to sacrifice that part of him because that is just who he is; he is still going to push to number one.

But now it’s different.

There is verbal and vocal acceptance and respect. Before it was unspoken; their relationship had changed ever since Ground Beta. They were proper rivals, with mutual respect and care, they were actively making each other better.

But Bakugo finally verbalizes it and tells Midoriya, not only is he sorry, but he wants to actually have a proper friendship; he wants to continue to become better and earn his forgiveness. He wants them to push each other to be better, he wants to continue to fight for the top spot, he still wants to be the best.

But when did it become something else? 

When was the turning point when it started to shift from wanting to surpass Midoriya and be the best, to wanting to keep up with Midoriya and stay by his side?

Bakugou has already sacrificed himself for Midoriya before. His body moved on its own; with no hesitation, he would save Midoriya. He has already risked his life for him. But there is a layer to it that I don’t think people talk about. 

He tells Midoriya he shouldn’t try to win this on his own. 

He disguises his concern with an insistence that he’s in it to fight for himself when he initially joins the battle. But it is to fight by Midoriya’s side and support him.

But taking the hit for Midoriya, jumping in the way isn’t just support. This is sacrifice. This is giving yourself to ensure the safety of someone. And it was second nature. 

There are two reasons and both are a sacrifice of something in the moment.

It is knowing someone is so valuable, so great, in all senses of the word, that they must be protected. Bakugou is sacrificing his body and admitting that Midoriya needs to stay alive, for personal reasons and/or for the world. He needs Midoriya to be okay, Midoriya can’t fight alone and Bakugou will do anything to make sure he will be okay. 

But the sacrifice of ideology. 

With every development, he has relinquished parts of himself. When he sacrifices himself he is not only sacrificing his body but is admitting that he can’t do this on his own; he needs Midoriya too. This isn’t him wanting to be better than Midoriya, it’s him wanting to do it together.

Midoriya changed him.

He doesn’t die for Midoriya. He wakes up and just as his last thought was Midoriya, so was his first as he woke up. He runs to his side. People are dragging him back, trying to have him rest, knowing before he even said anything that he would lose his mind over Midoriya’s situation. 

Everyone sees how Bakugou feels about Midoriya.

He sacrifices himself because Midoriya can not die on him. Midoriya has to stay alive. Midoriya has to keep fighting. 

There can not be a world that doesn’t have him in it.

This is the culmination of what has been developing ever since the final exam where Bakugou finally works with Midoriya; the day that win to save, save to win was noticed. Then furthered after Ground Beta where they finally talked to each other and something changed within them both.

But the final sacrifice is the culmination of Bakugou’s character.

He knows what this decision will mean. Everyone screams for him not to. He knows that he is going to die. He knows he will not win this fight.

This isn’t dying for the cause. This isn’t just a hero complex. This is because he can help Midoriya and he will. This is for Izuku.

I will sacrifice myself for you. To give you more time, to give you even the slightest chance of winning. I will sacrifice myself for you because you are who can win. I am going to die. I am going to die and in my final thoughts, I will ask if I will still be able to be by your side.

It is no longer can I beat you. It is no longer can I surpass you. It is can I still catch up to you. It is can I still even be equal to you. He has already sacrificed the idea that he could beat Midoriya, that isn’t what he wants anymore. What he wants is to stay here with him.

I will sacrifice everything I am. I have wanted to be the best. All my life I have wanted to surpass you and everyone around me. But you. I will let that go for you. I let it go in my mind for so long now and I have never wanted to admit it. Is it even possible? Is it even possible for me to catch up to you? Is it even possible for me to stay by your side. I can’t be that anymore. I am sacrificing even that now. I will never be number one now. I will never become the person I always dreamed to be. I will never surpass you. I am forever sacrificing that now. I will die here.  

But can I still be with you?

The sacrifice of his life is him fully relinquishing everything he is, admitting that he can’t keep up, losing all of the progress he has made, letting go of everything that made up his character.

And the last thing on his mind is if he can still be able to be by Midoriya’s side.

He won’t let him go again. 

Something something there were others with quirks before The Glowing Baby, but because it was flashy and harmless it made the perfect First Quirk story and that trend of holding up the flashy and “good” quirks of society while shadowing all others has been an issue since the beginning…

Having now read the official release of MHA 407, I don’t (yet) see the argument that AFO was a traumatized baby who was just looking for someone to respond to his cries and take care of him the way that Tenko was wandering the streets. While it’s revealed that AFO doesn’t want to be alone, AFO’s backstory and Tenko’s backstory reveal two very different men with different motivations.

The narrative in 407 says young AFO distrusts anyone who won’t turn and look at him when he cries because those people don’t offer anything of value to him. He can’t manipulate them into doing what he wants, and therefore they are useless and he can kill them if he wants. This has long been AFO’s thought pattern, and it’s what he taught young Tenko — YOU are more important than anything, and YOU should always act how you desire. Nothing in the world matters except what YOU want to do.

Contrast that with young Tenko’s initial reactions when realizing he killed his family, and with Tomura’s later hesitation to kill (or even attack) Katsuki after Katsuki refuses to join the LOV. Tenko/Tomura cares about other people, even after they refuse him, in a way that AFO does not.

Moreover, look at young AFO’s faces. He isn’t shown smiling or crying or having any emotion at all until page 11, when he reveals he killed the glowing child and stole their quirk. He then grins widely as he talks about his dream of a world that exists only for him. AFO didn’t smile when killing the anti-meta group OR when reading with Yoichi. He has no happy, smiling memories prior to this moment (even with Yoichi), unlike Tenko who had fond memories of his mom, sister, friends, and dog.

As another point of contrast, look at why AFO wants to be the villain: He wants to be surrounded by people who pay tribute to him. He does not want to “battle on in solitude.” (Another reason why AFO hated All Might for smashing his face in — it required a lengthy recovery hidden away from followers.)

To AFO, people are a one-way relationship. He doesn’t want to be alone, so he wants to possess a brother who directly opposes everything AFO stands for; a brother who is family and who wishes for the best but will never be a supporter, follower, ally, or friend. AFO gives Yoichi a quirk thinking that will change Yoichi’s mind, or keep him somehow bound to AFO.

Tomura, however, wants allies, and in return he wants to give back to them. He got downright DEFENSIVE when Mirio said he didn’t have any friends. Tomura understands the give-and-take involved in working with people. He doesn’t just want followers that do his bidding.

In the end, AFO’s unrelenting selfishness will leave him alone — at some point he will run out of “followers” and paths to victory. Meanwhile, Yoichi and Kudou built a network that ensured they would not be alone in their battle. They found true allies in the other OFA holders, and in turn Izuku found allies among pro heroes and at UA, just as Tomura did in the LOV. They are not alone.