“Trustworthy Alliance” - Art From My Hero Ultra Impact

BNHA 356 - Thoughts

First the leaks confused me, so I thought I'd wait for the scanlation. Then the scanlation confused me, so I waited for the official. But tbh, I'm still confused a bit with the central part of the chapter - Young Enji's appearance and what it all means.

It was a visually pleasing chapter, and I get why many people like it, but to me, it still feels a bit meh' because of how messy that middle part feels.

Tokoyami getting a big smash looked cool. And that's all it did. I wish this fight would bring back my immense love for the Hawks & Tokoyami content that I adored during the war arc, but so far, it just feels like an echo of the hype I felt then.

AFO eating the vestige. OK? I guess. AFO vestige stuff is so non-sensical at this point, that there is no point to comment.

Hawks is growing on me again. Him moving from wanting to score a killing blow to shielding the kids - this little featherless chicken certainly is pulling his weight in this fight. His expression as he turns to look back at Endeavor really got me.

He's not even surprised, because he knew that Endeavor would get back up, but also it's sad seeing Endeavor's sacrificing his arm.

4. I'm glad Endeavor is back up and trying to protect the kids who stepped in when he faltered.

5. On the one hand, his young self doesn't say anything shocking, but on the other, it reveals a deep self-hatred, that ties somehow to the loss of his own father, who died trying and failing to save a girl. We don't know much else. Whether he was a hero or a civilian. Whether he had the same quirk. Whether he was a good dad or another abusive asshole. Whether Enji watched it happen helplessly or learnt it later. It's all left open.

But what it gives us is a reason for Enji's endless thirst for power and strength, his obsession with All Might and how he turned to power to try to shield his heart.

It is tragic and sad and ironic how young Enji's loss of his family because of weakness leads to Endeavor's obsession with strength, which then leads to the destruction of his family at the first sign of his son's weakness. It gives context, but not an excuse. It doesn't lessen Endeavor's responsibility towards his family.

As the resident weakness expert said - there is more to strength than a strong quirk. Endeavor should have listened more.

I have to admit, Endeavor growing a flaming arm is a pretty cool visual - even if this is not the moment I'm waiting for. There ought to be a more emotionally resonating closure - something where it really feels like Endeavor is letting his "ugly heart" to be fully exposed and vulnerable, and fall to pieces, and where he lets himself grieve and accept and embrace both his own father's memory and his family who suffered so much on account of his "ugly heart".

The fight obviously continues, so maybe it will all makes sense in a few days. Until then, I keep believing that the story won't let Endeavor punch himself into redemption, because clearly his weakness has nothing to do with his quirk and everything to do with his heart.

(I this context also see Shouto's Phosphor coming from the center of his heart, and Touya's mystery glowing, which is also in the center of his chest.)

Natsuo is more like his father than he wants to admit...and it is both tragic and unsettling.

He does what he wants without regard for what the people around him want.

Sure, he'll go along with certain requests, like going to the family dinner because Fuyumi asked him to.

However, rather than be a polite host, he decides he'd rather embarrass his sister by being angry at their father all through said dinner and making things awkward for their guests. He didn't have to be there. Whoever he's talking to on the phone after the fact, maybe the girlfriend, he apologizes for bailing on their plans. He didn't even have to white-lie to Fuyumi. He straight up had other plans that night. So there are two ways you could look at this:

He conceded to a request to support his sister...then half-assed it.

Or he canceled his plans and went out of his way to be a prick.

He's not wrong for hating his father, that is 100% a normal reaction to an abusive parent, but he is wrong for not establishing his own concrete boundaries or respecting Fuyumi's.

Like Endeavor, Natsuo is pretty isolated within the family.

Mom’s out of the picture and contact with her is limited.

We all know what his relationship with his father is like.

His closest sibling 'died' when they were kids, but even then, Touya and Natsuo's relationship wasn't a good one. We know Touya spent years trauma-dumping on Natsuo, and little bro took it like a champ. Supporting one's siblings like that is admirable, but it does highlight a key difference between the brothers. Touya has memories of a happy childhood with their father. Natsuo does not. So he had to listen to his older brother crying for a past he knows nothing about, which had to have brought on a little resentment. "At least Dad loved you once. I never even got that much."

As stated above, Natsuo doesn't see eye to eye with Fuyumi. At least not enough that he respects her decision to forgive their father. Whether he supports that decision or not, he should love his sister more than he hates their father, and starting shit unprovoked over a dinner she asked him to be at is not a supportive decision.

His relationship with Shouto is hard to gauge. They were raised apart, sure, but they lived in the same house. So the fact that he didn't know Shouto's favorite food until he was fifteen is...odd. Natsuo never tried to have a conversation with him in passing? But I have a theory about that. With how Shouto behaved in the very beginning of the series, the mirror-image of their arrogant father, I think Natsuo had a, “Fuck, now there’s two of them," moment and actively avoided association with his younger brother. This may have contributed to him moving out even though he attends a college that's close enough that that he can casually stop by for dinner.

He Actually Does Get Violent.

Not with other people, thankfully, but he does slam his fist against the door in this scene, which is an act of aggression.

This makes for an intense moment in animation, sure, but if you saw a person do this in real life, you’d be nervous about where that fist is going next.

I already went over this in the Endeavor analysis that I made a few months back, but the gist of it is taking out your anger on inanimate objects is unhealthy because you're training your brain to associate anger with violence, which has the potential to make it harder to dissociate in the long run.

In his own way, he did abandon his family.

Fuyumi tells him to leave the family circumstances to her....and he just left her to it? She went to college to become a teacher and made a career work in spite of living in a volatile home. The series doesn't say where Natsuo is a student at, but he clearly lives close enough to home that he can drop by for a visit, so it's not like he went to some prestigious university out of town.

So yeah. Left his remaining brother and sister to their father.

The other point, though, is he's canonically studying medical welfare.

Medical welfare is the consideration of patient wellbeing, preserving individual dignity, promoting quality of life, and taking a holistic approach to healthcare that applies mental and emotional care to a patient, not just physical.

So it's ironic this is where his brother ends up and he says absolutely nothing about it. Nothing about promising to come see him, nothing about asking the staff if this really the best arrangement they could come up with, no promises to Touya that he'll figure something out. He just ghosts and, like their father, that is really hypocritical.

In the end, he puts his own hate and feelings above everyone else’s.

This one's pretty closely related to my first point, but it does bear reiterating for the finale. Natsuo's decision to never see his father again is ultimately going to hurt his family more than it's going to spite Endeavor.  Going no-contact is a healthy choice and I don’t fault him for it at all.  But if he sticks to it, it’s going to lead to some serious ramifications down the road.

If he's strict enough to refuse to be in the same vicinity as Endeavor:

He won’t attend Touya’s funeral and support his grieving mother and siblings if Endeavor will be there.

Since we see in the epilogue Rei stays with Endeavor, Natsuo visiting her is going to be complicated.

If Fuyumi gets married, she might want her father at the wedding. Is Natsuo going to skip his sister’s wedding out of spite?

If Shouto gets married and decides to let their father be there, same story.

If Endeavor outlives Rei, will Natsuo miss her funeral?

And finally, Natsuo might have to come to terms with the fact his own children may want to meet their grandfather, which is a decision he can only control until they’re legal adults.  He can tell them how much of a monster Endeavor was all he wants, but those kids may still be curious about meeting the man in person, especially if they hear stories from other family members and know the former No. 2 and No. 1 is their grandfather.

I’m not saying Natsuo should forgive Endeavor, or even stop being angry with him because he has every right to his anger. But if he still wants a relationship with the rest of the family, he is going to have to exercise some form of compromise.  Especially with his children because he unfortunately has all the hallmarks to become the next Kotaro Shimura. This is a society where kids want to be heroes, and then there's Natsuo who has a history with the dark side of hero society, no matter the good Shouto does.

Endeavor having a Lucille Bluth moment

Enji's the only one who can get the vicious little dinosaur to sleep.

yearning for soft Enji, so here’s a softdad!Enji with Touya

imma head to the bed and cry for a while 

Here is a little comic I did for Endeavor’s birthday a few days ago to say “Hi I’m back”

Also if you want to know this is the t shirt that Shouto gave him

family tree

Why do you think Endeavor's solution to every problem that raises is to remove himself entirely? Like aside from his obvious inferiority complex (do u think he has an inferiority complex? 🤔)

Well...

let's start in reverse.

Enji himself admitted he had a 'weakness' within, that he'll believe he'll never be a true superhuman (like All Might), that he felt envy for him and had an inferiority complex and tried to hide his weakness by putting up a front.

So it's canon he has an inferiority complex and most of his behaviour stems from his attempts at hiding it by putting up a mask, a front, acting the opposite of how he felt.

So yeah, he has an inferiority complex toward All Might.

Now... is Endeavor's solution to every problem that he raises to remove himself entirely?

I think the question needs some clarifications.

For start, if we're talking of Endeavor as the HERO, Endeavor, no, he generally doesn't remove himself, he tackles problems personally the harder he can.

The only moment in which he felt tempted to remove himself from a problem was when Dabi turned out to be Touya and, in the end, he decided to tackle it, showed up to the press conference, took upon himself the entire responsibility, went to help Deku refusing Shouto's help, accepted to take part to the war, told Shouto he wanted to be the one to face Touya, accepted for the grand plan it was better if he were to face All for One and did face him, even though he didn't feel up fighting Touya he lead him away so that his son at least wouldn't hurt the other Heroes and this despite how worn out and wounded he was.

But I think you are talking about Endeavor the Hero but about Enji the man, the father and husband.

And here canon confirms he tried escaping facing responsibilities by pushing them on others (he told Rei he wouldn't look at Touya so she had to do it, he let Fuyumi face the responsibility of keeping together the family, he tried to push first on Touya and then on Shouto the duty to surpass All might for him, he removed himself completely from Natsuo's life).

That's why he is trying to atone now, because he realized his negligence caused his family's destruction.

He never really explained WHY he decided to act in such a way.

We can just speculate so my answer is as good as the one of anyone else.

Of course we can connect some things to his envy for All Might and to his inferiority complex toward him.

There's a bit in one of the "School Briefs" I find rather interesting. The story is about Parents' Day, a day in which the parents of the students are invited to go to school.

Shouto says nothing about it to Enji (as he doesn't want his father to go there) but Enji finds the invitation (too late) and rushes at U.A. as he really wishes to take part to it but... once Recovery Girl opens the gates up for him he can't bring himself to admit he's there for parents' day because he doesn't want to be exchanged for a doting father as, according to him, a Hero as to project strength and nothing more, absolutely not the image of a sensitive family man. He must look ambitious and prideful, nothing else.

So, if we take "School Briefs" as canon, part of why Enji avoids his family is also due to this, he believes he has an image to project and protect, an image that's tied to his inferiority complex with All Might because it's tied to how he wants to be perceived AS A HERO.

Shouto is in a Hero school and, in the story, Enji ultimately convinces himself him watching Shouto performing in a Hero school wouldn't make him look soft... but think at his other kids.

They aren't in a Hero school, which means Enji might very likely have avoided going to school on parents' day meaning, after Rei's hospitalization, they had no one who would go to school for them.

But there's more to consider.

First of all, remove yourself from a situation, isn't necessarily a wrong strategy. Sometimes we must know when to back off and leave people more competent than us handle the problem... or just give up on seeing it being solved because it can't be solved otherwise we'll only do further harm. Knowing when one has to back off or when one has to continue tackling the problem is supposed to be one of the things that mark the passage to adulthood.

As an adult you're expected to know when something is worth trying being fixed or not and since it's generally not so simple and clean cut people still make plenty of mistakes despite being adults...

For example, while Rei was recovering it was important for her psychological health not to meet Enji. Enji staying away from her instead than, for example, pressure the hospital to let him meet her, was a good thing.

In Japan divorce isn't as smooth as in other countries (it carries a social stigma for both parties as well as for the kids involved) so if it'd gone for a divorce it wouldn't have been equally good... but it could have been a good solution in other countries.

Why this is relevant?

Because Enji has to judge each time if the option of removing himself from something is a good idea or not, it's not a given it's always wrong.

When he decides, for example, that he'll build another house for Fuyumi and Natsuo so they can welcome Rei there, he persuades himself it's a good idea FOR THEM.

Rei can't meet him, Natsuo feels bad when he sees him, Shouto told him not to put up a father's act in front of his friends, making him feel rejected as a father... so if they don't see him everyone's happy, right? Wrong because it doesn't take into consideration his family's wishes.

But the fact it seems right it's part of why Enji feels it's okay to choose such an option.

I particularly like how the anime represents this choice.

Neither Natsuo nor Fuyumi are happy with Enji's choice and the visual seems to imply he's leaving them, abandoning them...

...with Enji who instead continues to think "What I can do for my family after all this time...? I think about this every time I go to sleep."

The fact he dreams his family being happy while he's not with them, to him comes to seem the answer to the question.

He thinks that's what he has to do if he really cares about them.

But there's also, of course a dark side to all this.

Removing himself from his family... is the easy choice. Forcing Rei to look after Touya, leaving on Fuyumi the responsibility of the house, pushing first on Touya and then on Shouto the duty to surpass All Might, not caring about Natsuo... are also all easier choices than actually getting involved.

Let's pick this scene because it's easier.

Enji doesn't know what to say to Touya. Saying the wrong thing has the potential, of course, to make matter worse and Enji excuses his inaction also by telling to himsef 'if I go there I'll end up encouraging him'... so he chooses to do nothing... which requires him zero efforts... and ultimately leads to terrible consequences.

Touya needed him to step up to his duty as a father, to risk doing mistakes but putting up all his efforts into reaching his son, into keeping him safe.

Because although all this seems to steem from how Touya wants to become a Hero, the real core of the problem is he doesn't feel himself being seen by his father.

It's not so much about Enji telling him something, is about Enji making him feel seen. Enji doesn't, he kind of understands Touya needs to be seen but pushes that duty on Rei. He runs away hiding behind his Hero role. He has job to do, he can only show him the world of Heroes.

He runs away. He pushes forward excuses and runs away.

He did it with Touya but it's basically what he had done with the rest of his family, the story simply digs it more on how he did it with Touya because the consequences were terrible and came to bite him back.

And yes, we can blame for it his weakness, his inferiority complex, he wants to look like a strong Hero and he can't even help his child. He's afraid to fail because trying would be hard and failing wouldn't fit the image of a Hero and so he doesn't.

He's insecure, not in battle, not on duty but with how he presents himself.

Which might be tied to how he lost his father.

We don't really know the answer (and, of course, even if we were to know, this wouldn't make right what Enji did to his family), and throwing in his loss makes things really complex because Horikoshi developed extremely little that part.

Basically for 355 chapters he let us think that Enji's sole weakness was he was self centered, selfish, then with basically zero build up, threw in that he had lost a parent same way as Kotarou and this gave him trauma but... well, Kotarou's loss and reaction were better developed.

I really wish Horikoshi were to go back at that because that needed more space and... got nothing. But I doubt there will be time for it.

So hum... I fear I've ended up rambling a bit. Sorry if I can't offer you some definitive answer on why Enji does what he does, just my guesses about it and thank you for your ask!

I do love to talk about the Todoroki family!