Heytemporary - Heytemporary

He just wants to be trained guys let him spar

Meme I found on reddit that quite accurately describes how certain parts of the fandom are taking the extra chapter…

So I found this comment in a poll asking which is more overrated: anime or videogames, and I think this comment applies pretty well to the state mha is in. Emphasis on the explosions part.

Now that the first episode of the season is out, I can finally comment on how hilariously intense the meeting of the Upper Moons was. 

Like, we really watched (I, even paid money to see in the cinema) the equivalent of Akaza just taking the elevator to the office, pass by the recepcionist, get greeted by the one coworker he can’t fucking stand, get chewed up by the boss like every Monday and having to insist to his bitchass coworker that he’d rather die than go ‘hang out’ after work.

We really saw that but with an animation budget that’s off the charts. 

Hori really does love rewarding characters who don't deserve it, while punishing those who actually give a damn.

Bakugou's a bullying, narcissistic, idiotic moron of an asshole who lived a golden spoon life of wealth and being spoiled (conformed by Hori himself)? The narrative and characters bend over backwards to accommodate him. Obviously he's this genius prodigy who inspires everyone, even though his behavior in the field would realistically get people hurt and/or killed.

Shinsou's a whiny scrub with a victim complex? He gets favoritism from Shota "I hate favoritism" Aizawa himself AND gets to join the hero course.

Endeavor's outed as an abusive person? Well, obviously the people criticizing him are in the wrong, and this is supposed to be kept within the family!

Nighteye is a creepy and pathetic control freak who uses teenagers for his own means and doesn't understand the word 'no'? He was coming from a good place, and he was right in the end!

All Might's been put on a pedestal for the past 40+ years and makes mistakes because he's a human being? No, he's an idiot of a mentor who gets criticized and villified for breathing.

Aoyama's forced into being the traitor because of his parents and clearly hates doing it? Bye bye, he's leaving the hero course and getting replaced by someone who didn't care to actually TRY to prepare for UA.

Izuku operates within the law and tries to work with his bully? No, HE'S the one in the wrong and he's not allowed to be at least slightly resentful when he's screwed over by those around him. Not to mention, he's seldom been apologized to by those who wrong him.

The journalists rightfully call out UA on coddling Bakugou and doing a shit job at protecting their students? Obviously it's a smear campaign against UA, and who cares if Aizawa didn't even answer the journalist who directly called him out on not doing his job as a teacher and getting Bakugou's head out of his ass.

I'm so glad I dropped this series, because what in the actual fuck was Hori on while writing it?

It's such a pattern of rewarding shitty behavior that it's actually gross. And you know what? It exactly perpetuates what the narrative was trying to call out before Horikoshi changed everything. He literally actively wrote against his own thesis. That's got to be some kind of cruel irony right?

Older and Wiser

I think I finally realize why the writing in BNKA always puts me off in some way, something I've been saying for a while but never got a chance to go into detail.

The writing in BNKA feels like narrative manipulation.

I've come to this conclusion after seeing how the fandom reacts to certain moments and compare them to earlier scenes. And that was when it all clicked for me to come up with this word.

With how the unholy three started out (Bakugou, Aizawa, and Endeavor) then seeing their personalities and how others view them take a complete 180 to view them in a better light, that's what I'm referring to as narrative manpulation.

With Bakugou starting out as a bully and supposedly "changing" so others can say "Wow what a great guy he is!" And praise him to the moon and back... it's literally middle school all over again for him.

With Aizawa coming across as unfair and uncaring only for the narrative to prove he's right every time and have others treat him like he's japanese Einstein.

And with Endeavor starting off as a horrible person and the main conflict for Shoto to overcome... only for his family to welcome him back with open arms and say "We're all to blame for what happened!" just to lift some of it off of him and make him seem like he meant well.

The one common thing about these three is Hori having them express negative emotions and crying and the fandom eats it all up. Claiming that they've gone through development and that they really do care and are more than what we were led to believe. And then have them act the exact same way like nothing happened.

And that my friend... is narrative manipulation.

Hi @theloganator101 👋,

100%.

All of the writing in MHA is narrative manipulation but especially with those three.

Bakugou, Aizawa and Endeavour have narrative manipulation, their own in-universe simps, characters not reacting to them as they should and retcons to soften them and make them more palatable to the audience.

Bakugou and Endeavour are easy and extreme examples so I'll begin with Aizawa first.

With Aizawa, this has worked so well that you rarely see people critical of him and only those who have fully and critically looked at him in canon without #Dadzawa colouring their perception.

His students should dislike / hate or at the very least be wary of him. A teacher who sleeps all the time, pulls "logical ruses" lies and expels on a whim would realistically cause the mental health of his students to plummet. Yet all of 1A (including Izu who he seems to very much dislike) love him for some reason...

He's praised as logical, "harsh but effective" yet his fellow teachers should HATE him. Through the amount of students he's expelled I've heard some people theorising that he has expelled OTHER teachers students. Imagine how angry you would be as a teacher to find one of your students careers destroyed because a fellow teacher expelled them for a bullshit reason. Not only that but logically Aizawa's expulsions would have destroyed lives, destroyed careers before they fully lifted off the ground even made villians.

*There's also the fact that he's not shown to be a great friend in canon either, yet Aizawa is surrounded by Shirakumo, Yamada or Kayama who aren't offput from his behaviour. And even has a respect from All Might (despite the fact that Aizawa has been shown to dislike him.)

* - I'm not blaming Aizawa for being depressed or low key here. That's understandable. However friendship is about give and take. We don't see Aizawa being supportive back to his friends, we see them support him only. And when there's an opportunity to show Aizawa being supportive like to Mic after Midnight's death, Hori doesn't take it. Hori instead makes Aizawa shut Mic up. Additionally, when you like someone and are friends with them - you make the effort to show you like their company, you like being around them, you engage with them. Aizawa acts annoyed by his friends most of the time he's with them on screen, like he's grudgingly tolerating them at best.

Then there's Bakugou who is praised as the second coming of Christ, who lost nothing for suicide baiting a quirkless kid (our MC) and abusing him for ten years! Instead Izuku still calls him "Kacchan" 🤮, Bkg has made friends who are staunchly "anti bully" in Mina and Kirishima (who look stupid or hypocrites for being friends with this POS), Aizawa even praises and favours him for some reason despite Bkg's power being astonishingly one note and Bkg having so much of an awful attitude for heroics the villians thought he was a good recruit. 😬 Bakugou is the worst written character I have seen in a long time - a true Gary Stu.

And finally we have Endeavour, the child abusing POS himself who gets a tragic backstory that none of us wanted to see (his father dying as a kid), we have blame shifting on to Rei and Touya with their respective insanity (also now blame shifted on to Rei's incestous fam by some fans) and some even saying "Endeav had Touya's best interests at heart all along" which truly makes me scoff. If Endeav had Touya's best interests he would have taught Touya to cool himself off, he would have found another interest for them to bond over and sent him to therapy. Not ignoring his spiralling son until he died then got saved by All For One.

In addition, Rei's entire character being used as an "Endeav is not that bad" mouth piece makes me sick, Endeavour broke this woman, physically, emotionally and sexually (depending on your reading but she didn't look consenting to Natsuo and Shoto's births) abused her. So this choice with her character doesn't even make sense, she couldn't even see Shoto, she burnt her child because he looked like Endeav! Why doesn't she loathe this man like she should?! It is sick. It's even sicker of Hori to make her say "We are all responsible for what happened." Like that isn't the most delusional and victim blaming shit to say to your children who couldn't have done squat against their hero father.

Then there's Shoto and his story being overshadowed again by his abusive father, his friendship with Izuku being made about forgiving said abusive father. Shoto deserved so much better than this.

TLDR - the victims of the story should have been allowed to show the impact of their abuse / teaching malpractice that they have dealt with.

Aizawa should have resigned his teaching job (that he didn't even want in the first place) and got therapy as well trying his best to make it up to all those whose lives he ruined.

Bakugou should have been expelled for being an abusive asshole and being too dumb to hide it.

Endeavour should have had the Todofam HATE his guts and no one in his corner coddling him when he cries about Dabi then later Dabi should have finished him off instead of sprouting ice randomly.

i swear white lotus has gotten dumber tho... like the repeated fake out scenes of the dad killing his family are so obvious and heavy handed like i know it's important for the audience to see that possibility but real viewers knew that family massacre suicide was an option as soon as we heard he was rich w a southern accent. obv

chase if he locked in

inspired by the tweet below