I've Seen A Few Breakdowns On Yamada's Reaction To Aoyama And The Traitor Forgiveness/redemption Response

I've seen a few breakdowns on Yamada's reaction to Aoyama and the traitor forgiveness/redemption response and I think I've got a decent summary here. (This includes Aizawa's reaction too).

Yes we see Yamada is clearly protective, that much is absolutely clear without a doubt. A lot of people have kinda summarized it up to being just the way Yamada is.

But I've clicked that it's something further than that, this is not just Yamada's personality rising to the surface in these panels. This is where we involve Aizawa and his response. Because although Aizawa's response is still in a realm of possible responses within his character, isn't it a little, odd, to say the least, that Aizawa appears to approach it so lightly and so supportive initially at all?

Remeber that other post I did, about parallels of Izukus actions to Aizawa's?

These panels look familiar? (My post had the Japanese for Izuku cuz English hadn't dropped yet)

What were seeing is both Yamada's and Aizawa's trauma being reflected and their responses are directly tied to the Shirakumo/Kurogiri discovery.

Think about Yamada's position: he saw Aizawa struggle for years mourning Shirakumo's death, unable to do anything and knowing their relationship Aizawa absolutely shutting Yamada out from talking about his own pain from it. Aizawa took it and channeled it into avoidance and unhealthy, self destructive outlets, and I got a feeling Yamada at more than one point tried to talk about his feeling and Aizawa responded negatively (because he didn't want to address it). So Yamada bottled it up, he pushed it down, he put on a smile and pretended he was okay and decided to be there for his friend who - while outwardly was clearly showing signs of coping poorly - internally had chosen to attempt to ignore the pain at all costs.

Now Yamada has lost Kayama, he almost lost Aizawa a second time, and he's lost Shirakumo. And now he has seen these kids have been put at risk of losing each other (and experiencing the same pain him and Aizawa did) because of Aoyama's position. He saw how Kurogiri upset Aizawa, he saw how that has been a huge catalyst in how they responded to the Jaku raid. Now Yamada is seeing another child used by AFO and his first instinct is "not another shirakumo, not another kurogiri, not the same fate for these kids" and he jumps to this logic.

He sees Aizawa in these kids right now. He sees his own friend who was hurt, and traumatized, and has been near death twice now, and he can't bare the idea of seeing it happen again. His response comes from wanting to shield and avoid to keep them safe (much like he has with his own trauma and pain).

Then we have Aizawa: Who responds in the exact opposite.

Where Yamada sees Aizawa representing the kids, Aizawa sees Aoyama representing Shirakumo/Kurogiri. He sees an innocent, someone the class considered a friend, being taken and corrupted by AFO and Aizawa is responding to the upset he had seeing his own friend who is too far gone to save. (Supposedly, as Aizawa has said he talks to him everyday, regardless of that belief). Now Aizawa is seeing Shirakumo in Aoyama, but seeing him before he became Kurogiri. Aizawa sees Izuku doing the same thing he did with Kurogiri but with one substantial difference.

Aizawa sees that Aoyama can almost without a doubt be saved.

He's trying to save Shirakumo by saving Aoyama, by helping Izuku and his class do what he himself could not do for his own classmate.

Yamada quite possibly sees that, based on his reaction to Aizawa's support, but while Yamada is focusing his trauma into preserving the present, Aizawa is focusing his trauma on re-doing the past.

Both their responses to Aoyama are directly tied to their trauma with Shirakumo. So I have a very good feeling this will be brought up again in coming chapters.