Dang, there really were patients and doctors in the hospital. And they really did leverage that against Spinner and his villain riot, hoping it’ll appeal to their morals to stop them.
They, completely intentionally, put all these innocent hospital patients lives on the line to use as moral meat shields to protect Kurogiri.
Wow.
We’re supposed to root for these guys? Because that’s the kind of stuff that gets AFO taking notes.
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All Might’s backpack looks suspiciously similar to Deku’s.
I kind of have a long-time minor theory that we will see him run into the fray flinging a backpack to bring things to full circle and make everyone act.
That theory has become a little bit more tangible now.
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BnHA Ch. 372 & 373 - Review, parallels & comparisons: Shining the light on leaders, followers, and independent thinkers.
Fun fact: This chapter is called “Friend” and so is Ch.319, where 1A confronts Endeavor in Nezu’s office and declares their intent to find, follow, and work alongside their friend Midoriya. Ch.258, with Hawks befriending Twice, is called “FriendS”.
372 & 373 give us more Present Mic with Shirakumo/Kurogiri, woohoo! I’m psyched, as I’ve grown to love Mic along with Aizawa (and my main blorbo All Might). But I feel like Mic gets the short end of the narrative stick quite a bit. Shirakumo was the undisputed leader of the Rooftop Trio, followed by Aizawa, with Mic rounding out the back. Shirakumo pulled them both along.
Without Shirakumo, Aizawa goes off on his own, even though his quirk is “best suited for teamwork.” Mic stays in their “formation” behind Aizawa, patiently waiting for his friend and giving him nudges when he can. Mic never intentionally shields Aizawa, as Aizawa is too headstrong for that. (Plus being shielded plays into Aizawa’s insecurities, so Mic doesn’t go that route.) Instead, Mic follows Aizawa’s lead.
That means Mic at his most aggressive & protective when he doesn’t know what’s going on inside his friend’s head. Unfortunately, that’s a lot, because Aizawa doesn’t actually open up to anyone. His friendship with Mic is based on proximity, presence, and shared trauma, not talking about feelings. As far as we know, Aizawa has only spoken about his injury and recovery with Nezu, and even then Aizawa cuts off Nezu’s speech about a wisp of hope to ask about Toga.
The one time Mic and Aizawa get close to talking about something meaningful is after Tartarus, when Aizawa asks Mic what he’d do to the people who turned Shirakumo into a Nomu. But Aizawa gets cut off and has to tend to Eri.
We never really know how Aizawa feels, and neither does Mic. When Aoyama is revealed as the traitor, Mic initially asks the kids to slow their roll and think about how Aoyama betrayed them. He wants to make sure a second betrayal isn’t in the cards. Aizawa then surprises Mic by offering Aoyama a chance, which causes Mic to fall in line behind his friend. I wrote about it more in the UA traitor chapters here:
In 372 & 373 we see Mic rush to Kurogiri’s side. Mic even leaves Shoji and Koda to handle the crowd — despite Aizawa asking him to protect the boys — so he can confront Spinner and stop Kurogiri from helping the villains. There’s a few things happening here: (1) obviously, Mic doesn’t want the heroes to lose; and (2) he doesn’t want his dead friend desecrated further as a puppet used to hurt the heroes. Mic addressing Kurogiri as “Shirakumo” and saying “if you’re still our friend…” has immediate parallels to Ch. 254, where Aizawa asks if Shirakumo is “still in there,” because if so then they can still be heroes. If Kurogiri wakes up and helps the villains, then everything Shirakumo stood for is gone, and Shirakumo is truly dead. Everything Aizawa hoped — that the trio could be heroes together — is gone. Aizawa’s hope dies here.
Kurogiri telling Mic he’s the protector of Tomura is also a direct callback to 254, where Mic reacted viciously until he saw that Aizawa was engaged and truly trying to find the wisp of his friend beneath the Nomu-fication. Mic knows the stakes for society and for his best friend. The question is what Mic will do next. Does he keep trying to reach Shirakumo? At what point does he concede his friend is really, truly, completely dead? If Kurogiri can think for himself — real, true independent thought — doesn’t that make him more than a puppet? What’s the difference between a programmed Nomu and an angry mob blindly following their leader’s voice?
Spinner also has a friend stuck beneath AFO’s distortions. Shigaraki may not be a “Nomu,” but he is a puppet with almost no will of his own anymore (it’s all down to Tenko). It’s not an accident we get flashbacks for both friend groups showing when times were simpler and their wills were their own. Look at Shirakumo’s hand and Spinner’s hand — open and gesturing towards their conversation partner. Horikoshi is drawing interesting parallels between Shirakumo/Shigaraki as victims of AFO, and Mic/Spinner as the ones who follow their friends.
Mic didn’t become a hero for Shirakumo or Aizawa, and in many ways he’s the opposite of Spinner — he’s loud, very public, and has always had his own style. People cosplay Mic and not the other way around. But Mic is often sent on missions without backup, and at heart he wants Aizawa to stand tall.
Aizawa has always had insecurity surrounding his quirk and his abilities. Unlike Shigaraki, who steadily grows in power until he’s overtaken by AFO, Aizawa has steadily lost power and accumulated injuries (courtesy of the League) throughout the manga. He’s angry, and Mic is angry for him. Moreover, Mic has his own trauma surrounding Shirakumo’s death, since the villain who brought down the building on Shirakumo used Mic’s quirk to do it. Aizawa then had his first big heroic moment taking down that villain by himself. How did he find the will to do it? He heard Shirakumo’s voice urging him on through a speaker — and Mic KNOWS it. Seeing Spinner try a voice recording to force Kurogiri to do AFO’s bidding HAS to be offensive, and it makes sense why Mic broke the device.
A voice can be powerful. A voice can be used to lead. It can be used to destroy. It can push someone forward or pull them into the past. How will Mic use his voice and his Voice in this situation? And when is Shinso showing up with his voice modulator????
Horikoshi really uses this chapter to draw an explicit parallel between voice and light/fire. There’s the heroic fire, started by All Might, that continues to burn bright and colorful against AFO’s black-and-white world of “me” and “not me.” When people stand tall and their voices are heard, they’re brought into that light.
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