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epickiya722 · 1 year

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[NOTE: This is long! This is an actual ask about Mineta and among other things that I thought maybe some of you may be interested in reading, but because the font is in orange (due to Tumblr glitching out on Anon and their autism) I'm posting it like this. I'm not too bothered by the color, but I'm sure there are others who may find it unreadable. Now, you do not have to read it. And if you do read it, you may comment or just send me an ask ONLY if you're polite. Don't attack anyone over this. No matter how you may feel about Mineta, BNHA, Horikoshi, a dog, a cat, ANYTHING or ANYONE... DO NOT BE DISRESPECTFUL. Please keep any of your comments that you know are rude to yourself. And now, you may proceed if you choose to.]

Horikoshi said once in some interview that mineta is essentially a self-insert. Coincidentally, early-mha horikoshi had some pretty pervy tendencies (much like mineta—probably why he thought it would be cool to have such a character never really face consequences). The most famous example of this is probably the girls hero costumes, most notably Yaoyorozu. He mentions in an aside very early on in the story (volume three or something?) that he can’t seem to help himself and her boob window always gets bigger every time he draws it. Then there’s uraraka saying she didn’t want such a tight costume, Hagakure being naked, etc. When the anime started airing there was another interview where he said he really appreciated them making uraraka curvier than in the manga, because he likes curvy women. One could also use midnight and mount lady as examples of this but I’d say it’s more of a way of discussing mature themes surrounding hero society and all of its consequences rather than actual sexualisation. Something that sets him apart, even at this early stage, from other shonen mangakas is that he doesn’t only do this to the women, but the men as well. If Yaoyorozus hero costume is revealing, what about kirishimas (this comparison is my favourite because they both need skin showing for their quirks to function well, so why is one considered bad and the other fine? Because one is a boy and one is a girl? Please keep in mind I am not trying to say that kirishima is sexualized. It’s just food for thought)? If urarakas suit is considered too tight, then look at all might. You could probably see the outline of his dick from fifteen yards away when he wears that costume. Then there’s mineta, who makes certain comments regarding the women in his class. But what about mount lady and how she treats shoto? Or one of the wild wild pussy cats asking the boys in class 1-A how old they are to see how long til she can marry them? Unlike basically every other shonen out there, the sexualisation (at least as far as I can tell) is not based in sexism. It’s across the board, and we only notice it more when it happens to women because we are used to it happening to women.

For a long time, I hated horikoshi for the same reasons I hated mineta (it was a love-hate relationship for obvious reasons). He was openly perverted and seemingly one of *those* guys. You know, the ones I’d be afraid to walk near after dark. Or before dark. But I still loved mha and really appreciated what he was doing within the story. As a side note, he writes the women very well, which is rare in shonen (again—love hate relationship with dear old horikoshi). But if you’ll notice, the farther along in the story you look, the less sexualisation there is. It’s gradual so you hardly notice, but compare volume four or five to volume thirty. The difference is stark. It’s not really that mineta has less lines (although since the war started that has been the case) he still talks, just differently.

I think what happened is, when mha started getting popular, horikoshi started seeing huge pushback to minetas character, which probably all came to a head when the anime made him say something super fucked up to eri. I don’t recall if it was in dub or sub or both, but reading back through the manga it’s a bit different and honestly could’ve been poor translation or my own misinterpretation. But in the anime it was clear what he meant. He can’t wait for eri to be older, for exactly the reason you’re thinking now. The process of horikoshi realizing his mistakes started long before this, though, and gradually you can watch him patch up the holes if you pay attention. The anime does a poor job of this, at least until season six. But around the time that season four ends (and this is present in the manga too) there is a scene of Mina tying mineta to a chair and forcing him to watch something. After that, the sexualisation in the manga is gone for good. I’d like to interpret this as horikoshi finalizing his realization and own personal character development. He is no longer pervy, just like mineta is no longer pervy.

The one exception to this rule is that infamous chapter cover. The one with Hagakure on the front? Yeah, when I saw that, it made me rethink all of this. For about two weeks I was convinced that I’d been wrong about it, and he really is just a pervert after all. But lo and behold, he said in an interview that he was running behind and didn’t have time to draw or pick a chapter cover. He handed a bunch of old concept art to one of the higher ups and told them to pick something. He said he was never expecting that drawing to see the light of day, and he figured they’d choose something a little more suited to the story. (A little fucked up that he drew that? Yes, I think so. But keep in mind, these are *old* drawings. People are allowed to change and, following this metric, I think horikoshi has changed quite a bit.)

All of this is to say, mineta is not really a bad person anymore, and also has incredible writing (whether it was purposeful from the beginning or a last minute change) which just goes to show how talented horikoshi really is.

#I'm working on 45 minutes of sleep today like at this moment #not kiya's thoughts #kiya answers #bnha #mha #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #mineta minoru #minoru mineta #horikoshi kohei

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firesmokeandashes · 8 months

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How many people are actually quirkless in My Hero Academia?

We know that roughly 80% of the population had quirks, as stated by All Might in one of the episodes. Leaving 20% of the population without them. Now, 20% might not seem like a lot of people until you put the numbers in your calculator and see just how big the number actually is.

Going off the current population number of 8 billion, 80% of that number would be 6,400,000,000 (six billion four hundred million). Six hundred billion, four hundred MILLION people with super human abilities spread out between 7 different continents!

That's roughly 914,285,714.28571(nine hundred fourteen million two hundred eighty-five thousand seven hundred fourteen point twenty-eight thousand five hundred seventy-one hundred-thousandths) people in each continent with a quirk!!

Leaving, 1,600,000,000 (one billion six hundred million) people without quirks! If spread out evenly between continents, that would leave roughly 228,571,428.57143 (two hundred twenty-eight million five hundred seventy-one thousand four hundred twenty-eight point fifty-seven-thousand one hundred forty-three hundred-thousandths) people in each continent!

Divided up by 195 countries, that's 8,205,128.2051282 (eight million two hundred five thousand one hundred twenty-eight point two million fifty-one thousand two hundred eighty-two ten-millionths) quirkless people in each country, if divided up evenly.

Given the current population of Japan being 123,207,079 (one hundred twenty-three million two hundred seven thousand seventy-nine), the number of quirkless people living in Japan should be a fairly good amount.

Of course, sense Mha takes place in an alternate universe, and in the future, the population is probably a lot bigger, meaning there would be an even bigger number of both people with quirks and people without them.

So basically, what I'm trying to say is, with such a large number of people being quirkless in the world, why do so many people hold disdain towards them?

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everytsukauchi · 1 year

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#bnha #naomasa tsukauchi #anime #season 3 #episode 45

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delawaredetroit · 3 months

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As much as Kirishima and Izuku get compared to each other for their cheery demeanors and middle school depression, here is a clear distinction between them.

Because it's Kirishima and Bakugou who chose names that directly put their futures in the shadow of the older heroes they aspire to be like. Izuku on the other hand chose a name representing his own path based on his own origin. And then there's Shouto, who continues to reclaim his personhood by refusing to make any distinction between himself as a hero and Shouto as a person.

#bnha reread #bnha 45 #bnha #kirishima eijirou #midoriya izuku #bakugou katsuki #todoroki shouto

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thebearchives · 1 year

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finally caught up with the new season of bnha,,,,i need the next 12 episodes NOW.

#i’m literally having a fucking mental breakdown #at 3:45 am #don’t keep up w the manga so every episode and reveal was so :0 #i knew of touya but i didn’t know it was revealed this arc #same w aizawa’s leg #ALSO GIVE ME MORE IZUKU AND ERI INTERACTIONS #I LOVR THEM #— anime #bnha

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found-fam-trope · 10 months

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You Want It Darker Podfic, chapters/episodes 75 & 76 (of 90) are out now, with 77 & 78 recorded and queued up to release soon!

I'm hoping to have it all finished by the 24th.

#YWID #you want it darker #podfic #podfic length 30-45 mins #aizawa shouta #shinsou hitoshi #bnha #my hero academia #Spotify

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charmedreincarnation · 11 months

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My shift to Bnha

I’ll start with the basics. For starters my reality is a bit different. The legal age is 25, so therefore school duration is longer, and our ages are different. I start UA when I was 19 years old, which made me a year 1 student. my parents are both prominent figures in hero society, and I was an only child to them. I only add this because I think it’s important to acknowledge background information because it shapes your experience and your placement in society, especially in a world filled with heroes everything is ranked and merit based.

UA .⋅ ۵♡۵ ⋅.

Contrary to popular belief, at least in my reality school is very much emphasized and just as important as hero work. For me a typical day looked like, getting up at 7:45 to prepare for classes that started at 8:30 and ending at 5. We do have a one hour lunch break, and a specific period to work on our specific quirks alone any way we see fit. A lot of people do use that time to slack off and hang out with friends, but they’ve recently become very strict about it. Credits to to Tenya Ida for informing the board of what people were really doing ! A lot of people were mad but honestly I am a teachers pet in this reality so I kind of appreciated it.

I can’t speak for the other classes, maybe it’s because of everything we went to, but we are not a class we are genuinely family. I am closest to Izuku, Sui, Ochacho, Mina, Todoroki and MoMo! Not in any particular order. I’m not going to talk about everyone but here are some of the reasons I love them <3

•Mina is just as extroverted quirky and bubbly as you would expect. Shes one of those people you meet and you can’t help but adore because they energy is so welcoming and they’re so loving. She’s kind of a prankster and a rumor starter and I find it hilarious. You can’t keep anything from her, though but once she has a narrative she has narrowed upon, you have a better chance of changing the devils mind.

For example i talked about this in a different post, but she started a rumour that bakugo is in love with izuku and that’s why he’s mad all the time. It got back to bakugo and he threatened to turn the cafeteria into a live bake oven. It’s honestly hilarious how she can make a whole room laugh. Or make anyone mad.. I guess it’s a talent regardless.

•Sui is the sweetest girl ever. She kind of keeps to herself but she’s honest and what you see is what you get. She’s also kind of emotional and I am kind of a cry baby too there so we get each other. We really just want to do our best and see everyone succeed. I would say both of us made friendships are bigger priority than hero training and we have both been called out for it too.

•Ochacho is very similar to Mina but she can also get down to business when she needs to. Everyone loves her, and her powers are super helpful in any situation, like for sneaking out quietly… but I wouldn’t know anything about that. I vividly remember having a conversation about our hero progress and she’s deeply insecure. She grew up impoverished and Monterey compensation is one of the reasons that really encouraged her to be a hero. I remember one time she was telling me how impressive I was during the first few weeks of school because I had a better handle on my quirk than her. She said something of how I was meant to be a hero. It made me sad because I admired her will and determination more than anyone. I had so many factors that put me ahead in some of my peers. My mother is a pro hero and I went to a profound middle school that molded me to be ready. I told her she was born to be a hero and I was made to be a hero. I was being honest and I didn’t think it meant anything but she always reminds me of how she thinks about that anytime she’s in a situation where she needs help. Nothing made me happier

•Momo and my quirks are very similar. My quirk is called clairvoyance somnium, and my hero name is dreamer. Kind of what she can do but I visualize whatever I need. I can also do more things that I won’t get into but a lot of it, I was inspired by my shifting methods ! Anyways she’s the sweetest and we live pretty close to each other so I’ve seen her around for a while. She’s honestly very gorgeous and we both struggle with insecurities and anxiety, so she really is someone I relate and rely on. Maybe it’s because our quirks or so similar or we have similar backgrounds and personalities but… she’s probably the person I am closest with! But I really do love everyone equally

Bakugo .⋅ ۵♡۵ ⋅.

Ok lots of people ask about him so let’s go.

Yes he’s so loud and always angry. You know I thought i would be scared of him but I honestly even I even give him snarky remarks sometimes (in a nice way because I am so nice in this dr) but wow he is the loudest person I’ve ever met in any dr but his powers are amazing we all respect it

Contrary to popular belief..no one is scared of him. As angry, loud and aggressive as he is he has proven time and time again all he wants to do is be a hero. Honestly it surprised some of us but everyone knows he has kind of good intentions under his wrath ??

He also makes everything a competition and he’s actually good at eveything. He’s good at school I’m pretty sure he placed after me in mid terms ! I got third and he got fourth. He’s a great cook and baker. We had a baking competition and he placed after sato. We made ramen and he made the best ramen ! Like he’s not as dumb as he looks. He’s also in a one sided competition with Todoroki but as we have all noticed he doesn’t give a fuck.

Powers .⋅ ۵♡۵ ⋅.

This may be egotistical but I could not imagine not being a hero in a world with 80% hero. Don’t let the league of villains hear this it will fuel their fire. 🥲 in all seriousness we are lectured that we are not better than anyone, and we are simply stronger than other people and that is it so we shouldn’t let it conflate our egos. The only way we would be given the green flag to pat our own backs is when are abilities begin to save millions of lives. But then I guess if we’re only being heroes to look good then would that really make us heroes. At least that’s what I wrote about in my English essay. Present mic did in fact eat it up, I got an amazing grade on it. But that’s not the point. The point is it’s easy to get a big head but we were simply genetically lucky, not better, smarter, etc.

Now that philosophy is behind us, having powers is so cool and coming back here the limits of other realities having no bounds never fails to amaze me. Our quirks are an extension of ourselves and literally are us. It’s not second nature, it’s first nature after having these abilities for so long. Especially my quirk, if I wanted I could “dream” 500 million yen, and well I wouldn’t be able to put it in the bank but I digress. Finding out what your quirk can do and how far your cbs push your limits always allows us to be going through moments of self discovery. Having a quirk is honestly it’s own life alone, and I genuinely could not be happier.

My favorite classes .⋅ ۵♡۵ ⋅.

As a student in this incredible universe, I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to pursue many amazing topics of study.

One class I took was Hero Studies, where we learned about the many different hero theories and methods of justice, as well as what it takes to become an effective hero. We also discussed the history of the hero world and its evolution throughout the years. It was a fascinating subject and definitely one of my favorites!

The next class I took was Quirk Studies. Here we learned all about quirks, their effects on people and how they can be used to help protect civilians and stop villains. We even discussed how to best work with a partner with a different quirk, and how to combine two quirks to create a unique and powerful attack.

Finally, I also took a class called Combat Training. This class taught us all about combat techniques and how to use the environment and our natural abilities in order to survive any situation. We learned how to effectively dodge and block attacks, as well as how to use our quirks to create powerful attacks.

We of course also had the general classes of math, English, science, math, and music

The classes at UA High were some of the most interesting classes I have ever taken and I am so grateful for having the opportunity to explore them. Not only did I learn a lot about the world of My Hero Academia, but I also grew as a person and as a hero.

Random funny story .⋅ ۵♡۵ ⋅.

I’m going to tell you one of the funniest most embarrassing things that happened during the UA sports festive. This happened during the third event, when we were in teaams.

I was with Izuku, mei, Ochako, and fumikage. Everyone is trying to steal the headband from us because Izuku has all the points ! Everyone was targeting us and it was so unfair. during the last few seconds I started running to dream us a tower so we can hide and to grow into to the skies. Then someone came so they threw me the headband and i I was waiting for them but then they got attacked and they told me just go without them !?? I was literally shaking and my anxiety was at an all time high time so I quirked my tower or whatever and made it grow and then the time ran out! I had the headband and we thought we won and we were cheering but umm no. I was the only winner technically because I wasn’t with my team. BUT because that took away FROM the point of the team work part I was deducted points from my own Individual points because that wasn’t the point of the challenge. Honestly you win some you lose some. It was a fun experience regardless.

Also honestly i shifted here around the time of the World Cup, which I could not care less about, but I get the hype of sports witnessing Izuku’s fight against Shinso (manipulation guy.) it was so awesome !!! I was at the edge of my seat the entire time!!! So I guess Now I understand how some people feel about sports lol. By the end of the festival, I got third place overall and my mom was so proud of me. It was the honestly a great feeling.

Random dump with no correlation

my mother (Uwabami’s) Quirk gives her a trio of live snakes growing from her head. One of the snakes have acute senses, allowing her to locate hidden criminals and disaster victims.one snakes also has a scent that can make her victims mindless slaves, one snake produces poison and attacks her victims.

my father who also attended UA with my mom has Squirmy Fingers (can precisely bend and control his fingers, giving him great dexterity) As well as a High Scientific knowledge Skills IQ in engineering. I found this interesting because usually children are a combination of their parents quirks or either or, and mine has nothing to do with either lol.

Todoroki’s pretty smart though he places after Bakugou in the mid terms. he also loves to read ! He’s also politically educated and actually had profound knowledge on the history of heroes and how and why he believe hero’s and villains came to be so.. surprisingly he is more philosophical than I would think. He doesn’t really talk about it or bring it up because if you have a good conversation with him and get him to open up it is always worth.

Food

Tbh to no surprise the food options were eclectic and varied. There was something for everyone! I had everything from traditional Japanese dishes such as ramen and sushi, to western and American-style dishes like pizza and burgers. I even had access to a variety of international cuisines like Indian, Chinese, and Korean.

One of my favorite places to get a good meal was the school cafeteria. Every day it was full of delicious options, from freshly-cooked dishes to the convenience of pre-packaged items. There were also lots of drinks and snacks available. On certain days, the cafeteria also served special meals such as curry or tonkatsu.

If I was looking for something a bit more fast-paced, there were several food stalls and restaurants around town. I could find an assortment of things like ramen, takoyaki, and okonomiyaki. There were also locations that offered more unique dishes such as Japanese-style hamburgers or omurice (Omelette Rice).

Although I often ate at restaurants, I also cooked meals in my dorm room. I could make simple dishes with ingredients from the local grocery store, like fried rice, or make something more complicated with ingredients from the nearby specialty grocery store. I even tried my hand (well with sato as well) at making dango, the traditional Japanese dessert.

Tbh No matter what type of food I was looking for, UA had it though. With all of the different options available, there was something to satisfy whatever cravings I had.

I also write and speak in English so don’t ask any language questions because I do not know

#law of assumption #manifesation #manifesting #reality shifting #shiftblr

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stillness-in-green · 7 months

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On Heteromorphs & Heteromorphobia (Arcs VI - X , Hero Killer to Provisional License Exam)

(This post will also cover the bonus chapter “Tsuyu's Ribbity Diary.”)

Thank you all for your amazing response to last week's post, my goodness! I thought I'd found about all the audience I was likely to get for my harping about heteromorphic discrimination, so I was delighted to see a number of new names!

I do have to warn you all, if you haven't done much looking into my archives, that I'm pretty critical of BNHA these days, especially of the ways it insists on holding up individualistic solutions to problems clearly established as systemic in nature. That will become more apparent when I get into the post-war material, as the endgame is absolutely rotten with it.

This week, though, we'll start by getting out of the school to get a look at signs of and contributors to heteromorphobia in the wider world.

The Vs. Hero Killer Arc (Chapters 45-59)

Chapter 45:

Mina’s preferred alias, Alien Queen, in reference to the Xenomorph queen from the Aliens franchise, is turned down by Midnight. The reason for this is never made especially clear. Class 1-B gets away with a number of villainous or monstrous hero names, like Phantom Thief and Gevaudan, violent ones like Battle Fist, even an animal reference in Jack Mantis. But Mina, for whatever reason, gets pushed towards the indescribably twee Pinky instead. Does Midnight the R-rated hero not think girls should get to have hero names with some edge? Surely not; her entire persona is based on titillation. Length is clearly not a factor, given that Midnight personally approves Can’t Stop Twinkling. I don’t know exactly what went down here (from a Watsonian perspective, that is; the Doylist guesses are readily apparent and all eyeroll-inducing), so I will simply point out that a non-baseline gal wanted to name herself after a famous monster with acidic blood and was pressured into going with something cutesy based on her skin color instead. Bakugou’s choice gets turned down as well,[1] but he actually has “murder,” like, right there in the name; Alien Queen is quite roundabout by comparison!

Chapter 48:

Introduction of Uwabami, the Pro Hero gal with the head snakes. She’s a bit of a weird case. Given that all we know she does is find hidden people using the snakes’ keen senses, do they have some self-awareness that makes them able to communicate with her—a case somewhat like Tokoyami and Dark Shadow, perhaps? Does she just tap into their senses at will rather than being able to speak to them? Or are they rather just extensions of herself, with no particular consciousness of their own, and they function like what must be a fairly dizzying array of extra-sensory perception that she receives at all times? Whatever the case, she’s a model and celebrity, and thus our first clear example of a heteromorph who doesn’t seem to suffer for her looks. Her looks are, of course, quite accentuated, given that her hero costume is a low-cut evening dress with a slit in the side up to her hip. Other than the hair-serpents, she’s a baseline woman who checks all the boxes for modern beauty standards; she will serve in this fashion as a good predictor of other highly ranked heteromorphic Heroes.

Chapter 51+55:

Endeavor, as will be made clear in Chapter 55, doesn’t really have any idea what the Noumu’s deal is. As far as he knows, it’s just like any other villain—and yet in Chapter 51, he opens up with an attack that bathes the Noumu in flame anyway, and comments in 55 that he’s never known anyone to remain conscious after such an attack. While I think this mostly speaks to the general brutality with which villains are treated by heroes—much different from standard police practice in real-life Japan!—it’s nonetheless notable that the Noumu he attacked with such casual ferocity certainly doesn’t look very baseline to the casual eye, between the exposed brain, the significant height, and the crawling movement.

Chapter 56:

Midoriya is startled by Chief Tsuragamae’s “woof” interjections. He doesn’t comment on it out loud, so I’m not inclined to hold it against him (not like someone else I’m about to bring up), but it wouldn't be the first time he’s come across this kind of vocalization: Tsuyu makes ribbit noises pretty frequently.

Tsuragamae notes that the authorization of a certain class of people, called “heroes,” to weaponize their quirks against others was initially a heavily criticized decision, one which only garnered public support because those original heroes were careful to always obey the laws dictating the circumstances in which they used their quirks. He goes on to say, of using one’s quirk to inflict harm without explicit instruction from the powers-that-be, “Such action would represent a stunning breach of law.” Like Thirteen before him, he completely omits any mention of how such laws disproportionately affect heteromorphs, who can’t turn off a permanent physical trait, and, particularly in cases of people whose entire bodies are divergent, have little choice in whether or not to use their quirk in any sort of physical altercation that might lead to harm.

Shouto, angry over what he perceives as punishment for a good deed, calls Tsuragamae a mutt. The chief doesn’t react particularly strongly to this, but as the chief of police, you have to imagine he’s pretty used to the slings and arrows of public opinion. The incident passes without comment, but it will not be the last time we hear a Todoroki derisively referring to another human being as an animal.

There are some sweatdrops and exhortations to get the kid to cool it, but those were ongoing before the animal words came out.

Chapter 57:

Gran Torino notes that the age they live in, for better or for worse, is one of suppression, and that the situation with Stain and the League will draw people out who are influenced by that ideology. Gran doesn’t elaborate on exactly what sorts of people he has in mind—All Might says only, “Then heroes will deal with them,”—but it’s an early hint that there are people in this society who feel unjustly suppressed. Crucially, Gran Torino doesn’t even necessarily think those people are wrong; he just thinks it’s a necessary evil. But what, exactly, is it that he’s grudgingly accepting as inevitable for the sake of maintaining the status quo? And how might his circumstances need to differ for him to have a different opinion?

In Chapter 27, we learned that producing support goods requires a government license; here we find out, courtesy of Giran, that dealing in and producing support goods without such a license is a major crime. So if you, for any reason, failed that “rigorous examination” to get cleared for support goods for quality-of-life reasons, you’re unlikely to find someone who’ll just provide them to you out of sympathy provided you keep quiet about where you got them. Instead, you have little choice but to turn to black market brokers—all because the government doesn’t think your quirk is affecting you negatively enough to qualify you for support equipment. Again, this isn’t specifically about heteromorphs, but someone having an emitter quirk they can’t control well who needs the support item because they are choosing to pursue a career requiring them to learn that control is a very different case than someone who needs government support because of an immutable, always-on physical trait.

This chapter contains the first appearances of both Gigantomachia and Spinner, both fairly extreme heteromorphs: Machia for his size and rocky hide, and Spinner for animal traits considerably more prominent than e.g. Tokoyami’s bird head or even Tsuyu’s conglomeration of mildly froggy traits. Indeed, Spinner’s heteromorphic traits are so much more prominent than something like Jirou’s earlobes that it hardly seems accurate to even categorize their bodies the same way.

The sidebar for Daikaku Miyagi, the anchorman with the quirk that gave him two big horns who amputated one so that it would be less in the way during newscasts and other things that required there to be a camera on him. This in and of itself wouldn’t necessarily be notable, save that the same extra goes on to describe how the decision garnered some backlash from “a certain human rights group” who said that decisions like his fostered discrimination and were linked to the rejection of quirk-based society on the whole. Horikoshi further notes that he enjoys thinking about the lives and stories behind minor characters—even this far back, then, three and a half years before the introduction of the CRC, we have concrete evidence that the author was thinking about quirk-based discrimination and the politicization of heteromorphic features.

Chapter 59:

All Might drops some exposition about the Advent of the Exceptional, during which we see an image of a crowd full of implied-quirkless people holding up signs proclaiming their humanity and the monstrosity of those with quirks. Conversely, three of the four quirked people we see have obvious physical divergence from baseline human appearance. So from early on, that “monster” turn of phrase was heavily associated with changes in the physical appearances of those with special abilities. Later on, the PLF advisor at the hospital will tie these two things together explicitly.

The Final Exams Arc (Chapters 60-69)

Chapter 61:

Ectoplasm’s character sheet. The teeth are creepy no matter which way you cut it, but they look much more profoundly unsettling when they’re right there on his unmasked face, as opposed to behind a black cowl, where you can let your eye fool you that they are in some way part of its design. His hero costume, naturally, includes the cowl, but his daily clothes do not—I wonder if he ever tried to have a gentle talk with Shouji about why Shouji wears the mask even in his downtime? I wonder even more how much the teaching staff in general, and Nedzu and Aizawa specifically, actually know about Shouji’s history. o It’s also noted that Ecloplasm looks scary, but has received continued support after coming back to the job after losing both legs in a fight with a villain—we see this same pattern with Jeanist after Kamino. No word on how regular his support was before the traumatic double limb loss, though.

Chapter 66:

Nedzu, we find, was “toyed with by humans in all sorts of ways in the past.” Nothing we know about him suggests that he has any particular longevity, but his dynamic with Endeavor,[2] many chapters down the line, does suggest to me that he was at least on the staff when with Endeavor was at UA some thirty years ago. Thirty years is within the span of All Might’s career, well after society began to stabilize with the formalization of the Hero System. And yet, despite that, a sentient being, one with human—above human!—intelligence, was mistreated badly enough that he bears a grudge to this day. Nedzu is, again, not in precisely the same situation as a human heteromorph, but he serves as an indicator of what humans have, even in the age of heroes, been willing to do to those they think of as “animals.”

A shot of Koda and his mother, who look much alike. Interestingly, the biggest difference in their appearance is that she has horn-like protrusions that her son lacks. We’re a long way from the first quirk evolutions, and even farther from Koda’s quirk evolution, but we will later see Koda’s mother specifically tie those horns to her animal communication quirk becoming more powerful. This makes for another good piece of evidence towards Horikoshi having a grasp of heteromorphobia from early on, as the evidence is pretty good that Koda-mama got those horns as a result of a quirk evolution of her own, and those don’t happen under normal, non-stressful circumstances. More on Koda’s parents in a bit, as they're a pretty stand-out case in another way that isn’t immediately apparent here.

Can we call it foreshadowing for Koda defending Shouji at the hospital that Koda is wearing the same scarf as the main character in Horikoshi's Oumagadoki Zoo? Hmm. I'll leave that one to codenamesazanka.

Chapter 67:

A flashback panel to Mineta’s days in middle school. While I don’t doubt that there are P L E N T Y of reasons Mineta would be unpopular with the girls in his class, it is nonetheless notable that the popular boy getting showered with attention is perfectly baseline, while Mineta and his friends are not.

Note also that the cute heteromorph girl has long-ish ears and no other obvious divergent features.

Chapter 68:

Shouji and Iida are specifically called out to at the mall, trying to attract them as customers with claims that whichever storefront employee is hailing them can help them find anything they need. Midoriya mutters to himself about the difficulties of catering to everyone, given the many different types of quirks scattered across multiple age groups.

Crowd scenes at the mall show scattered numbers of heteromorphs, a somewhat higher number than usual for such civilian crowd scenes. The Kiyashi Ward Shopping Mall is noted for being the biggest and trendiest in the prefecture, with a variety that attracts lots and lots of people, so perhaps it’s no surprise to see somewhat more heteromorphs than usual there.

The Forest Training Camp Arc (Chapters 70-83)

Chapter 70:

Introduction of the Wild Wild Pussycats. A team of three Emitters and a Transformation-type, none of them in the slightest heteromorphic (give or take Tiger’s permanent :3 mouth), they nonetheless theme themselves after cats, including fake tails, big costume paw gloves, and cat-ear-esque headsets. It’s cute and unobjectionable in and of itself, but I do wonder what people like e.g. Officer Sansa think of it.

Chapter 71:

Shouji is missing from the hot springs scene. It doesn’t hugely stand out in the moment because Aoyama and Sero aren’t there either, but it does read a bit differently with the benefit of hindsight. Given the strong possibility that Aoyama is off doing Traitor Activities and Shouji is avoiding any possibility of having to torpedo the hot springs fun-times with an explanation of that time he was savagely beaten by people in his hometown right in an open street, it kinda leaves Sero as the only one who maybe just skipped for normal reasons, like that hot springs would gunk up his tape or something.

Chapter 73:

Bakugou addresses Ojiro as “Tail”—referring to him by his heteromorphic trait. He’s not even particularly angry at the moment; he’s just still nursing a grudge about Todoroki’s underwhelming performance in their Sports Festival match and wants to swap partners for the Test of Courage. Early Bakugou is very much a “judge a person by their quirk” sort.

Pixie Bob ushers Tsuyu and Ochaco into the woods for their turn at the Test of Courage by referring to the latter as Uraraka-kitty and the former as Ribbit-kitty.[3] While in the English, this reads as a baseline woman in a cat costume referring to the heteromorphic student by her animal-themed verbal tic and the baseline student by her actual name, uraraka is a fairly onomatopoeic way to say bright and cheerful. I would guess that Pixie Bob is probably referring to Ochaco’s personality here, which makes it somewhat less egregious. It won’t be the last time someone refers to Tsuyu via the frog sound instead of her name, though.

Chapter 75:

Mandalay telepathically compliments Spinner, calling him both cool and handsome. While I doubt he’s the only person in the world who’d react the way he does—he blushes, gets flustered, and missteps, giving Mandalay an opportunity to attack him—the moment does get some new context when you consider how everyone called him “the lizard freak” in his hometown. Approximately zero people calling him cool and handsome back there, one imagines! Having it immediately turn out to be a ploy likely informs some of the outraged anger in his response.

Chapter 81:

Mandalay points out that Spinner never used his quirk during their combat, implying that she doesn’t think just his lizard-like appearance or his claws “count.” Chalk another one up to the classification problems of “heteromorph” as a descriptive term. This will turn out to rather neatly illustrate one of the issues I’ve been talking about with regard to the way heteromorphs are unfairly disadvantaged by the current laws about public quirk use. Remember, a “Villain” is someone using their quirk illegally. So if Mandalay doesn’t think Spinner used a quirk here, and since he has no record, why does he get categorized as a Villain instead of just a garden variety criminal? Now, one could say that by associating with the League of Villains, Spinner is rather claiming the designation for himself, and we don’t know how the legal system will technically classify him, when and if he ever actually faces trial. To that, I would say to hold the thought, because Skeptic will eventually back me up on the, “Heteromorphs are unfairly targeted by Villain designations,” claim all but word for word.

BONUS CHAPTER 1: Tsuyu’s Ribbety Diary

We meet Tsuyu’s family, all various froggy types. They’re a cute family, but the husband and wife both being froggy kind of raises some questions about pressures that might exist about marrying your same “type,” or at least refraining from marrying anyone too obviously not. I’d be more willing to wave it off if not for two things. First, we get the same sort of scenario from Spinner’s character sheet, that his is “a family full of reptilian quirks.” Second, there are very few romances in the series between someone close to “baseline” and someone with a more extreme heteromorphic appearance. The most obvious, clear-cut, canonical example is Koda’s parents—his dad has slightly weird hair but is otherwise entirely baseline; we see him defending his wife from other peoples’ mockery. That, of course, is a single panel limited to a flashback inside a flashback, so not exactly very visible to the reader! The next-most significant one I can come up with is Natsuo and his mouse girlfriend, who has likewise been seen in one (1) panel, had no dialogue, and whose appearance and identity were so incidental the anime deleted her entirely. Who’s next? Well, if you assume all those No Comments from Kamui Woods and Mount Lady about their relationship are indicative of a relationship between them, they’d be another, though we don’t actually know what Shinji actually looks like under his mask, only the implication that it’s divergent enough that he prefers to cover his face. Next up on my tally would be Thief Takami and Tomie, but since the sum total of Takami’s animal traits are tiny little elbow wings, you can see how fast the drop-off is there. Compare this to the number of pairings/families we have between people of like type: Bakugou’s parents, Iida’s, Jirou’s, Aoyama’s, Tsuyu’s, Ochaco’s, Shouto’s, Toga’s, Spinner’s, and Tomura’s whole family on both sides. Then you get the ship-teasy stuff that’s more about crushes, people dating, or hints that are perceived as pointing towards epilogue romances: Deku and Ochaco, Jirou and Kaminari, Shindo and Yo, Gentle and La Brava, Miss Joke’s flirting with Aizawa, and Toga’s variety of crushes (among which Tsuyu is the most distant from Toga’s own body type).[4] I think Kirishima and Mina are right on that borderline, with Mina having a normal body type but a collection of minor but highly visible divergent traits. So like, the vast, vast majority of the romantic relationships in the show are between relatively baseline people. In that context, it sticks out like a sore thumb to me that Tsuyu and Spinner are both explicitly said to have the same type of animal heteromorph quality on both sides of their family tree. It’s not an incest concern or anything, just that I wonder what the pressure is on cross-type couples, or what social circles look like post-graduation.

Two classmates talk about how it’s hard to tell what Tsuyu is thinking; one of them says, with her eyes hooded and a kind of cool expression, “That expression of hers never changes. Maybe ‘cuz she’s a frog?”

Tsuyu tells us that she never really made any friends; while some of this may simply be because Tsuyu didn’t have much time to socialize, between hero training and looking after her family, it’s also true that all of her classmates that we see have baseline appearances.

This lasts until she starts getting stalked by a snake-headed heteromorph girl named Mangusu Habuko—a fellow loner. Tsuyu is initially frightened by Habuko’s behavior, but has an intuitive sense for what the deal is, that Habuko wants to be friends but is awkward and doesn’t know how to broach it.

When asked if she wants to be friends, Habuko flips out. She calls herself treacherous and untrustworthy; she calls Tsuyu a foolish frog and says she must be joking, and that she should choose her friends more carefully. She then immediately dissolves into tears. Somehow, I doubt all this self-loathing about her innate nature manifested out of thin air!

The Hideout Raid Arc (Chapters 84-97)

Something that’s observable throughout this arc is that we’re in another sequence, like the Sports Festival, where the percentage of people with heteromorphic features in the crowd shots tends to run a bit higher than the norm of the series to date. Unlike the Sports Festival, though, these crowds are just civilians, not heroes. So what’s the difference between Kamino and the earlier on-the-street crowd scenes? Well, the neighborhood the Noumu warehouse is in is a somewhat rougher area. Part of the visual shorthand for that is people in edgier clothes, stuff that’s indicative of districts with bars, clubs, sleazy hangout spots, and so forth, but another shorthand is an increased number of heteromorphs.

These panels are respectively from Chapters 87 and 92.

Chapter 87:

The character sheet for Kamui Woods notes that the story of his early childhood is “grand and compelling,” and that his story was made into a documentary. That, to me, has Inspiring True Story written all over it. Probably not coincidentally, Kamui Woods is another character whose face we’ve never seen. As more pointing in the direction of him having a childhood marked by severe discrimination, he’s not sure of his age—it’s given as “29 since he started counting.” So was he abandoned as an infant for his weird face? I could come up with other explanations, all equally over the top (extreme confinement, for example, that left him unable to properly mark the passage of time), but the fact that he can’t e.g. look up a birth certificate for himself suggests that whatever went so wrong for him, it happened very early. …Though I suppose there’s the possibility that he’s not human, but rather a tree that manifested a quirk. As documentary-worthy origins go, though, that feels less Inspiring True Story and more Educational Biopic About Rare Phenomenon.

The Provisional Hero License Exam Arc (Chapters 98-121)

Chapter 99:

Shouji’s room is shown, all but barren. He says that he doesn’t care much about owning things, but knowing what we come to know about his history, it’s easy to wonder if he really doesn’t care about owning things or if this is rooted in a childhood in which it was believed that anything he touched would be polluted. Not a situation that led to him being given much of his own, one suspects!

Chapter 103:

This chapter introduces Yokumiru Mera, from the HPSC, who gives an opening statement that has some very interesting ruthlessness lurking in its subtext. Particularly relevant to our current topic is his comment that in the modern era, the time it takes to resolve a given incident is incredibly short, so the test that year will be prioritizing speed. Prioritizing speed (wouldn’t want some other hero to get the metaphorical kill first, after all!) is a surefire way to guarantee that heroes are not taking the time to really examine all factors in a situation or make any attempts whatsoever at calm, considered de-escalation, but rather are just making snap judgements based on their biases and gut reactions. Guess what group of people that’s going to disproportionately impact? o Now, it’s notable that Mera says the test prioritizes speed, but the conclusion many others come to is that the test only pretends to do so; that actually, it prioritizes care and information gathering. Indeed, we find a few chapters later that the actual priority is teamwork, as requested by police higher-ups—the idea is to fill in the gap left behind by All Might with hero squads that work well together.[5] However, while the intention may be to gather those good at teamwork, it certainly doesn’t stop people like Shouto and Inasa from cruising through—and, in any case, whether the groups learn teamwork or not doesn’t take away from an HPSC rep telling them to their face that speed of incident resolution is one of the most important things to a modern hero and never following that up with any kind of amendment or clarification.

Chapter 107:

Introduces the HUC, or Help Us Company, professionals trained to act as victims in disaster rescue exercises. Given that context—what they’re communicating to students training to understand what “victims” look and act like—it’s extremely worth examining what they, well, look like.

God, this is so Yikes.

And having asked that question, we find that the only people in this group that might not be baseline—the ones with short, childlike statures—are dressed to emphasize that stature. The end effect is a crowd of “victims” with not a single heteromorphic representative.

Chapter 109:

Shiketsu’s class rep, Mora Nagamasa—the extremely hairy one—approaches Bakugou to extend an apology for Shishikura’s behavior during the exam. It’s noticeable here that, having matured somewhat since Early Series Bakugou, and having been approached in downtime in a reasonable manner, Bakugou manages to refrain from coming up with any demeaning nicknames centered on Mora’s appearance. Kirishima remarks internally on all the hair, but only internally; he’s much too polite to say anything out loud.

Chapter 110:

A big splashy introduction for the man ranked #3 in the Heroes Who Look Like Villains ranking, Gang Orca. He’s at the test to play villain and is, just as noticeably as all the play-victims are baseline, a heteromorph. At the time of his introduction, he’s ranked Number 10 in the Hero Rankings, but will be bumped out later on. This does, however, make him the highest-ranked known heteromorph who doesn’t have a human face,[6] with the possible exception of Kamui Woods—who, like Shouji, covers it with a mask.

Gang Orca’s character sheet notes that, while he’s a popular guest at aquariums, his intimidating face and “stony personality” always result in weepy children. He apparently finds this relatively upsetting (“lots of angst”) but, unlike Shouji or Kamui Woods, has not taken to wearing a mask, nor trying to tone down his personality on any level—to the contrary, Present Mic suggests much later on that he exaggerates it.

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

Next time, I'll cover from the Shie Hassaikai arc through the end of Joint Training. Thanks for reading!

--------------------- FOOTNOTES ---------------------

[1] Initially. He sticks to his guns long enough that he gets away with it in the end, though.

[2] The big tell is that Nedzu addresses Endeavor as Todoroki-kun rather than Todoroki-san or simply by his hero name, but his observation that Todoroki-kun has “matured” (literally in the Japanese, “become an adult”) doesn’t hurt, either.

[3] Kerokero neko and Uraraka neko.

[4] You can get further out there with this, but by the time you get to e.g. Shouto and Momo or Ojiro and Hagakure, the ice is definitely getting thinner on whether you’re seeing groundwork for future wedding bells or just reasonably close male/female friendship. Your mileage may vary depending on how tightly attached your shipping goggles are or how cynical you are about shounen authors’ tendencies towards timeskip marriages. Also, I can’t be bothered to dig up and list out the crushes or shipping patterns among the Class B kids. Koroiro likes the mushroom gal?

[5] Note that Mera phrases this as being merely a stopgap until they find the next All Might. The HPSC is not so eager to change the methods they’ve come to rely on over the last thirty some-odd years!

[6] We don’t know enough for me to say for sure whether Wash is a heteromorph.

#bnha #heteromorph discrimination plot #my writing #bnha meta #bnha worldbuilding #huc for no. 1 group that needs to have mandated diversity hires #seriously there needs to be a lawsuit or something #where's that “certain human rights group” when you need them

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