Last time on My Hero Academia, the
minor characters got a chance to shine. Plants beat lighting in the match
between Kaminari v Ibara, Iida was manipulated by but still “won” his match
against Hatsume, Mina outpaced Aoyama’s belly laser, Tokoyami overpowered Yaoyorozu’s
defenses before she could react, and the stone fist of Kaminari knocked out and
was knocked out by the steel fist of Tetsutetsue. Uraraka, meanwhile, mentally
prepped for the single most stressful fight of her life against the ferocious
Bakugo. Let’s get to it, shall we?
We open to Bakugo and Uraraka
having a stare down before the match begins. Once again, Bakugo shows off that
he is completely oblivious to his classmates, referring to her as Pink Cheeks,
much to her annoyance. Dude, eighteen names, that’s all you need to memorize,
that can’t be that hard. Anyway, he tells Pink Cheeks to back out now if she
wants, because he’s not holding back. She, obviously doesn’t and gets into a
fighting stance.
In the stands, Iida asks Izuku about
the plan he’d come up with to fight Bakugo. Izuku admits that he only had about
11% of a plan. Wow, that’s barely a concept. Guardians reference for the win. Anyway,
his simple plan is that she just needs to get in close, null his gravity and
shove him up and out of the ring. Simple, but hey, the best plans are.
 |
| She's faster then she looks. |
The match starts and Uraraka rushes
Bakugo. Bakugo confidently announces “Now you die!” and fires off an explosion.
Uraraka, despite seeing Bakugo telegraph his usual big right hook, takes the hit
and gets blown back several feet. The smoke his blast kicked up hides Uraraka
for a few seconds. Something comes at Bakugo’s face and he blasts it. Turns out,
it was the jacket of Uraraka’s uniform, she nulled its gravity as a distraction.
She lunges from behind, but Bakugo whips around and blasts her again. Despite
this, she keeps coming at him, getting around his back and going to use her
Quirk. Bakugo keeps blasting her though.
This may come as a shock, but, professional
heroes don’t particularly care for seeing a sharp-eyed sociopath seemingly sadistically
savaging a single sweet slugger. Alliteration for the win! A group of heroes start
booing Bakugo for being a dick and dragging things out when he clearly has the
power to win. Present Mic agrees, but Aizawa shoves him over and tells the guys
who started the chant to shut the heck up. Why? Because the fact that Bakugo is
fighting so hard shows that he respects Uraraka as an opponent and the peanut
gallery is doing her a disservice by booing him.
Uraraka shows why Aizawa’s assessment
is accurate by showing off her strategy. Well, that dick Monoma breaks it down.
It goes something like this. One, Uraraka stayed low with each of her attacks,
keeping Bakugo’s eyes on her. Two, she attacked relentlessly so he couldn’t
take a moment to view their surroundings. Three, she made sure her moments
other then her big attacks were hidden in the smoke Bakugo’s attack kicked up.
This was all to make Four, a massive cloud of debris floating above their
heads. She releases her hold on debris, causing an artificial meteor shower to
come down on Bakugo’s head. Her plan is to get him with an anti-grav jab while
he’s distracted either dodging or destroying her attack.
 |
| I think it says a lot about Bakugo that he doesn't relax even seeing her this knocked out. |
Imagine her shock when he releases
a MASSIVE blast that obliterates her debris field. Uraraka, despite obviously
feeling a little depressed her plan didn’t work, tries to keep fighting. Bakugo
is happy to oblige her and reveals that she may have actually earned his
respect a little bit. Well, he at least bothered to learn her name. Unfortunately,
she drops after only a few steps. She tries to keep dragging herself forward,
and Bakugo doesn’t lower his guard until she passes out. Bakugo is declared the
winner, pretty much to everyone’s dismay.
Bakugo meets up with Izuku while our green haired
protagonist makes for the prep room before is match. He starts berating Izuku
for, he assumed, giving Uraraka that strategy she used, but Izuku smacks that
right back down. If Bakugo thought it was a hard fight, then it was 100% her
doing. Understandably, that just makes Bakugo more irritated. Once back in the
stands, the rest of the class tease Bakugo for playing the role of bad guy so
well in that fight. Kaminari makes a crack about Bakugo going whole hog against
a ‘frail girl,’ to which Bakugo mutters that she was anything but.
In the waiting room, Uraraka is already
healed up and is clearly putting on a brave face for Izuku. He compliments her
on a fight well fought, but he’s called away before he can do more then that.
After he leaves, Uraraka calls her father. He’d tried to call her while she’d
been talking to Izuku. Mr. Uraraka compliments his daughter on a fight well
fought. Side note… seriously, none of the PARENTS were invited to watch their
CHILDREN’S big event? You buy massive flipping robots for them to fight but can’t
set aside a small fund to make sure everyone’s parent or guardian is there to
cheer them on? Izuku could have seen his dad if you offered to fly him in from
Someplace Japan. Whatever. Talking with her father, Uraraka finally starts
breaking down, as losing in her first match was kind of a blow to her pride.
And it set back her plans on becoming a successful hero and providing for her folk’s
retirement. Mr. U gives some of the best Dad advice a fella can give, and
reminds her she can her time. She’ll have plenty of opportunities to show off
her talents in years to come.
 |
| It's a real shame that Mrs. Midoriya only passed on her ability to sob massive amounts to her boy. |
Izuku runs into Endeavor on his way
to the area. Goodness, this area’s hallways are right up there with Scrubs’ magic
hallway for important chance encounters. Enji Todoroki, like his son before
him, notes that Izuku’s powers are very similar to All Might’s. Izuku tries to
walk away, but Enji goes on to point out that that makes this a perfect match
for his son. He tells Izuku that Shoto is destined to surpass All Might, and since
Izuku has All Might like powers, he should do his best to be a challenge for
Shoto. His word choice makes it clear that while he’s saying Shoto, he’s thinking My
Son. Izuku basically tells the guy to screw off and that neither Shoto or
himself are their mentors. He’s way politer about it then that, but I wanted to
make you all think of Izuku being a bit more aggressive than usual. Hehe.
 |
| Ooo, this is going to be good. |
Round 2, Match 1 is about to begin
between Izuku Midoriya and Shoto Todoroki. Uraraka joins the rest of the class,
having gotten the tears out of her system, just in time. We’re shown everyone on
pins and needles waiting for the match to start. That includes the kids in the
stands, All Might in the teacher’s box, and Tomura Shiguraki watching from the
league of villain’s secret lair. The highlight of these moments being Mrs.
Midoriya surrounded by a small mountain of tissues as she watches the match
from home. Match start just as the credits
roll.
Hot diggity daffodil that was a
good match. I’ll be honest, up until this point while I like Ochako Uraraka,
she didn’t especially standout in my mind. Sure, she had some victories,
grabbing the bomb in her first team test with Izuku, stopping Kurogiri from
getting Iida during the attack on UA, but those were largely in a support
capacity. For the test Bakugo vs. Izuku was much more pivotal a moment then
actually passing the test, at least to the audience, and while she stopped
Kurogiri, it was Bakugo that more or less disabled the villain for most of All Might’s
fight with Noumu. This is the first time that we’ve seen her go toe to toe, fist
to fist with an opponent and she did a hell of a job. She acted strategically,
and was more then willing to take a blast from Bakugo to see her strategy pay
off. Sure, she lost, but she kept right on fighting until her body couldn’t
keep going. It’s the first step, but this is the first step of Uraraka shifting
into a major fighting force. Next up, Izuku is about to get some frost bite.
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Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero
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