It's filler time. And that's not an insult.
Last time on My Hero Academia the Provisional
Hero License Exam (PHLE) began in earnest. UA was immediately mobbed by other
school, wish is apparently a tradition for the exam. Izuku and the rest of his
class are separated when Ketsubutsu academy Izuku…er Yo Shinto used his vibration
power to cause an earthquake. He quickly runs into a Shiketsu High student
named Camie Utsushimi who hits one of his targets. Izuku seemingly escapes her
and a group of attacking students are Uraraka comes to help… only for “Uraraka”
to be revealed to be Camie in some kind of shapeshifted disguise. He’s saved by
Sero and the real Uraraka, and the three retreat to form a plan. Meanwhile,
Todoroki is cornered by a group of students dressed as Ninja. This should be
interesting. Let’s get to it.
We open with Todoroki’s battle with
the group of Ninja. I really need to know if that’s a legit school uniform or
are these guys cosplayers? Oh, they’re filler characters, right. The Red Ninja
has the ability to increase the size of objects that he throws at Todoroki. He
seems to have a preference on nuts and bolts, his comment about using objects
made of tungsten which has a high melting point, implies that he prepped for
Todoroki’s flame. This seems to be more or less proven when the rest of the
group attack, two of his Ninja have water powers and two have enhanced strength
and throw stuff at him. Realizing that they’d overwhelm him, Todoroki unleashes
a massive fire blasts that the Water Elementalists put out, but he runs in the
steam that the attack created. Todoroki works out that this factory was made to
be as realistic as possible, and finds a large tanker, he pierces it to confirm
his theory. He draws the Ninja in, and when they’re close, hits it with a fire
blast. The explosion isn’t as big as it probably should have been, only
slightly burning the Ninja’s uniform and ringing their bell pretty thoroughly.
Todoroki knocks them out and leaves this industrial area. He’s told via his
targets that he should go to the reception area to wait for the rest of the
test to wrap up.
In voice over, Present Mic explains
that the targets are super advanced pieces of equipment. They are able to track
the students, determine who hit their target and a bunch other “neat” thing. Once
placed, they remain fixed in place unless unlocked by a magnetic key.
Of all the eye-wear options, why a monocle?
We then cut over a group of girls
in fancy uniforms. (This part is filler) The lead girl, referred to as Miss Sei,
is drinking tea when she’s told that a group of students are approaching the
area they set up shop in. Her friend has a hologram eye, and shows Yaoyorozu
(creates non-living objects), Shoji (multiple tentacle arms he can grow
additional body parts onto), Tsu (is a frog), and Jiro (extendable earlobes
that she can hear through or project her heartbeat through as a sonic attack).
Miss Sei triggers her quirk, which seems to cause a bunch of complex formula
and numbers to appear around her, smiles knowingly and tells her team to
prepare.
We jump back to Todoroki whom had
just made it to the reception area (This part is not filler). He enters and
spies Yoarashi. The enthusiastic hero-in-training is talking about some hero he’s
a big fan of to another student, who has no idea who Yoarashi is, who the guy
he’s talking about is, and seems to just want to leave the “conversation.”
Todoroki finds it odd that he doesn’t remember Yoarashi, as they would have
taken the same test since they both were recommended to the school. Yoarashi
sees him, glares, and then gets back to his one-sided convo.
Not a team I'd have chosen, but it's a good group.
Over the intercom, we get told that
56 students have passed. The foursome had entered a large building, went up to
one of the top floors (because reasons) and were using Shoji’s eyes and Jiro’s
ears to try and locate other examinees. (This is filler) Initially they were
looking for classmates, but after hearing only 44 spots are still open, decide
to switch to passing themselves. This is when the girls of Seiai Academy start
their run. First, Jiro detects a small group approaching their floor at a
deliberate pace, just before incredibly loud rock is played with rings Jiro’s
bell real well and pretty much disables her as a recon asset. They then have a
sniper, she uses energy balls launched from a slingshot, to shatter the glass
on their floor, making it impossible for Shoji to see out of, blinding them. Wanting
to go down fighting, Jiro tries to charge, but the sniper is good enough to
shatter bother of her wrist mounted amps and hurt one of her earphone jacks.
And then they turn up the AC and drop heavy shutters over the windows. Yaoyorozu
believes Seiai Academy is trying to freeze them, a strategy that works
incredibly well with Tsu. Apparently, her animal-based powers also come with
extreme susceptibility to temperature extremes, and our little froggy is going
into hibernation. It’s not so bad for the others, but they’re all shivering. Yaoyorozu
wants to help her, but knows that this group probably has contingency plans for
her creating anything advanced to warm them up, and the sprinklers make just
going caveman and starting a fire a bad plan. She makes a blanket to keep Tsu
warm, just as all the doors to their area are welded shut save one. Yaoyorozu
tries to think of a plan, and knows that the air conditioning is their biggest
immediate threat. She thinks about blocking the vents by making clay to cover
them.
Outside, Miss Sei has already determined
Yaoyorozu’s course of action. She’ll use up her lipids (she burns these fatty
acids when she makes items) blocking the air conditioning, removing herself as
a possible threat and then her team can storm in and take them all out. It’s
only at this point that it’s revealed that she’s Saiko Intelli, second year at
Seiai Academy and her quirk is IQ. She drinks tea and it boosts her intellect.
What a… bizarre power.
Oh, sleepy froggy.
Back inside, Yaoyorozu starts
making the clay, but stops before she materializes any. She realized that their
opponents forced her into this situation and were probably planning on
attacking once her lipid reserves were burnt up. She tries to think of a new
plan, and fixates on the thought of ‘how would Todoroki, Iida or Midoriya
handle the situation?’ She remembers Izuku speech from around when Bakugo was
taken, and comes to the conclusion that he’d focus on saving his team, his
friends, above all else. She has an idea, she makes copies of Jiro’s headphones,
and then makes something large from her back. Oh, how interesting.
HA, group attack for the win.
Saiko, believing the UA students were
either frozen or Yaoyorozu was disabled, has her team prep to attack. That is
until a massive sound burst comes from the room, more or less instantly
incapacitating most of her team and leaving Saiko stunned. Yaoyorozu, as it
turned out, created a giant speaker for Jiro to plug into and use her favorite
heart-beat as a sonic blast technique. The noise is loud and intense enough that
it even gets through their ear protection, but they only had to hold the noise for
a few seconds to make sure all of Seiai Academy were knocked out. They go out
to claim victory, only for Saiko to pop out from behind the door, grab
Yaoyorozu and force her back into the other room, shutting and locking the door
behind them. Apparently, she decided that if she can’t win, she’ll at least
make sure Yaoyorozu doesn’t pass either. Thankfully, Yaoyorozu is able to hold
her off on her own long enough for the others to burst back in and disable
Saiko. She’s confused as to why they’d waste time saving Yaoyorozu, as for all
they knew she had already been taken out, but the others explain UA Class 1A
looks out for their own. Saiko surrenders.
We then jump over to Kirishima, Bakugo
and Kaminari climbing up onto an overpass of some kind. While it wasn’t
mentioned before, it seems Kaminari followed the other two when they broke off from
the group. No idea why, considering Bakugo verbally abuses him only slightly
less than he does Izuku. Just sayin’. At the top, something hit’s Kirishima. Whatever
it is, it turns him into some kind of lumpy potato looking thing, and drags him
back to a Shiketsu academy student standing in a bunch of the meat potatoes.
Gross. We hear over the intercom only 40 spots are left.
Izuku and his crew are still in
hiding and trying to think of a plan. Izuku is hoping that the time crunch might
work to their advantage, hopefully eroding the larger groups coordination as spots
are taken up. Sero is a little confused by this explanation and asks why Izuku
wanted them to stay in a big group, since the same thing might have happened to
them. Izuku explains that he assumed that it would be easiest with a large
group, as their class have a lot of folks with capture and Area of Effect powers,
so they could have disabled a big group in one go and then taken points at
their leisure. Shinto and his crew are coming up on them, so time is running
out. Izuku elects to run out ahead and distract them, allowing Uraraka and Sero
to use their powers to hopefully nab six of them so the three UA students could
pass. Uraraka isn’t a super huge fan of that plan, but lets her obvious crush
go when he pulls the ‘it’s the only way’ card, and she reaffirms to herself
that she has faith in him.
Not going to lie, this Quirk kinda grosses me out.
Back with Bakugo, the Shiketsu high
student gives Bakugo and Kaminari a speech about how his school is all about
order and discipline and how wearing hats sin battle signifies that. I don’t
get it either. Kaminari feels dumb listening to him, and Bakugo just gets
pissed. The Shiketsu kid says that he has respect for UA, but thinks that
Bakugo is a degenerate that sullies the schools name, as does the rest of class
1A. Be makes a bunch of large, finger shaped appendages that look like they’re
made of sand materialize behind him. Bakugo isn’t impressed and rushes him.
As Izuku tries to lure opponents
in, we join Aizawa and Ms. Joke in the stands. They seem to be killing time,
waiting for this stage of the test to be over. She offers him some gum, but he
declines knowing it’s one of those trick gum things. She notes that he seems
attached to this group, which is unusual and wonders if he’s worried they’ll
pass. She also says that seeing him care about things is gross, which isn’t important
but funny. Aizawa explains that he really isn’t worried at all, as he has two
students that seem to have an effect on the others. They aren’t the most
popular, and they don’t get along, but they have a habit of bring out the best
in everyone. And we close the image on a still of Izuku and Bakugo fighting the
good fight.
Okay, so this is 90% a filler
episode, but like all previous filler episodes of My Hero Academia, I don’t
feel like it’s a waste of time. Got to give it props for that alone. This is in
part, I think, to My Hero sticking to filler stories that fit into the larger
arc. Shows like Naruto, Bleach and even Dragonball Z had a habit of throwing up
filler episode that kill the pacing of the story at large. Hell, all three have
had multiple episode long arcs, Naruto and Bleach had literal seasons, that were
entirely pointless filler. My Hero’s filler at sticks to the story, and expands
upon interesting characters. Like Tsu’s time with her internship. And, in Todoroki’s
case, it was all stuff that might have happened. As I said above, his fight and
early win occurred entirely off screen in the manga. So, really, any story
about what he did after leaving the rest of the group could work. I did like
how they took a moment to highlight his continual frustrations with learning
how to use both his elements concurrently. And in Yaoyorozu’s case, they pretty
much wrote a story about her that reinforced that closing idea, that class 1A
is better for just having Izuku specifically being apart of it. As it was her
memory of his speech about saving friends that motivated her to think outside
the box in defeating her Anime only opponents. And kudos to the writers for
highlighting Jiro and Shoji, two minor characters that need more love and
attention. I’d include Tsu in that too, but I know she’ll be getting a lot
relatively soon. No spoilers, though. Finally, the closing segments did do a good
job setting up Izuku and Bakugo’s upcoming fights. The dude from Shiketsu is a
tough opponent, if his body capturing power wasn’t enough of a hint, and Izuku
has an uphill battle, being his group’s strongman as Uraraka and Sero try to do
subtle work behind him. But we’ll get into that next time. Have a good night.
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Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero
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