Some people will do anything to help their friends.
Last time on My Hero Academia
we got some backstory on the stoic Mezo Shoji. Shoji grew up in a rural area
where things were… tense with Heteromorphic quirk havers. While by the river
one day, he saw a little girl getting swept away and dived in to save her. This
was his one good memory of his hometown, and unfortunately was the root of his main
bad one. See, rather than focusing on him saving a life, the other villagers
were infuriated that the freaky armed Shoji kid touched one of their ‘normal’ children.
He was severely beaten for this, which gave him scars on his face, which lead
to him wearing a mask. He and Koda volunteered to go with Present Mic to try to
protect Central Hospital and the captured Kurogiri from being released. He’d
learned from Ippon, the large fox woman, that Heteromorphs are gathering to
raid the place. They faced off against Spinner, who was given a gigantification
quirk to make himself more physically intimidating, at the cost of his brain,
and an armored quirk to make it harder to stop him. Shoji fights hard against
Spinner while trying to convince the civilian Heteromorphs that lashing out
against everyone is the wrong thing to do. He very nearly convinces a few, but
Spinner strings together enough words to convince his followers that hurting
those that hurt you is always justified and h charges into the hospital. Oh,
and Koda captures this spider-face dude who was acting as Spinner’s interpreter
via an Alfred Hitchcock reference. Which was neat. Enough recapping. Let’s get
to it, shall we?
The episode begins right where the
last one left off, with Spinner in his new armored form breaking into Central
Hospital. We learn that before the mission began, AFO gave Spinner a recording
device, saying that when he finds Kurogiri to use it to play either his or
Tomua’s voice in order to rouse the perfect Nomu. He says that in this Spinner has
to become Tomura’s hero and free Kurogiri. Several Heteromorphs follow him in,
but they’re met with the medical staff. The doctors and nurses stand as a wall trying
to keep the invaders from the patients. They don’t say a word, just staring
defiantly at them. The rioters remember Shoji telling them that they better
have a plan for when they go into the hospital. This seems to break something
in some of the rioters, who drop their weapons. Spinner rushes ahead, not
noticing. We enter his mind space, where Spinner still sees himself as a normal
lizard man. He admits that he never thought that he’d amount to much, but he decided
that if he followed ‘him,’ maybe he’d do something important. He asks Tomura Shigaraki
if he can see him, and if he can see all the people following him. In meat
space he breaks through a wall, looks back and is only then made aware that he’s
all alone. Or so it looks for just a moment. Present Mic walks up, saying that
Shoji broke through to his followers. He knows what the plot was here and he
refuses to allow Kurogiri to be used again. He unleashes a sonic boom that
obliterates Spinner’s plates, knocking him to the ground and frying his
recorder. I guess the damage he’s taken today has finally caught up with him as
well, as he deflates as he passes out.
We jump back a few minutes to when
Present Mic first chased after Spinner. He left Shoji and Koda outside and tells
them to do their best to handle the mob. Shoji stands his ground while Koda
wrestles Spiderface to the ground. A goon rushes Shoji and tries to smack him
in the head with an axe. He’s saved at the last second by the pig-man that had
been part of the group that followed Spinner inside. Hank, as I shall hereby
call him, says that he thinks they’re channeling their anger the wrong way. Spiderface
tries to keep the hate high, but Hank and the others are very conflicted at
this point. Hank says that when he first heard the call to action, he felt
better standing up and doing something. After seeing Shoji stand up to them, Spinner’s
melted brain indifference, and the medical staff standing up to protect the
innocent, he’s not sure that he CAN blame everyone anymore. Spiderface starts
to panic, as he and the other PLF members were counting on using the civilian
rioters as their meat shields in this fight. He tries to get everyone angry
again, but he’s just so less intimidating with Koda grappling him. Hank asks Shoji
if he was wrong to ask, if he should have just sat quietly and hoped for the best.
Shoji tells him that his feelings are valid, that they need to bring their
oppressors into the light. He may have acted rashly coming here, but when push
came to shove, Hank and the others didn’t lose their heads. Shoji says that they’re
all the light that will help bring change to this world. The fight goes out of
the mob, which allows Rock Lock and the other heroes to run into the hospital
and back up Present Mic.
Present Mic notices that Kurogiri’s
shadowy form is still completely inert. He notes that Kurogiri hasn’t moved
since the day when Shirakumo broke through for just a moment and tipped them
off about the League’s plans. He wonders if that act of defiance broke him
beyond repair. Spinner is conscious but paralyzed. Spinner calls himself a
failure. He remembers a conversation with Dabi a while back where the prodigal
son of the Todoroki house called him an empty cosplayer. He remembers how he
got started as Spinner with the League, and then Shoji asked him to think about
how he’s using his anger. Spinner, sorrowfully, says that he DID and that he’d
chosen to follow Tomura Shigaraki. He wanted to lift up his friend. Present Mic
reports Spinner is down and prepares to do the hard thing. He knows that Kurogiri
is a major lynchpin of the League’s plans, and that even if he stopped Spinner here,
someone else will come for him. He hates himself for having to do this, but in
his mind, Shirakumo is dead and his other best friend, Aizawa, has already
given a leg and an eye for this fight. He inhales and prepares to execute
Kurogiri, begging Shirakumo for forgiveness. This rouses Spinner, who grabs Tomura’s
hand mask that he brought along with him. He gets the hand on Kurogiri and
tells him to save Tomura. This rouses Kurogiri just as Present Mic unleashes a
sonic scream. Spinner gets knocked out, but Kurogiri is unaffected. He breaks
free, a bit of his shadows peeled back so Present Mic could see Shigarkumo’s
face in the black. He says that he’ll protect Tomura Shigaraki and envelop
everyone in darkness.
We cut to National Weather Service
report in the US. The weather girl informs the viewers that the US is
experiencing a weird amount of cloud cover due to the heat and smoke that the battle
between the house of Todoroki has created. The weather girl turns the report
into a speech, saying that our leaders are selling us all out to All For One
and that people need to rise up to stop it. Her producer cuts her off and says
that the network will have their heads for this.
Back at Kamino, Dabi is powering
up. Iida keeps Shoto from launching himself at his brother, saying that Dabi’s
heat is too intense for him and that he’s already exhausted himself using his
Phosphor. Shoto still struggles to get into the fight, knowing that he’s the
only one that can really stand up to Dabi. He’s frustrated that Dabi is
rallying so much faster and stronger than he is. Dabi is also frustrated, as he
realizes that he’s too far away from Gunga villa to reach his dad. He also
knows that if he stick around trying to kill Shoto, his body will definitely give
out. He starts to fly away, planning to try to reach Endeavor anyway. Shoto tries
to bait him into fighting more, but Dabi isn’t listening. Burnin’ is shocked
that Dabi is still standing, as she was assured that his body is compatible
with his quirk, so he should be down by now. Skeptic radios in and says that someone
is covering Dabi’s travel cost. A moment later, Kurogiri’s portal opens.
We return to the Coffin in the Sky.
Rain is pelting them and the fortress is floating slightly to the side. Manual
tells Aizawa and Monoma that with the storm getting worse he might have trouble
controlling the water. Monoma is more interested in making sure that the
history books make it clear that he’s the one that won the battle for
them. He knows that the others are working hard to battle Tomura, and all he
has to do is not blink, there’s no way that he can complain. Then the Kurogiri
portal opens and Present Mic is thrown through along with the hand-mask.
We return to Gunga Villa where the restored
AFO explains his brilliant plan. He says in his experience, he’s learned to bet
on people’s emotions. He knew that Spinner, lonely, forsaken Spinner, who
valued his friendship with Tomura so much, would put his entire being into getting
to Kurogiri. The hand mask was implanted with something that got Kurogiri up to
speed on what has been happening. He has Kurogiri bring Dabi to face off
against Endeavor, and for Hawks, he has his own karmic punishment. That being
Toga in the form of Twice. Remember, if Toga has a strong affinity for the
person who’s blood she drinks, she can copy their powers as well. AFO tells
Hawks that, if he hadn’t prioritized killing the ‘poor broken soul’ that was
Twice, this is how that last battle would have ended. Hawks screams at Endeavor
to destroy the clones, NOW.
We jump back a few minutes to the
island. The League are holding out against the heroes, Toga is doing her best
to hide her movements by causing swells in the water before she attacks. She
nearly stabs Tsu, but Uraraka intercepts. She, Tsu and two pros with sensor powers
prepare to capture Toga. Gang Orca and his squad take down the Nomu that was
breaking its body to pieces to cause the waves that hid Toga. He announces that
this Nomu doesn’t have super regeneration either, and that they’ve nearly
gotten the villains captured. They just have to keep at it and the battle is
theirs. Toga starts to panic, as fewer allies means its harder for her to use
her hit and run tactics. She considers using Twice’s blood to take on his form
and use his clones to escape, but she’s only got enough blood for forty minutes
at the most. With her stuck on the island, Twice’s Sad Man’s Parade would be
wasted. She wonders if they realized she had Twice’s blood and that’s why they
brought her here. She decides to put her faith in Spinner getting teleportation
back on the table and goes for the vial. Narrator Present Mic interrupts for a
moment to say that before today, Toga was a being of instinct. She really didn’t
strategize or think things out, she reacted. But the death of Twice and seeing
her house burn has caused her to shift into full villainy. She tries to drink
the vial, but Tsu sees and fires her tongue at it, shattering the vial. Only for
Toga to admit that that vial was a decoy. It was filled with a chemical that
draws the Nomu’s attention. The spike Nomu fires a volley at Tsu, disabling her
and giving Toga the opportunity to take Tsu shape and dive at her. Using Tsu as
a shield, she drinks Twice’s blood. As she made Twice clones, Kurogiri
manifests and asks what her desire is. She wants to kill Hawks and then every
other hero. She tells him to scatter her around the battlefield. Uraraka tries
to stop Toga, launching wires at her, but she cuts them off. Uraraka then tries
her last gambit, saying that they hadn’t had their talk, about boys and romance.
Toga, regretfully says that she knows and wishes that they could have before slipping
through the portal.
In the present, Twice clones start
raining down. Hawks is terrified of this, he was sure that he’d destroyed all
of the samples the League had of Twice’s blood when he was undercover, but they
must have had some left. He wonders if Dabi somehow planned this. Toga tells
Hawks he’s a dead bird as she unleashes “Infinite Doubles: Sad Man’s Death
Parade.” A wave of Twice clones spray down on them. Dabi’s speech at Toga’s
house is echoed, saying that he’s going to make sure that they keep laughing,
forever as the episode ends.
One thing that I like about All for
One is that he understands empathy. Don’t get me wrong, he’s an amoral sociopath
that will use anyone and everyone for his goals, but he understands people with
more complex emotions form connections to others and how to use them. He knows
how to weaponize them. It’s why making Spinner, a man that still bears scars
from when he was a NEET (an anti-social shut-in) without a friend, fetch
Shigaraki was so brilliant. Spinner is desperate to be useful to Tomura Shigaraki,
his first genuine friend that he shared a lot in common with. He’d fight tooth
and claw, sacrificing anything and everything to help him. Which is why he was
willing to leap in the way of Present Mic’s finisher in order to potentially
free Kurogiri. And that just makes it sadder when I realized that, if you took
supervillainy out of the equation, Spinner and Tomura would have been bros and
probably been each other’s support system that they needed so badly! Same
with Uraraka and Toga, they seem to have a sort of spiritual connection that
really would have helped the more destructive Toga get through the rough patch
that has been her whole life had they met under other circumstances. The fact
that Toga would rather get her revenge on Hawks than to live out her friendship
fantasy with Uraraka says a lot. So… Kurogiri is back on the board, the villains
have ferried their most powerful fighters back into position, and now all that’s
stopping All For One from joining Tomura and finally claiming One For All is
his level of interest in this upcoming fight. Thank god that the man loves the
drama that’s about to unfold or he’d be at UA already. Have a good night, and
stay safe.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/viewer-log-my-ep-159340292
Bluesky: @basicssuperhero.bsky.social
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