Bakugo is shifting into Turbo.
Last time on My Hero Academia
Stain tried helping for once. He used Blood Curdle to paralyze AFO and rushed
him with All Might to try to finish off the Demon Lord. Unfortunately, AFO
anticipated Stain trying to get involved and made sure he had a quirk that let
him expel his blood and then also to change his antigens, giving him a
different blood type. AFO lays the beatdown on Stain, thanking the psycho for
all that he did to help develop the League of Villains and Shigaraki, but say
that the only thing he has left to contribute is his Quirk. He pops Stain like
a blood balloon and steals his Quirk. All Might is badly hurt in this tussle,
but visions of Nana and his old apprentice Nighteye get him to keep going.
Bored with this, AFO tries to Sludge Warp Tomura Shigaraki to him so he could
transfer his quirks and re-possess Tomura. Tomura refuses to go, though, and
tells the old man to back off. AFO grabs All Might and flies to the Flying
Coffin to show off the defeat of All Might to Izuku and the world. Young
Midoriya’s attention is torn between battling Tomura and trying to think of
something he could do to help his mentor. AFO lifted All Might overhead and
began to slowly rip him in half. Izuku reached out to his mentor, and Tsukauchi
begged someone, anyone to save All Might. To everyone’s surprise, this seemed
to have worked, as it was at this exact moment that Bakugo’s heart kicked back
on and Katsuki “Dynamite” Bakugo is looking to save the day. Enough recapping.
Let’s get to it, shall we?
We open with AFO slowly ripping All
Might in half as everyone watches in horror. We’re shown how people around the
world are reacting, some are horrified, some are treating it’s not their
business, some are interested but in a ‘I’m not scared just curious’ sort of
way, and so on. Meryl, the weather girl that tried to speak out about what was
happening in Japan, is noticing a weird cloud causing weird changes to the
weather. Bakugo gets up and starts breathing hard. We shift to showing various
people praying for intervention for All Might. We get the final line from
Meryl’s broadcast, ‘One person has the power to change the world.’ As that line
is spoken, Izuku and Bakugo make eye contact, nod, and both lock into their
assigned task. Izuku must beat Tomura Shigaraki, and Bakugo must save All
Might. Bakugo leaps from the Flying Coffin and rockets toward Izuku. Izuku
spins himself and Tomura around and catches Bakugo by the wrist. He keeps
spinning, build momentum. Kudo manifests to Izuku and warns against using Gear
Shift so soon, he says that his body will get hit with serious recoil and he
should save the attack for when he has a clear path to victory. Kudo looks over
and sees that All Might’s energy Vestige has started shifting to look more like
the actual man and goes quite. Izuku used Second Gear and Bakugo fires off an
explosion to rocket at AFO. Tomura mocks Izuku, saying Bakugo will never make
it in time. He knows about the Vestige in Izuku’s head and says that it’s
starting to gain definition because All Might is about to die. He predicts with
All Might’s death, it’ll show the world the future of peace he promised was a
lie and that will break them. We then see that the tailwind blowing behind
Bakugo is increasing. Izuku remembers Nighteye’s last words to All Might, how
Izuku changed the future when he couldn’t. He felt like maybe, somehow,
people’s thoughts can alter fate. If enough people believe something with their
whole being, maybe that’s enough to change the future. Bakugo rockets forward,
faster and faster, remembering how he felt when he realized All Might lost his
power because of him. He collides with AFO, grabs All Might and breaks him free
of AFO.
The second he’s out of AFO’s hands,
the Vestige of him returns to a yellow cloud All Might asks what Bakugo is
doing here and he screams ‘Let’s win this!’ All Might seems to pass out and
sees a vision of Sir Nighteye. He asks if this was supposed to be the end.
Nighteye confirms that, yep, if things had gone like he’d seen, All Might
should have been ripped in half. But somehow, fate has been rewritten. Nighteye
says that All Might’s dream is over, but he hasn’t been beaten yet. He needs to
do all he can to fulfill his promise to Izuku and the world. All Might laughs
and says that he thought that the mentor was supposed to die when they pass the
baton. Nighteye shrugs and says that this is life, not a comic book. All Might
asks what is he even supposed to do with this hallucination, what’s the point.
Nighteye tells him that he is a person, but he’s a hero too, so he doesn’t get
to die so easily.
The world reacts in confusion to
Bakugo’s sudden save, some recognizing him as the crazy kid that made a ruckus
at the sports festival, some remember that he was kidnapped by the League of
Villains, but Maharo Shimano (older sister from Heroes Rising) remembers
the hero, Bakugo! Bakugo and All Might hit a building and roll to the other
side. Bakugo drags himself upward and stands between All Might and AFO. All
Might asks if he’s alright, and Bakugo says he should ask him the same.
Edgeshot comes from Bakugo’s chest, warning that Bakugo’s body was royally
screwed up. He did the best he could to sew him up and wrap up his bones, but
Bakugo did straight up die. Edgeshot drops to the ground, exhausted and used up
from making himself so thin and doing all that work to get Bakugo up again. He
says that Bakugo shouldn’t be moving right now and that every breath will be
agony for a while. Bakugo thanks him for saving his life. Edgeshot tells him
not to, as he only stitched him up. He tried to use his special technique to
get Bakugo’s heart beating again, but it wasn’t working. He hit the point where
he was going to have to choose between trying to save Bakugo or saving himself,
when some of Bakugo’s explosive sweat somehow got into Bakugo’s blood stream
and the mini-explosions from that got his heart going again. Edgeshot says that
what saved Bakugo was his mastery over his quirk. I’m calling bullshit on the
science of that, but let’s move on. Bakugo goes back to his bombastic self,
asking who this young idiot with an actual face is, as he thought he was going
to fight AFO. All Might says that is AFO and calls Bakugo over. He says that
his suit is basically out of power, but the gauntlet he has should work as a
splint. He transfers the gauntlet to Bakugo’s right arm, which gets it back in
working condition. Bakugo starts tearing up at having received a gift from All
Might.
AFO looks incredibly torn on what
to do. He thinks about going after All Might to finish him off, but decides
against it. He has to transfer himself to Tomura ASAP or risk de-aging into
nothing. He decides to take OFA and his brother first. He flies over, intent on
transferring his Quirk and mind into Tomura’s body. He curses that Tomura
resisted his other self when he tried to teleport the boy to him. He thought
he’d accounted for every variable. To which I say, bro, if you didn’t think
Tomura Shigaraki was going to be a stubborn, willful child, you didn’t account
for crap. He flashes back to his boast to the League that he plans every route
carefully with contingency plans, so if the optimal route is blocked, he’ll
just switch to a new one. He’s visibly infuriated that he’s been foiled so many
times today. He knows he’s powerful enough to handle any one of the heroes that
has stood against him today, but they just keep getting in his way. He mentally
shrieks, asking “why does it feel like the gears are slipping out of place! The
Winds should be blowing in MY favor!” And its at that moment that Bakugo all
but teleports to his side. He screams, “I’m the final boss, got it?! All For
One!” and grabs AFO’s face and blasts him to kingdom come. He boasts that
because He, not sure if he means All Might or Izuku, can’t beat AFO, he’s going
to be the to end AFO.
The cops at HQ take a moment to
celebrate Bakugo saving All Might before Tsukauchi asks for a status update.
The big fights are mostly over at this point. They’ve got Skeptic and Spinner
in custody, the Nomus have all been defeated on the island, and they’re freeing
the heroes that Kunieda captured. There’s still fighting at the stadium, but
that was like 5th on the list of battles so that’s acceptable.
They’ve evacuated everyone from UA to Shiketsu high. The only folks unaccounted
for at the moment are Kurogiri, Present Mic and Aizawa. Which isn’t great but
isn’t terrible either. We return to the rooftop that Lady Nagant passed out on.
She woke up in time to see Bakugo blast AFO.
All Might is impressed with his
other protegees extreme speed. The still tiny Edgeshot says that Bakugo,
despite his injuries, was able to move so fast that not even Tomura Shigaraki
could keep up with him earlier. He thinks Bakugo is on the cusp of learning
something important.
Bakugo thinks to himself that using
his Quirk hurts right now, but he’s going to keep fighting. AFO drags himself
out of the crater Bakugo blasted him into, infuriated and swearing he’s going
to finish this.
Tomura is annoyed that Bakugo
refuses to die. He thinks Bakugo is a gnat or a cockroach that he intends to
keep squishing until it takes. He breaks free of Black Whip and starts
scratching his neck again. Izuku assesses the situation. He’s been able to keep
Shigaraki at bay with his quirks, specifically Black Whip and Danger Sense, but
he just doesn’t know how he’ll finish off someone that can 1. Regenerate
endlessly and 2. Kill him in one hit. He knows that he needs to use Gear Shift
to do it, but that using that Quirk will render him immobile when the power
runs out or he switches it off. It’s all or nothing. He prepares the Shift.
Izuku and Bakugo mentally scream that it’s time to go beyond as the fighting
resumes.
AFO rockets past Bakugo, intent on
stealing OFA. Bakugo screams after him “Do you think I’m an extra?” AFO
assesses that Bakugo’s power is middling at best and he’s not on the level of
All Might, Endeavor or even Dark Shadow in terms of intimidation. He’s just got
a schedule to keep. That’s why he’s running like a coward. He’s running because
he doesn’t want to risk having to use Rewind again just in case this pissant
gets a good hit in. Bakugo meanwhile has had an epiphany about his explosions.
He’s figured out how to time them, to use them to their maximum effect. This
seems to essentially give him access to the Speed Force from DC comics as he
rockets like the Flash after AFO and blasts him out of the sky. He’s coughing
up blood as he goes too far, passing AFO, and cackling that he went too fast.
AFO tries to keep flying but Bakugo dogs him the whole way. Bakugo remembers
asking if he could ever hope to catch up to Izuku, and realizes that maybe,
just maybe, he’ll be able to surpass Izuku.
At Shiketsu, Mitsuki Bakugo shakes
her husband’s shoulder and makes Masaru watch their son go apeshit on AFO. He’s
scared for his son. Mitsuki tells him to suck it up, for Katsuki, because
despite everything she knows he still has a grin on his face.
The woman knows her boy well.
A grinning Bakugo is scaring the
piss out of AFO. He’s baffled as to why Bakugo is making him react so
passionately, even more so than when he faced All Might. He flashes back to
when he killed Kudo. He had the man by the throat as Kudo told him that his
brother, Yoichi was dead, and the ‘demon lord’ himself killed him. AFO actually
started to cry upon hearing that. He realizes the hate he feels toward Bakugo
is the same as he felt towards Kudo. Kudo, who ruined everything. Kudo that
even ruined Yoichi. He shrieks that Kudo ruined everything when he
reached out his hand to Yoichi. He realizes that the same thing happened again
when Izuku grabbed Bakugo’s hand and this whole fight started going against
him. Everyone watching the fight cheers as Bakugo blasts AFO into the side of a
building again. AFO drags himself from the latest crater, shrieking that the
person he hates most in the world, the one who ruined everything, the source of
his hate was Kudo. Bakugo laughs at this, asks if he’s gone senile and proudly
proclaims that his name is Kacchan Bakugo! Way to own your best
frenemies childhood nickname for you, Katsuki.
On the one hand… Bakugo coming back
to life and then using a newfound understanding of his explosions to
essentially enter the Speed Force is silly, cheese, and kind of dumb if you
think about it for more than a minute. Still… hype as hell. I knew that Bakugo
would get back up, but I underestimated how much aura the boy would farm once
he got into fight mode against AFO. There are few scenes that are as cool as
when a hero locks in against someone that they or their allies were struggling
with and suddenly they make the villain flee. AFO doing his best to rationalize
why he was afraid and running just added to the moment. On paper, this fight
should still be one sided, but because of his dwindling time and the
destructive force of Bakugo’s power, I get why AFO is starting to panic that
maybe Bakugo will do enough damage that he’ll have to Rewind more. He’s
definitely hitting the limits of what time he can spare. The reveal that Kudo
earned a special bit of enmity from AFO due to whatever part he played in Yoichi
Shigaraki’s life and death was interesting. I’d assumed that while AFO hates
the OFA users, it was in a more clinical, detached sense. They are the ones
that hold power he wants and continue to defy him, obviously he hates the OFA
wielders. But… the idea that it might be a lingering resentment towards the
second wielder is a… not shocking twist exactly but an interesting development.
Makes everything that happened before this much more personal. It was cool to
see how Nighteye’s vision was supposed to go. I totally get why Sir Nighteye
was so dead set on trying to prevent what would have been an incredibly graphic
death. Seeing the Symbol of Piece get split like Jazz in Michael Bay’s Transformers
would have been a hell of a blow to moral worldwide. And I like the explanation
that Izuku kind of… manifested this change. I like this idea that while yes, by
in large a lot of what happens to people is ultimately too big to change even
with foreknowledge, there are ways to shift things even if doing so is insanely
rare. The power of positive thinking is silly in a lot of ways, but I’d be
lying if I said I didn’t think there was merit to it. And if anything is going
to change fate, it might as well be a nearly planet wide desire to save someone
that spent decades trying to be Superman. Izuku struggling with Tomura is a
little lame just because they didn’t do much besides get prepared to start
fighting… but their struggle is the main event and we’ve got like six episodes
left, so I get trying to tease it out a little. Guess we’ll see next time how
it starts… oh, and I liked Bakugo owning the name Kacchan. His best Frenemy has
called him that for years and he’s just now accepting it, it’s sweet. See you
later. Have a good night and stay safe.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/u2761062/posts/viewer-log-my-ep-162274294
Bluesky: @basicssuperhero.bsky.social
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