Not a real meta because I don’t have the juice to argue this on a deeper level, but just some food for thought:
I was thinking about how strongly this “war” arc is driving home the point that heroes blame the villains for their violent radicalization, right. Times and times again, during this arc, we’ve seen them strike punches harder and harder (plus ultra!) with the fervor of someone who thinks they’re fighting for justice, and striking down the bad eggs who “choose” to do evil things for no reason, or because they’re irreparably warped after crossing an (arbitrary) line between good and bad.
(for the record: this is not my bias. This is straight up canon text. Aizawa blames Shigaraki for Shirakumo’s death. Gran Torino blames Shigaraki for “choosing” to be bad (read: abused and brainwashed since he was 5) and for rejecting Nana’s will, wishing to kill him for it (when her will was to keep her legacy alive, mind you). Hawks blames Jin for choosing the League over reformation in jail.)
Arguably, none of them has even attempted to rescue any of the villains.
What we can glean from this is that the heroes are fully pushing the responsibility of “being bad” on the villains, right. Implying that they were rotten from the start.
With Hawks as the only notable (and flawed) exception, all of them are fighting the League as if they’re past the point of saving.
I think it’s interesting to compare that narrative to a different perspective, one that isn’t told through the pov of someone belonging to the hero establishment. An outsider, if you will. Cause when the heroes talk about the fine line between villainy and victimhood, they do so from a very biased and not objective perspective.
Dabi’s case is the perfect example to understand the theme at play here.
Dabi was canonically introduced as a follower of Stain, but one without a noteworthy criminal record prior to making contact with the League. It’s even arguable if he even did crimes before that. Everyone else, even secondary characters like Magne, had a death count prior to that, save Spinner, a fellow Stain enthuasiast and hikikomori. Up until this point, Dabi is pretty much a random nobody who talks big, but without anything to prove that he’s even a bad guy. Even at training camp, he led the operation in a way that specifically avoided unnecessary clashes between his people and the heroes. He spared Aoyama, he forgot he had a noumu that obeyed his orders, and he didn’t kill anyone despite voting to pick up on Stain’s agenda. I remember that at the time his… Laidback attitude towards villainy struck many fans as odd, to the point that many theorized that he was a mole, or an undercover hero.
So when does Dabi’s violent radicalization actually start?
Interestingly, it’s right at the start of Chisaki’s arc. After Kamino. After his first actual villainous gig where he could’ve gone hog wild with bloodlust.
… After his father unofficially becomes number one following All Might’s retirement.
That is not a coincidence, because we’re informed of it literally in the same chapter.
Chapter 115, notably told through Jin’s pov. The pov of an outsider, of a victim of the system that was later brutally murdered by that same system who doesn’t look people in the eye after labeling them viillains.
This is literally a couple of pages later.
Dabi’s case is interesting because his violent radicalization is not the result of Stain’s influence, but Endeavor’s.
Canon went extra out of the way to make it clear that this was Dabi’s first kill. Before this moment, he wasn’t a murderer. So get this:
Endeavor made it in the news as the new symbol of peace, rousing people’s anxieties but not enough for anyone to question his hero status. Within the same chapter, Dabi starts roasting people to a crisp.
Later making the news himself for it.
… As a murderer who uses fire to burn people to a crisp. It’s almost like he’s trying to say something. Wild, right. I wonder what that could possibly be.
It’s super ironic then, when this happens:
On a literal level, Endeavor’s vision is blurry and that’s why he doesn’t recognize Dabi.
But on a deeper level, it’s kinda telling that despite that he only ends up identifying Dabi as Snatch’s killer. But not his son. Because he’s so focused on his job, on fighting villains without holding back, to the point of overheating and almost dying if it means neutralizing the threat, that he doesn’t even recognize his own child.
The symbolism is pretty obvious here, especially when you reread this through the lenses of the heroes’ self-righteousness in the war arc.
Endeavor doesn’t expect Dabi to be his son, because he doesn’t expect to be faced with his own actions. Cause to him, and to hero society at large, villains are villains because they are irreparably broken.
But who actually broke Dabi?
tangentwithtanner
titsay
jbbartram-illu
yousharknotpass
baratheonpilled
