Father (technically erased by Eri’s Quirk – “Death by De-aging”)
Function in the story: Eri’s father is defined almost entirely by his absence. His erasure is the traumatic origin point of her suffering, as it prompts both his physical nonexistence and the mother’s eventual rejection.
Tropes:
Death by De-aging / Empty Piles of Clothing / No Body Left Behind / Not Enough to Bury → His “death” is unusual because it provides no closure. His disappearance embodies trauma without a body, a fate that makes mourning or acceptance almost impossible.
The Faceless → He’s barely shown, reinforcing that his core role is symbolic: he represents innocence lost and the destructive potential of Quirks.
Good Parent (implied) → The ending sequence implies he was a loving parent, which makes his sudden loss sting harder narratively — Eri’s Quirk kills the very person who represented safety.
Analysis: He isn’t meant to be a character so much as a ghostly absence. His erasure leaves a void that drives Eri’s trauma, her mother’s rejection, and Overhaul’s exploitation.
Mother (the more complicated case)
Function in the story: Eri’s mother is a tragic moral failure — positioned at the intersection of victimhood, weakness, and culpability. Unlike the father (erased unwillingly), she actively chooses to give Eri away.
Tropes:
Disappointed in You / I Have No Son! / Parental Abandonment → Her choice to abandon her daughter shows the emotional collapse of someone unable to cope with grief or responsibility. It paints her both sympathetically (a broken woman) and unsympathetically (she condemns her child to hell under Overhaul).
Unwitting Instigator of Doom → Her decision — whether out of despair, fear, or cowardice — directly leads Overhaul to experiment on Eri and weaponize her suffering. She doesn’t intend evil, but her weakness enables evil.
Mafia Princess → Her ties to the Shie Hassaikai (her adoptive Yakuza family) add a tragic irony. In separating from them, she thought she was protecting her freedom/love (her marriage). Yet, she ends up running back to them at her lowest point, betraying her child in the process.
The Faceless / Unnamed Parent / Un-Reveal → Keeping her visually and narratively obscured adds to the mythic weight of her betrayal. She isn’t fleshed out as a character — instead, she’s an archetype of abandonment.
Walking Spoiler / What Happened to the Mouse? → Her story arc is deliberately left hanging. The audience never fully knows whether she regrets, survives, or reflects on her actions. This ambiguity intensifies her characterization as someone weak and unfinished, defined by what she failed to do.
Analysis: Eri’s mother isn’t so much evil as she is crushed by fear and grief. Losing a spouse in such a bizarre, horrifying way would shatter anyone — but instead of channeling that grief into protecting Eri, she transferred blame onto the child. She becomes a narrative foil: where future guardians (Izuku, Aizawa, Mirio) choose compassion and responsibility, she chose cowardly abandonment.
Why this matters to Eri’s arc
Eri’s backstory is structured around failure of family → her father can’t protect her (he’s erased), and her mother won’t protect her (she disowns her). This sets the stage for her need to find a new family in the heroes.
Her trauma isn’t just Overhaul’s abuse — it’s rooted in first being betrayed by those who should have loved her most. That’s why her later bonds with Deku, Mirio, and Aizawa carry so much weight: she experiences the healing inversion of these same tropes (adoption, protection, unconditional love).
✅ Conclusion:
Eri’s father is the innocent victim, symbolizing Quirk danger and the fragility of family. His faceless absence is a ghost that lingers over her trauma.
Eri’s mother is a morally broken weak point, not villainous but complicit in her daughter’s suffering through abandonment. She’s defined by failure, absence, and the devastating consequences of not being emotionally strong enough to parent in crisis.
Together, they illustrate how Eri is “orphaned by tragedy,” leaving her wide open to Overhaul’s exploitation until she’s “rescued” into a surrogate hero family.