i really love Kiribaku like, the concept of THESE TWO CHARACTERS together is SO GOOD like
the overachieving, asocial, mean guy with a fuck-ton of baggage, who swears and growls and yells and spits insults as easy as he breathes, whose ego ran unchecked for a decade of his young life, who was a bully and a jerk and a vicious, spiteful brat and who still kind of is, this guy who had his entire worldview ripped out from underneath him again and again, who’s trying in his own way to figure out how to be a better person than he was,
the cheerful, happy, social butterfly dude whose positivity is a veneer to cover up the things he’s insecure about, who’s doing his goddamn best to become the person he wants to be, to live up to his own self-imposed ideals, who always goes out of his way to try and lift up and encourage others and has trouble extending that to himself sometimes, who smiles easily and yet doesn’t stand bullshit when instead he could be helping people,
and you’d think that these two characters would clash, and be at odds with one another, and fight and argue and all of that…
But they don’t
Somehow they just clicked
you’d think that they’d be at opposites but actually they have a whole lot in common - they’re both LOUD and boisterous and have spiky hair and red eyes and hot heads and bold confidence to cover up the parts of themselves that they don’t like.
Kirishima reins Bakugou in a little, helps him dull some of his edges
Bakugou boosts Kirishima up a little, reminds him of what he’s worth
They’ve never had anyone like the other before
Kirishima’s friends before were friends, sure, but they never pushed him to do good, no, to do better, but Bakugou does. he fires Kirishima up and inspires him and Kirishima really, really admires that about him.
Bakugou’s friends were more… sycophants than anything else. they did what he told them to do but they only did that ‘cause his quirk was strong and they feared it. Kirishima has almost nothing to fear from Bakugou’s quirk but he hangs out with him anyway, and Bakugou suddenly has someone who really cares about him, as him and not for his quirk and what it might be able to do for him.
They’re EQUALS.
they’re best friends, not despite each other’s flaws but because of them. they accept each other’s flaws, they help each other to work on them, and they really, genuinely like each other and like to be around each other. no obligations, nothing pressuring them together. they just like each other.
and that… that’s why they make such a good pair.
