"When I was shouting from the top of that building, thoughts of Himiko Toga filled my head. I shouted at her about what I thought was right, but it twisted her face into the saddest expression I'd ever seen."
This one is mostly directed at the "Himiko *was* saved and dying is a fantastic way to end her arc because she's dying happy, fulfilled, and on her own terms" and "Hawks is too injured to help, there's no one else capable of helping, she's dead, get over it" crowd.
Himiko has the same laments as Touya-- "If only someone had loved me sooner, then maybe I would have been happy just being myself..." "If someone had reached out and given me love sooner, then maybe I could have finally given something back to the world....." It's an utterly dismal, depressing note to go out on.
Himiko isn't smiling happily in her dying dream-- she's wearing the same miserable, resigned smile she had when she let go of that last bit of hope that Ochako and Izuku would ever understand her. This time, she's smiling resignedly because she’s letting go of the life she thinks she’ll never have-- because she thinks it's too late and that the world will never be any easier for her to live in. In both scenes, Himiko is letting go of her hopes-- and in a series that's all about inspiring hope, this is something that needs to be challenged.
Ochako's goal started from wanting to alleviate her parent's burdens because they always wore tired, unhappy expressions-- that goal eventually grew into wanting a future where they can all smile together. And Himiko is explicitly tied to that goal.
I'm getting more and more convinced that Ochako's role as a "normal girl" who is able to inspire the civilians to see the heroes as human is what's also going to play a big part in getting them to see the villains as human. Ochako's heroism touched Himiko and made her heart lighter-- but it also touched the civilians, the media, and Keigo.
The phrase "the feelings of a single girl can change the world" has been repeated several times now throughout Ochako and Himiko's arcs during the final act. Ochako reaching out to Himiko and saving her, and Himiko attempting to sacrifice herself to save Ochako... both scenes are being broadcast to the world right now. Multiple civilians who got stranded within the vicinity of Gunga are currently watching the battles via livestream... while in possession of multiple high-speed transport vehicles. Basically, what I'm saying is: There are more people who are capable of reaching out and helping than this chapter leads us to believe, and that's relevant to Ochako's arc as someone who has connected the spirit of OFA to the people.
If "the feelings of one girl can change the world," now would be a good time for "the world" to respond to those feelings.
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yes! i do like [problematic thing]! and unfortunately i am under no obligation to defend my interests to strangers on the internet. good day and thank you for your time
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Bnha ends Midoriya is nowhere in sight Uraraka turns around looks at the readers to break the fourth wall and says "this truly was my lesbodrama academia"
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So what direction do you think this togachako fight is going?
Ohhh I love where it seems to be going right now. This might be the most interested I've been in Toga's and Ochako's story ever.
First of all, we've finally got a clear picture of Toga as someone in need of saving. Her anxiety is so relatable it hurts. There are all sorts of things she could be thinking about, like how maybe she's not adequate to her friends because she can't be as helpful as Jin, or maybe her "love" isn't enough to save her friends, all that self-defeating jazz.
Which leads into what seems to be the crux of the matter: Toga's "love." I've noted in passing before that having her use the word "suki" to describe this love is very curious. It's just an adjective that means something is the object of your affection. It's not a specific word for love like the nouns "ai (love, but broadly)" or "koi (romantic love)" are. "Suki" is just as often translated as "like" as it is "love." So what does it mean that Toga can only use the quirks of those she feels "suki" for? Was it perhaps on purpose that Horikoshi used such a vague word for this feeling?
It seems like Toga has a problem identifying her feelings. By her own account, she "loves" Tomura and Dabi just as much, but she can't use their quirks for some reason. That means her "love" for them is different from her "love" for Ochako and Jin. And perhaps Ochako's character can provide the answer here.
Because Ochako has trouble putting words to her feelings for Izuku all the time. Other characters like Mina tell her it's love, but she doesn't seem comfortable accepting that. She also isn't comfortable with the feeling itself, so she pushes it out of the way when she doesn't want to deal with it.
As of now, I think the feeling--for both of them--is admiration.
For Ochako, it comes down to the events of the sports festival. She talks about how embarrassed she is for just following in Izuku's shadow and comments on how amazing Izuku is, how this tournament has really highlighted that for her. And she becomes inspired to grow on her own and meet him as a rival. In her match against Katsuki, her thoughts are focused on being like Izuku. "If Deku were here..." "Deku wouldn't give up..." "I'll win and be just like Deku!" Katsuki even mistook her battle strategy for one Izuku could have come up with. She wants to be like Izuku.
Sound familiar?
Toga wants to be like those she loves. Perhaps this isn't true with Tomura and Dabi. She doesn't want to destroy everything like Tomura; she wants to live with the ones she loves. She doesn't want to have vengeance against her family like Dabi; she wants the world to be easier for her to live in. She doesn't want what they have.
But she wants what Ochako and Izuku have: friends. She wants what Jin has: love. Jin loved his friends and devoted his life to helping them. She wants to be like that. We even see it with her first crush in middle school, a guy who looks like Izuku and is highlighted in her memory as fighting someone. Perhaps he was standing up for her, or standing up for anyone, and that's why she admired him. She wants to be a hero? She wants to be free to be herself...and maybe she wants that for the ones she loves too.
It's a sort of envy. Both of them have it. They want to be like the ones they admire. They're not comfortable with who they are. It's only when Ochako embraces the pieces of herself that she likes, the love of seeing others' happy faces, that she can push through her discomfort, cope with her jealousy, and accept herself for who she already is. Ochako learns more about Izuku than just the heroic image she starts out admiring; she professes atop the UA roof to everyone how Izuku isn't a special person, he was just given a special power. He's just like everyone else. He needs love and support as much as any other person. That's what prompts her to remember Toga's tears, and now we know that in that moment she wanted Toga to be smiling along with them too. It's when Ochako lets go of her envy and her idealized image of the heroic Izuku she blindly admired, when she accepts him as a person not above her but equal to her, that Ochako accepts herself and realizes she wants to save Toga. She's going to have to help Toga come to realize this about her own feelings--she has to help Toga learn to love herself for who she is.
And does any of that sound familiar? Blind admiration of a hero? Izuku's admiration of All Might perhaps? Izuku's blind admiration of Katsuki that contributed to the rift between them? How when Izuku accepted All Might and Katsuki for their flaws and saw them as people he managed to form better relationships with them? 👀
Uraraka: who saves hero’s? This is a role left unfilled, I will fill this void!!
Recovery Girl:
No cause like seriously wtf is she talking about? Side kicks, hero partners, first responders, literally any career that branches off the support course, and anyone who has the common sense to not koala into someone in a crisis and has a vague helpful attitude fills that role
Yes I am still mad about her grabbing onto Deku during the blackwhip debacle, because there’s no a single emergency I can think of where grabbing and holding onto someone like that is ever helpful or even okay??
Not a single damn one, and by that time in their hero training she should know better, they all should, it’s one of the first things you learn in a safety course!
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But I really want to ask just from a writing standpoint, no ships or anything
Do you like Izuku and Ochaco's development as possible (or probable? idk where Hori wanna go with that) romance?
Cause I appreciated it (even tho it felt like the usual shonen romance) till the return of Izuku to UA, which made me see them more as platonic (and made me appreciate their bond way more tbh)
So from a writing standpoint, I'm not exactly a romance aficionado. It can really only come down to my preferences in what I like in a romance, but there are just some cheesy romance tropes I'm not into. I do think it's perfectly viable to analyze any relationship in any property, MHA included, for whatever dynamic you want. If you ask me to take a look at the potential romance in Izuku and Ochako's relationship, I can do that.
That said, this is a warning to hard-line IzuOcha shippers: I can't guarantee you'll enjoy everything I write about in this post.
To me, there are five major "sagas" in their relationship. Some of these I like, some of these I don't.
Saga 1: Beginning through the Internships
Saga 2: Final Exams through Kamino
Saga 3: Provisional License Exam through School Cultural Festival
Saga 4: Joint Training Arc through Paranormal Liberation War
Saga 5: Deku Retrieval Arc through to the present
Saga 1 was my favorite. This was when they were still getting to know each other and becoming friends. I like this part best because Ochako has the most characterization in the show. Her personality shines through and she's very entertaining. I also thought the stuff that happened between them in the Sports Festival was some of the most refreshing writing of opposite-sex characters I've seen in a while, platonic or romantic. Ochako has personal motivations that can be in conflict or in harmony with her relationship with Izuku, and the manner in which they interacted showed a special type of relationship for Izuku that he didn't have with any other character. It was nice variety in the context of everything else the show was giving us at the time. I wasn't necessarily dying for romance, because I do love a good platonic opposite-sex friendship too. But if it did take a romantic direction, I was excited to see how it went at the time.
Saga 2 just felt like it shoehorned the crush thing in there. It didn't really come from anything that came before it. I thought it was gonna be a good opportunity for some romantic humor, but it just turned out to be a bunch of embarrassed blushing and not much else. Wasn't really my thing.
Saga 3 tried to add something interesting to the mix with Ochako's jealousy which she tries to deny and squash, but...it doesn't come across as particularly deep or well-developed. Horikoshi kinda just throws it out there and then immediately ditches it. I wouldn't have been so annoyed if it didn't encompass all of Ochako's character for this saga. She didn't really do much of anything else at all. Even in the Overhaul arc, she didn't get any meaningful spotlight, and I mean this from an action perspective. After the awesome action she got in the Sports Festival, Horikoshi really pulled back on her and it felt like he was too afraid to make her get dirty and fight again, save for a brief moment when she pinned Toga in the woods at summer camp. I liked it better when Izuku was pining a bit after Ochako than the other way around.
Saga 4 was a bit better. There was finally some meaningful development between them with Ochako getting inspired to update her costume, saving Izuku as a development of her new character question of "who saves the heroes?", and--my favorite part--when she decides to trust Izuku when he says he can take Shinso on alone and she goes to take care of business elsewhere. But I notice these developments I like also happen to have non-romantic elements to them. It's really just when things are one-dimensionally romantic that I'm super disinterested. I like the complexity of other feelings even in their easy friendship. Platonic friendship that leads into budding romance brings at least a bit more flavor in the writing. That said, it's not a whole ton of flavor. I can see why other people would like it, but it's not the MOST exciting for me personally.
Saga 5 is again more exciting to me because of the non-romantic elements, kind of like you say. It's not that it's necessarily platonic, but it's just more interesting that Ochako's feelings seem more complicated now, and Toga has been added to the mix too. What we get in this saga especially puts me in a weird position where I'm rooting for Izuku and Ochako NOT to get together in the end, not because I don't like them or have a problem with the ship, but because it makes the overall story about their relationship since the beginning..."make sense" isn't the right phrase. It's just an interesting take on the trope in this genre. I really like the message it could potentially deliver on. I'm just not a big romance person in the first place, so the whole "there are even deeper things happening between people than just high school crushes" angle that doesn't necessarily mean romance speaks more to me. I don't really know what we get out of them getting together if that happens. But, as I said, I'm not big on romance to begin with, so I'm not the best judge of this. It could be we get a great message out of it and I'm just really bad at being able to see that at this stage. I will still be forced to lament what was lost in that case, though--because we would lose the far more interesting take on the trope if they were not to get together.
And that's why I say I'm not anti-IzuOcha, just anti-IzuOcha in canon. I think they're cute together and I really love their earlier dynamic. I think the fanart of them is cute. I love when they get along doing things. I love when people create excellent fan content for their favorite pairings. I just most like the idea of an ending where they don't end up together for the purposes of my own intrigue.
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