♡his little shadow♡

Shigaraki, Toga, and Dabi all served the scapegoat role to their family to a certain extent, they were all problem children where their parents didn't see them as children, but rather as the problem-maker in their household. I once wrote a meta comparing the Shimura and the Todorokis basically saying that despite Touya literally dying, and coming back from the dead, and the whole family getting a second chance with him, the Todorokis basically view him the same way as they did when he was a child.

Even though Endeavor was the problem-maker in the household, Touya was unfairly blamed as the problem child. Rather than confront Endeavor those around him chose to instead, tell Touya to quiet down, and simply stop reacting to his father's ignorance of him. This mirrors how anyone in the Shimura household could have stepped up to confront Koutarou's unfair punishment of Tenko for wanting to be a hero just like any other kid his age, before it ramped up to physical abuse, but they instead tried to gently persuade Tenko to give up on his dream instead.

Therefore, nothing has truly changed and the Todorokis recreate the same unhealthy dynamic they always have had, Endeavor remains the hero, Touya remains the scapegoat to be blamed. Even though nothing that happened in his childhood is truly his fault.

So returning to these lines, people don't care whether or not you're smiling or crying. For Touya it's a reference to no matter how they choose to present themselves, people are always going to view them in a certain way. Touya is the scapegoat of his family. Even before he became a villain. When he was just a twelve year old, his family's perspective of him was very uncharitable.

Rei knew that Touya was just a child that wanted his father's attention, but that came across very differently in how she acted with him, following Endeavor's rules and trying to persuade him to give up on getting his father's attention, even acting afraid fo Touya when he resembles his father. In doing so she slides the blame on Touya.

I mean, just to illustrate my point if you look at the situation was Touya's perspective his behavior is completely reasonable. Touya was groomed, separated from other children, told he was special and he belonged in a different world. Told that he needs to practice and train to stop All Might. He was raised on those words.

He repeats those words to Rei later. Touya can't adapt to the change, because the change doesn't make sense in his mind. He was used to getting all this attention, but suddenly he's not getting it, it's like he's being punished when he didn't do anything wrong. He can't figure out what he's doing wrong so he tries to fix it, but in his attempts to fix it following everything he's been taught beforehand, training good, he's gotta work hard to get his father's approval, he was born to be a hero, that's suddenly no longer good any more and Touya's parents never put any effort at all into trying to bridge the gap to Touya or help him adjust to the situation.

Like I said, Touya's entire arc revolves around the idea of how his family views him. Almost everyone in the household, except Shoto who was too young at the time didn't know him. Fuyumi brushes off Touya's attempts to train like it's not a big deal to him, Natsuo doesn't get why Touya is talking his ear off about their father at night (they're also too young to properly comprehend), Rei at least tries to understand that Touya is just a child in need of attention from his father but her fear of endeavor reflected in her children makes her distant from all of them, and Endeavor has no intention of changing or course correcting. How unseen Touya's distress was in his own household, is brought up multiple times. Endeavor is just now, remembering that his son literally cried and pulled his own hair out in his attempts to get his attention. The memory was blurry for him before.

Touya mentioned his father never even bothered to notice or care, that he was crying his eyes out nearly every day about his father's neglect. We're even shown in the flashback itself, Touya acts confrontational and demanding with his mother, attention hungry with his father, but when he's all alone he's so overwhelmed by emotion he literally starts crying because that's how he feels about his neglect, abandoned to the point where it overwhlems him with tears.

Touya's entire story is about how literally no matter what face he shows to people, even his own family is determined to characterize him in the worst way possible. Even when he was just a twelve year old so overwhelmed he was constantly crying and sad, nobody even bothered to look at his distress. Even before he was a villain, he was villainized for normal kid stuff, like... wanting his father's attention. This continues far into adulthood, when Dabi angrily accuses Hawks of murdering Twice, Twice questions if he's really sad about it because he shows a smiling face in that moment. Touya can't even feel sad for his friend dying even though Hawks witnessed him trying to protect Twice, without Hawks accusing him of villainy.

This is why Dabi tells Toga to not show anybody her tears, to smile instead of crying, because in everything Dabi's experienced so far everything's told him that nobody cares about his internal world or what he's feeling inside. People have already made up their mind about what he is and have decided to demonize him. This is also probably why Dabi doesn't bother to socialize with others, and has isolated himself for a long time in the first place. He says as much to Rei. Why would I want to play with normal kids? They belong in a different world than me? They don't understand me.

Why would Dabi think other people would understand him when his own family is so committed to misunderstanding him, when Dabi can make a live broadcast on television about how endeavor raised him in his household and people are just like "oh that Dabi is annoying an insane." Dabi doesn't open himself to others and only shows them a smiling mask because deep down inside he believes that no one will ever give him a fair shake anyway so why bother expose himself.

However, that's what makes his decision to open up to Toga just a little bit this chapter so meaningful. I think it's important for perspective to realize Dabi and Toga's relationship hasn't really been good so far, and that actually matters. Dabi from introduction has picked Toga out as a remorseless psycho. He characterized her rather the same way that others have characterized him. Even during team bonding moments like immediately after Twice's death when Spinner was trying to convince the group and Toga to stay together, Dabi screamed in her face he doesn't care and she can do whatever she wants. All of that matters because it's such a contrast to this moment. Dabi hasn't been acting like a good big brother around Toga so far, he's been acting like an asshole, she has almost no reason to think he's kind, or that he's doing anything but using her.

However Toga, the most emotionally intelligent character in the league. Who was able to see Twice's distress and empathize with him. Who was the first oen to see Shigaraki's faith in all his friends along with Twice. She's willing to see the kindness in his actions that his family isn't.

And this is specifically why Touya has avoided making friends until now, because he was convinced no one could even understand him if he tried. He simply belonged in a different world than others. His own family can't even recognize him with a little bit of hairdye, so why bother?

We're meant to draw a line between Toga's self reflection all this chapter and Touya's. It's actually clever, because we're not shown nearly as much and in detail of Toga's emotional abuse. We never see her get hit like Shigaraki, we never see her break down crying over it like Touya in his two flashback chapters. We only see the moment she snapped. However, everything in this chapter goes to suggest how little her parents cared to try to understand Himiko, and how quickly they gave up on her. They stopped measuring her height against the wall when she was three years old just before her quirk manifested. They literally tell her to her face no one will ever accept her the way she is. They threw away everything in her room, and let the whole place be vandalized. Did they even wait for their daughter to come home, or were they relieved she left?

Toga is different from Touya and Tenko, because she was younger when her villainry "started". As far as we know Shigaraki didn't debut as a villain until he was legally an adult during the UA invasion incident. Touya didn't debut as a villain until Stain's rise to power. Toga's first violent incident was in middle school. Even in our society, violent stabbing incidents between middle schoolers is a thing that happens sometimes, and while it's complicated legally in japan Toga wouldn't be tried as an adult, and even if she went to juvenile detention center that record would be sealed once she turned eighteen. However, the case seems to be different in Hero Society. Number one, we have in VIgilantes as teenage girl vigilante being labeled as a villain for her first offense, and having Endeavor go after her fully with the intent to kill. Aoyama was taken hostage under extremely extenuating circumstances, yet he's tied up in maximum security prison, and has been threatened with not only arrest, but evidence of his arrest showing up on his permanent record even if he changes sides and helps the heroes. We are given all indications that hero society isn't exactly lenient even on first offenses for children.

However, Toga could have been saved much much earlier. If on her first violent incident she got the help she needed, b/c her freakout in middle school was very clearly a cry for help and attention. Like. This is pretty obviously a metaphor for self-harm.

Touya and Toga even follow a similiar pattern with their quirks. At first they only harm themselves, Toga biting her wrist and sucking her own blood, (like such an obvious metaphor for slitting her wrists do I even need to point him out) and Touya at first all he did was burn himself while practicing with his quirk in an attempt to bring attention. When that wasn't enough, only then, did they start lashing out and using their quirks against others in desperation.

However, the labeling of Toga as a demon child happened before she even started harming anyone, by her own parents. While it may be reasonable to call Toga a demon child for now being a serial murderer with several kills to her name, it was the act of labelling her a villain in the first place,t hat not only got the ball rolling, but also prevented her from getting help every single opportunity she needs to.

So another thing with Toga and Touya both being given the worst possible least charitable interpretations by not only their own families, but also the heroes around them, is that it's clearly had an affect on Toga.

Uraraka characterizes Toga's actions as entirely superflous, her motiations as spur of the moment, and she also jumps to assuming that Toga just killed that old lady when she could have sucked her blood and left her alone. Characterizing her with the worst interpretation possible. However, when looking at the situation from Toga's perspective, why she did this, why she transforms into others and even why she kills.

After witnessing Jin's death, Toga seems to confirm in her own mind what she's been suspicious of for awhile. That heroes won't come and save a person like her. It goes all the way back to Toga's fight with Curious. Out of all the villain vs villain matchups, Toga is the only person whoa actually kills her counterpart on the MLA. Shigaraki even spares Re-Destro. So wy, only Toga, why does she only kill her clear foil on the MLA. You could say it's because HOri didn't want to write another female villain, but considering the actual context of the fight itself, Toga's decision to kill is motivated very specifically by one thing.

She was terrified for her life. Toga suffered the most mortal wounds in her fight. She was literally surrounded by a crowd of people who all turned against her. Toga while running away in the crowd, murmurs to herself repeating to a psychotic extent she has to do all of these things so she doesn't get caught, she has to blend in, she has to be sensitive to how other people behave and transform herself. All to protect herself. All to keep running away. So, we arrive at the answer of why did Toga kill Curious?

Because she was fucking terrified for her life and in that situation she was convinced it was kill or be killed.

Toga is uniquely a child in the League of Villains, and more than that, a runaway child with one violent incident who started ramping up shortly after she joined the league. If she was caught after running away before she joined the league, in a normal society, she'd most likely wouldn't even be tried as an adult. However, this is hero society where Toga has every reason to believe that since she's been labeled as a villain and hunted down like a villain by heroes, that heroes like Endeavor are going to come after her with lethal force and burn her alive. THis is once again, something Endeavor did literally onscreen, and burned a bystander and got no punisment for. This is something Heroes are allowed to do, so Toga is completely reasonable in her belief that no hero is going to come save her, and if they do corner her they're just as likely to go for the kill as the arrest.

So Touya is characterized by this prevasive belief that he's always going to be going through whatever he is going through alone, because no one will understand him. Touya himself is so isolated he can't even accept that he might have burned Toga's house down as a gesture of kindness. He insists he isn't kind, he's just using Toga, that she's wrong about him, because that's all Touya knows about himself. Touya has only ever been seen as Endeavor's son and nothing else, so even while being cast away from his family he still characterizes everything he does as to get revenge against Endeavor and be Endeavor's villain because the way he was raised he has no other way of seeing himself.

While Toga believes deep down to her core, that she's going to be killed and eradicated for being born with the quirk she was born at. Like the dream wasn't subtle,s he dreams of a red bird piercing her through the stomach and dancing in the blood. I wonder what that was a metaphor for. Maybe, Hawks gutting Twice with the knife? Toga says that her motivation for killing people is to love and become them, but if you analyze her actions, she's a runaway girl desperately afraid the heroes are going to hunt her down for her deviant quirk, so she has to do anything she can, even transform herself into other people, to pass herself off as normal and keep hiding.

They are two people whose families and the people around them have committed to interpreting them and their actions in the worst way possible, while turning a blind eye to their inner distress. Touya is just the villain of the family, even Endeavor whose directly responsible for creating him can't separate seeing his son from being a villain, and Toga is a just a pleasure killer who kills on a whim.