MHA Only Has Four Important Female Characters And The Rest Could Comfortably Be Removed With Zero Impact

Now that the first episode of the season is out, I can finally comment on how hilariously intense the meeting of the Upper Moons was. 

Like, we really watched (I, even paid money to see in the cinema) the equivalent of Akaza just taking the elevator to the office, pass by the recepcionist, get greeted by the one coworker he can’t fucking stand, get chewed up by the boss like every Monday and having to insist to his bitchass coworker that he’d rather die than go ‘hang out’ after work.

We really saw that but with an animation budget that’s off the charts. 

Sorry for not being on in, like, forever. Life’s just gotten in the way.

Anyways, that’s not what I wanted to talk about today. What I really wanted to focus on is something I’ve been thinking a lot on lately, and that’s the idea of asshole characters.

Obviously asshole characters come in all shapes and sizes. Each have their own motivations for being an asshole and/or unfriendly individual. Katsuki, Shota, and Hitoshi are asshole characters themselves, but why is it that I dislike them so much?

At first I thought I didn’t like asshole characters in general. However, I then remembered that there are several characters people would classify as assholes/unfriendly individuals that are characters I adore. Lysithea from Fire Emblem 2 Houses and Natsuki from Doki Doki Literature Club are characters who are rough around the edges and aren’t nice to people immediately. The reasons behind their behavior aren’t too far off from why Shota and Hitoshi act the way they do, that being trauma, so why am I able to look past their behavior and not that of Shota and Hitoshi? With Katsuki, it’s obvious, but the other two had me scratching my head for a bit.

The answer, outside of the fact that Lysithea and Natsuki are multi-layered characters written far better than Shota and Hitoshi, is that the girls are REACTIVE assholes while Hitoshi and Shota are ACTIVE assholes.

What do I mean by that? Well both Lysithea and Natsuki for the most part keep to themselves. Something that someone does ends up causing them to snap. For Lysithea, it’s when she feels that her time is being wasted after someone approaches her about something irrelevant. For Natsuki, it’s a defensive mechanism triggered by a perceived attack on her character. Now, is that an excuse for their behavior? No. There are better ways to defend yourself and to get people to stop talking to you, but it’s at least understandable that they’d snap due to their traumas.

Katsuki, Hitoshi, and Shota aren’t like that. When they’re an asshole, it isn’t because they’re provoked into being one by someone else’s actions, but because they’re the ones doing the provoking. Katsuki’s rude and aggressive to everyone around him, choosing to make the life of another boy absolutely miserable without any provocation. Hitoshi decides to mock 1-A and issue his “challenge” not because anyone approached him, but because he himself is looking for trouble. Yeah, Katsuki gave off a shitty first impression, but Hitoshi already was planning on challenging 1-A from the beginning. Shota’s the one who controls his teaching style and is a position of authority. Rather than do his job, he’d rather tear someone down.

Am I supposed to sympathize with these so-called heroes? I for the life of me can’t seem to do so. Meanwhile, with characters like Lysithea and Natsuki, I can because they don’t mean to be an asshole, it’s just that they want to be left alone.

Now, am I saying reactive assholes are better characters than proactive assholes? No. Proactive assholes can have great character development. The problem is that proactive assholes are tougher to warm up to, especially when they’re meant to characters the audience is meant to root for. MHA’s writing does nothing TO make people want to root for these guys. They’re just assholes who wanna throw their weight around and never receive punishment for it/are called out for it. Hell, MHA seems to think these characters ARE in the right for being the way they are and/or doesn’t take the fact that they are assholes seriously (looking at you Katsuki).

Anyways, I thought I’d write this up to really explain more of my thought process and why Katsuki, Hitoshi, and Shota bother me so much whereas I find myself adoring characters such as Lysithea and Natsuki.

My 25 years of palaeoart chronology...

A zoom in at the male and female Caudipteryx in my painting, called "The Duet," commissioned by the University of Bristol.

Omg welcome back!! You've been sorely missed, I hope you're well <33

Also I'm not on twt and haven't paid attention to the spiky pompom in a while but people hate him now?? :O

Yep 🙌. Well, either they’ve woken up/changed their tune as they grew up/consumed better media or those who were once afraid of speaking out against him have begun doing so. It ain’t perfect but people can finally hate him without worrying about being doxxed 😂

bday gift for @/hanviito on twitter!! 

Some of my favourite Muzan fanarts are those where his human self "meets" his future self

artist: @gywjd3

artist: @kawasemi500k

artist: @gimgiyak

The Bakugou Experence(TM)

Bakugou: *punches Izuku*

Izuku, starry eyed: "Woow, Bakugou, that was so cool!"

Kirashima: "What a manly punch!"

Eraserhead: *grumbles, but is secretly impressed by how good a punch it was, even though he wants to improve his form a bit*

Shigaraki: *nods* "I can see why you're the one closest to Deku."

All Might: "What good friends they are!"

story of my life

The most terrifying part of having memory issues is when you can feel something from 5 seconds ago be thrown out the window and there's an empty hole where it once was. You remember that you forgot something.

Tsubomi is probably aroace, honestly. Being queer in a predominantly non-queer setting can be quite isolating, which has its own additional aspects for aro and ace people, since we can't just translate the general experience of romance into something that makes sense to us the way people who do experience attraction can. She's described as having some distance between herself and her friends, and she doesn't seem to have interest in anyone romantically. When in the epilogue, it's revealed that Mob rekindled his friendship with her after all, it's not portrayed as being indicative of any romantic subtext. It's just what it is: a rekindled friendship.

Middle school is a time where a lot of allo people start to realize what kinds of people they're into, so it's a confusing time for aro and ace people. It's hard to pinpoint an absence, after all, and the world is so amatonormative. There's an expectation that wanting a straight romance with one other person is the norm, and anything else is thrown to the side. It's just as hard for people to realize they want something different as it is for people to realize they don't want any of it. Tsubomi's distance from her friends and her disinterest in any of the guys who asked her out seem to fit this.