#anyways yeah i didn't mention the whole heroes/vigilantes thing bc that kinda speaks for itself

[ro-rogue]

-- some small spoilers up ahead for mha -- it is so interesting to me that uno often gets compared to mha by people who haven't read uno. because when you actually think about it, they really are eerily similar, despite many uno fans denying it.

at first glance: in uno, the main theme is "the government is evil and should be stopped at all costs". in mha, it's "well yeah the government isn't exactly good, but the villains are definitely worse".

and then you dig deeper.

in uno, the authorities are criticized because they do absolutely horrible things to people in the name of keeping the peace. they've lost the plot, gone too far, and what is, in theory, a very logical system (the royals) has devolved into systemic oppression. (i've read a really good commentary on here that explained why the royals are actually kinda necessary in a school like wellston, but i can't find it now, so if you've found it, pls lmk.) violence is constantly criticized. when john went joker, it wasn't glorified, like it would've been in so much of contemporary media. resistance and revolution are definitely advocated for, but violence never is.

(slight spoiler ?) the recent manga chapters of mha reveal a theme that has been pretty central for a while now: criticism of authority figures and their abuse of power. the lov is humanized, their actions are explained, they are clearly their own heroes. it's people like overhaul, like afo, who are really evil: people in positions of power who hurt those below them.

not to mention (SPOILER) hawks losing his wings. i didn't like it when i first read it, but looking back, it was the only possible ending for him. keigo had been used his entire life by the (evil) government because of his quirk, and now he's finally free. they don't have a use for him anymore. him losing his wings, ironically, set him free. (know of another character being used by an evil government because of their power?)

in uno, violence is very clearly posed as a bad thing and people in positions of power hurt those below them. in mha, violence and its glorification (hero society) is frequently criticized and the real villains are those in positions of power who hurt those below them.

also: in mha, lady nagant was a (one of presumably multiple) assassin for the government, cleaning up those who the authorities felt disrupted the current order too much. sounds familiar?

and then you have the protagonists. izuku and john both grew up powerless and then suddenly got one of the strongest powers in their society just before starting highschool, though at first, they weren't very good at using it. they both seem capable of using multiple powers, but technically it's just one really op power. i would like to claim that they both kept a really important secret about that power from their close friends for a while, but izuku told katsuki that he had a borrowed power literally weeks after he'd gotten it, so. props to john though.

there is another fun similarity between them, though. both are introduced as pretty non-violent people (rip pre-joker john, your miserable existence is missed dearly), and both go absolutely feral when their best friend ("best friend") gets hurt.

(it's also fun to mention that both izuku and john are Going Through It in the current arc.)

now, of course, a fundamental differnce between john and izuku is that izuku is fundamentally a good person who cares for people, and john,,, doesn't. it's not that he doesn't care about anyone; he just doesn't care all that much about people he doesn't really know. izuku wants to save everyone. john wants his loved ones to not be hurt. that doesn't mean he wants others to be hurt, but it will take more for him to want to save someone than just seeing them suffering. interestingly enough, it's pre-joker john who was the biggest advocate for cripple equality, while izuku has never been shown to do anything similar for the quirkless. also, izuku never went middle-school-katsuki when he finally got a handle on ofa.

but in the end, these visual-medium stories are remarkably similar and comparing them actually yields significant insights into both of these stories. comparisons should therefore not be avoided, but instead encouraged and expanded upon.