#mTa: dabi

[savnofilter]

Is dabi a bad person in canon? Yeah. His list of crimes is super long but nobody can ignore that Endeavor literally caused that!!! His motivation for hurting people is because Endeavor was a shitty dad so in a way, he's responsible for those things too. Obviously Dabi committed the actual crimes and Endeavor didn't know but on some level, Endeavor does need to take accountability for that (imo). I don't agree with Dabi being even more villanized either. He's a victim and an abuser, but to throw him under the bus and try to redeem endeavor is just irresponsible and again, lacks proper nuance of what motivates villains. Ik that's the point but it's handled so fuckin poorly

it makes my ass itch upside down from the way that ppl dont want to acknowledge the fact that Dabi is the was he is BECAUSE OF ABUSE. not to mention, they downplay what hes been through because he wasnt physically touched.

he was neglected emotionally—and even attention wise too. any abuse is abuse. it was good that hori wrote it in, but now ppl just dont have a working braincell to fully develop and understand that concept. Dabi is a product of Endeavor's actions. why is it only when Shouto is injuring himself or getting hurt the only time ppl want to feel slight towards Endeavor? ohhh, its because his rebellion is more inflicted on himself quietly. he suffers in silence like his other siblings.

and one thing i notice ab Endeavor stans is that theyll say, "i dont support his actions 🗣" and then talk down on Dabi?! i mean, i dont blame them. if you have a face level understanding of media literacy, id nod my head and go along with every stories themes i read too. 🥴

[hamliet]

I find it interesting you think Hawks will be burn while oppsing Dabi. Why you think it will be necessarily an avversative behaviour that will led to tragedy? Icarus was a tragedy, but it’s differently portrayed in few version. In some, it was to underline to not chew more than what one can bite. Basically Icarus died of the ecstasy of flying itself, he died from hubris. But there’s no trace of it in Hawks. other interpretations stress how Icarus wants to get close to the sun, reaching a field it should prohibited. Basically while classics says icarus was too daring, some stress he liked the sun a lot. Hawks is an Endeavor ally. I strongly doubt he would do anything that would have the man he admired hurt. So what if instead he tries to stop Dabi, and he can’t and this results tragedy? The hubris of wanting to do all alone? Besides this is the meaning of Jin’s death to him: helping others and the sin of thinking killing was the only way.

Well, Hawks is the one flying around with giant wings and getting direct narrative shoutouts to Icarus. 

I’m teasing. Now that we’ve got the requisite sarcasm out of the way, I’ll answer. I think hubris is misunderstood a lot. It’s the oldest sin in the books, the oldest flaw known to man. It stretches across cultures and time. You might say it’s part of human nature. The story of the Garden of Eden records it as the cause of mankind’s fall from grace: shall we become like God? 

It’s thinking you are god, but rarely do people actually be like “hey I’m literally god.” Instead it’s shown in behavior: you can judge people. You can condemn, you can save, you can destroy. It’s pride. It’s assuming you know how the world should go, including how everyone should react to you and to life, should think, should behave. It’s assuming the rules of reality don’t apply to you, that you are the exception, that you are in control. 

That’s what happened to Icarus: he was given wings to become above the rest of humanity (literally and figuratively: literally because flying, and figuratively in that it is a feat left for the gods or mythical creatures). He fell and drowned; no one killed him, there was no villain, his hubris just led to a dead son and a heartbroken father. Icarus is not a bad guy. Neither is Hawks. Icarus was just a child who had been traumatized (he and his dad got imprisoned and left to the mercy of minotaurs) and the wings that his dad created helped them escape. Those wings saved them, if you will. The wings aren’t the problem either. 

Hawks’ flaw is absolutely hubris. The entire hero system’s flaw is hubris, actually. @linkspooky​ covered it excellently in their analysis of Hawks here. Also, because of the whole “human nature” concept, heroes with hubris are relatable. They’re likable, often. From Eren Jaeger to Herakles to Icarus to Antigone, they’re characters who are sympathetic, understandable, and we root for them. Icarus isn’t a villain in his story; he’s a sweet boy who didn’t listen. Which uh. We’ve all done. 

To answer your ask about why Hawks would hurt Endeavor: Hawks doesn’t know what Endeavor thinks of Touya/Dabi. Why would he? We know, but he does not know what we know. I explained this here. Plus, hubris is itself assuming you know better than someone else, so... it’s not a good recipe. I don’t think Hawks is out here being a bad dude or gonna turn into Moonfish 2.0, but instead that he’s going to continue to act on his hubris with predictable consequences--since he doesn’t appear to be drawn to personal reflection even after getting his wings burned off the first time. 

I do think you’re absolutely right though that one of Hawks’ issues is trying to do things alone! So I think that’ll be part of it--while I try to shy away from predicting specifics, it seems quite possible, as I said above, that Hawks will not directly ask Endeavor about things, and thereby land himself in... sunny hot water (I’m sorry I had to joke so I don’t cry). 

One more thing about tragic falls: the reason it is supposed to resonate is because the hero doesn’t deserve what they get. Sure, they do bad things, but we’re sympathetic to them and the punishment is supposed to be worse than the flaw. So when I say Hawks is tragic, that’s what I mean--not “he is bad and deserves this.” 

Also of note, I know I say often BNHA isn’t tragic, and that does give me hope Hawks will be able to rise like a phoenix from his eventual fall (bird! bird! bird!). But the reason I am still expecting a tragic moment is because Hawks is, unlike Toga, Dabi, or Shigaraki, not a major shadow parallel who must be saved by the main characters. In fact, he’s not very connected to the main characters at all, at least not in the way the other three are. Hence if you’re going to insert a tragic subplot... that’s where you’d do it. Tragic subplots in otherwise optimistic child-aimed stories are not unheard of, either. Twice’s subplot was tragic, and guess who’s been linked to Twice’s subplot and isn’t reconsidering things from it? (Toga is reconsidering.) 

That said, again, I do expect some kind of redemptive element to his story by the end. I don’t think he’ll just fall into the ocean and no one will care. My specific prediction is that he goes for Touya eventually, and Endeavor stops him by sacrificing himself, not by murdering Hawks, because he’ll realize that Hawks is also a sad kid, thereby giving Shouto the chance to go and save Touya. It’s what happens afterwards that I’m nervous about, but I do believe it’ll involve redemption of some sort. Right now I’m pessimistically sitting at a stew of redemptive death helping Shouto somehow, but again, BNHA is a happy story, so maybe he’ll be able to come up and stay up, but humbled. Not as a god. 

[sethmacenzie]

So besides the point that My Villain Academia is my favourite ark and I might be a bit biased on changes to it, especially because Spinner is my favourite character, but what they did with it is a terrible adaptation due to the pacing and scenes they did in the Endevour Agency arc. And I am going to explain why! I’m not going to even touch the animation style going from amazing to abysmal with Shigaraki and his flashback. Or the fact that Dabi is the tallest now or some reason. And don’t get me started on Spinner’s bad animation, (the link is a nice comparison by @helga-grinduil) because if anything it plays into quirkism that is now not getting adressed. So @mettywiththenotes already explained better than I ever could how they screwed up with Re-Destro’s introduction, but they did that way earlier already with the scenes of the PLF and Shigaraki destroying Deika. Watchers know the League are going to win, that takes out the threat completly. We know that they are going to make it out alive and fine.We saw Toga with both eyes intact alive and well, we saw Dabi, Spinner and Twice as part of the PLF. You can see Re-Destro in his pinstripe suit in the Hawks scene. You can make out Trumpet’s back and maybe with good eyes Sceptic’s. That leaves Geten’s, Curious’, Giran’s, Compress’ and Maschia’s fate undetermind. Two of them are enemies of the LoV that watcher’s most likely won’t care about, Giran is a background character and Maschia is the boss fight they have to win anyway, so that leaves Mr. Compress as the only person with an unclear fate of the entire ark to care about. We see Shigaraki in the Ujiko scene that happens in the episode before they get transfered and if you look closely you can see his missing fingers. So we know he’s going to be fine after the fight and it completly spoils the war arc. Let alone the fact that the power up got spoiled. As @robotlesbianjavert pointed out: screwing up Spinner’s narrative fails the narration and that’s something they can’t undo. If you bring the Spinner screams at Shigaraki later in a flashback it loses all emotion because we know how it ends instead of experiencing it the same way Spinner does in the manga. The reader sees through Spinner’s eyes in this ark, we saw the inspiration that he got from Shigaraki and the anime watchers should have gotten the same.   The anime misses out on so much of them just being human normal being which is extremly important to the entire story, that they are people too. So cutting out all of it loses that. The banter with Dabi, Toga noticing Shigaraki misses Kurogiri, Compress’  thinking about his image, all of that is lost. Let alone it completly erases both Spinner’s backstory and the worldbuilding of discrimination. This was brought up earlier and it’s going to come back later. If they don’t cut it too, not that isn’t a theme that was in the manga since the first chapter. The “Mutant KKK” (as I like to call them) are part of making them seem human instantly. There are people who fight for awful things that have nothing to do with choice, aka discrimination based on how you are born and the LoV are killing them. It’s one of the easiest ways to make bad guys seem not as bad and it works, but the anime doesn’t have that. So for the viewers they are just the same child kidnappers from before. And Spinner’s narration backs that up, he’s a pretty normal guy and the viewers eyes and by cutting out the entire chapter we lose his intro and you start to wonder why this guy is the one narrating everything. Spinner is the one that asks Shigaraki what the plan is and this ark is the answer to that question for both Spinner and the readers. It amazing framing and it is completly gone. And of course the whole Sushi scene is why Shigaraki decides that he wants an alliance, because he cares for the League’s wishes. 220 adresses their poverty and they are in dire need of money not just by showing Compress’ broken hand like the anime did, but they are running low on food, Toga’s equipment is broken, their cothes are torn and Spinner is obviously not ok living like that.

@future-dregs already added to my post how important this all is for the future manga arc. Or as they put it: they shot themselves in the foot.

So when this comes back up later they are screwed, they’d have to stitch in illfitting flashbacks that are narrativly bad, change the story or just make it seem as if they included it earlier. And so far there no plans for this, since the voice actor of Spinner already confirmed that it’s not in season 5.

They will have to adress this and more: Why would Spinner be the most loyal to Shigaraki if he never doubted him? Why are they going to make an alliance with the mta if Mr Compress and Spinner weren’t uncomftable with their living situation? Why would Mr. Compress sacrifice himself like that if they are just average companions? Let alone stuff like: Why would anyone fear for the live of Toga if they saw her being fine? Why would anyone think that Re-Destro is threat if Miyashita isn’t in the anime?

[savnofilter]

Like fr this is why I like fanfics where Dabi is more nuanced than endeavor. I fully believe Dabi is aware of half the abusive behavior Endeavor has pulled, and would consciously try not to be his dad WHILE ALSO DOING IT ANYWAY AND NOT KNOWING HOW TO CATCH HIMSELF. I’ve seriously read fanfic - fucking FANFIC - more interesting than the bullshit take Hori is trying to pull with this stupid endeavor writing

....

aight you finna hand it ever or...?

[savnofilter]

Endeavor doesn’t care about doing better for his family. He’s only doing it for appearances and to make everyone still stick with him in pro hero society. It’s blatantly self serving y’all stan this??

LMAO RIGHT. mfs think theyre based for stanning endeavor like okay special snowflake... we get it, you ignore abusive behaviors. dont gotta shout it from the rooftops. nor doesnt it make you different from everyone else. 🤓

its very clear like regular abusers, endeavor does not care to change unless theres a public presence on it. we all know as individuals that abuse is bad (at least i think most of us do). inflicted on others or even onto ourselves. the todoroki family are literally the textbook example of abuse. so there is no excuse or reason why to pretend like endeavor was unaware of his actions. for fucks sake, he even BOUGHT HIS WIFE?? and these are the same ppl who have the audacity to put their two cents on actual abuse stories. they can barely grasp fictional ones.

personally, liking an abusive, villain or just nasty character can be excused with how they are 1) written and 2) worked into the plot. and in this case, i really dont like how either is done. its like theyre trying too hard to rush it. and it doesnt help the fact they make dabi more of a bad guy than he needs to be portrayed. it couldve really been handled more differently and better.

[savnofilter]

What bugs me is these are the same mfers who preach about “I was abused!!!11!1!1 and I know what it’s like and I love the Todos but Endeavor is daddy and Dabi is wrroooooong” like…y’all are seriously gatekeeping trauma and being preachy like y’all didn’t do toxic shit as a trauma response goodbye, suck a dick disrespectfully and fuck off. Fuck I hate the bnha fandom.

especially since their main drive for why they wont support dabi is sometimes based on the literal sides that they are portrayed on. its like?? ion wanna sound pompous for saying ppl dont know how to digest or understand media but shit. 💀

as soon as i hear that spiel i just gotta roll my eyes and tune out. cuz what youve been through does not give a full on excuse or good reason to support something that isnt worth supporting. its like ppl like shitty things because they want an excuse to be shitty themselves. mayhaps why they cling to any of the bad/nuanced themes of mha.

and also, its very popular so the "bad" amount of ppl are going to stick out like a sore thumb...

[savnofilter]

Do…do endeavor stans know negligence is a form of abuse? There’s physical, emotional, sexual, financial abuse, and negligence….which…is ALSO A FORM OF ABUSE. Like…just because Touya didn’t get physically or emotionally beat down DOES NOT mean he got out unscathed.

im pretty sure they do, they just dont care. its the only scapegoat to excuse the actions he takes it. dont even get me started on the way they totally ignore the other types of abuses you listed in this ask. i think ppl just wanna support bad characters so they can use it as a mask to indirectly support the things they do irl.