April 5th, 2021
Underdeveloping Overhaul
Anime Relations: Boku no Hero Academia 4th Season
(not a review, anime only. disclaimer: I do not hate S4, I'm just putting my thoughts on paper.)
By all accounts, season four of Boku No Hero Academia should have been fantastic. The introduction of a bunch of cool new characters, more fleshed-out backstories, and more epic fights- but it got off to a weak start, and (to me at least) felt less important, less tense than previous seasons despite the colossal threat Overhaul represented. Why is that?
To me- and a couple of people I asked- it's because Overhaul fails to pack his ideological punches. All For One poses a threat and feels important to the world because he has such a hold on our protagonist and his mentor, and serves as a direct foil to all they stand for. Stain, while (in memory) a much weaker villain with less brute force to threaten our heroes with, presented a moral quandary that was immediately relatable (greed produces rotten heroes) and seemed human- despite the awful things he did and the bloodthirsty (literally, haha) way he did them, in theory he was the little guy fighting for what he believed was right, and hurting only those he deemed to be fake heroes- for the most part.
Overhaul fails in both aspects. His ideology is far too large and unrelatable, too much of an upset to the world Horikoshi presents to the viewer, and yet does not correlate nearly enough to the themes that have already been established within our story world. In theory, his arc should have established huge ramifications for the flaws in quirk evolution and how humanity can devolve by relying on an imbalanced power system- maybe with a commentary on quirk eugenics for good measure.
Instead, we get an overpowered villain with too many henchmen to be considered the little guy, and too little explanation to be justified. It's tough to believe he has this strong belief that drives him when he's the head of a huge shadow corporation who looks down on everyone, murders others without reason, doesn't care for the fallout from his actions, and uses his already bloated ideals as a reason to torture a child for the sake of his cause. He says it himself when he's fighting Deku- nobody except him has the 'right to use' Eri.
That's where the main issue lies, isn't it? BNHA is a show that tries to start discussions about the societal side effects to a quirk-driven world, and as such most of its arguments have to be led by the villains on screen. When a villain has an ideology so far removed from what arguably makes us human, it's already hard to relate to them. When they're further boosted by firepower and drive, but not reason or an appeal to empathy, it further detaches them from us, and we care less about them because they automatically seem more irrelevant.
What further aggravates the issue is how much the arc tries to juggle- asking if foresight is a boon or bane, the weight placed on the viewer when acknowledging All Might's eventual passing, the ethics of child abuse in general- these are all important to the story, but a minor point in relation to the issue I'm talking about- just like in the case of the arc itself. To address these as well, I suspect fleshing out Overhaul and his backstory took a backseat- to the detriment of the season's themes as a whole. As I said, this show is run by its villains, and Overhaul's argument was given very little to run on.
Season four had a huge task to tackle. It had a ton of things to address, many characters to introduce, many questions to ask- with a limit on how much time the studio was given to establish all of this, I don't doubt they did the best they could. The end result is by no means bad- just weaker in comparison to the less busy seasons that had more leeway to really delve into their discussions and give us a reason to want to look from the villain's perspective.
Too, perhaps, Overhaul was written as unrelatable and cruel as possible. Maybe we were given someone whose dogma chokes out any shred of humanity we could look for, an antagonist meant to intimidate and scare the audience via sheer terrifying force of will and clearly twisted means of achieving his ideals. That in theory is not a bad villain- someone presented as an evil the audience is meant to root for the downfall of- and giving them backstory would weaken such a proposed lofty, far-gone character.
As it stands, however, the storytelling itself took a hit from the choices made. What a pity.
By all accounts, season four of Boku No Hero Academia should have been fantastic. The introduction of a bunch of cool new characters, more fleshed-out backstories, and more epic fights- but it got off to a weak start, and (to me at least) felt less important, less tense than previous seasons despite the colossal threat Overhaul represented. Why is that?
To me- and a couple of people I asked- it's because Overhaul fails to pack his ideological punches. All For One poses a threat and feels important to the world because he has such a hold on our protagonist and his mentor, and serves as a direct foil to all they stand for. Stain, while (in memory) a much weaker villain with less brute force to threaten our heroes with, presented a moral quandary that was immediately relatable (greed produces rotten heroes) and seemed human- despite the awful things he did and the bloodthirsty (literally, haha) way he did them, in theory he was the little guy fighting for what he believed was right, and hurting only those he deemed to be fake heroes- for the most part.
Overhaul fails in both aspects. His ideology is far too large and unrelatable, too much of an upset to the world Horikoshi presents to the viewer, and yet does not correlate nearly enough to the themes that have already been established within our story world. In theory, his arc should have established huge ramifications for the flaws in quirk evolution and how humanity can devolve by relying on an imbalanced power system- maybe with a commentary on quirk eugenics for good measure.
Instead, we get an overpowered villain with too many henchmen to be considered the little guy, and too little explanation to be justified. It's tough to believe he has this strong belief that drives him when he's the head of a huge shadow corporation who looks down on everyone, murders others without reason, doesn't care for the fallout from his actions, and uses his already bloated ideals as a reason to torture a child for the sake of his cause. He says it himself when he's fighting Deku- nobody except him has the 'right to use' Eri.
That's where the main issue lies, isn't it? BNHA is a show that tries to start discussions about the societal side effects to a quirk-driven world, and as such most of its arguments have to be led by the villains on screen. When a villain has an ideology so far removed from what arguably makes us human, it's already hard to relate to them. When they're further boosted by firepower and drive, but not reason or an appeal to empathy, it further detaches them from us, and we care less about them because they automatically seem more irrelevant.
What further aggravates the issue is how much the arc tries to juggle- asking if foresight is a boon or bane, the weight placed on the viewer when acknowledging All Might's eventual passing, the ethics of child abuse in general- these are all important to the story, but a minor point in relation to the issue I'm talking about- just like in the case of the arc itself. To address these as well, I suspect fleshing out Overhaul and his backstory took a backseat- to the detriment of the season's themes as a whole. As I said, this show is run by its villains, and Overhaul's argument was given very little to run on.
Season four had a huge task to tackle. It had a ton of things to address, many characters to introduce, many questions to ask- with a limit on how much time the studio was given to establish all of this, I don't doubt they did the best they could. The end result is by no means bad- just weaker in comparison to the less busy seasons that had more leeway to really delve into their discussions and give us a reason to want to look from the villain's perspective.
Too, perhaps, Overhaul was written as unrelatable and cruel as possible. Maybe we were given someone whose dogma chokes out any shred of humanity we could look for, an antagonist meant to intimidate and scare the audience via sheer terrifying force of will and clearly twisted means of achieving his ideals. That in theory is not a bad villain- someone presented as an evil the audience is meant to root for the downfall of- and giving them backstory would weaken such a proposed lofty, far-gone character.
As it stands, however, the storytelling itself took a hit from the choices made. What a pity.
Posted by asdfghjklicia | Apr 5, 2021 10:47 AM | 1 comments