As Grand Torino and other heroes fend off against a Nomu attack in Hosu City, Midoriya and his classmates come face to face with Stain, the Hero Killer.
A lot happened in such a short space of time, but despite that, this episode didn’t feel rushed. The primary focus was the confrontations with Stain, starting with Tenya Iida. It had been established in previous episodes that Iida has a lot of resentment and anger towards Stain for what he did to his older brother, Tensei Iida who he looked up to as a model hero. Since episode 26, it has been clear that the reason he chose the internship at Hosu City was for the chance to come into contact with Stain. When he finally faced him in the last episode, Iida proclaims he will take him down, taking on the mantle of his brother’s hero name Ingenium.
However the Hero Killer, quickly disables and paralyzes Iida deeming him to be weak like his brother and explains that only reason he allowed his brother to live so that word about him could spread. He also points out in Iida’s singular focus on revenge, he neglected to notice the Pro Hero Native, whom Stain was in the process of killing. The Hero Killer states that a hero’s focus should be on others rather than themselves and believes all self-interested and self-entitled Pro Heroes ought to be eliminated.
But before he deals a finishing blow, Midoriya comes on the scene delivering a punch using 5% power of “One-For-All” and manages to give the Hero Killer more of a challenge ultilizing all that he had learned. Stain is impressed with him, especially since Midoriya’s sole intention was to rescue his friend and deems that he is worth sparing. However, this doesn’t prevent him from paralyzing Midoriya as well so that he would be unable to stop him as he proceeds with his plan to kill Iida and the Native.
But once again he is interrupted, this time by Shoto Todoroki’s flames. This is thanks to Midoriya who texted his location before he fought with Stain. Todoroki says that despite having nothing else to go on, he figured that Midoriya was in trouble and thus came to help him out until the Pro Heroes arrive. We are able to see that Todoroki has taken Midoriya’s words from their tournament battle to heart and has begun to use his fire half, recognizing that it is his own power. We also see him sympathizing with Iida’s resentment toward Stain, since he experienced the same resentment towards his father. But since the Sports Festival and meeting with his mother, he is taking strides to look beyond his anger since it will only prevent him from being the hero that he desires to be.
This episode reminds me of how much I love My Hero Academia, because it follows up and builds upon past events as the story moves forward. Seeing the development of these three characters as they confront this one single villain makes this an amazing watch. I can’t wait to see how this fight is going to end.
Rating:
Fandom Factory 