My Hero Academia 228-231 Review: Who is the Real Me

Boku no Hero Academia, Chapter 228: Heart Trauma; Chapter 229: All it takes is one bad day; Chapter 230: Sad Man's Parade; Chapter 231: The Path

Yeah, I've been sort of slacking on this front. Forgive me. I'm not going to catch up to all of the available chapters just yet, but it's mostly still focusing on the same arc of villains, which is what I'm all about. This arc has apparently came under a fair amount of criticism of people yelling "get back to the heroes already", which... fair enough, I suppose, because there's so many secondary hero characters who haven't gotten the spotlight... but I'm such a big fan of the villains that actually do leap into the spotlight in this arc that I do like this sequence a lot.

This series of chapters basically covers a chunk of the villain-vs-villain arc that primarily focuses on Twice and his character development, and a little bit on Shigaraki as well. 228 is sort of a fake-out with any real revelations for Dabi as he fights against weird beady-eyed Captain Cold and his massive ice hands (named "Apocrypha" or Geten, depending on which you prefer), and it's a huge massive fight scene and all before we cut away to Twice recovering the wounded body and being completely crazy -- with his opposite speech really going into overdrive. He goes super duper insane, but eventually cries and talks about how the League of Villains is his home. 

Of course, he ends up facing off against another member of the Liberation Front, Skeptic, whose ability, Shadow Puppet, creates a massive army of fake Twices to basically traumatize the poor man. And... man, you got to really feel sorry for Twice here. As entertaining as his psychosis is, the sheer brokenness and panic he displays when faced with the sins of his past... Twice has easily been the most entertaining out of the Villain League characters, particularly with that one-man solo chapter (or episode) where we focus entirely on him, and I'm a huge fan that his genuinely pitiable mental condition ends up getting explored. 

229 continues with this, particularly with the traumatic experience of Twice getting his mask removed and faced with a dozen fake versions of himself. But the sight of the fake puppets about to quite literally snap Toga's neck (which is a horrifying panel, by the way), Twice ends up going completely insane, going "I AM KILLING HER!" before going straight into an existential crisis. Am I me or not, and all that jazz. This leads into a pretty interesting pre-Twice backstory, where a fateful road accident caused him to lose his job, and eventually he delved into just sort of bouncing here and there, being completely disconnected from the rest of the world... and needing someone he could trust is what led Twice to create copies of himself.

Which, of course, led to the tragic bit where all the Twices turn on each other, and in his own words, he "lost the ability to trust even himself." Eventually, he is introduced by Giran to the Villain League, noting that people who are 'lost' in the world like Twice are numerous enough that they gather as a group, and, well, that's how he entered the league. Also, we learn just how fragile Twice's clones are, and enough damage akin to a broken arm would be able to cause a clone to disappear... and this indecision and Twice's own internalized uncertainty on whether he is the real Twice is what caused him to avoid actual physical combat so readily. 

But the sight of Toga about to be killed ends up what motivates Twice. So much that both his arms and legs get broken in the process by Skeptic's minions... but while it hurts, Twice isn't disappearing, and he suddenly gets super resolute and finally activates the full scope of his clones, unleashing the "true terror" of his power, while the chapter title is noted below: "all it takes is one bad day", a line that is very, very closely associated with Batman and the Joker. I appreciate the Western superhero comic book reference. 

230 gives us a bit of a confirmation about Twice's Double quirk, basically confirming that anything created by Twice is weaker than the original, and apparently, there used to be a severe limitation on the amount of things Twice can create, as we get a neat flashback to the yakuza bullet arc... while Twice's own monologue plays above it, noting that he's "always dragging people down"... and he's determined to not do so anymore, and we get the horrifying unleashing of the Sad Man's Parade. Which... yeah, it's both badass and pretty awesome from an art point of view. As mentioned by various other people, Twice's quirk is amazingly dangerous, and only his mental problems and pscyhological trauma really kept him in check. Again... it's pretty awesome to behold, and while I'm not sure if this is the healthiest thing for Twice's psyche, it's certainly one of the more badass results. 

We get a bit of Dabi-vs-Geten (which is what more people seem to be calling him by) in this sequence, and all of the fighting that's being done ends up being interrupted by the massive wave of Twices, with Mr. Compress throwing a fun lampshade about how heroic Twice's motivation to rescue his friends are... and then Twice's big speech is interrupted by Geten blowing away and ripping a whole chunk of Twice armies to shreds, and we get a "my power is so badass" monologue, because Geten apparently can increase the amount of his power by simply freezing more ice and manipulating them... and also points out that apparently Dabi's weak and has been burning himself. 

It's at this point (and the brief beginning of 231) that the Doctor finally gets Gigantomakhia to wake up and start his speedy trek towards the city where the Villain League is fighting the Liberation Army. Interestingly, 231 focuses a fair bit on Hawks and his double/triple crossing stuff as we get a flashback to what is presumably Hawks' call to Dabi during the whole Endeavour-vs-High-End-Noumu fight a while back. Also, in the background, there are news reports of poor Best Jeanist apparently having disappeared... and in the flashback, Dabi apparently asks for Hawks to eliminate Best Jeanist. I'm not sure if Hawks actually did eliminate Best Jeanist, or if they struck a deal for Jeanist to lay low for a while as part of the cover story, but man, the artwork really does make Hawk's expression and pose look menacing in this sequence, huh? Like, I can totally see a story arc of a double agent who's way in too deep and sees a powerless superhero as, well, basically collateral damage or acceptable losses in the grand scheme of things. 

We don't get a whole ton of Hawks, though, because the rest of 231 just sort of cuts around here and there. We get a bit of Dabi fighting Geten, a bit of Spinner and Shigaraki discussing, a nice sequence of the Twice army showing up to rescue Shigaraki... and Twice really gets motivated to rescue Giran, essentially opening a huge path for Shigaraki to waltz up and take on the boss himself. It's mostly setup for Spinner and Shigaraki's own arcs, with Twice eventually carrying Shigaraki all the way to Re-Destro's office, while Spinner is conflicted on what he is supposed to do as he's faced with the politician among the Liberation Army. 

Overall, though, the Twice stuff lasted for around... two and a half chapter total? It ran a bit long, I suppose, but it's honestly a pretty well-told story. Again, I really don't mind the huge focus on the villains at all, and I know that at least until 235-ish, we're still deep in the villain storyline, but focusing more on Shigaraki. It's been a surprisingly long story arc for the villains, but one that I honestly really do like -- it really contextualizes at least Toga, Twice and Shigaraki as actual characters, which is something I appreciate a lot more than just having them be mini-bosses for our heroes to take down. I actually care for these villains, and I'm a huge fan of that -- it's certainly something that makes My Hero Academia relatively unique among most Shonen manga.