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silentfanmusings · 2 years

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Todoroki Family Abuse Analysis

So, I’ve been thinking about the Todoroki family, specifically Enji’s abuse, and I want to know…

When did Enji start to physically abuse his wife and children?

I can speculate based on what is canonically shown during any of the Todoroki family flashbacks in the manga and anime, but it’s hard to know if my interpretation is true without it being stated outright.

Canonically we know that he has hit Shouto (5) so hard that he ended up puking. Afterwards, when Rei tried to get him to stop being so harsh with Shouto, he hit her and knocked her aside (in anime only scene).

From Ch 39 - Todoroki Shouto: Origin

The next time we see Enji physically hit someone is during The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire (Ch 301 and 302) - which dived into the Todoroki backstory more and focused on Touya’s trauma - when he hits Rei for not stopping Touya from going to Sekoto Peak (implied by the fact that she’s lying on the floor), and Shouto steps in to protect his mother.

From Ch 302 - The Wrong Way to Put out a Fire Part 2

Enji also roughly grabbed both Touya and Shouto: Touya when he found he was training when he grabbed Touya’s shoulders and later on in order to pull back his clothing to reveal his burns after finding out that he was going to Sekoto Peak; Enji’s also dragged Shouto behind him towards the training room while refusing to allow him to spend time playing with his siblings.

From Ch 301 and Ch 302

(1st image (Ch 301): Touya 8; 2nd image (Ch 302): Touya 13)

From Ch 39 and Ch 302

So looking at all these images, while it’s hard to tell for certain, I highly doubt that Enji was physically abusive towards Rei or his kids before Shouto was born. She was uneasy around Enji, but she also didn’t appear afraid to talk back to him slightly when she was proven right about Enji’s mishandling of Touya’s situation.

At this point she probably felt safe enough to express her opinion towards Enji and try to get him to look at the situation and stop being so stubborn and neglecting the fact that Touya needed help and wanted his father’s attention.

From Ch 302

After this point in time we have a time skip. So what has been going on with the family between the point when Touya (8) attacked baby Shouto and five years later when Shouto (5) started training is unknown. All we know for certain is that Shouto was isolated from his older siblings, and Rei was tasked with keeping an eye on Touya.

We don’t really see any scenes of Rei and Enji alone together after the time jump. Enji was probably rough with her, that’s implied, and he likely got angry at Rei for calling him out on things, but I believe one of the first times he’s actually struck her was after Shouto started training when he was 5. When he was also being harsh and brutal with Shouto in the name of training him. (I am absolutely not blaming the physical abuse starting on Shouto. This is entirely on Enji and his own actions. But Enji having a proper successor likely triggered him to become more abusive.)

There’s nothing to indicate that Enji was this aggressive and harsh when training Touya as a child, even if he was training Touya from a younger age. Touya definitely saw his training with his father as something fun to do together and a way to show that he could become a hero and make his Quirk stronger.

This likely means that while Rei was concerned about Enji’s goals and obsession after they found out that Touya’s Quirk would continue harming him, she was unaware that Enji would start harming his family in pursuit of his goals. He didn’t want Touya harming himself. So Enji’s solution was to have more children to get Touya to give up on being a hero, while also providing Enji with a proper successor/heir. Rei knew that this was cruel and wouldn’t help Touya, but she obviously relented to Enji’s desires to have more children.

And it took two attempts, and nearly 4 years, for Shouto to be born. And even after that, Enji had to wait for Shouto’s Quirk to manifest and for Shouto to be older to begin training. And by that point, it’s been nearly a decade between when he stopped training Touya and when he could properly begin Shouto’s training.

All of this makes me think that Enji didn’t really start getting physical with Rei and Shouto until he started training Shouto when he was 5; while he was neglectful of Touya, Fuyumi, and Natsuo since Shout was born. By this point, Rei’s mental health was deteriorating from the stress of living in the house. But I believe that once Enji started taking his anger and frustration about Touya out on Rei and Shouto physically that Rei reached her tipping point.

From Ch 39

Which is what led to the Tea Kettle Incident that ended up with Rei removal from the house after she harmed Shouto during a mental breakdown.

There’s absolutely no denying that Enji was mentally and emotionally abusive towards his family. But Shouto’s birth was when Enji started to see his goals within reach. Before that point, he’s mostly just neglected being a father towards any of his children. It’s only after Shouto that he has also been shown being physically abusive in addition to mentally and emotionally abusive.

But Enji’s spiral further into his obsessive mindset ended up with him taking out his anger on his family - likely starting with verbal and mental abuse to make his family fear him before taking things to the physical extreme.

He also likely became even worse with Shouto once Rei was out of the house, and then there was the added tragedy of Touya’s death on Sekoto Peak pushing Enji to take things further. Because if Touya was killed by Enji’s ambitions to be #1, then Shouto had to be perfect. Otherwise Touya’s death would have been for nothing.

From Ch 302

Enji knows that his ambitions killed Touya. But instead of realizing that he’s taken his obsession too far, killing his eldest son, breaking his wife, neglecting his other children, and harming Shouto in the name of training. He doubled down on all his bad actions and continued to abuse the rest of his family by either ignoring them completely or controlling their entire lives.

And he didn’t even start trying to atone for any of his actions and abuse until nearly a decade after Touya died, and after realizing what it was like to become #1 Hero. Having not actually earned it himself, but instead getting it by default when All Might retired from the position.

He destroyed his family and didn’t see all the damage he has done and willfully ignored it all until finally looking back on all the actions over the last 20 years and saw the broken family he had created.

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littleholmes · 2 years

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just gonna leave this panel from 301 here

I’ll likely elaborate more when 352 officially drops on SJ tomorrow but what Shouto did is a pretty incredible attempt that will likely work since Touya can physically take it and wasn’t meant to be using his fire to this extent all these years so he’s at a point where he quite literally needs to chill out to be okay

#bnha #mha #bnha 352 #shouto todoroki #todoroki touya #dabi #he’s got too much of Rei in him and he’ll maybe be okay after this #the freeze is going to help him even more than we think it will #bnha manga spoilers #listen the todoroki family is my fave #todoroki shouto #touya todoroki #bnha thoughts #mha 352 #bnha 301 #shoto todoroki #bnha manga #toya todoroki #bnha meta

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gonnagobankai · 2 years

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It’s actually really interesting how throughout the todoroki backstory you can see visually as Enji distances himself from his family

In the begging when introducing Touya and Fuyumi it’s all centered around Enji himself

Note how Rei is nowhere to be seen. Which makes sense given that this is his personal narration (realistically she probably did 99% of the work). Rei isn’t needed because he isn’t talking about her, he is talking about his children and how they where like when little. What we are seeing is his own memories of being around them.

As the chapter moves on the focus around the children (with Touya as the exception) moves over to Rei.

There are barely any scenes with the younger children where Rei is not present, and even then it’s scenes with shouto after she left.

He no longer has memories of interacting with the children himself, and merely remembers how Rei was the one to take care of them.

#even with shouto they only interact alone after rei is gone #while touya and him where fighting until the day he died #it’s interesting how fuyumi moves between the two categories while natsuo is wholeheartedly in the second one #as is fitting for their characters #bnha #mha #endeavor #enji todoroki #bnha 301 #todoroki family #rei todoroki #touya todoroki

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kouendeavor · 2 years

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Top: Canon Gorillas

Bottom: Don’t call them gorillas

#bnha #bnha endeavor #todoroki enji #endeavor #bnha 301 #vol 31 #bnha 95 #vol 11

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just-some-girl-xiii · 2 years

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BNHA CHAPTER 301

That was wild

#no I will not explain #chapter 301 bnha #bnha 301 #mha 301

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codenamesazanka · 11 months

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The Himura clan

did some research! lots of research, actually, all about what being 'village headmen' entailed, what it meant to be wealthy post-land reforms, and I've even come up with a theory/explanation about why they had numerous branch families. let me share what I've found:

(but first, please go read @stillness-in-green’s wonderful review of chapter 387 that contains a great explanation on clan intermarriage and how the situation at the Himura’s must have looked!

The 庄屋 - Shouya - "Village Leaders"

Shouya translates to village headmen, village leader - which is correct, but I don’t think that tells the whole story. So I’ll tell it to everyone:

The 'village headman' (and his lineage) was part of a specific, special rank of 'titled' peasants during the Tokugawa period (1603 - 1867). Basically, they were the elite of the peasant elites. When the shogunate came into power, it created a new system of village offices of headman and council to better collect taxes - and this new status granted prestige and the power to collect and deliver tribute, keep records and maintain the population register, and generally presiding over all public affairs. Headmen were still peasants, but they would be allowed things that would normally be only entitled to the warrior/samurai class, like the usage of surnames, the wearing of silk, and even carrying one (1) small sword.

(Source: Tokugawa Village Practice, by Herman Ooms)

With these culminated privileges and means, then, it was easy for village headmen to get cultivate lots of land, get rich, establish lineages and cadet branches, cultivate more land, get richer, etc. This being feudalism, all land belonged to the central state, so they weren't exactly landowners, but they essentially functioned as wealthy landlords (and became exactly that when the Meiji era (1868 - 1912) established the right to private land ownership.)

This is what the Himura(?) marriage broker meant when they talked about how the family was once "considered prestigious, with a long and storied history", and when Geten spoke of the Himura having wealth and pride. This is a family who could trace their history and genealogy back to samurai times, a lineage with inherited land and fortune that has been continuous for over 500 years by the time the story in HeroAca takes place.

The 農地改革 - Nouchikaikaku - Land Reforms

idk what exactly Official Viz Translator Caleb Cook was thinking when he decides to translate nouchikaikaku - agrarian reforms - as ‘agricultural revolution’ which (to me) brings to mind ‘the era when cavemen starts farming’. It’s not incorrect, exactly, but there are much better options that have more accurate connotations. Nouchikaikaku can be referring to land reforms in general, but here, it is almost certainly talking about the post-WWII land reforms of 1947.

Some background: When poor farmers fall into debt - due to crop failures, due to the chaotic economic times, due to random things like "a fall in the price of rice coinciding with the expense of a wedding or funeral where social custom would permit of no stinting", just having one bad day, etc. - they usually were forced to sell their land... then stay and become tenant farmers on that same land, except now they were paying rent that could be as high as half their income. Thus a system of landlords and tenants came to be, and the gap between their economic statuses would widen.

By 1941, 46% of cultivated land in Japan were tenanted; and only 30% of peasants owned all the land they tilled. (In other words, landlords owned nearly half of all farmland, and 70% of farming households were tenants of some kind.)

(Source: Land Reform in Japan, by Ronald Dore)

This is where land reforms come in, in order to correct this inequality.

After the war, all absentee landowners and landlords who own too many acres were required to sell their land to the government, who then sold it to the people who actually worked the land. In this way, large landlords was practically eliminated, tenant farming was no more, and every farming family became proper small property owners, and Japan's land reform is considered today to be one of the most successful in history.

The whole purpose of the land reforms was to reduce the wealth and power of rich landlords... So how is it that the Himura clan somehow found a way to keep all that?

This is, I think, where the key words of "by creating branch families" come into play.

Quick jump back to the agrarian reforms: Under the land reform laws, owning and selling land became a very regulated affair - Corporations and non-farmers cannot own farmland; there was a maximum limit to how much land a person/family could have; only limited local landlording was allowed, and even then, tenants rights were favored.

Essentially, the “only way an individual could acquire farmland was by joining a farm family through birth, adoption, or marriage, then co-residing with the preceding generation until inheriting the parents' land, and eventually passing the same land to a household heir to repeat the cycle.”

So, my theory:

The Himura, as wealthy ancestral landlords, were bound to lose land (and their fortune) when the land reforms came. To avoid doing so - or, rather, to gain back land they had to sell - they could've started marrying local neighboring families, bringing them into the Himura clan. Each non-eldest, non-inheriting son who married out would already be creating a branch, and have access to his wife's family's land; with the Himura's influence and status, it wouldn't be strange if their daughters' husbands take the Himura name instead of the other way around.

Heck, they also could've just adopted people - one traditional method was indeed this: "families often adopted as “branch families” people who were not related by blood. This kind of branch family was often in an economically subordinate position: perhaps a family of farm workers who depended on the stem “family” for land and tools. The fictive familiar relationship added extra depth and strength to the economic relationship."

Thus, on paper, a tract of land is owned by a individual couple or family... but that couple or family is now Himura, and therefore the Himura clan have increased in branch families, and maintained/maybe even increased their wealth (land), exactly as Geten says.

Which is why when the Advent came, "Heteromorph blood" became so abhorrent?

To be sure, they were likely just bigots who discriminated against Heteromorphs for being different.

However, if their whole operation had been to bring people into the clan, this hatred would mean a loss of marriage and adoption candidates. Anyone who had heteromorphic quirks were out; anyone who came from a family that had even one (1) individual with a heteromorphic quirk was out, since that trait could be inherited. As @stillness-in-green points out in her post, "Given that the characters in-universe still don’t know the origin of quirks, there’s no way to completely guarantee desirable quirks, or even to perfectly guard against the dreaded heteromorphic quirks," outsiders had the potential to bring surprise heteromorph blood, which would've been horrifying for them.

Official Viz Translator Caleb Cook translated this part as 'They [the Himura] didn't want to dilute their blood', but the more accurate translation, I feel, would be 'they hated the mixing of blood'.

'Dilute' gives off the sense that they wanted to keep their 'Himura essence' or whatever pure, which is true to a point; but in the context that Mr. Compress gives us - heteromorph discrimination - and how it's only after the Advent that the result of clan endogamy came to be, I think it's more accurate to say that, yeah, the Himura specifically did not want to associate or mingle with 'unknown qualities', so to speak. They hated the idea of that ‘mixing'; so the Himura had to turn inwards to be certain that no heteromorph lineage could be mixed into the clan.

In doing so, the Himura would've lost their traditional method of growth. No more increasing branch families; instead, the branches would combine and decrease. No more obtaining, inheriting, and accumulation of land to the Himura name. The family shrink and wane, and eventually lost everything altogether.

(and the final delicious irony of all this is that their last ditch effort to marry off Rei would be consistent with their earlier methods, trying to save themselves and obtain wealth...

except this time it would be too little, too late.)

＊

Thanks for reading!

#Himura Family #Himura Clan #Geten #Todoroki Rei #Heteromorph Discrimination #Chapter 387 #Chapter 301 #HeroAca #bnha #mha #worldbuilding #actually it would be more #history #?#I did allllll this research and wrote allllllll this solely because of my love for Geten #tu superbus Himura nube #Himura #nalslastworkingbraincell

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yreapwhatyasow · 1 year

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“But They Dunno what it’s like. . . To Have You as a Father”

“Look at me Endeavour…”

#dabi #bnha dabi #bnha s6 #boku no hero academia #toya todoroki #mha dabi #bnha spoilers #bnha #chp 301: The wrong way to put out a fire #my art tt

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lowqualitytodofam · 2 years

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#bnha #dabi #touya #301

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class1akids · 6 months

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After Touya’s attack, the family was torn apart and they never appeared in a single panel until Shouto’s attack, which reunited the family.

I love how their poses mirror each other

#bnha 301 #bnha 390 #todoroki shouto #Todoroki touya #Todoroki family #Touya - Shouto parallels

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qe3n · 1 year

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Dabi - BNHA (S6 Ep.17) (chapter 301 in manga)

#bnha #mha #my hero academia #bnha dabi #mha dabi #dabi #bnha touya #touya todoroki #mha touya #mha s6 spoilers #bnha s6 #mha season 6 #mha season six #bnha season six #bnha season 6 #dabi touya #i want to grab his waist

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kiritouyadeku96 · 1 year

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I’m so excited we’re like two days away from Touya’s backstory, and I’m so excited for more baby Touya and Shouto, ready to be sad and just all round ready for it!

What I’m not ready for is the no doubt re-ignited discourse of “Touya was evil from the start” “Enji was a great father” or hell the few sodden weirdos whom blame baby Shouto for being born 🙄 just in general the all round discourse centred around the Todofam! Not looking forward to that!

#bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #bnha #mha #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #dabi #bnha dabi #todoroki touya #touya todoroki #mha dabi #the todoroki family #dabi is a todoroki #bnha 301 #bnha 302 #bnha s6

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bnhaobservation · 7 months

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BNHA Observations, speculations and assorted info: Pre-marriage Todoroki Enji (Part 2)

So, in order to write my fic, I spend much time observing canon scenes, comparing the manga and the anime version, take note of details, translations and info in them as well as finding out how are some things called.

Since what I noticed/speculated/found out can be of use for other fic authors I thought to share as well.

Resources:

Chap. 301 "The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire, Part 1" (火の不始末前編Hi no Fushimatsu Zenpen) Chap. 31 "The Boy Born with Everything" (全てを持って生まれた男の子 Subete o Motte Umareta Otoko no Ko) Chap. 302 "The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire, Part 2" (火の不始末後編 Hi no Fushimatsu Kōhen) Chap. 187 "Flaming Roar! vs. Nomu: High-End" (燃えよ轟け！VS 脳無：ハイエンド Moeyo Todoroke! vs. Nōmu: High-End) Chap. 387 "Congealing" (煮凝り 'Nikogori')

Ep. 130 "The Wrong Way to Put Out a Fire" (火の不始末 Hi no Fushimatsu) Ep. 19 "The Boy Born with Everything" (全てを持って生まれた男の子 Subete o Motte Umareta Otoko no Ko) Ep. 88 "His Start" (始まりの Hajimarino)

School Briefs I "Notice from School"

OBSERVATIONS, SPECULATIONS AND ASSORTED INFO:

As of now we only have two more scenes which depict Enji pre marriage, the first being his 'Miai' with Rei and the second being their first 'date'.

The scene are flashbacks placed while Enji is at the hospital so first let's look at...

THE FULL SEQUENCE AS IT IS IN THE MANGA

So now let's focus solely on the scene in question and, since it has been transposed in anime version (and the anime added scenes) let's have a...

COMPARISON BETWEEN THE MANGA AND THE ANIME

The anime starts by adding more scenery, we see what could be the Himura house, which is also a traditional Japanese house... though with all the green it has around it seems its garden is a lot bigger than the one of the Todoroki mansion.

Actually it might also not be the Himura mansion but some place they have chosen for the meeting but it seems more a traditional Japanese house than anything else and the Himura used to be wealthy so they might still have their old residence and anyway... who knows?

The anime gives us also a close up of the Shishiodoshi (鹿威し literally, "deer-frightening" or "boar-frightening") device or Sōzu (添水 "Adding water") fountain, a bamboo water funtain originally derived by a devices to frighten away animals that pose a threat to agriculture and who's currently part of the visual and aural design of gardens, and are used primarily for their aesthetic value.

We also see the Soribashi (反り橋 "Arched bridge"), a red arched bridge, over a pond (probably a Koike (鯉池 "koi pond") filled with Koi (鯉) carps, or, more specifically, Nishikigoi (錦鯉 “brocaded carp”) carps.

'Jiki No.1 no yobigoe takai Endeavor-sama kara o koe kake itadakeru to wa yume ni mo omoi masendeshita! Gyōkō no kiwami ni gozaimasu!!' 「次期No.1の呼び声高いエンデヴァー様からお声掛けいただけるとは夢にも思いませんでした！僥倖の極みにございます！！」 "I never dreamed that I would be approached by Endeavor, who has been hailed as the next No. 1! We are at the height of luck!!"

The anime shows Rei's father bowing to Enji while the dialogue has him calling Endeavor-sama. He uses his Hero name and the -sama (様) suffix which is highly respectful.

Interesting enough, even if Enji is marrying Rei because he doesn't think he can surpass All Might, according to Rei's father there's many people who think he'll do it.

All Might and Endeavor have around 10 years of difference as, during the final fight with All for One All Might says he's more than halfway through 50 while Enji should be 46.

In chap 165 Enji has said at 20 he figured out he couldn't surpass All Might, and we know Touya was born when he was 22 so, considering Touya should have been conceived when he was 21, either he's still 20 or he's just turned 21 and he and Rei will have a fast marriage.

On another side, Rei's father never mention Enji also coming from a prestigious family, just that he's the Number 2 Hero and, possibly, will become the Number 1, which might hint to how Enji didn't come from an equally prestigious family and make a name for himself after he became a Hero.

The anime partially shows us Rei's father's face. In teh manga he's just a black shadow but he gives me the feeling Horikoshi planned him to look different than in the anime.

The anime changes the background a little, in the manga there's a scroll on the wall, in the anime we see white Fusuma (襖) doors, vertical rectangular panels which can slide from side to side (they're often painted with scenery but not in this case).

Also the glass window in the manga is close while in the anime is open.

They are in a Washitsu (和室) room, a Japanese-style room with a Tatami (畳) mat flooring and they're sitting on Zaisu (座椅子) chairs, Japanese chairs with a back and no legs.

In the garden there's also a Ishi-dōrō (石灯籠 "stone lantern"') lantern, a lantern made of stone in its Yukimi doro (織部灯籠 "Snow-viewing Lantern") variant. The customary placement is at the edge of land and water and the original Japanese character describing this lantern may have meant ”floating light”.

The anime adds Rei's father turning toward her but doesn't show Rei looking at the side. She's just staring down. As for Enji he seems to frown a little.

The group is drinking tea. In the manga they're probably using normal Chawan (茶碗 "tea bowl") bowls, traditional Japanese bowls used for preparing and drinking tea.

In the anime though they seem to be using the Chinese Gaiwan (盖碗) bowls, Chinese lidded bowls without a handle, used for the infusion of tea leaves and the consumption of tea, which consists of a bowl, a lid, and a saucer and they are still used by tea connoisseurs all around the world, as a simple piece of teaware that gives the brewer a lot of control over the tea.

I might be wrong though, maybe they're just Chawan bowls or maybe the Himura are using their best tea set, which happens to be a Chinese one.

The anime then adds exposition from Enji's point of view.

'Ichiō, miai to iu katachi o totte wa iruga, koreha "kosei" kon' 一応、見合いという形をとってはいるが、これは"個性"婚 "Just in case, although it was made to look like an arranged marriage meeting, this was a "Quirk" marriage."

'Jishin no "kosei" o yori kyōka shite tsuga seru tame ni haigūsha o erabi, kodomo o uma seru tame no kekkon' 自身の"個性"をより強化して継がせるために配偶者を選び、子どもを産ませる為の結婚 "A marriage to have children in which the spouse is chosen in order to strengthen and pass on one's "Quirk""

'Ore wa nozonda noda. Ore no honō no "kosei" to kōri himura-ke ichizoku no kōri no "kosei" ga majiwareba, All Might o mo koeru Hero ga umidaseru to' 俺は望んだのだ。俺の炎の"個性"と氷叢家一族の氷の"個性"が交われば、オールマイトをも超えるヒーローが生み出せると I wanted it. If my fire "Quirk" and the ice "Quirk" of the Himura family were combined, I could create a hero that would surpass All Might.

'Katsute wa meikadatta Himura-ke mo ima wa aoikitoiki…' かつては名家だった氷叢家も今は青息吐息… "The Himura family, which was once a prestigious family, was now in deep distress…"

'No.2 Hero no chii to meiyo, soshite djisankin meate ni Himura-ke no tōshu wa ore no teian o assari to ukeireta' No.2ヒーローの地位と名誉、そして持参金目当てに氷叢家の当主は俺の提案をあっさりと受け入れた "The head of the Himura family easily accepted my proposal, aiming for the status and prestige of the No. 2 hero, as well as the dowry."

'Kotowaru koto mo dekita hazuda' 断る事もできたハズだ "She could have refused."

'Daga kanojo wa "kosei" kondearu koto mo shōchi no ue de, ie no tame ni ore no tsuma ni naru to iu' だが彼女は"個性"婚である事も承知の上で、家の為に俺の妻になると言う "However, even if she was aware that it was a "Quirk" marriage, and said that she will become my wife for the sake of her family."

So... this exposition remarks it's a Quirk Marriage but they don't quite want to admit it so they make it pass for an arranged marriage. Because if your family sells you off but it's not for the purpose to strenghten your husband's Quirk, it's so much better. -_-

Anyway at the meeting there's just Enji, Rei and the "family head" (当主 'tōshu'), which is generally assumed to be Rei's father (but it could have been her grandfather if he was still alive... or her brother if her father died prematurely).

Generally in arranged marriages, or better in the 'Miai' (見合い, "matchmaking"), the marmatching meetings made to organize arranged marriages there's either a mediator or the parents of the two who're meant to marry. Enji though is alone. We can speculate that Rei's mother (whom we know is alive) is absent because she's preparing more tea or retrieving sweets... but Enji went there alone and we'll never, through the whole story, hear about his mother.

Maybe she died too.

While in the manga the family head only sounds honoured to receive Enji's proposition in the anime he looks at Rei greedily, as if instead than Rei she's saying a stack of bills. I feel bad for Rei.

On a sidenote this clashes a bit with how Shouto presented the whole thing back in the past. Shouto made it look as if they were pressured into agreeing to him marrying Rei...

...while in the manga they just seem glad he asked to marry her and in the anime they seem delighted to sell her to him.

Also the anime in this scene and the manga in another scene implied Rei could still have refused. She was likely pressured but could still say no, while Shouto paints it as if she and her family had no choice but to sell her off... though it can be a matter of translation.

'Jisseki to kin dake wa aru otokoda… Oyaji wa haha no shinzoku o marumekomi' 「実績と金だけはある男だ... 親父は母の親族を丸め込み」 "He is a man with accomplishments and money. . . My old man won over/seduced/persuaded my mother's relatives"

'Marumekomi' (丸め込み) seems to have a not so positive implication as it's used to imply you manage to talk someone into doing what you want, as if the Himura didn't really want to sell Rei and needed to be persuaded.

Tōya too also seem to imply the Himura were forced into selling Rei...

'Endeavor wa katsute chikara ni kogarete imashita. 「エンデヴァーはかつて力に焦がれていました」 "Endeavor was once thirsty for power."

'Soshite All Might o koe renai zetsubō kara yori tsuyoi "kosei" o motta ko o tsukuru tame' 「そしてオールマイトを超えれない絶望からより強い"個性"を持った子を作る為」 "And out of despair of not being able to surpass All Might, in order to create a child with a stronger "Quirk"

'Muriyari tsuma o metorimashita' 「無理やり妻を娶りました」 "He took a wife by force"

Tōya uses 'muriyari' (無理やり), which means "Forcibily, against one's will".

In the manga he'll also say (without Rei correcting him)...

'Obāchan-tachi ga binbō shi tetakara okāsan o uttandaro' 「おばあちゃん達が貧乏してたからお母さんを売ったんだろ」 "Grandmother and the others were poor so they sold mother, isn't that it?"

'Okāsan wa sō suru shika nakattandaro' 「お母さんはそうするしかなかったんだろ」 "Mother had no choice but to do that, isn't that it?"

Here it doesn't say his father forced them to sell his mother, but that his grandparents did it because they were poor and insists on how Rei "had no choices" (しかなかった 'shikanakatta')... which Rei doesn't deny with him but will later deny in an inner monologue.

'Sentakushi wa kagira rete itakeredo' 選択肢は限られていたけれど "Although my options were limited"

'Erande susunda no wa watashi no ashi de' 選んで進んだのは私の足でーーー "I chose to move forward with my feet."

'Semete sono-sakide wa waratte iyou to' せめてその先では笑っていようと "At least I'll try to smile there"

'Omotte ita no ni...' 思っていたのにーーー… "That's what I was thinking…"

She claims she had limited options but, confirming Enji's words, she still could choose.

I should probably say that the impression I get from Tōya first saying it was Enji who forced Rei to marry against her will (same as Shouto), and then him instead choosing to blame his grandparents for Rei's marriage, with Enji and, more important, Rei, feels like a retcon (and since this chapter already contained a retcon in its magazine version I wouldn't be surprised if this was the case here as well).

Of course we can excuse it with an 'at the time Tōya was still longing for Enji's love and didn't want to blame him too much...' only to remember he was blaming him in that same chapter in his chat with Natsuo so... whatever.

And, in addition to this, there's also the narrator in "School Briefs I: Notice from School" which says Enji "singled out his would-be wife and forced her into a Quirk marriage".

Really, this doesn't make it look like Rei even had the option to refuse... only for chap 301/302 to change the situation having Enji say she could refuse, Rei saying she chose that path for her family's sake and Tōya not blaming anymore his father but his grandparents for that marriage.

So, skipping the old bits as retconned out of the story, honestly the impression I got of the Himura from the scene was they saw this as their golden chance as soon as they were asked out so Enji didn't really have to work on being persuasive. Maybe it's just me, though we'll later learn the Himura were already into organized Quirk marriages... however their own were to strenghten their own Quirk as they tended to marry among distant relatives.

In Japan is considered incest only if you marry someone who's a second or a third degree relative so I guess they could safely marry among forth degree relatives.

Rei also will claim she

Anyway really, I doubt Enji had to do much work to persuade the Himura and, if he hadn't shown up, her family would have still likely try to organize her marriage so...

The anime cuts Enji's pouting face as he and Rei walks around the place.

The flowers Rei is watching are Gentians.

In the series we see Enji gifting them to Rei in November as she has them during the Second Hero Billboard chart which takes place in November but she also has them during the Paranormal Liberation War which takes place in March.

Now, we can assume the first kind of Gentians Rei has are likely the ‘gentiana scabra’, a specie of gentian with a blue (青色)/purple color (紫色), also called Japanese Gentian. In Japan their name is Rindō (リンドウ/竜胆) and well, they're basically The Gentian in Japan as when you mean to say just gentian in Japan you say 'Rindō'.

However this comes with a problem. In Japan the ‘gentiana scabra’ blossoms in Autumn, from September to November... so it's fine for Enji to gift them to Rei in November for the Hero Billboard chart... but it would be difficult to do the same in March, before/after the Paranormal Liberation War,

The alternative is that the second gentian we see, the one she's holding in March is actually a 'gentiana zollingeri' or Fude Rindō (フデリンドウ), another gentian typical of Asia which is either white or blue and whose flowering period is Spring, usually from April to May... but the problem is I've heard this gentian is usually quite small so... no idea. For now I'll let the guessing to who knows more about gentians than me.

Now let's focus a moment on what Rei says...

'Kono ohana watashi ga suki tte itta no' 「このお花私が好きって言ったの」 "I told him I like/love these flowers"

'？' 「？」 "？"

'Hajimete atta koro tatta ichido' 「初めて会った頃たった一度」 "Only once when we first met"

Actually, the Japanese text in this scene matches more with how we saw it being played out. In the flashback Rei never said they were her favourite flowers and here she confirms she only told him she liked/loved them.

Anyway, according to this scene, this mean they have that walk in which they saw the gentians on their first meeting.

And that's all we know about Enji pre marriage form the manga.

#boku no hero academia #Todoroki Enji #Todoroki Rei #bnha observations #Todoroki Shouto #Todoroki Touya

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