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acedcoffee · 1 month

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Not a meaningless crush: Ochako's crush on Izuku doesn't have much to do with Izuku at all

- Vague Manga Spoilers

Many people who watch My Hero Academia go through a similar process with Ochako Uraraka’s character: they think she’s the typical Female Lead That Could Be A Love Interest, then grow to like her when some of her motivations are revealed early in Season 1, and then get annoyed by her when the latter half of Season 2 – the Final Exam Arc – puts some focus on her crush on the main character, Izuku Midoriya.

While it seems like shallow and unnecessary fanservice, this crush of her serves an actual purpose in the plot and for her character, but not in the romantic sense. In fact, it doesn’t have much to do with Izuku at all.

Enter Himiko Toga. Here's a comment made by Horikoshi himself:

There's a lot of similaties between them, but here we're going to focus on the crush and romance aspect, to see why Ochako's crush on Izuku was just a way to establish her relationship with Toga.

Season 2: Final Exams

The first proper focus we have of Ochako’s crush on Izuku is during the second half of season 2 - first during her final exam, and later in the final episode at the shopping mall.

Toga is also properly introduced to us during these episodes, although we see a glimpses of her (and Dabi) earlier in the Season.

Season 3: The Training Camp

This is where it really starts, as Ochako and Toga meet for the first time.

Tsuyu is also at the scene, and Toga shows an interest in both of then, referring to both of them as “cute”,

But she focuses more on Ochako, saying something along the lines of her sensing that Ochako has a crush on someone, which of course, was shown to us in the earlier episodes.

Tsuyu doesn’t have a crush on anyone, and thus recieves a little less of Toga’s attention.

A major point established about Toga’s character is that when she likes someone, she doesn’t only want to become like that person, but actually become that person.

As shown to us before, Ochako has a pretty high level of respect and admiration towards Izuku.

Toga notices this, and coupled with the crush, she assumes that Ochako also wants to be like Izuku “You want to be the same as the person you like, right?”

At this point, we’ve also learnt that Toga also has a crush on Izuku, and wants to become him.

So, it’s easy to understand that Toga thought Ochako would understand her in regards to this. [this is then confirmed in Chapter 289 and 348]

A conversation: Chapter 342

Toga is a villain that has killed a lot of people, and has no qualms about bringing destruction to the city.

Ochako has fought her a couple times, but only as a hero vs. a villain.

Their conversations [chapter 289] consisted of Ochako saying things that was obvious to her with the way her life has been up until now.

In her conversation with Izuku in chapter 342, she mentions how she realizes now that Toga is just a person too, and that what’s obvious for her doesn’t apply to Toga.

Izuku mentions how he feels the same with Shigaraki and the cying child inside him.

Chapter 394: Ochako vs. Toga

Yes, Ochako explicitely states that she fell in love in Izuku Midoriya.

No, that is not the point of the chapter.

The point is that her love and admiration made her want to be more like him, to see people’s hearts like he does. [re: chapter 342, Izuku trying to save Shigaraki’s heart]

As stated before, Ochako has realized that she hasn’t been trying to see Toga as more than a villain she had to defeat, and now she is reaching out, trying to save Toga’s heart even if it’s too late.

Love and Smiles

“Smiling is why we live our lives”. - Dabi to Toga, Chapter 341

This has always been their thing.

Toga, who has been cast out of society due her “weird” and “creepy” quirk, and the way she shows her love,

Toga, who wants a place where she can exist just the way she is, loving who she loves, and smiling when she wants to

Ochako, whose parents always happily encouraged her and made time for her even when they were struggling with money and tired from work

Ochako, whose eyes were drawn to the smiling citizens when a hero saved someone and defeated a villain, and wanted to be the reason for those smiles

Also reminder that as much as they are made for each other they also exist as characters outside of that

In conclusion,

People who think Ochako is nothing more than a heroine that has a crush on the main character are stupid and have no reading comprehension.

People who say that Ochako’s character “fell off” after the romance was introduced only care to see their bias about female leads proven right have no patience for the actual story.

Her crush is a way to establish her story with Toga.

Horikoshi is a great storyteller and everything he does in the story is for a reason [except Mineta in the earlier chapters]. <33

#this was originally a ppt i made cause i saw one (1) negative post about ochako today #but honesty it was a long time coming #TOO MANY STUPID PEOPLE KEEP SLANDERING OCHAKO #THATS MY CHILD RIGHT THERE #another plus side of this is that now i have all the evidence at hand if anyone says anything #also chapter 394 and 395 made me cry #mha #bnha #my hero academia #uraraka ochacho #toga himiko #midoriya izuku

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ranchthoughts · 11 months

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thoughts on genre, tropes, Bad Buddy, and My School President

This is a monster of a post (almost 5k words) so I’m going to post it in pieces, and then in full. This is Part 1 (of 3): part 2, part 3, full.

I also go more in detail about a lot of the terms and concepts I use here (indexes, conventions, genres, intertextuality, etc) in this post here, in case you would like more context

The BL “genre” has so many conventions - in narrative, characterization, themes, settings, iconography, filmic techniques, and of course, tropes.

Bad Buddy and MSP do not lack these genre conventions (both are stories about boys in love, both are set in schools which is very common in Thai BLs especially, both explore a budding relationship and other social and emotional problems of youth, both hit familiar plot beats like confessions and narrative/emotional climaxes, both utilize many editing and sound effect techniques seen in other BLs, and both deploy many BL tropes like cheek kisses, head pats, forced proximity, looming, etc.). However! Bad Buddy and MSP are atypical in their deployment of genre conventions, especially with regards to trope usage and pacing - they go against genre and trope expectations to subvert seme/uke roles and dynamics and they space their narrative beats differently than other shows. As a result, the shows feel familiar but also fresh to BL audiences.

Bad Buddy, MSP, and tropes

BL tropes index so much information to audiences familiar with the genre (e.g., the nature of the relationship between characters, the seme/uke dynamics, other social information, etc.). Bad Buddy and MSP take these familiar indexes, with their well established meanings, and mix them up, give them new contexts, and use what they normally tell us about the characters, social context, relationship dynamic, etc. to tell a new story.

There are SO many examples of this so I have decided to focus on two “subcategories” of tropes: the faen fatale and tropes which are strongly associated with seme/uke dynamics.

Faen Fatales

In most BLs, the faen fatale (thanks to AbsoluteBL for the term) is a character (male or female) whose sole purpose is to drive a wedge between the main pair, often serving as a catalyst for their relationship/confession, and who generally does not get much character development or identity of their own.

In Bad Buddy, Ink seems like a classic faen fatale: she is introduced as an old high school friend that Pat was interested in and Pran was jealous of because of that fact, and now in the present day of the show Pat pursues her again and Pran is once again jealous, especially since it seems Pat is succeeding (they get food together, they hang out a lot, Pat wears the bracelet Ink gave him in high school, etc.). Pran believes that Pat likes Ink and that they are well on their way to being together, if they aren’t together already. Pat even tells Pran he likes Ink. However, it becomes clear quite quickly that Ink is not a typical faen fatale. Her interactions with both boys feel platonic, she shows just as much interest in fostering a friendship with Pran, and when Pat uses Pa’s patented “Four Ways to Tell if Someone Likes You,” Ink fails in every category. She does act a a catalyst to Pat and Pran’s romantic relationship in some ways (e.g., Pat using Pa’s patented Four Ways he learned to assess Ink to realize his own feelings for Pran), and she does act as a barrier to their relationship as some of Pran’s hesitation post their ep.5 kiss comes from his understanding that Pat has a crush on Ink (though of course their family and friends present the main barrier). However, Ink has her own personality, interests, and crucially, her own romantic arc. She is a fully fleshed out character who never had anything but platonic feelings for either lead: ergo, a subversion of the faen fatale trope.

In MSP, there are a couple of potential faen fatales, but neither develop that way in the end. Sound is introduced as Tinn’s rival, and romance media logic would suggest he will fulfill a love rival role in the show, competing with Tinn for Gun’s affections (especially as Sound is interested in music like Gun and he joins Chinzilla). Even Tiw suggests Tinn should look out for Sound moving in on Gun. However, Sound never shows interest in Gun and quickly gets acclimated into the band, only briefly presenting a threat to Tinn and Gun’s relationship when Tiw witnesses them having a seemingly intimate moment but that is sorted by the end of the episode. Like Ink, Sound never has anything other than platonic feelings for either lead and ends up with his own romantic arc. The other possible faen fatale in MSP is Nook, though she is present so briefly. I think other shows would have stretched out her plot line more and had her fill more of a faen fatale role. As it stands in MSP: Gun sees her give a gift to Tinn and compliment him, he gets jealous and snaps at Tinn, and then the show/Tinn immediately reveal to us and to Gun that it was a case of mistaken identity (Yo was catfishing with Tinn’s picture). In a matter of minutes, Nook went from being a faen fatale set up to simply someone involved in another character’s arc, part of a problem that Tinn and Gun could work on together.

Neither Bad Buddy nor MSP have faen fatale characters, though there are characters that could, and indeed seem to be set up to, fill that role. Both shows subvert our expectations and BL tropes by having potential faen fatales be uninterested in either lead and possess more character development than most other examples of the trope (including their own, completely separate, romantic arcs). In the case of Ink, this also subverts typical BL handling of female characters, who tend to be few and far between and generally relegated to the under-developed role of faen fatale.

Seme/uke Tropes

Most BL shows can be read through a lens of seme/uke dynamics, which originated in yaoi. The seme is the “pursuer” character and the uke is the “pursued”. There are certain physical (height, skin colour, etc.), social (age, wealth, social capital, etc.), and personality (active vs. passive, extroverted vs. introverted, flirtier vs. shyer) markers which are typically associated with either the seme or the uke. For example, semes tend to be taller, wealthier, older, flirtier, tanner, more active, and have a higher social status, while ukes tend to be shorter, poorer, younger, shyer, paler, and have a lower social status. “Seme” and “uke” roles are also sometimes conflated with masculinity and femininity (semes are “masculine” and ukes are “feminine”) and sexual preferences (semes are dominant and tops and ukes are submissive and bottoms). There are also tropes associated with either the seme or the uke, like ukes typically give cheek kisses and semes forehead kisses.

Thus, things like height, age, wealth, personality, presumed sexual preference, and the role they take in tropes can index the character’s status as a seme or a uke, and in turn the character’s identity as a seme or uke in the narrative (pursuer vs. pursued) indexes a character’s personality, sexual preferences, etc., however unrealistic and simplistic that is in real life. In a BL, we would expect the seme (pursuer) and uke (pursued) characters to exhibit most, if not all, of the associated seme or uke traits and roles in tropes, though this is not always true (and some BLs have little to no seme/uke dynamics at all).

In terms of physical, social, and personality markers in Bad Buddy, Pat exhibits slightly more “seme” traits than Pran, like his larger size and more “rugged” and “typical” masculinity compared to Pran’s neatness. However, both Pat and Pran take the seme or uke role in tropes about the same amount of time, with Pran having several significant moments where he embodies the seme role (looming over Pat, licking his fingers, drying his hair, etc., not to mention the post-sex scene in ep.11) and Pat many significant moments where he embodies a uke or even “feminine” role (casting himself as the girlfriend at the bus stop, being clingy, pretending to be sick so Pran will give him a sponge bath, etc.). In fact, tropes often happen twice, with Pat and Pran taking turns in the seme and uke role (e.g., both take turns cleaning the other’s face, both cook for the other, both kiss the other’s cheek, etc.). Furthermore, and I’ve spoken about this before here: both Pran and Pat deliberately take on the seme role during their ep.7 Flirt-Off bet ("whoever falls in love first loses”). To win the bet, they have to be the pursuer (i.e., seme), and thus spend the episode taking it in turns to exhibit the seme role in tropes (Pat takes off his shirt multiple times, Pran looms over Pat, they wash each other’s faces, they take the seme roles with Ink and Wai at the noodle shop to make the other jealous, etc.), thus also spending the episode taking it in turns to fulfill the uke role in tropes. The fact that the seme and uke roles in Bad Buddy are so interchangeable and balanced (sometimes they even play the narrative roles of pursuer and pursued at the same time) demonstrates the show’s upending of traditional seme/uke dichotomies.

In MSP, Tinn and Gun are pretty much the perfect seme and uke in terms of physical and social markers: Tinn is taller, wealthier, has a higher social status, and even has a female “faen fatale” (more typical for seme characters), while Gun is shorter, poorer, from a marginalized club at school, and has a male “faen fatale” (more typical for uke characters). Some one on Tumblr (and I cannot for the life of me find this post again) mentioned that Tinn is a little “feminine” coded when it comes to romance (he is the dreamer, the romantic, always imagining romantic situations), while Gun is more what we’d think of as “masculine” when it comes to romance (more brusque, less sappy), though I am not sure how applicable these types of divisions are to BL. In term of preference markers, there isn’t much sexual content to go off of, but MSP does mention the TinnGun vs GunTinn divide in ep.12, never coming down on either side, and one of the things the homophobic teacher says is that he thought Gun was more “masculine” so he is surprised to see him dating a boy. Overall, the show deliberately eschews and criticizes the association of top/bottom or masculine/feminine with the pair. Furthermore, Tinn talks a lot about wanting to be Gun’s boyfriend, to belong to Gun - and as @cinna-bin points out here, for a genre that equates seme with dominance, the one who shows and has ownership of the other, it is pretty subversive to have the seme character in the narrative express a desire to be “owned”. Like Pat and Pran, Tinn and Gun are fairly egalitarian when it comes to which role they take in tropes (Tinn catches Gun when he falls, Gun touches Tinn’s chin constantly, they both kiss the other’s cheek, etc.). I’ve talked about this here too, but often Tinn will imagine a moment with himself in the seme role (e.g., wiping Gun’s face) that won’t come to fruition, but when it does happen in real life, the trope is reversed and Gun takes the seme role (e.g., when it happens in real life, Gun wipes Tinn’s mouth). In MSP, the deployment of tropes is more about natural moment and real life, and less adhering to strict role divisions. This back and forth feels more accurate, more high school - they both take it in turns to boldly initiate and then to be shy (all the aborted kiss chances, etc.).

Finally, I’d like to add that there are many moments in both Bad Buddy and MSP where the characters are aware of the romantic tropes and intentionally utilize them to further a romantic agenda. We aren’t exactly subverting tropes here, but we are playing with them deliberately and consciously in a way you don’t get in a lot of BLs so I thought it worth mentioning here. Most of these instances come in the Bad Buddy ep.7 Flirt-Off or from Tinn’s day dreams and include:

Pat employing the “drinking from a water bottle/pouring water on yourself” and “shirt off” tropes to try and get Pran hot and bothered in ep.7

Pran looming over Pat during the bet

Pat and Pran trying to make each other jealous by employing various classic tropes with Ink and Wai respectively while eating noodles (opening their water bottle, feeding them, wiping their mouth, etc.)

Pran symbolically losing the bet by wiping Pat’s mouth

Tinn imagining himself wiping Gun’s mouth

Tinn imagining a Ghost moment while cooking with Gun

Tinn making a joke about a “hot underwater kiss”

To be continued in parts 2 and 3

#bb #bb meta #msp #msp meta #bl meta #ranch thoughts #bad buddy #my school president #part 1 of 3... this post is a monster #ppt thoughts

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