It's interesting that Horikoshi went with an anticlimax for the grand finals like that. Appropriate, too, considering this is really supposed to be a
sports festival and not something that any one character's fate really hinges on. Also, All Might's hugging was adorable and very appreciated.
That doesn't stop me from wishing we got a little bit more, though.
Laiza, if you ever do get back into writing and drawing more and get your own stuff out there, hit me up because wow that sounds awesome.
This is a really, really good post
Add me to the group of people that thinks Laiza makes excellent posts.
Really late response, but
d'awww! Thanks, you guys. I didn't expect that kind of response to my musings, heh.
Expanding on my thoughts a bit, these last few episodes have really driven home for me just how lopsided the power distribution really is in MHA. None of the female characters really have a heavy-hitting quirk like the top four do. (Amusingly, given Horikoshi's love of Western comics, this is in stark contrast to series like the X-Men, where the female characters have some of the strongest powers in that universe.)
Yaoyorozu comes closest with the sheer versatility of her power, but she has some pretty severe limitations, not the least of which is being limited to whatever technology is available in the MHA universe at the time. That's not to mention the fact that anything she can do, someone else could do with proper prep work (plus money and access to decent tech).
Jiro (whose name I forgot because she's been sidelined
so hard with this arc), with different writing, could actually have been a contender for the grand finals - but Horikoshi really wanted to focus on three characters in particular, so here we are. (Also, the fact that her "power" stat is listed at
E is really a disservice to her quirk's potential - and possibly misleading on top of that.)
Speaking of "power" -
not one of the female characters in Class A has a high "power" stat. That alone is a huge red flag and something Horikoshi should've noticed before putting ink down on paper. If it were up to me, I would've replaced Invisible Girl (who is so irrelevant she's practically a wasted slot) with someone who would have a decently high level of power, and who could have taken a spot in the top 4 of the sports festival. Also of note: none of the female characters would rank high on the "looks like a villain" stat. I, personally, think that's a waste.
Give her a quirk that lets her look like she can't amount to much, but has incredible hidden potential - a sleeper, if you will. Give her an appearance evocative of oni so she can rank high on the "looks like a villain" stat (while still remaining somewhat acceptable for Japanese viewing audiences). Then have her quietly work her way into the tournament and force everyone to confront their preconceptions as she shakes up the status quo and feeds the (current) top four a good helping of humble pie.
Even with that seemingly major change,
every single character could have ended up with a similar outcome, and we would've had a female character besides Ochako that doesn't seem irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. Seeing a female character that everyone thought at the beginning would be as irrelevant as Invisible Girl is now make it all the way to the semifinals (if not the grand finals) would've been
hype as fuck. Even moreso if her quirk requires creative application to get around its inherent lethality (remember, she's supposed to have a really high "power" rating).
Hell, it would've been great to have another foil to offset the current top three, who are all
burning to get into that number one spot. I know that at least part of the point of this arc has been to hammer home the difference between those who are aiming for the top and those who aren't, but there's still room in there for someone who just aims for personal self-improvement, and for whom getting close to that top spot is just a consequence of that aim, rather than a primary goal.
Anyway, I'm not going to put any more thought into this than that. It's just a neat "what-if". Hopefully the female cast gets a bit more screen time going forward to offset what a sausage fest the top 4 became. To be honest, my expectations are pretty low at this point, so I'll just be pleasantly surprised to see any one character (besides Ochako) boosted to relevancy. I look forward to seeing what Horikoshi has in store.