My Hero Academia: Vigilantes Season 2

Episode 20

I want to make it clear that I didn't hate this episode. As a feel good slice-of-life episode with some really well animated action set pieces, this is probably one of the best in the entire season so far. Seeing Aizawa come into his own a little bit by establishing his own fighting style was nice. Plus it was cool to see the friendship between him and Oboro fleshed out a bit more, and there's a pretty believable sense of growth as the cast starts discussing what they want to do during their high school careers. In a lot of ways, this episode kind of speed runs through a lot of the practical and business stuff that class 1A went through in the main series, but I kind of like that. The episode is all about establishing how cozy our main cast is so that things will feel that much more devastating when the tragedy strikes. But therein lies my problem: what I got here isn't so good that it made me forget what was supposed to happen in the narrative and thus, it felt like I was just waiting for the tragedy to hit.

Prequels and flashbacks aren't inherently bad, even if you know how they're going to end. When written well or when given enough time to breathe, they can make you forget about how things are going to end to an extent so that the emotional weight feels that much more tragic. I think my problem with this episode is that it very much just felt like it was filling in space before that twist at the end happened. I think it comes down to the fact that when looking at Oboro as a character, I personally don't really get that attached to him as much as I'm just seeing how much Aizawa seemed to be relying on him for emotional and practical support. The episode established them as a bit of a duo during this episode, which kind of shocked me because I thought Present Mic would be a lot more involved in some of the more intense elements of their high school hero work. Instead this episode is more here to establish that what was helping Aizawa compensate for his shortcomings and frustrations was Oboro. But now that Oboro is tragically going to “die,” I guess the idea is that Aizawa is going to feel like he can't do what he was on his way to doing without him.

That can be pretty emotionally enriching and satisfying, especially if the whole point of this flashback is to push Aizawa to go be a teacher at UA in the first place. The problem is that I don't think that codependency is highlighted strongly enough during this episode because it's kind of bogged down by other stuff. The weird rivalry with that other explosion guy just kind of felt like padding, even if it was very well animated. I know what the episode is going for in establishing Oboro as the sort of person who puts a positive spin on everything to balance out Aizawa's pessimism. But at most, it felt like Oboro was helping him with practical stuff like taking down heroes together or reminding him that he can wear goggles to prevent his eyes from getting damaged.

I feel like I needed to see these guys bond more, which I know sounds like a very weird complaint when I've already made it clear that I think the show is spending too much time on this flashback. But if I'm going to be stuck here anyway, then at least use the time more economically. This is probably the first time I finished an episode of My Hero and thought to myself, “OK what am I supposed to talk about here?” because ultimately there wasn't much established here that I didn't already know. What I was most worried about was that these episodes were just going to be a slight extension on the backstory of Oboro that was already established in the main show. This episode unfortunately solidified some of those fears. I hope it sticks the landing now that the tragedy has actually struck.

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My Hero Academia: Vigilantes Season 2 is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.