For those of you that have never seen the Disney movie Hercules, let me give you a quick synopsis of
a specific scene that I will now embody. During the scene where Hercules is reunited with his father, Zeus, and in many occasions after, he says the phrase “That’s my boy. My Hercules” with pride. Especially when his son learns the importance of love and selfless honor. Of course this is wildly inaccurate to the concept of real Greek gods, but you know what it is accurate for? My pride as this tiny babu Midoriya makes momma proud. Also, he made All Might proud or whatever I’m more proud shut up All Might.(Also his real mom, who is the best anime lady)
T
his episode focuses entirely on the rest of the race and what obstacles lay before all of these crazy kids. Todoroki and Bakugo spend the entire time trying to one up each other as the front runners. All Todoroki has to do is use his ice powers to create a path, but he usually makes a path that’s more difficult for his opponents. Meanwhile Bakugo is using his fire powers as a jet system. So what can poor Midoriya do? He doesn’t want to reveal his quirk this early but he needs to stand out. Everyone is being forced to use wits but Midoriya has to do more. He has to win.
Here is the coolest thing about My Hero Academia, this episode shows once again how important it 
was that Izuku really be studying all the things he needed to. Yes, he is lagging behind in power use but he has the knowledge and determination to beat everyone. The final trial turns out to be a minefield that has mostly annoying bombs as its set up. However Bakugo and Todoroki have to beat each other, and all the other students are struggling to get up, but no one is thinking with their heads. Early in the race Izuku took a piece of one of the 0 point robots and kept it in case of fights or necessity. Because he was the only one to consider using something other than his own quirk, he was the only one who had it for the last track. So what does the kid do? He builds up a bunch of bombs, uses the armor of the 0 point robots to blast himself upwards, then uses the other mines to propel himself forward and momentarily take out the two in first place. Deku is the only one using the blue shell in this entire race.
I have some real issues with say Ochako not being more clever about this. I know she gets nauseous but the easy solution would be to take a running start, float into a jump, then slowly lower herself so she lands in between mines so she can rest. Deku was the only one who used real cunning and he didn’t use his quirk at all. I suppose this makes sense for a society where quirks are so common- we don’t think anything of using our thumbs because they are so convenient and part of our anatomy, but species who don’t make due in other ways. Deku once again overcomes his failure of evolution with the human favorite of logic! Hooray for Deku!
The end of the episode is fairly ominous- he wins, but now he has the largest amount of points on his head for the competition to want to take down. I didn’t think he would win last time but now every hero is gunning for him. . . aw who cares, I’m so proud of Deku. This anime wouldn’t be half as fun if I didn’t love this loser to bits!
Oki
“I have some real issues with say Ochako not being more clever about this. I know she gets nauseous but the easy solution would be to take a running start, float into a jump, then slowly lower herself so she lands in between mines so she can rest”
Her nausea when she floats herself is not a “oh I can keep running and do that over and over again” kind of thing. It’s something she can do maybe twice for a couple of seconds before she’s laid out on the ground, so sick she can’t move. Have you ever been really REALLY sick to your stomach? It HURTS. It is incredibly painful, as your insides feel like they’re trying to warp themselves around in ways they arn’t meant to move. Once she pushed herself that far she would be out for the rest of the race. That’s why she was careful not to do that. You’ll note she made it in well before the cut off anyway.
I’ll bet that’s why Aoyama came in dead last of those that made it through, clutching his stomach even: he probably had to use his laser all the time to push himself around.
Must say, this must be the first episode where I prefer the dub over the sub completely: the Mic-Aizawa back and forth is funnier and adapted better from the manga, Hatsume’s voice is even better and more zany, and All Might’s comment on Deku tearing up is more subdued.
I totally agree with you! I watched both and didn’t feel half as impressed over the episode when I watched it subbed. They’re doing a great job.
Yes- last season! Last season Deku also improved enough to get the strength for the One for All, Bakugo learned to control his power through logic, and roughly half of the cast improved. Not that I don’t agree that it was unlikely she could use it the whole way, but it’s still saddening to me that side characters often don’t get to reveal cool new parts or growth until a really late point. But Ochako is merely an example, I wish we got to see more cool super power kids do cool things. But as I noted, they’re just too use to using their quirks to really adapt as if they didn’t, which is why deku is so cool! 🙂