My Hero Academia Season 6 Episode 117

Hawks and Dabi

My Hero Academia Season 6 Episode 117 was another good episode. I don’t want to call myself a My Hero Academia fan. But, I can’t deny that the series has been good recently. Hopefully, the season continues like this for all 25 episodes (unlikely).

At the start of this episode, we get to see a bit more of the “fight” between Hawks and Dabi. It’s not much of a fight, though. It’s just Dabi burning Hawks to a crisp. But, there’s some important information here that I want to go over.

First of all, there are more death flags for Hawks. We got another scene of Tokoyami thinking about Hawks. And, it was implied that Dabi told Hawks his identity. If he actually did that, then it would make the most sense for Hawks to die here so he can’t pass that information on.

I’m still not convinced that Hawks is going to die here. And that also means I don’t believe Dabi actually told Hawks who he is. Instead, it seems more likely that Dabi told Hawks something only he would understand. Remember, Dabi knows Hawks’ real name despite him not using it since he was a child.

So, it could be that Hawks and Dabi were part of the same program as children. Hawks may know who Dabi is from that without knowing who he actually is. To me, this is the most likely scenario. But, I do want to bring up that in my review of Episode 113, I did predict Dabi could be the one to kill Hawks.

Oh, and I’ve suspected that Dabi is actually Endeavor’s “dead” son Toya since Episode 106. That prediction hasn’t changed. I still think that’s who he is. But, I’m thinking Hawks doesn’t realize that.

Hidden Quirks

I’m pretty sure this has come up before. But, it’s pretty cool to see how keeping a quirk secret grants an advantage in battle. Obviously, if your opponent doesn’t know what your quirk is or how it works, you have the advantage.

The thing is, hiding their quirk isn’t all that possible for most pro heroes. Some heroes can’t hide their quirks because of how they manifest. Other heroes tie their quirk to their identity in the form of their outfits. And then there are heroes who are so famous that everyone knows their quirk anyway.

Think about Endeavor. As soon as he uses his quirk, it’s obvious what it is: Fire. Endeavor also uses his quirk as part of his identity with his flaming facial hair. And, as the number 1 pro hero, everyone knows who he is and what he’s capable of.

In a lot of ways, this is where villains have an advantage. Villains don’t necessarily need to brand themselves the way heroes do. From looking at Dabi, Himiko, and Twice, you can’t guess what their quirks are until they use them.

On top of that, villains tend to work in the shadows. They’re not constantly being filmed using their quirks by the news the way pro heroes are. So, while the villains know a lot about the heroes’ quirks, it doesn’t always work both ways. A new, never-before-seen villain can pop up out of nowhere. That’s not happening with heroes.

Anyway, all this is to say that I liked how there was a focus on how Eraser Head hides his quirk. He doesn’t make what his quirk is obvious. And even if the villain realizes he suppressed their quirk, can they figure out how he did it?

All-for-Shigaraki

The end of Episode 117 had quite the twist. We knew that Shigaraki’s original quirk turned things to dust. From what I remember, we also saw this quirk evolve during his fight against Re-Destro. And in the present, Dr. Garaki was attempting to further enhance Shigaraki’s quirk.

The twist is that Shigaraki’s current quirk isn’t his ability to disintegrate things. That’s not the quirk Dr. Garaki is attempting to enhance within him. Instead, Shigaraki has All-for-One’s original quirk. And the version All-for-One has within himself is actually just a duplicate.

What does this all mean? Well, it means that Shigaraki potentially has a lot of quirks now. We’ve only ever seen him use the disintegration quirk. But, he has access to many more quirks, in theory. It’s also a bit unclear when he acquired All-for-One’s quirk. He may have had it this entire time and never made use of it.

As Dr. Garaki says, All-for-One foresaw his own defeat. So, he set up his successor, Shigaraki, with his own quirk. But, All-for-One is currently in prison after All Might defeated him. Since All-for-One has a duplicate of his quirk, he must have given Shigaraki the original in the past.

Shigaraki may have had All-for-One’s quirk even before All Might defeated All-for-One. Or, it could be that Dr. Garaki stored All-for-One’s quirk as data. If that’s the case, then I guess he could be transferring the quirk over to Shigaraki now. You could argue for that being the case.

For now, I’m going to guess that’s not what’s happening. Instead, I think Shigaraki already had All-for-One’s quirk. But, the reason we never saw him use other quirks was that his body couldn’t handle it. So, what Dr. Garaki was doing to Shigaraki here was strengthening his body.

Conclusion

What do you think about My hero Academia Season 6 Episode 117? Do you think Dabi told Hawks his true identity? Should pro heroes take more care to hide the true nature of their quirks? And how long do you think Shigaraki has had All-for-One’s quirk? Let me know in the comments.

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My review of Episode 118 is available now.