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A review by cyanide_latte
My Hero Academia: Vigilantes, Vol. 14 by Hideyuki Furuhashi, Hideyuki Furuhashi, Kōhei Horikoshi, Betten Court
adventurous
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I've been working on reading this throughout the day and I don't think anything can really account for how much I've been screaming this entire time other than that I need you take my word for it. For all that we're still mid-conflict in this climactic final fight, there is some major info that gets dropped here, and I'm losing my mind over it. I'll throw it under a spoiler tag, just in the event anyone needs it but ho DAMN boy!
So this is kind of the first time we get any significant information about Sixxy. We see the doctor who always works with AFO talking about kid Sixxy in a flashback, claiming he has "agnosia" and has no sense of self, no ability to recognize or form his own identity, and therefore cannot fit into society or fit in with other people. Now, "agnosia" is a VERY broad umbrella term for a huge variety of cognitive disabilities, so the reality is this is more likely a case of complex prosopagnosia (commonly considered to be face blindness, though the issue is a little more complex than that) directed inward at the self coupled with social-emotional agnosia, just going off of what the doctor says. BUT! Point BEING. THIS EXPLAINS A LOT.
Number Six sees himself as a formless clay lump because he doesn't recognize his own face in the mirror. He envisions the "6" on himself because of the ID bracelet the doctor makes him wear. While it could be a natural developmental issue in his brain or caused by physical trauma to the head, the highest likelihood is actually that Sixxy would have suffered a stroke when he was extremely little and that's what it did to his developing brain. This also explains WHY his features are so bland and variant between him taking different aliases in the background, and why when he develops a set alias, it's comprised of features he sees from other people (biggest example being his Rokuro Nomura identity using a face like Koichi's.) It ALSO explains why his face is shown in shadow so often in past volumes, and not just because he's the villain and he's meant to evoke a myserious, sinister vibe. It's because he has no idea who he is outside of being a specimen in an experiment. It's why he gets so upset when he's reminded he doesn't even have a real name. And why he hates The Crawler so much, because to him, Koichi has taken the thing he wants more than ANYTHING in the world, and that's the nebulous concept of being the heir to one particular hero, which is the closest Sixxy's ever come to developing his own identity (thanks to AFO's influence.) (Also if you go back and look at any panels where Sixxy tries to get Knuckleduster's approval, or the panels where he angrily talks about how this was supposed to be his time, his turn, or when he, weeping, screams at Knuckleduster "why [Koichi] and not me?! All I ever wanted was to be you!", it all starts hitting much harder when you understand how important this is to him.)
Additionally, this makes the correlation Betten Court and Furuhashi draw between him and Nightwing make even more sense beyond just being a visual tribute, given how much of Richard's development concerns his identity both outside of and yet due to Bruce's impact on him. Sixxy's search for his own identity is rather different from Richard Grayson's, but it's clear he's meant to parallel him more than just visually.
ALSO ALSO ALSO
THE TRAGEDY
THAT BOTH THE PROTAGONIST AND ANTAGONIST GO ON THE SAME JOURNEY THROUGH THE SERIES, PARALLELING ONE ANOTHER
THEY'RE BOTH TRYING TO BECOME MORE THAN WHAT THEY ARE, TO BECOME THE PEOPLE THEY WANT TO BE
BUT SIXXY IS AT A HUGE DISADVANTAGE AND GENUINELY EVIL PEOPLE TOOK ADVANTAGE OF THAT TO USE HIM AND TURN HIM INTO THIS
AND ALL HE WANTS IS TO HE ACKNOWLEDGED AND VALIDATED BY THE SAME PERSON WHO TOOK THE PROTAGONIST UNDER HIS WING
In case you've not figured it out by now this is killing me. It completely recontextualizes the character of Number Six as we saw throughout previous volumes, in the best kind of way. This was amazing use of clever art and writing to create a fantastic build of foreshadowing to this reveal in the middle of the climactic part of the series. This series has my utmost respect and love. Everything in this volume is great, even as it hurts, but this especially is fantastic.
My copy of volume 15 can't arrive fast enough.
Number Six sees himself as a formless clay lump because he doesn't recognize his own face in the mirror. He envisions the "6" on himself because of the ID bracelet the doctor makes him wear. While it could be a natural developmental issue in his brain or caused by physical trauma to the head, the highest likelihood is actually that Sixxy would have suffered a stroke when he was extremely little and that's what it did to his developing brain. This also explains WHY his features are so bland and variant between him taking different aliases in the background, and why when he develops a set alias, it's comprised of features he sees from other people (biggest example being his Rokuro Nomura identity using a face like Koichi's.) It ALSO explains why his face is shown in shadow so often in past volumes, and not just because he's the villain and he's meant to evoke a myserious, sinister vibe. It's because he has no idea who he is outside of being a specimen in an experiment. It's why he gets so upset when he's reminded he doesn't even have a real name. And why he hates The Crawler so much, because to him, Koichi has taken the thing he wants more than ANYTHING in the world, and that's the nebulous concept of being the heir to one particular hero, which is the closest Sixxy's ever come to developing his own identity (thanks to AFO's influence.) (Also if you go back and look at any panels where Sixxy tries to get Knuckleduster's approval, or the panels where he angrily talks about how this was supposed to be his time, his turn, or when he, weeping, screams at Knuckleduster "why [Koichi] and not me?! All I ever wanted was to be you!", it all starts hitting much harder when you understand how important this is to him.)
Additionally, this makes the correlation Betten Court and Furuhashi draw between him and Nightwing make even more sense beyond just being a visual tribute, given how much of Richard's development concerns his identity both outside of and yet due to Bruce's impact on him. Sixxy's search for his own identity is rather different from Richard Grayson's, but it's clear he's meant to parallel him more than just visually.
ALSO ALSO ALSO
THE TRAGEDY
THAT BOTH THE PROTAGONIST AND ANTAGONIST GO ON THE SAME JOURNEY THROUGH THE SERIES, PARALLELING ONE ANOTHER
THEY'RE BOTH TRYING TO BECOME MORE THAN WHAT THEY ARE, TO BECOME THE PEOPLE THEY WANT TO BE
BUT SIXXY IS AT A HUGE DISADVANTAGE AND GENUINELY EVIL PEOPLE TOOK ADVANTAGE OF THAT TO USE HIM AND TURN HIM INTO THIS
AND ALL HE WANTS IS TO HE ACKNOWLEDGED AND VALIDATED BY THE SAME PERSON WHO TOOK THE PROTAGONIST UNDER HIS WING
In case you've not figured it out by now this is killing me. It completely recontextualizes the character of Number Six as we saw throughout previous volumes, in the best kind of way. This was amazing use of clever art and writing to create a fantastic build of foreshadowing to this reveal in the middle of the climactic part of the series. This series has my utmost respect and love. Everything in this volume is great, even as it hurts, but this especially is fantastic.
My copy of volume 15 can't arrive fast enough.