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The current season of My Hero Academia has been incredible and the stakes higher than ever as the heroes wage a two-pronged all-out assault on the Paranormal Liberation Front. Wasting no time to get right into the thick of it, season 6 of My Hero Academia is definitely the series' most eventful to date, especially with the re-awakening of the recurring-turned-overarching antagonist of the series, Tomura Shigaraki.

Speaking of Shigaraki (Quirk: All For One; Decay, and countless others) and the Paranormal Liberation Front, episode 11 of the sixth season of My Hero Academia, titled "Dabi's Dance" saw the crucial revelation of the true identity of the villain known as Dabi (Real Name: Toya Todoroki | Quirk: Blueflame), in a fashion that is reminiscent of the revelation of Shigaraki's past during the events of My Hero Academia season 5's "My Villain Academia" sub-arc. Shigaraki and his colleague in evil bear some kind of eerie similarity – but what exactly is the tie that binds Dabi to the Symbol of Fear? The following article contains some mentions of parental abuse, read at your discretion.

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Burn, World, Burn

What a Face – Shigaraki Tomura My Hero Academia

True of each of the members of what used to be the League of Villains, discontentment with the state of the superhuman, hero-obsessed society is one of the major aspects to the characters of both Dabi and Shigaraki. This has also been the case for other antagonists in the series, such as Chizome Akaguro – the man who was once known as the vigilante Stendhal; who went on to become who fans know as the Hero Killer, Stain (Quirk: Bloodcurdle). Within the small group of Shigaraki's closest allies, this discontentment is a major connective tissue, and with both Shigaraki and Dabi, this discontentment with society is more than just an ideal – it is personal. For Shigaraki, his grandmother, Shimura Nana's deep involvement in her heroics, as well as her true identity as a wielder of One For All led to her having to make a choice: cut off her family and keep them safe, or run the risk of having All For One find out her true identity and harm them.

In season 6 of My Hero Academia, it is shown just how significant this decision was for Nana on a personal level as she had to abandon her son for the cause, which brought her unimaginable pain. This abandonment traumatized her son, who went on to pass this trauma; which he'd associated with her heroics and hero society. Ultimately, Nana's decision to protect her family and attempt to defeat All For One led to her son's hatred of heroes and society as it were, and the abandonment issues made him controlling and abusive towards his own family. Effectively, All For One is directly responsible for the emergence of the individual who'd go on to follow in All For One's footsteps and become the true Symbol of Fear. In his childhood, Shigaraki had greatly admired heroes and wanted to become one himself; and his eventual discovery of his grandmother's identity became the catalyst for the decay of life as he once knew it. Living on the streets as a child with nowhere to go, and watching content members of society notice him without even the slightest intention of intervening because "the heroes will handle it" filled Shigaraki with an anger towards society that burns to this very day. Toya Todoroki's development into the villain Dabi follows a similar path of destruction.

Agni Atsukai

dabi-eye

In an extremely similar set of circumstances, Dabi finds his hatred of the status quo fueled by his own personal experiences. Being the son of Endeavor, the long-term Number 2 hero who longed to become Number 1 and surpass All Might, meant that Dabi's childhood was effectively one long experiment to see if he would develop the Half-Cold, Half-Hot Quirk that Endeavor had longed to create in his progeny. Endeavor's biggest sin is the fact that he forced an innocent young woman into a loveless marriage all with the intention of literally breeding her; something so heinous that it warped his wife's mind, fractured the family and led to his son's own defection from his family – and from heroism. Endeavor, despite wanting to create the perfect weapon, refused to continue training the young Dabi because despite the youngster's Quirk having more destructive potential than his own, it proved to be a double-edged sword that injured the child whenever he used it.

Dabi's anger at his father's abusiveness and lack of interest in his family as people, not to mention the Todoroki family's ability to move on from his apparent demise and even see him in action as a villain without so much as a shred of recognition fulled his involvement in the League of Villains and his association with Shigaraki and All For One. When he reveals his true identity in the episode titled "Dabi's Dance", Dabi effectively puts a huge hole through the symbolism of the heroes in society, especially given Endeavor's identity as the hero who replaced All Might as the nation's best, their best hope. In showing the cruel nature of Endeavor, and how his own parenting led to the creation of a prolific villain, Dabi sows seeds of doubt in the minds of the citizens, and with that, fracture the very basis of the superhuman society – the social contracts established between heroes and citizens; society, the superhuman and the powerless. Dabi's emergence as a Todoroki puts huge cracks in the idea that heroes are paragons of virtue and justice, blurring the lines between the concepts of "hero" and "villain", effectively having a shattering impact on people's stable perception of the status quo.

Ashes to Ashes; Dust to Dust

Young Shigaraki Tomura and Toya Todoroki (Dabi) – My Hero Academia

The fact that both Shigaraki and Dabi are direct descendants of incredibly significant heroes, but end up becoming prolific villains is perhaps their most important point of connection. Their Quirks were both incredibly uncomfortable for them growing up, and both characters suffered some kind of epidermal damage from the incubation and eventual use of their respective Quirk. That being said, Shigaraki and Dabi also share cosmetic similarities – both characters experience a change in hair colour that serves as the visual indicator of their most significant psychological changes. Dabi faked his death and changed his hair from white to black, while Shigaraki's Decay awakening caused his black hair to turn a blue-gray, and after his awakening in season 5 of My Hero Academia, his hair turns white. There are several obvious similarities between the two, such as their induction into villainy at a young age; and their susceptibility to such manipulation being the direct result of the rough childhoods they had at the hands of their fathers in particular.

While clearly having a flame-based Quirk, Dabi's identity and Quirk were never provided, and even informative eyecatches that mark the mid-point of a My Hero Academia episode's runtime have – at least prior to the revelation of his true identity – never ever provided a name for Dabi's Quirk. This parallels Shigaraki's own development, as for the longest time, he had no recollection of his past as a child whose own home life became collateral damage in the generations-long battle between All For One and One For All. In some respect, both Shigaraki and Dabi have existed in the My Hero Academia universe as villains with lost identities who have a clear bone to pick with the way society has been set up to toss them aside. As such, both Shigaraki and Dabi assumed new names; therefore, new identities, to line-up with this rejection that their former selves experienced at the hands of society. Tenko Shimura and Toya Todoroki were victims of circumstance, but Tomura Shigaraki and Dabi are joined by their position in their own minds and in the narrative as powerful forces of destruction that will reject society back. Ultimately, the biggest thing that joins Shigaraki and Dabi is the simple fact that they hate everyone.

MORE: My Hero Academia: Dabi's True Identity, Confirmed