I think one of the best measures of a spinoff is when you can look at it and say “the parent series would have been better if that had been in it”. Vigilante has never run afoul of that – nothing it’s done has ever felt out of place. But it’s never done anything as pertinent to Boku no Hero Academia as this arc. Aizawa is a major character – the most important Yuuei teacher behind All Might. And maybe veteran hero too, though Endeavor can certainly make a case. But his character was never explored to the extent it was done here.
There are a couple of things at play here. First, Illegals looked at the cast and made a very smart decision about which HeroAca character would best fit in with the universe-in-universe it was creating. Eraserhead – brooding, somber, a loner, but essentially kind and protective of youngsters – is the perfect bridge to the world of vigilantes and small-time operators this series depicts. But as well, the whole Korugiri subplot in the parent series – while it was pretty powerful as is – would have packed much more emotional punch if this story had been included. And that’s a feather in Vigilante’s cap, no doubt about it.
This flashback is not a suspense story, obviously, but a tragedy – we know how it’s going to end. That lent a strong sense of foreboding to its final episode, which ended up being probably Vigilante’s strongest of the season. The villain of the piece is a legit kaijuu, a giant toad named Garvey (as a Cubs fan I approve of the naming). Garvey is huge, yes – but the real problem is that it can “eat” quirk attacks used against it and store them in its warts to turn on its opponents later. Unfortunately Yamada (and Sensoji’s) agency Buster Union was the first to attack Garvey, and didn’t know that.
No two ways about it, that’s a seriously powerful villain quirk. His Purple Highness steps up to try and slow Garvey down, charging Aizawa and Loud Cloud to evacuate the local children to safety. But Garevy is making a right mess of the city, debris is flying everywhere, and Purple is soon out of commission. To make things worse, Shirakumo is forced to take drastic action to save the kids, leaving him out of commission too. That leaves it on Eraser to try and stop a rampaging kaijuu that’s already kicked the asses of a bunch of pro heroes.
In a sense, this is the ideal battle scenario for the young Aizawa, tragic as the circumstances are. He’s a classic overthinker, and here he has no time for it – all he can do is survive. He’s already shown how brilliant he is when he can get out of his own way, but this is the true debutante dance for the Eraser we all know. He can devise tactics on the fly as well as anyone – he just doesn’t know that yet – and he needs every micron of both his cleverness and power to take Garvey down. But take it down he does, giving the beast of taste of its own medicine – with the help of Shirakumo’s voice on his speaker.
Illegals never makes it clear what happened here, but somehow his friend’s voice did reach Aizawa. The lesson he takes from this, however, is to be a lone wolf – not to depend on others. That means becoming (effectively) a bounty hunter on graduation, much to the chagrin of his teachers. But that’s the path that led Eraserhead to Naruhata, and eventually back to Yuuei, so who’s to say it wasn’t right for him all along. He had a journey to make just like all the other heroes we love, but eventually it led him where he needed to be.
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