Recap / My Hero Academia S 6 E 20 Hired Gun

Welcome to the Gun Show!

Tropes

• Always Someone Better: U.A's Snipe, in a past interview, admits that he couldn't hold a candle to Nagant's superior Quirk and marksmanship. There is also the fact that she can mold her hair into various types of bullets.
• An Offer You Can't Refuse: All For One asks Lady Nagant to capture Izuku Midoriya as they escape Tartarus. When she refuses at first, he promises her that removing Midoriya from the equation is the key to bringing down the "corrupt" Hero Society that resulted in her imprisonment. He also gives her an extra Quirk that lets her move around in the air, granting her an expanded vantage point for her Rifle Quirk.
• Badass Boast: The tall woman wonders if things will go back to normal with all of the Villain activity going on. Deku declares he will make sure it will before he has asks All Might to take her to a shelter.
• Big Damn Hero: In a downplayed but no less heroic example, Deku swoops in and stops a trio of vigilantes from hurting the tall mutant woman, whom they thought was a Villain. Rather than fight them, he de-escalates the situation by playing into their caution, understanding that everyone is on edge at night because someone is bound to exploit it, but shows them that the woman they just attacked is not a Villain at all, but a scared and innocent citizen. The vigilantes don't apologize for their attack but leave anyway, allowing Deku to comfort and escort the woman to a safer area.
• Character Check: If you felt like Deku's dark costume appearance and mission to find All For One threw you off, the scene where he rescues and comforts the tall woman is a reminder that rescuing people remains his top priority. Seeing the look on his face when accepting All Might's food shows he's still a young boy within the costume.
• Cue the Rain: Things aren't much better in the city with Villains still roaming around, but then it starts raining as things get much worse. A tall mutant-like woman is attacked by vigilantes for no other reason aside from her genetic appearance, the Top 3 deal with other Villains and more irate citizens, and Midoriya faces a sniper hired by All For One.
• Did Not Think This Through: The "Ordinary Woman" confesses that she missed out on the evacuation call and thought she could simply wait until things settled down on their own in town. It's only when the Villain attacks escalate and more people around her get hurt that she finally decided to rush out of her home for shelter, leading to her being attacked by the vigilantes.
• Divide and Conquer: All For One tells Lady Nagant that pursuing Midoriya will be easier if she can distance him away from the Pros accompanying him during the rainfall. Deku himself makes use of this so he can focus on stopping her before the others catch up. Meanwhile, an unknown party ambushes All Might with a grenade.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Deku believes that if someone is targeting him specifically, that means they might have direct connections with All For One unlike the other escapees.
• Fantastic Racism: Played With. The vigilantes who attacked the tall mutant woman thought she looked like a Villain. They hesitantly make an excuse that she shouldn't be wandering in the dark when Deku de-escalted and broke off their attack, though it could be more tied to her genetic appearance thanks to an unknown mutant Quirk. It has been established in the series that such prejudices were far more frequent in the past, though still present in smaller areas, leading to Heteromorphs like Spinner to turn evil. The recent and rising Villain attacks have made things even more difficult for innocent people like her.
• HiredGun: Lady Nagant is a titular and literally metaphorical version of this. Her main Quirk allows her to transform her right arm into a rifle, making her a professional gunner or sniper after training. She was once hired by the Safety Commission before an incident resulted in her incarceration, and is now a reluctant lackey for All For One.
• Insane Troll Logic: The Pros discuss why Shigaraki and All For One haven't tried going after Midoriya after their escape. Both All Might and Midoriya disclosed to them the details about One For All and how AFO has been trying to take it by force. He almost succeeded by using Shigaraki's Power Of Hate, and they suspect AFO himself doesn't have enough hate himself, if at all. This may mean that he wants Shigaraki to be fully healed and evolved so AFO can completely take over and finish what he started. There is also the question why he didn't sic multiple Villains after Deku to save time.
• The Load: While Nagant decided to take Kai Chisaki/Overhaul with her during the prison break, he can be seen as this in his catatonic state and no arms to use his namesake Quirk. He was defeated by Deku and later disabled by Shigaraki in Season 4 on the way to prison. Losing his Quirk-erasing bullets decidedly broke him, as he was trying to help his mentor and the Yakuza become relevant again.
• Mistaken for Terrorist: A very tall, mutant-like "Ordinary Woman" is attacked at night by a group of vigilante civilians, who mistake her for a monstrous Villain waiting to strike, before Deku intervenes. She previously thought things would calm down earlier so she remained isolated at home, only for more Villain attacks to force her to leave her neighborhood and seek shelter.
• Names to Run From Really Fast: Lady Nagant is more than just a Fallen Hero. She was once seen as one of the best Heroes in her generation, trained under the Hero Public Safety Commission and preceding the current No. 2 Hero Hawks. Hawks warns Midoriya earlier, after the mass Villain breakout, that he absolutely needs to avoid fighting her at all costs if they ever cross paths now that she has escaped Tartarus; not that she gives him much choice near the end but to surrender or fight when All For One tasks her with capturing the boy.
• Never My Fault:
  • The vigilantes that attacked the tall mutant woman leave after Deku tells them she's innocent. They make this excuse that they only attacked her because she looked like a monster Villain waiting to catch them off guard at night.
    Vigilante #1: Well... Someone who looks like that shouldn't be out this late!
    Vigilante #2: What were we supposed to think?!
  • One of the Villains that Endeavor defeats blames him for why he was causing trouble at a supermarket. Regardless, Endeavor states that he's here to fix that, continuing his atonement.
• Noodle Incident:
  • Banjo and the 2nd and 3rd Users compare the current chaotic state of Japan to their respective era, back when Quirks started becoming more common and All For One was at his prime with more victims and pawns under his control. They said to have either had to rely on stealth or go all out with many casualties behind them, implying that it was their Darkest Hour.
  • All For One remembers hearing about Lady Nagant being convicted of murdering another Hero, which landed her in Tartarus.
• Rule of Symbolism: The reason why the two OFA Users were facing the wall was because they turned their backs on Midoriya, not in the least bit confident in him being the key to AFO's permanent end. It took some convincing with the 1st for them to turn around and trust them, finally giving Midoriya their full support.
  • In relation to this, it turns out that the area where all of the Users have congregated represents the room where AFO's brother, the 1st user, was held before his future successors rescued him. He claims this moment was where "One For All truly began" as an origin.
• Shout-Out: Lady Nagant is able to "curve" her shots, a concept similar in the Wanted comic book (or rather the film adaptation).
• The Order: The 1st User of One For All calls upon the 2nd and 3rd to put their faith in Deku. With all eight vestiges officially rallied as this, Deku will soon have the means of honing the truly full power of One For All so they can finally stop AFO.
• Team Dad: All Might may not be able to fight anymore, and he's not an actual father to Midoriya, but he does keep an eye on him. He even made the boy lunch to keep up his strength.
• Ungrateful Bastard: After capturing another group of Villains, the Top 3 face an angry crowd who demands they leave their sight. Endeavor continues to endure the brunt of it thanks to Dabi. They aren't wrong that this crisis could have been prevented if they had stopped Shigaraki, but they didn't know the Heroes were unprepared for the circumstances behind his awakening. Plus, they are among the minority still currently fighting while others have quit.

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"Ordinary Woman": Do you think... things will go back to normal?
Deku: I'll make sure of it.