English Dub Review: Fire Force “Boys, Be Weak”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

The three sides continue trying to bring down Nataku to no avail, but Shinra is able to mentally connect with him through their Adolla Link. He learns that Nataku has been feeling pressure all his life, first from his parents regarding grades and then from Rekka and Haijima when he got his powers. This led him to be obsessed with being strong in order to please everyone, even if it means showing that strength now by nuking the entire city. It’s only thanks to Charon absorbing the blast (taking his role as protector of the Pillars very seriously) that they avoid a major catastrophe. This weirdly inspires Kurono to get serious as well and start putting down the giant corpse Nataku is stuck in, all while telling the boy something he’s never heard from anyone before: Be weak.

He doesn’t have to be strong or do something no matter what. He’s just a little kid, so he should stay weak. This sentiment…is surprisingly relieving for him to hear and gets him to finally calm down. Seeing this, the White Clad decide to leave Nataku with Haijima, at least for the time being until they really need him. In the aftermath, after thirty two lives are lost and a big crater is left on the moon, Company 8 agree to this too and confirm that the White Clad don’t seem to have any major connection to Haijima. Instead, Vulcan’s declaration to create a new power source that can replace Amaterasu and doesn’t require any human sacrifice inspires the CEO to look up from his Game Boy and form an alliance with them. Though at least now, Nataku won’t feel the need to be strong.

OUR TAKE

Despite the overly long wait for this episode, the ending to this arc is quite the strong one, not just in terms of action, which is often a strong suit, but also in character. Early on when Shinra was established as wanting to be a hero, it was hard for me to take that seriously as anything else other than typical shonen protagonist bravado or a knock-off of Naruto’s dilemma of being hopeful in the face of discrimination. Thankfully, this season has shown there to be more to that than expected, particularly in how he’s dealt with other Pillars. With Inca, he acted in the heroic way of wanting to keep her safe and assumed that she wanted the same, only for him to find out that she wanted anything BUT safety. Likewise, this time he tried appealing to Nataku in regards to being strong enough to control his own power, not knowing that just tapped into an anxiety he’s had for awhile. So, what we’re learning about this regarding Shinra is that his aspirations for being a hero aren’t just a coping mechanism, but also a means for him learn more about why the world doesn’t fit into just heroes and people who need to be saved.



Though of course Nataku definitely deserves special mention. The pressure for kids to be at their peak performance, especially in school, is a very real thing, more notably in Japan where students are given much more pressure to do well, but obviously that extends globally to different extents. In addition, the concept of men and boys needing to have strength to have worth is also a common idea, one that puts even more pressure for them to never fail. In a genre like Shonen where gaining strength is the name of the game in power escalation, it’s quite surprising to see this topic broached in this way, where the way to resolving a near nuclear holocaust is to tell the little boy that he doesn’t need to be strong, rather that he should be weak because he’s still a kid. The fact that it’s coming from Kurono, who takes unique pleasure in abusing the weak, kinda muddies the waters a bit, but there is also a sense that he does care for Nataku in his own weird way, so…I guess it’s fine for now. Still, these two new Pillar encounters have been quite enlightening as character pieces for both the new Pillars and the characters they interact with. We probably won’t be seeing the other two this season, but I imagine they’ll get similar treatments as well. But next time, we take a short breather from long arcs and focus on Iris, who has long been neglected for character development!