What Did Endeavor Do to His Wife and to Shoto in My Hero Academia?

During the earlier parts of My Hero Academia, one of the things that we learned was that Endeavor wasn’t exactly a good father and the nicest person despite the fact that he was one of the most prominent heroes in the world. That’s because his family basically despised him for what he did to his wife and children sometime before the events of the main series. Of course, these are also some of the reasons why Dabi hated him. So, what did Endeavor do to his wife and to Shoto?

Endeavor forced Rei to bear more children despite the fact that she felt that doing so would be too cruel to Toya/Dabi. Rei was also physically assaulted by Endeavor when she tried to stop him from training Shoto harshly and when she couldn’t stop Toya from training. This led to her deteriorating mental state.

As good of a hero as Endeavor may have been, he wasn’t exactly the best person. He was someone who was so obsessed with his goal of producing a child that could surpass All Might that he had forgotten about his duties as a husband and as a father. That is why Endeavor tried to redeem himself in the latter part of the My Hero Academia storyline, only for Dabi to expose his past cruelties to his family.

What Did Endeavor Do To His Wife?

Even though we know that the heroes in My Hero Academia are seen as figures that are larger than life because of the things that they do for the public, the thing is that they are still human and are prone to mistakes. That is why Endeavor was portrayed to be a very flawed hero from the start as he also had his fair share of mistakes. In fact, he was seen as a rather cruel and ambitious man at the start despite the fact that he was a hero in every sense of the word.

Part of what allowed us to understand that Endeavor, named Enji Todoroki, wasn’t exactly the nicest man was the fact that his son Shoto and the rest of his family weren’t exactly too fond of him. Rarely showing emotions, Shoto hated his father during the early part of the storyline due to the things that he did to him and his mother. 

Of course, we only saw a few details of what happened to Enji’s wife, Rei Todoroki. But we do know that she wasn’t mentally stable because her deteriorated mental state forced her to pour hot water on Shoto’s face, causing one side of his face to be scarred. So, what did Endeavor do to his wife in the past?

In the past, the relationship between Enji and Rei was actually great. Endeavor entered into a Quirk marriage with Rei by paying her family because he wanted to bear a child that had both of their Quirks so that their offspring could surpass All Might, the only hero that Endeavor could never be greater than. Considering that Rei’s family was poor, they accepted the offer. However, they actually learned to love each other.

Enji was happy with his wife and children at the start, especially because his eldest son, Toya, had flames hotter than his. They also had a daughter in Fuyumi, who was conceived because Rei thought that having a sibling would be great for Toya. However, things started turning sour when they learned that Toya’s body couldn’t handle the flames that he produced because he inherited his mother’s resistance to cold temperatures instead of his father’s heat resistance.

Endeavor stopped training Toya, who still persisted in mastering his Quirk to make his father proud. Meanwhile, Enji forced Rei to bear more children despite her concerns that it will only hurt Toya, who already saw himself as a failure. Despite the fact that she didn’t want more children, Rei was forced to bear two more sons, the youngest of which was Shoto

Toya was hurt by the fact that Endeavor saw Shoto as the perfect son, and that was what prompted him to attack Rei and his youngest brother. Enji stopped him from causing any damage but Rei’s mental health had already been affected by that incident. After that, Endeavor decided to train Shoto in secret while forbidding all of his siblings from seeing him. 

Enji started training Shoto harshly and cruelly so that he would learn to master his Quirks. Rei tried to intervene but was physically assaulted by Endeavor. Of course, Toya trained in secret as well but only got burned as a result. When Enji learned that Rei couldn’t stop their eldest son from training, he physically assaulted her as well.

Toya also lashed out at his mother for bearing him because her family was poor. This made Rei feel guilty for Toya’s entire existence, as she also understood what her eldest son was feeling the entire time. Toya only wanted to make Endeavor proud, but he felt that he was an unwanted child because his father didn’t acknowledge him at all. As such, Rei also felt guilty about the entire situation.

But it was Toya’s apparent death that actually forced her to reach her mental breaking point because she felt that she was guilty over her son’s demise. Shortly after that, she poured boiling water on Shoto’s face when she saw his red hair as it reminded her of Endeavor. But she apologized to her son when she snapped back to reality. Still, she realized that she was no longer in the proper mental state to be a mother, and that was why she had to stay in the hospital.

What Did Endeavor Do To Shoto?

After Toya’s death, Endeavor struggled with his grief and guilt. Instead of talking things over with his family, he continued to train Shoto harshly as he used this as a way to forget about his problems instead of facing them. Of course, the young Shoto didn’t appreciate the harsh training of his father.

Shoto also asked Endeavor what happened to his mother, and Enji merely replied that he sent her to the hospital for hurting him. This caused Shoto to believe that their family was broken and dysfunctional due to his errors as a husband and a father, and that’s why he hated Endeavor during the earlier part of the series.

Before he started attending UA High School, Shoto’s entire mindset was geared towards rejecting his father and his Quirk, and that was the reason why he neglected to use his flame abilities. Instead, he focused more on using his ice powers as a way of expressing his rebellion against his father. In some way, Shoto also felt that he “killed” Toya just by existing.

Shoto’s harsh and dark past caused him to become cold and distant from other people, and that was the reason why he hardly expressed his feelings or interacted with his classmates at UA High School. In that regard, it was clear that what his father did to him and his family affected him from a mental standpoint as well. And both Shoto and his older brother Natsuo hated their father, with only Fuyumi treating Endeavor well enough.

Of course, we all know that the relationship between Shoto and Endeavor improved during the latter portion of My Hero Academia when Enji actually started becoming more of a father to his children. He realized the wrongs that he did in the past and became a better person. However, his efforts were almost blown up in smoke when Dabi revealed that he was Toya and proceeded to expose Endeavor’s past cruelty and mistakes.

Liked this article? Join us on Reddit for the latest Marvel & DC news!