WARNING: the following contains spoilers for My Hero Academia: World Heroes' Mission, now playing in theaters.
The stakes have been raised to terrifying new heights in the World Heroes' Mission movie when most of class 1-A's students fight across the globe to help pro heroes take on the threat of Humarise. The Humarise organization, led by the villain Flect Turn, aims to set off trigger bombs to overload people's Quirks and kill them off, leaving behind a Quirkless world.
All this is based on the Quirk singularity theory, in addition to real and perceived tyranny against the Quirkess in a Quirk-dominated world. Flect Turn's motives, methods, and ideology may remind The Legend of Korra fans of the masked villain Amon, who was an anti-magic revolutionary in his own right.
Flect Turn & Amon, Fighting For The Powerless
Flect Turn and Amon the revolutionary have a lot in common, including the general tone of their missions -- to fight back on behalf of the oppressed masses, and obliterate the tyrannical ruling class. This is a class struggle, but with a magical twist, where it's benders and Quirk users, rather than the wealthy, who keep everyone under their heel. In this world, many Quirkless people live in fear of those who do have Quirks, since they are vulnerable to attack and cannot compete with the supernatural gifts of Quirks in the workplace or everyday life. There is even a stigma against the Quirkless, which can take a serious mental toll on the Quirkless and cost them many opportunities in the long run. Similarly, the ruling council of Republic City was made up entirely of benders, representing the four nations.
Flect Turn and Amon thus created their respective organizations, Humarise, and the equalists, to volunteer to fight on behalf of the powerless masses. Interestingly, neither villain was petitioned or asked to do this but rather took it upon themselves. It's possible that some powerless people actually resent having villains like Flect and Amon speak for them, for fear of being seen as an ideological ally of terrorists or thugs. But that doesn't stop Flect Turn and Amon from raising anti-magic armies to change the world order and free the masses from all oppression, real and imagined. And the similarities are personal, too.
The Personal Struggles of Flect Turn & Amon
Flect Turn and Amon are similar not only in their worldview and methods but also in their personal struggles and the role that those struggles play in the grand scheme of things. For Flect and Amon, the battle against magical tyranny was personal from the very start. They understand firsthand how cruel these powers are, even for the users, let alone for the powerless. It's highly likely that Flect Turn's scheme was inspired by his personal hardships with having a Quirk, based on the brief flashbacks seen during his climactic fight with Izuku Midoriya.
Due to his appearance and odd Quirk, Flect felt alienated from others all his life -- at home, at school, in college, in the workplace, and beyond. He never intended to become a hero, either, so he couldn't even weaponize his Quirk and justify its existence that way. He wanted to live as an ordinary man, but his Quirk didn't allow that, so he saw his Quirk as a curse. He inferred that many other people were burdened with unwanted Quirks as well, and on top of that, the Quirkless suffered greatly at the hands of those gifted with good Quirks. For everyone's sake, then, the only solution was to rid humanity of Quirks entirely.
Amon was once Noatak, born in the Southern Water Tribe with his younger brother Tarrlok. The brothers were the sons of Yakon, a Waterbender crime lord who lost his power and his bending at Aang's hands. Yakon fled to the Water Tribe to start a family and groom his sons to avenge him, but Naotak, a highly gifted bender, was disgusted by his father's schemes and his father's attitude about bending. Noatak refused to see himself or his incredible blood bending as weapons, and he was certain that other people would use their own bending in a similar way.
So, he resolved to ironically use his blood bending gift to erase other people's bending, and lead the equalist revolution against all benders in Republic City and the world. Amon personally knew how easy it was to abuse bending and let it turn into a weapon, so he projected these fears onto everyone else. That's exactly what Flect Turn did -- project his insecurities and loneliness on everyone else, and make sure that no one felt cursed by a Quirk ever again, even if 80% of the world's population had to pay the ultimate price for it.
