Characters / One-Punch Man: Garou

One-Punch Man Main Character Index
Saitama | Hero Association (S-Class Heroes) | Neo Heroes | Villains and Monsters (Garou | Monster Association) | Others

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"Hero Hunter" Garou

Voiced by: Hikaru Midorikawa (Japanese), Greg Chun (English)

Debut: Chapter 45 (Webcomic), Chapter 39 (Manga), Episode 13 (Anime)

Disaster Level: Dragon, Dragon or Above (Monster), God^note Self-proclaimed, pending factual confirmation (Awakened: Cosmic Fear Mode)

^{Click here to see Monster Garou} 

^{Click here to see Monster Garou's Second Form} 

^{Click here to see Monster Garou's Third Form} 

^{Click here to see Awakened Garou: Cosmic Fear Mode (Spoilers)} 

"The popular will win, the hated will lose. It's such a tragedy. Then I won't lose to anyone. I will become the strongest monster ever and change this scenario. "

The "Hero Hunter" Garou is a human, yet he is on a quest to defeat as many heroes as possible and become the ultimate monster. He was formerly Bang's pupil, and his talent as a martial artist is tremendous, making him a serious threat to the Hero Association.

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A — H

• Above Good and Evil: While reflecting his past, at the end Garou says how he rejects the idea of "good" and "evil".
  "Screw justice. And screw evil too. I'm gonna be killed because that's what everyone else wants?! It's not fair! I can't stand it! It pisses me off! All I want is to make them understand! I want to strike a blow for the little guy! "Good" and "evil"? I reject them both!"
• Accidental Hero: The manga adds a cause and effect, to the point of it being a gag, where Garou's monsterification inadvertently pushes him to save other people, no matter how much he tries to enact his evil deeds; in place of Saitama breaking Garou's ideals like in the webcomic, it's this bizarre effect that convinces Saitama that Garou might as well be a good guy underneath in the manga version. It is only after Garou is partially corrupted by "God" that he truly becomes evil, but in the end that is completely reverted, damage included.
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: The webcomic shed no light in Garou's family situation, the tragedy behind his ideals was solely focused on Garou's contempt of how biased heroics could be, often reduced to the popular being automatically placed as heroes and the outcast as the villain; the manga, however, mentions offhandedly Garou has a father, but nothing beyond that, implies at the end of the Monster Association arc that Garou is drawn to women who remind him of his mother, but unlike her at least seem to be kind, suggesting he's looking for the kindness his mother never showed him, and has Bang privately note his parents never showed up to his detention, basically abandoning him, which is likely why the manga's Bang is turned into a more affable parental figure who stuck with Garou after his defeat, looking forward to put the guy back on track.
• Adaptation Personality Change:
  • His steps into Awakening reduce Garou into a feral state in the Manga; originally in the webcomic he was mentally sound throughout the entire process, and some of the scenes where he faces the Monster Association Executives and S-Class heroes are different between versions, with Garou only grunting like a monster when facing them in the manga while he taunts and boasts against them in the webcomic. After Feral Monster Garou wins against Bang, however, a crack opens on his face and Garou’s sanity returns.
  • Additionally, in the Manga Garou doesn't have his belief about the unifying power of villainy explicitly challenged by Saitama, and is still somewhat attached to it after the Monster Association arc.
• Adaptational Attractiveness: His webcomic incarnation looks more like a simple thug; Murata drew him as an athletic handsome dude wearing tight-fitting clothing.
• Adaptational Badass: In the manga, his Monster form serves the same role as the Webcomic's Awakened form, merely being an upgrade of his base abilities and physical mutations. He gains a new awakening form in "Cosmic Fear Mode" which is capable of manipulating the forces of the universe and of copying Saitama's strength through "modes".
• Adaptational Dumbass: When he first appears in his Monster form in the manga, he's not exactly fully conscious, and the only things he says is groaning and roaring sounds, similiar to a monster. That is until Bang manages to speak through him in his fight, eventually a part of his form gets cracked and is able to speak normally again.
• Adaptational Nice Guy: The manga adjusts the story in presenting Garou as more of a good man deep down, unlike the Webcomic which originally kept his true good side more subtle till his fight with Saitama happened during the later climax of the Monster Association arc, showing cracks in Garou's resolve; to note: Garou's ideal of becoming the supreme evil to unite the world against him is revealed early in the manga, and he temporarily teamed with Metal Bat while at it to kill Sage Centipede, with some gag moments added. After his Awakening, instead of taunting and humiliating every hero he comes across before going after Saitama, here Garou immediately goes after Saitama himself. It is only after Garou is empowered and corrupted by "God" that he starts acting consistently nefarious, truly hurting heroes and bystanders.
• Adaptational Relationship Overhaul: The manga majorly extends his relationship with Tareo. In the webcomic he only meets Tareo three times - at the park after his dine-and-dashining, in the Monster Association base to save him from Royal Ripper and at the battlefield after MA's being destroyed to save him again from Golden Sperm and later when Tareo stop Sweet Mask's assault on him. In the manga however they meet more than twice as much, with Garou saving Tareo's life even more to show how the latter is a Morality Pet for him with the earlier being a sort of inspirational The Hero for the other. Both of these traits in the webcomic are pretty downplayed or at least not as much explored as in the manga.
• Adaptational Villainy: After being corrupted by "God", despite retaining most of his self, Garou's manga counterpart chooses to be much more evil than his webcomic counterpart once he awakens his Cosmic Powers, deciding to kill Genos to draw out Saitama's full power. Thankfully, he has a Heel Realization later.
• Adaptive Ability: Garou is a very fast learner. If he ever loses a fight, but manages to escape or at least survive, he'll recall the move that was used on him and add it to his arsenal. It's unclear if this is an actual superpower he has or just something he's good at. Once he undergoes monsterization, he begins to physically evolve to adapt and overcome any attack or opponent that can harm him. In the webcomic, Saitama's impossible strength actually forces Garou to begin devolving since getting stronger and faster wasn't helping, so he eventually returns to human form. In the manga, he actually is able to adapt to Saitama's strength but didn't count on Saitama's own body adapting in turn and making Caped Baldy grow stronger than him. Which leads to Garou being put on the backfoot and eventually losing the fight.
• Ambiguously Human: Tank-Top Master during his fight with him and pretty much everyone else asks themselves if Garou is really human at all, questioning wether it should be moral or not to kill him. His monster transformation in the webcomic also uses this trope with his monster design, devloping horns and having a mutated body, but still retaining some of his human features.Eventually, he turns out to be human and, in his own way, Good All Along as pointed out by Saitama.
  • This gets an intresting Call-Back later when it's the Garou questioning Saitama during their fight is he human at all. In the manga "A being like that should not live on Earth" is added.
• Anti-Villain: He may be playing for the monsters' side but as it turns out he never really killed any heroes and doesn't even target civilians. Hell, he actually killed quite a few members of the Monster Association. The main reason he attacks the heroes is that he wants to destroy the status quo and get what he believes to be fair justice. In the webcomic and manga, his goal is to, more or less, pull an Ozymandias from Watchmen where the entire world unites against him out of sheer terror.
• Arc Villain: Of Human Monster Saga and contained in it Hero Hunt and Monster Assocation arcs.
• Armor-Piercing Question: At the end of his big Motive Rant in the webcomic, Garou attempts to hit Saitama with one of these, but it doesn't work. Saitama ends up hitting Garou with an Armor-Piercing Question of his own combined with a Kirk Summation, which causes Garou's determination to crumble instead.
  Garou: If you weren't here, I would have become the world's absolute evil. Unbiased terror scattered throughout the world...that can establish real peace. Don't think that all children are waiting for heroes. There are even kids around the world waiting for a great monster to take the stage. Can you save them!? Can you follow the ugly kid being picked on in the park!? I can! I can save the whole world with terror! While humanity is fearing Garou the Monster, everyone's hearts will unite to survive. Is there any peace other than this!? Can you create peace? Can you unbiased save the world with that flimsy cape? Do you have the means to stop the unseen tragedies? You're strong but so what? You may defeat me, but can you handle it?! THE RESPONSIBILITY!!! WELL!? IF YOU'RE GOING TO DEFEAT ME, THEN ANSWER THE QUESTION! WHAT WILL YOU ACCOMPLISH? Why will you kill me now? Do you have a sense of duty like mine? WHY...ARE YOU...A HERO?!
  Long pause, Saitama thinks about the question for a moment
  Saitama: It's a hobby.
• Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: Used to be Bang's top student, before Bang found out Garou wanted to be a Monster. Garou is still quite confident of his skills, and pushes his limits daily. This backfires because Bang gets worried Garou might become an unstoppable monster, so he calls his brother, Bomb, for backup and they kick Garou's ass straight to the monster hospital. Yes, the monsters have a infirmary for monsters that get beat up by heroes and survive.
• As Long as There Is Evil: Played With — Ultimately, Garou wants to be the "world-destroying evil" simply because at least against him humanity would stand a chance, because they could stand up against him as many times as it took to beat him. And by focusing on him, humanity would never have to worry about its greatest enemy: Itself.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Garou is not only very skilled at fighting, he's also able to figure out the weaknesses of his opponent's fighting style through simple observation alone. Opponents may get some hits in at first, but once Garou figures out the technique, he will be able to counter anything that the opponent uses. He also does research on his targets to be able to better prepare himself for their inevitable meeting.
• The Bad Guy Wins: In the manga, he technically succeeds in becoming the "absolute evil" in his "Cosmic Fear Mode". Although he still loses to Saitama, he successfully provokes him by killing Genos and making him fight to the point where Saitama's limitless growth goes up and succeeds Garou's abilities. Deconstructed however, since he came to his senses by realizing that his new mode has killed Tarou due to radiation poisoning, eventually teaching Saitama to go back in time to stop himself.
• Bare-Handed Blade Block: A more realistic version against Spring Mustachio and Royal Ripper, as he lets them hit one hand to immobilize them, and then beats them up with the other. He plays it straight against Atomic Samurai as Awakened Garou in the webcomic, as he catches the blade between two of his fingers, snaps it off, and then beats him up in the time it takes for Atomic Samurai to finish swinging his sword.
• Berserk Button: Absolutely DO NOT be a condescending jerk about justice and heroism in Garou's presence unless you want the most humiliating beatdown of your life. This happens with Superalloy Darkshine, who compared Garou's quest to a child playing monster, and with Sweet Mask when he tries to give a lecture on how pathetic the S-Ranks were being mid-battle. Garou responds by literally punching his face in, mid-rant.
• Big Bad: The first true overarching villain the series has ever had, and genuinely retained this for a time.
• Big Bad Ensemble: He is this with Orochi in the Human Monster Saga.
• Big Eater: In Chapter 87, Garou orders all the meats and salads on the menu at a restaurant and a huge glass of water and was able to eat the entire serving before attempting a dine and dash. Granted, before that the guy was unable to get a decent meal for at least over a day.
• Bio-Armor: His pre-Awakened monster form in the manga seems to be the normal Garou in a chitinous exoskeleton; it cracks after his fight with Bang, leaving his eye exposed, and later Saitama punches him right out of it.
• Big Red Devil: His Awakened appearance in the webcomic plays with it. His horns used to be his hair before he gained the desire to become a real monster for heroes to fight. This does two things: it changed his physical appearance to one similar to a demon, and all his hair turns into his two "horns", leaving him bald.
• Bishounen Line: His progression into his Awakened form in the manga follows this trend. He starts off as a monstrous version of himself, grows more muscular and demonic to power up against Saitama, and then takes on God's power to become Awakened Garou: Cosmic Fear Mode, a Humanoid Abomination that looks like a Celestial Body version of his initial monster form.
• Blood Knight: Garou truly enjoys fighting. Such as when he actively goes out of his way to hunt heroes in the name of his code and has a blast when doing it. He even has enough courage to challenge S-Class Heroes as they are probably the biggest challenge he'll get throughout his hunting spree. It is also expressed when he wears a truly arrogant grin on his face while he demolishes any one of them in his path.
• Break Them by Talking: This is how Saitama defeats Garou in webcomic.
• Broken Ace: Garou is a good looking guy, charismatic and an amazing fighter, that ultimately becomes so strong, only Saitama can beat him. But he also suffers from a plethora of deep-seated psychological issues that make him a very troubled young man.
• Bullet Catch: He deflects all of Death Gatling's bullets fired in one explosive burst. He boasts afterwards that guns can no longer hurt him.
• The Bus Came Back: He gets few times Put on the Bus, usually because he gets knocked out. He returns in Chapter 146 when all remaining S-Class heroes battle Monsters executives, this time in his Awakened form.
• Butt-Monkey: When Garou starts his crusade against heroes in the manga, he's just as likely to get his ass kicked as he is to kick ass. Against Watchdog Man for instance, he gets utterly outclassed and has to retreat, only escaping worse punishment because Watchdog Man doesn't venture outside his own territory. And every time Garou runs into Saitama, he gets knocked out instantly, with Saitama never even realizing who he punched out. One time Saitama even wonders right afterwards about that Hero Hunter he had heard about and whether he'd possibly be a challenge seconds after punching Garou through a wall. Overall, Garou has been knocked out thrice by Saitama before their ultimate confrontation.
• Card-Carrying Villain: He has "Hero Hunter" as a title. He introduces himself by walking into a meeting at the Hero Association, which is full of various rogues and evil doers. (in-context: The Association was putting the word out about the world-ending prediction, hoping the Underworld might decide the world ending is against their own self-interests), and loudly proclaiming they are all weaklings and that he, the Human Monster, could defeat all of them right here to prove it... and then he actually does it. He then goes for a casual stroll while making a threat to the Hero Association head. He also doesn't pay for his meals.
  • Ultimately, however, it's Deconstructed. Saitama realizes that despite his power and title, Garou didn't actually kill any heroes, and from there he realizes Garou is a Well-Intentioned Extremist and Noble Demon with no small degree of self-loathing.
• Came Back Strong: One of his abilities seems to imply "what doesn't kill me, only makes me stronger." This especially comes into effect in the latter part of the human Monster saga, when he begins fighting the merciless members of the Monster Association such as Royal Ripper and Bug God, Overgrown Rover, and Orochi, and begins growing exponentially because of it. This is part of Psykos's theory on breaking the limiter; by being exposed to near-death situations and then overcoming it, one can gain explosive bursts of power. Psykos engineered these situations in hopes of creating a being even more powerful than Orochi as her ultimate trump card.
• Celestial Body: A new stage of Awakened Garou in the manga appears as a silhoutte of his initial monster form with nothing but the night sky and galaxies inside him.
• Character Development: After the Monster Association arc, Garou is set for a new outlook on life, which the Webcomic and Manga handle in different ways:
  • Webcomic: Having his All-Unifying Evil ideal completely shattered by Saitama rebuking all of that as Garou simply being too much of a wimp to be the hero all along, Garou seeks to find his new meaning in life, his will to live again reignited by Tareo calling him a hero, and goes through some lone soul-searching to hone his mind and spirit.
  • Manga: Steering away from the Webcomic, Garou doesn’t have his ideals shattered, instead he breaks down after witnessing where his "Evil" self led him, killing the innocent like Tareo, which immediately leads him to assist Saitama in rewinding time before all of that happened; a new Garou that didn’t cross that line is left in defeat, not remembering his change of mind, but knowing he's lost the power to take on the unbeatable unfairness he sees in Saitama. Tareo, Bang and King prevent Garou from attempting suicide-by-hero, and afterwards Bang seeks him out, dedicating himself to taking care of Garou and having him reform as a new man whom the Hero Association expects to become Bang’s successor one day.
• Chekhov's Gunman: He is mentioned in passing as the student who Bang beat up and expelled due to going wild and beating up all of the other students in Bang's dojo. He shows up several chapters later as a villain.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: When all of his areas of expertise are trumped by just how horribly unfair Saitama's strength is, Garou gradually becomes more and more of a literal monster. However, all this does is make him bulkier and easier to hit, though this makes him durable enough to tank Saitama’s normal punches.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Both played seriously and played for laughs — played seriously in that Garou is really brutal in beating up heroes, then played for laughs when Saitama lightly taps him for Dine-and-Dashing, which results in a OHKO. Ditto when Saitama mistakes him for a mugger while he's out wig shopping.
  • Curb Stomp Cushion: His ultimate fight with Saitama is still very one-sided, but he significantly puts more fight to him compared to others as Saitama didn't One-Hit KO him, even getting himself to pull out his "Serious Series" moves to incapacitate him, though even after evolving over 4 times into his "unfair evil" ultimate mode, he's unable to hurt Saitama. In the manga, as Cosmic Fear Garou, despite his growth allowing him to even if only briefly rival Saitama's "full" strength, he can't keep up with Saitama's own accelerating growth in response at all.
• Dark and Troubled Past:
  • He was bullied by the other kids in school for sympathizing with the monsters on TV shows and for not playing along with their hero games on the playground. When school authorities got involved, he was victim-blamed for not conforming to the other kids' standards. Because of this, Garou always felt like a universally-hated underdog, and it's part of why he goes on his self-destructive crusade to knock heroes down a peg and become the ultimate monster.
  • While they are barely alluded to at all in the webcomic (barring a brief mention of Garou's father in his backstory), it's implied several times in the manga that Garou's parents don't care for him and in post-note of Chapter 170 he's mother wasn't a kind person. Which is why in the manga Bang serves more as a parental figure to Garou and at the end of his long arc tries to redeem him.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: Of Balance Between Good and Evil and As Long as There Is Evil. Garou represents the idea that as long as good and evil both exist in the world, there needs to be a "balance" between them. As long as evil exists in the world, there needs to be good as well, and the only way that an absolute good can exist is for an absolute evil to simultaneously exist. The deconstruction comes into play when it's revealed that Garou isn't really evil at heart. He has a body count of zero (for humans, at least; he kills monsters indiscriminately, though) and actively avoids harming innocent people, and takes mercy on kids such as Tareo and Zenko multiple times. Garou doesn't really want to do evil things, but rather wants to become the ultimate antagonist in order to force the world to focus on him and become better people that way. He believes there's too much picking on the little and unpopular guys, and wants people to focus on a real threat instead of the kid who doesn't fit in, for example. Saitama slowly challenges his worldview in the webcomic by bringing up the fact that he's a good person who basically went with a half-hearted monster hobby because he lacked the conviction to be a hero, to be the change he really wanted to see in the world. In the end, Saitama asks him if he's okay with being a villain - Garou's facial expression very clearly says he isn't.
• Deliberate Injury Gambit: Several times Garou takes advantage of his Determinator Healing Factor to tank an attack in such a way it allows him to get in close and punish his opponent several times over what he got, such as when he impales his hand on Spring Mustachio's Finishing Move in order to take him out with one good strike.
• Determinator: Even beaten, tired, wounded and poisoned, he never gives up and never stops fighting until his beliefs collapse when confronted by Saitama.
  • It's also deconstructed in the webcomic because he isn't enough of a determinator. Despite never stopping in fighting, he became a monster as a compromise. His heart isn't in it, and he can never let go of his humanity and become a real monster. His real goal was to be a hero, but he lacked the conviction to follow through and according to Saitama, it's because he lacks confidence.
• Don't You Dare Pity Me!: The manga adds this, to an extent, in his first "real" encounter with Saitama. When Saitama finally finds Garou and scolds him for dine and dashing, he simply warns him and tells to not do it again. Even Tareo tries to calm down his "uncle" and let the hero off the hook... And this greatly angers Garou.
  "Are you kidding me? When not only the Monster Association, but also no name heroes and shitty brats start pitying you, you know you've fucked up. No idea how old man Bang managed to get away alive, but I'm really pissed at myself for feeling relieved when I heard that. Screw the definition of monsters, I lack determination, that's for sure. Does this mean I'll be obeying the Monster Association? I'm gonna take the head of a hero. Don't look down on me... I'm an actual monster!"
• Elemental Punch: Cosmic Fear Mode Garou can enhance his punches with nuclear fission so that every time he punches a massive nuclear explosion goes off. He later copies Blast's ability to control gravity and enhances one fist with it while another is powered up with nuclear fission and then performs a Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs. The result is pure devastation.
• Enemy Mine:
  • Ends up performing a Teeth-Clenched Teamwork with Metal Bat in the manga to fight off Sage Centipede, despite bickering with him the entire time. Almost by pure accident and coincidence, they make a near-perfect team together.
  • This is actually what Garou wants by becoming an "Absolute Evil". He wants to become the fairytale-like monster that everyone fears so that they are forced to unite against him to survive. By doing so, he aspires to end conflict and war and achieve world peace.
• Enlightened Antagonist: In achieving "Cosmic Horror Mode" of his "awakening", Garou claims that the power came from rejecting the attempts of "God" to claim his body, and surviving the power surge this encounter gave him. The result is that he can mimic any style with his knowledge of the fundamental flow of all energy and the behaviour of all forces in the universe. This is represented by Garou's body appearing as a blank void containing stars and galaxies with a silhouette of his initial monster form. He can also project energy blasts which Psykos recognised as similar to Homeless Emperor, who also had contact with "God".
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Garou isn't interested in killing civilians like "some sort of crazed mass murderer" - he's only a villain to fight heroes - and still takes time to help Tareo with his bully problems. When Tareo gets kidnapped by the Monster Association, Garou even saves him from their dungeon (though he is very Tsundere about it, and the two get split up before Tareo can actually reach safety).
    • In fact, "bullying the weak" in general seems to be a weak spot for him. During his fight with Superalloy Darkshine, he starts curbstomping him so much that Darkshine loses his confidence and starts flashing back to when he was bullied as a kid. Garou actually stops mid-attack because he felt that something was wrong. It's also why he saves Tareo from bullies, seeing a lot in him.
  • When the Monster Worship Party attempts to sacrifice a civilian to the Monster Association, Garou beats up a multitude of their members and tells them to get lost.
  • He seems to subvert this when he threatens to kill Tareo, but this turns out to be a bluff, as Saitama points out.
  • Even when he beats up heroes he never leaves them with permeant, or career ending injuries. Even the three high ranked A-Class heroes he injured at the Hero Association meeting with criminals by Stich were shown later on working just fine. Most likely Muffintop is fine too.
• Evil Is Cool: In-Universe, Garou has this belief, and also tries to invoke this by attempting to become a monster himself. When he borrows Tareo's almanac, he fawns over the monsters instead, thinking that they are cooler than the heroes.
  Garou: The scarier the better. These guys are way cooler.
• Evil Is Easy: According to Saitama in the webcomic, this is why he actually became a Noble Demon. To Garou, it was easier trying to bring world peace by being an all-powerful evil monster, because all he had to do was beat heroes. As Saitama observed, Garou chose this route because he did not have the confidence in himself to actually be The Paragon that he believed other heroes should be like. It's also deconstructed, since despite his noble goal, the truth is that by trying to be evil, he's really just half-assing it and against someone like Saitama, who puts all of his conviction in it, he will never win. Evil may be easy, but that doesn't mean you'll end up achieving what you really want.
• Evil Laugh: Gives one every now and then, though it's mostly just a small chuckle then a full-on laugh.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: The aftermath of his battle against Saitama in the webcomic left him with shorter hair, as if to symbolize the removal of his previous horned hairstyle and his desire to be a monster. He keeps this shorter hair as he continues to train in isolation afterwards. This hair also resembles his hairstyle as a kid, seen in flashbacks, showing a return to his true self. In the manga, the end of the Monster Association arc sees his hair return to its usual color, but he retains the horned hairstyle, albeit only for a while, his next appearance in the manga back in Bang's dojo tutelage shows Garou cut his hair short, matching his appearance between the two versions.
• The Faceless: As Awakened Garou - although you see a few features, eventually he gets so strong due to Saitama getting serious on him, almost everything about him is blacked out and featureless - you can't even tell WHAT he looks like anymore. And then Saitama literally punches his face off, revealing his human eyes underneath, when he gets shocked by Saitama's speech. In the manga, his "face" is a number of celestial bodies layered over his pitch black body.
• Fatal Flaw: In a roundabout way, Sloth. Garou desires to be the ultimate monster, noting that in doing so, humanity would unite against him rather than pick on each other. However, despite his massive growing power, he doesn't really kill any of the heroes and ends up befriending a couple of kids. However, where this truly comes into play is when he faces Saitama in the webcomic. Garou puts up a good fight, but is still easily beaten by Saitama and Saitama realizes the truth through Garou's ranting: that Garou actually wanted to be a hero. However, Garou chose being a monster for his goal because it was easier; as Saitama put it, all he (Garou) had to do was beat up heroes. He even says that he chose it because he lacked the confidence to actually be who he truly wanted to be. Saitama then tears into Garou, saying that his plan would never work as long as he couldn't beat Saitama and Garou's "half-hearted monster hobby" would always lose against Saitama's "full-hearted hero hobby." As such, Garou's moral sloth is his own failing for his goal; he was too afraid to actually try and be The Paragon he thinks heroes should be, despite having the strength and nobility to do so.
• Flash Step: Most notably when giving his "Reason You Suck" Speech to the contingent of S-Class heroes, he frequently starts a sentence in front of one hero, and finishes it in front of another, with the heroes still looking at his old location, the implication being that he flash-stepped so fast that nobody could follow him. He also manages to close the distance between himself and many of the heroes, hit them, and then move back fast enough that it appears that the hero was hit by thin air, which happens to Sweet Mask, Child Emperor and Zombieman. He also flash-steps multiple times during his other fights.
• Foil:
  • To Saitama. Both of them have a strong sense of morality and justice, albeit manifested in different ways. While Saitama wanted to be like a hero from his childhood who fought villains, Garou wants to be a monster who defeats heroes. While Garou is a genius fighter and a prodigious martial artist, Saitama is an untrained brawler with basic (albeit solid) fighting skills. Garou has an important moral mission he is determined to accomplish, while Saitama is just a hero for fun. Furthermore, Garou can enjoy the feeling of losing in order to improve himself to become stronger in most of his fights, while Saitama desires to have a worthy opponent to find the rush of excitement he once had while he was training.
  • Also to Tareo. Both of them have intrest in heroes, but while Tareo loves them and aspires to be one of them, although he admits that he is too weak to become one, Garou hates them and aspires to be the monster. Garou also feels sympathetic towards Tareo, because just like him he was also bullied by his peers.
  • Also to Sweet Mask. Both desire world peace and justice, spouting melodramatic rhetoric about good and evil to make up for the fact that neither of them feel confident enough to do it themselves: Garou's plan is to force the rest of the world to become better, while Sweet Mask wants to police other heroes and create a supreme hero. While Sweet Mask is a superstar idol, Garou is a neglected underdog; while Sweet Mask is a monster playing the hero, Garou is a normal guy playing the monster. The list goes on.
• Freudian Excuse: A lot of his hatred for heroes and trying to find someone he considered to be a true hero is because he was bullied as a kid by the local popular kid, and realized that all it takes to become a hero is say you're one and then have the public worship you, regardless of your actions.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Began as a somewhat eccentric kid who thought Evil Is Cool. Became one of the strongest villains in the world, and proud of it. Except maybe not so proud about it.
• The Gift: Garou is noted to be gifted without parallel, and is capable of learning martial arts by observing them once. In addition, he experiences explosive growths in power and can adapt to any situation quickly, especially in mid combat. It is this reason Psykos chooses him to succeed Orochi as her right-hand, noting he possesses talent beyond even the Monster King's.
• A God Am I: In the Webcomic, after many battles as Awakened Garou, he arrogantly declares himself to be a Disaster Level God Monster, however, that remains a statement only Garou himself makes, after his defeat, no one shares that idea or comments on it. In the manga there's more direct involvement from "God" in Garou's awakening, there Garou claims himself to be absolute, shying away from directly claiming to be Disaster Level God, but the amplitude of his abilities and terror he inflicts is much higher than how it went in the Webcomic, more or less implying the same self-entitlement without directly mentioning it, until he does by the very end of the fight, not arrogantly like in the Webcomic, but in sorrowful retrospect when Garou decides Saitama should defeat him.
• Good All Along: Saitama certainly thinks so. Judging by Garou's expression when Saitama explains it, he's right. He (and the other Monsters) also note that Garou went out of his way to avoid actually killing any humans during his so-called Hero Hunt. He also reveals that Garou's threat to kill the child he spent his entire story arc protecting was a bluff by pointing that Garou was walking in the wrong direction. Saitama quickly grows bored of their fight for this very reason: Saitama became a Hero because he wanted to fight villains. Garou isn't a true villain — he's just a guy making a ruckus in Saitama's neighborhood.
• Good Thing You Can Heal: Another of his abilities: the ability to adapt his body and slowly heal himself. His body is physically battered by the end of his arc, but the man has sustained such a massive beating that it's a wonder he's even standing.
  • After a few more evolutions later on, he could even regrow limbs in seconds.
• The Greatest Style:
  • In his Awakened/Monster state, the Monster Calamity God Slayer Fist is this, the amalgamation of 12 separate martial arts styles he learned. Combining it with Awakened Garou's latent physical abilities lets him stand up to Saitama for a time. After he devolves back to a human in the webcomic, he seemingly loses the ability to use it.
  • As the manga's Cosmic Fear Garou, he makes two even stronger styles, one called the All Life Eradication Fist, which is able to recreate cosmic phenomena with sheer skill, and another he simply calls "my fist", that integrates all the styles he learned, including the All Life Eradication Fist and Blast's ability to control gravity. After Saitama's time-travelling punch depowers him, making him forget all the secrets he learned as a monster, he says he wants to remember "my fist"... which given the timeline where he learned it was supposed to have been averted raises a number of questions.
• Healing Factor: At first it just allowed him to rapidly recover from injuries, though he could still be winded or exhausted afterward. As his powers evolve, it just gets even more ridiculous. By the time he's on the verge of breaking his limiter and "Awakening", he's able to heal over his rib cage effectively-being shattered by Superalloy Blackluster within minutes, while still able to keep fighting and moving like it's not bothering him.
• Heel–Face Turn: At the end of Monster Association arc in the manga he is put under the watch of the now retired Bang, who intends for Garou to take his place in the Hero Association.
• Hero Killer: Oh come on, it's in his villain nickname. Near the end of his webcomic arc, he beats nearly every single hero that was S-Class, including a partially weakened Tornado, and even the A-Class number 1 (which is S-Class strength-wise) without any effort. Zig-zagged trope however - Saitama notes that Garou didn't actually kill any of them! In the manga version he did kill them all as Cosmic Fear Mode Garou just by standing there and letting his radiation do the work. It doesn't take though thanks to Saitama time travelling.
• How Much More Can He Take?: Hero and Monster alike are often in awe at Garou's durability and endurance, which has allowed him to push forward and keep fighting even as his muscles tear and his bones break. Even his Healing Factor only helps so much, as he's often continuing the fight even as it's in the process of working its magic. Superalloy Blackluster is left in shock when Garou is still able to keep going and launching complicated martial arts moves despite taking a blow that basically shattered his rib cage, which puts the first spark of doubt and fear in his mind that he might actually lose despite his own Nigh-Invulnerable body.
• Humanoid Abomination: What he becomes as Awakened Garou: Cosmic Fear Mode in the manga, having received God's power.
• Hyperactive Metabolism: In Chapter 87, he recovers from a beating by going to a diner and ordering all of their meat dishes (for protein and calories) and salads (for the vitamins) and washes it down with plenty of water. Right after he finishes his meal, his injuries immediately start to vanish as his Healing Factor kicks in.
• Hypocritical Humor: He yells at Saitama not to underestimate him and proceeds to underestimate him, getting reduced to a Butt-Monkey.

I — Z

• If You're So Evil, Eat This Kitten!: Monster Assocation members demand that Garou kill 100 people (webcomic)/kill 1 hero (manga), in order to see if he truly deserves to call himself a monster. Saitama also pulls this on Garou in his fight with him.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Chows down on the meat of some monsters he slaughters at one point, stating that "food's food" and he needs to restore energy. Note that many monsters were originally human, and Garou considers himself as a monster.
• Implausible Hair Color: He's had white hair since he was a child.
• Invincible Villain: A concept that gets played with; Garou actually loses about as many fights as he wins, but with every loss he gets stronger and adapts to his opponents' fighting styles. Garou eventually does reach a point where he surpasses all the S-Ranked heroes, but he is still ultimately defeated by Saitama.
  • The big takeaway from all of Garou's fights is that as strong as he is, he's only so successful because of his ability to strategize and exploit an opponent's weakness. This comes into play during the final webcomic fight with Saitama. He just kept evolving into stronger and stronger monster forms, but his mind was basically deteriorating in exchange for brute force. That's what sealed his defeat.
• Kick the Dog: Pretty much most of heroes who receive a beating from him count as this, but especially Mumen Rider and Genos, the latter only being killed so Saitama could give it all in the fight (though the last one was done in Garou's Cosmic Fear Form, so an argument can be made that Garou was being influenced by God).
• Knight of Cerebus: Ultimately, this is the sort of Monster Garou wants to become — the type of monster that, once it appears, changes the atmosphere of a battle completely. He becomes capable of defeating almost all the S-Rank heroes and he actually makes Saitama fight seriously-ish, but in the end, he never manages to get Saitama to consider him a monster.
• Large Ham: He's loud and bombastic, like the cartoonishly hammy supervillains he worships.
• Lightning Bruiser: Second only to Saitama in terms of strength, speed, and durability. Word of God implies he's approximately as powerful as Boros.
• Like Parent, Like Spouse: Has a thing for a sentai actress who resembles his mother, though it's noted that unlike his mother, she seems to be kind.
• Mad Eye: As he takes more and more damage and evolves further, his right eye begins to change a darker color.
• Meaningful Name: Of the ironic type. The dreaded Hero Killer is named after a wolf, the lowest threat level classification for a monster, which only signifies a potential threat to a group of people. Turns out more accurate than not by the end of Saitama's fight with him though.
• Meaningless Villain Victory: Played with. In the case of the Hero Association officer Muffintop, Garou likened the sense of clobbering him to stepping in crap knowing full well said pencil-pushing reprobate was lying douche bag looking to cop a feel off of those girls.
  • Ultimately played straight. Despite everything he does and all he's sacrificed, he still can't do a damn thing against Saitama. And also Saitama discusses it that even if he will somehow win, he won't get much of it.
• Mook Horror Show: Probably the best example, since he managed to last an entire fight against Saitama. Not only is he a category above the entire S-Class heroes, but his abilities went to the point that he could block literal light-speed punches, and cuts that could split atoms, by evolving god-like abilities in martial arts. Then Saitama, an amateur with "normal punches", crushed him over and over again, to the point that he crossed all the possible ways to defeat him. Due to this, Garou labels him as the representation of the unfairness of justice. Even becoming the "unfairness" of evil left him only as a punching bag for a couple of minutes. Though Saitama pretty much reveals in the webcomic that the reason why is because Garou's conviction was half-hearted and couldn't beat Saitama's full-hearted conviction.
• Morality Pet: He takes a shine to Tareo and goes out of his way to protect him multiple times, since he empathizes a lot as a fellow victim of bullies. The only other reason he fought and killed monsters other than to protect himself is to protect Tareo. He even teams up with Metal Bat against Sage Centipede when Tareo is threatened.
• Motive Rant: He gives a long one to Saitama and other heroes on battlefield at the end of Monster Assocation arc:
  Garou: "You're all insane! Yet people rely on you madmen. They make the mistaken assumption that of course you'll save them. No matter what happens, someone will do something. It's not their problem if a monster appears. It's not as if most people's lives will change. And so in a small part of their heart, it will have room to grow: evil will be born. But still, the evil of people will never be judged, and that's the difference between people and monsters. The phony peace that heroes create will dye people with evil! That's why I'm doing this. I will be the devil that plunges humanity into terror!! In a world with no room for survival, evil will disappear, and so will bullying, discrimination, even war! What this world needs is not justice, but unbiased, absolute evil! I'm fighting for world peace. No justice will be able to overthrow me. I will be stronger than anyone! I will be an absolute monster! If you weren't here, I would have become the world's absolute evil. Unbiased terror scattered throughout the world can establish real peace. Don't think that all children are waiting for heroes; there are kids around the world waiting for a great monster to take the stage. Can you save them!? Can you follow the ugly kid being picked on in the park!? I can! I can save the whole world with terror! While humanity fears Garou the Monster, everyone's hearts will unite to survive. Is there any peace other than this? Can you create peace? Can you unbiasedly save the world with that flimsy cape? Do you have the means to stop unseen tragedies? You're strong, but so what? You may defeat me, but can you handle it? The responsibility!!? Well!!? If you're going to defeat me, answer the question! What will you accomplish?! Why will you kill me now?! Do you have a sense of duty like mine?! Why.. are you.. A HERO?!"
• Mr. Fanservice: Garou has many shirtless scenes in the manga, showing off his muscular torso, shoulders, and chiseled abs. Word of God claims that Garou's back is a reference to Bruce Lee's muscular back.
• Necessarily Evil: This is what his "Absolute Evil" ideology boils down to. The main reason he attacks the heroes is that he wants to destroy the status quo and get what he believes to be fair justice. In the webcomic and manga, his goal is to, more or less, pull an Ozymandias from Watchmen where the entire world bands unite against him out of sheer terror. Saitama later points out how flawed this idea is.
• Nightmare Fetishist: Ever since he was a kid, he would always play the role of the monster that the heroes fight. Always. Of course, he respected the monsters due to their more often than not superior effort. Unfortunately, certain kids took advantage of this to have an excuse to beat him up. This just made him more determined to become the sort of monster that can beat self-centered, self-proclaimed "heroes" like them. Ironically, if it was the other way around, he would've been a lot like Genos. And it later turns out he never really went evil, either.
• Noble Demon: He definitely shows a degree of martial honor and is upset by crueler tactics or sleazy individuals, though he claims otherwise. Saitama realizes, if anything, the Demon part is the one that's suspect. A certain manipulative Skirt Chasing HA administrator who milks the company budget to pick up chicks found this out the hard way.
• Nominal Villain: Garou has never actually killed any heroes and is only presenting himself as a villain in hopes of uniting the world in their hatred against him.
• Nonchalant Dodge: It's repeatedly noted in his manga incarnation that he dodges attacks and projectiles with a minimum amount of movement. Yet, the trope is subverted because Garou does take the dodging seriously as his human body is still vulnerable to blows and projectiles. It's just that for a martial artist of his level, it's the most efficient way of evading damage.
• No-Sell: He manages to evade or deflect all of Saitama's normal attacks at the beginning of their battle and announces to the latter that he will ultimately lose because Garou's combat style will eventually prevail over Saitama's combat style. Too bad for Garou that Saitama decided to show him a little bit of his serious side.
• Odd Friendship: With Tareo. Garou is rude to him, but he deeply cares for him, and Tareo despite his actions still treats him like uncle hero. They're also pretty much their only true friends to each other. In fact, Tareo's words begging heroes to not kill his uncle touched Garou so much he retained his will to live and retreat from battlefield.
• Oh, Crap!: Breaks instantly out in cold sweat in the manga and anime, which goes upwards in the latter, when he first meets Saitama who no sells Garou's sneak attack with the highly sophisticated method of not reacting to it at all. Garou forgot about this encounter afterward.
  • Has a series of this during his fateful confrontation with Saitama. Whenever Garou thinks he has cornered Saitama, he is proven wrong. Becomes the cause of his Villainous Breakdown.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: He is the "younger villain" being 18-years-old, while Saitama is the "older hero" being 25-years-old. Also Garou's previous mentor, Silver Fang, who's 81.
• One-Man Army: As Awakened Garou, he's so strong that he can simultaneously defeat most of the S-Class heroes while barely trying.
• One-Winged Angel: Played straight when he becomes a bald, horned figure to mirror Saitama's own generally basic appearance, becoming what Black Sperm calls Awakened Garou. Then inverted when he starts trying to milk it further.
• Out of Focus: Despite that he plays a big role in Human Monster Saga, he doesn't do much in Super Fight arc, except for battling with Watchdogman. Later in Monster Assocation arc, he also dissapears few times.
• Parental Abandonment: In the manga's epilogue to the Monster Association arc, Bang notes that Garou's parents never showed up to his detention. A bonus picture at the end implies his mother is not a kind woman.
• Parody Sue:invoked Garou is a parody of Villain Sue, being an unstoppable force that keeps getting more powerful with no real explanation and trounces everyone until Saitama comes along. However, his status as the most powerful antagonist faced yet is effectively neutered due to how he's never killed anyone besides monsters and was never planning on it. Garou was never an actual threat and halfassed trying to be a villain.
• Passing the Torch: The manga has Bang intend Garou to take his place in the Hero Association. The Association know this will draw a massive internal backlash from the other heroes, but they don't really have a choice because they need to bolster their forces for the Great Prophecy, so they have to count on Bang's ability to rehabilitate Garou.
• Person of Mass Destruction: His Awakened form in the Manga is imbued with radioactive powers, courtesy of God. His punches are capable of causing nuclear explosions, he can fire out gamma ray bursts at will, and he constantly emits lethal amounts of radiation which kills anyone in his presence unless they're sufficiently powerful or have some special resistance to radiation. Saitama and Blast both recognize the potentially apocalyptic power of his attacks and try to direct them away from the earth.
• Pet the Dog:
  • When Metal Bat's little sister throws herself in between the two of them, Garou actually follows her request to stand down, claiming he's too busy to keep wasting time on Metal Bat. And when a Monster Association goon considers grabbing Zenko as a hostage, Garou kills him, supposedly because he didn't like being watched.
  • Whenever he's around Tareo, he will save him, in his own way of course.
  • He won't hesitate saving innocents when it's needed. E.g., when the Monster Worship Party attempts to sacrifice a civilian to the Monster Association, Garou beats up a multitude of their members and tells them to get lost.
  • In the OVA "Games and rivals" during a fighting game tournament in Suiryu's battle with Garou the latter moves so fast that the system can't process it which causes it to glitch preventing Garou from winning. He attempts to throw and destroy VR set, but he stops after thinking about it and just gives it back to executive. He then asks where he could find his opponent in the building, which he's told that they can't for the purpose of not causing any problems. By hearing this he just walks away dissapointed. Mind you, this is Garou we're talking about - he could easily rage out and start threating people, but he choosed not to. And this was already at the point where he heavily beat all of Bang's other disciples at his dojo.
• Physical God: His monster form was already powerful enough to rearrange the shape and face of the Earth at his most powerful, but his Awakened: Cosmic Fear Mode is powerful enough to keep up with Saitama and even control the fundamental forces of the universe.
• Poke the Poodle: He doesn't pay for his meals. And ultimately, his entire "villainous" career-compared to monsters in general, the property damage he does (accidentally) and repeated nonlethal humiliation of heroes is barely worth mentioning; the aftermath of it in the manga sees him simply getting interrogated by the police for the dine-and-dash and property damage and having to apologize for them.
• Power Copying: His innate ability greatly amplified by "God", Garou only needs to fight something once to understand it and then either adapt or copy its techniques. This even works on non-physical abilities like Blast's portal generation, or Saitama himself.
• Power Makes Your Hair Grow: His hair grows outwards wildly, and becomes more horn-ish as he fights and becomes stronger until he transforms into a mysterious being and his hair becomes real horns. He goes bald in exchange in the webcomic, though.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Any kind thing Garou does, he invokes this trope. Though as we see later he is proven wrong by Saitama and Tareo.
• Pummel Duel: Manages to endure Saitama's two-handed Consecutive Punch Combo for a while. This is quite an achievement, considering what normally happens when Saitama uses the one-handed version.
• Put on the Bus: Gets this few times during long Monster assocation arc.
  • First when Orochi defeats and imprisons him, after his battle with him, disappearing for more than 20 chapters.
  • After his battle with Superalloy Darkshine, we don't see much of him except for him transforming into his Awakened form, when he dissapears for more than 10 chapters again, until emerging from underground in his Monster form, ready to fight Silver Fang.
• Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: As a practitioner of Bang's Water Stream Rock Smashing Fist, he's capable of this.
• Razor-Sharp Hand: He starts using the Whirlwind Iron Cutting Fist after beating Bomb, albeit on a lower level. He could karate-chop a cup perfectly in half before then, though.
• "Reason You Suck" Speech: In the webcomic, after Garou goes on a rant when Saitama defeats him and learns that his heroism is just a hobby, Saitama picks up on Garou's true nature. He proceeds to spell it out in front of Garou along with why Garou was never gonna defeat him:
  Saitama: So you did have an "image of an ideal hero" inside of you. I see now. I now understand what you wanted to do. Even though you said you wanted to be a "monster of absolute evil"... What you really wanted to be was a hero. But you compromised and decided to be a monster. To bring about world peace, you took the easy route, thinking a monster's job was quicker and easier than a hero's. A monster's role is simpler after all, all you had to do was defeat heroes. It's perfect for someone with no confidence like you. BUT YOU CAN NEVER DEFEAT ME. And peace made by ruling the world with fear can't succeed as long as you can't defeat me. So it will never work. It's absolutely impossible for you. Because if it's your compromised monster hobby vs. my serious hero hobby, even if that's all I had, I still wouldn't lose! It was a mistake to lower the hurdle right before the goal. A half-assed objective just can't succeed.
• Retired Badass: In the webcomic, after the Monster Association saga, Garou takes Saitama's words to heart and tries to live a peaceful life while atoning for his misdeeds against society. He starts looking for simple employment, becoming... the Job Hunter.
• Reused Character Design: Give him a few guns and make him wear football gear, he'll look like Yoichi Hiruma from Murata's previous work Eyeshield 21.
• Rooting for the Empire: In-Universe. As a child he was more interested in villains than heroes. This ended up adding more to his current-day behavior as other children turned against him when he talked about it.
• Rugged Scar: In the manga, after the Monster Association arc, he's left with a scar on his face going from above his right eye to the middle of his left cheek.
• Running Gag: Everytime Garou engages Saitama, it results in Garou getting knocked out, and neither one of the participants remembering what happened. At least in the manga, this naturally culminates into Saitama knocking Garou so hard in their final battle, it causes a Cosmic Retcon, again resulting in Garou severely beaten and neither one remembering the events of the fight.
• Scarf of Asskicking: As he progressively gets stronger, he eventually gets an ominous scarf.
• Seeking Ultimate Strength: Garou, the Hero Hunter, is the former disciple of Bang, and a self-proclaimed Human Monster. Frustrated by the common belief that The Good Guys Always Win, he learns different fighting styles and seeks out superheroes to try them on, growing more experienced over time, with the sole stated purpose of showing that not even S-Rank heroes are invincible. Which in the end is revealed to be a Genghis Gambit.
• Shadow Archetype: To Saitama, but not for the reasons you might think. While Saitama grew up wanting to be a hero and Garou grew up wanting to be a villain, Garou made a mistake. Garou always liked villain designs in his cartoon show as a kid, but he didn't empathize with the villains because they were evil. He adored their personalities and designs over the show's Invincible Hero. He convinced himself that he would rather be a monster and that he hated heroes, but what he hated was heroes that weren't ideal or who were just plain bland. When it came to Tareo, he just couldn't stand seeing the kid get hurt like he was as a kid and defended him with his life. With the heroes, he just wanted to upstage them and knock them down a peg, not kill them. He didn't have the same qualms about killing monsters especially when they tried to hurt innocent people, especially kids. In the end, while he gained power in the same way Orochi and Saitama did, he couldn't break the final limiter in the webcomic because he wasn't enlightened like Saitama is. The reason why as Saitama implies is because Garou's conviction was half-hearted, being too unconfident to try and be the hero he really wanted to be.
• Slasher Smile: Wears this expression a lot whenever in a fight.
• Spell My Name With An S: The Viz translation shaves the "u" off the end of his name, leaving it as "Garo" so that English readers know to pronounce it [garo] instead of [garu].
• Strong and Skilled: Garou specializes in Bang's martial arts techniques and has a lot of raw power to back it up, but can subvert this trope as he prefers using his skill even though he has a lot of strength to back up his fighting ability. Especially when he amps up his abilities in his One-Winged Angel form to where he can fight Saitama at "Semi-Seriously".
• Supernatural Martial Arts: His All Life Eradication Fist is this. By receiving God's power and then combining with it with his ability to understand the flow of energy via his mastery of the Water Stream Rock Smash Fist, Garou is able to understand the nature of the universe itself. He then combines this knowledge and his own physical abilities to make All Life Eradication Fist, a martial arts style that can recreate cosmic phenomena such as nuclear fission, wormhole generation, gravity manipulation, and gamma ray bursts.
• Super-Strength: He is strong enough to smash through concrete walls and crumble them to bits.
• Super-Speed: Garou attacks very quick, as he was able to beat hundreds of criminals in seconds in his introduction arc. And in one OVA when he entered video game tourney, his moves were so fast that the VR system couldn't track them down at some point and cause it to glitch out. And later, when he transforms into his Monster form, according to timer, he managed to defeat all remaining cadres at the battlefield in less than a second. And then when he battled Flashy Flash and Platinum Sperm, Garou was able to outspeed them both.
• Super-Toughness: Durable enough to survive several punches coming from Saitama and able to walk away from it relatively unharmed as Awakened Garou.
• Talking the Monster to Death: It's very gradual, but Garou's worldview is very slowly deconstructed. Saitama breaks it by asking simple questions during the fight (it didn't hurt that Garou's previous responses stopped working), and even after he's beaten ("Are you okay with that?"). Garou seemingly decides to stop being a villain after seeing the kid that constantly got kidnapped throughout the arc stick up for him, simply because Garou saved his life every time, and retreats.
• Teens Are Monsters: He is an 18-year-old teenager who refers himself as the "human monster".

• Thou Shalt Not Kill: As Saitama notices, despite Garou's name, he hasn't actually directly killed any heroes or humans. At worst he brutally injured many of them, but not beyond recovery.
• Took a Level in Badass: During the entire Monster Association Arc we see Garou taking several levels. From a guy that had difficulty in defeating a lower S-Class hero, to one that can defeat much stronger S-Classes. At the last part of the arc, he curbstomps several S-Class heroes and gives Saitama a slightly tough fight.
• A Twinkle in the Sky: Eventually Saitama uppercuts him so hard he flies into orbit... AND THAT STILL DOESN'T KILL HIM. This just makes him disappointed that Saitama's strength is unfair, so he just resolves to become a "unfair Evil" in order to stand against him and he returns in a bigger form.
• Tsundere: Especially towards Tareo. He actually deeply cares for him, as shown with how much he talks with him about becoming a stronger being and saving his life a bunch of times, though with Garou's delinquent attitude he's pretty rude about it and pretends that he doesn't have any redeeming qualities.
• Underdogs Never Lose: He invokes this a lot at the beginning of the story, coming out victorious in situations where he's outnumbered and outskilled multiple times. It's almost ludicrous. However, as time goes on and he encounters stronger enemies such as Overgrown Rover and Orochi, he begins to lose fights more and more.
• Villainous Breakdown: He starts losing it the longer he fights with Saitama and seeing how outclassed he is. In the webcomic, he finally loses it all when Saitama gives him an Armor Piercing Answer and Kirk Summation.
• Villainous BSoD: Has one of these when he realises that he killed Tareo with cosmic radiation. At first, he screams in horror and tries to run away, but realises that it's too late, begging Saitama to kill him and becoming angry when he refuses. Ultimately, he snaps out of it when he sees that Saitama lost someone he cared about as well, and resolves to Set Right What Once Went Wrong.
• Villain Protagonist: The part of the series where he is the lead antagonist focuses almost as much on him as it does the heroes.
• Walking Spoiler: His true motivations and the truth about his actions are major spoilers.
• Walking Wasteland: In his Cosmic Fear Mode, Garou exudes radiation. This passive ability makes him a threat to all life on Earth.
• Wave-Motion Gun: In Cosmic Fear Mode, he's able to fire off gamma ray bursts, the most powerful known explosion in the universe, at will. Luckily he doesn't use this on anyone other than Saitama who can take it.
• Weak, but Skilled: Subverted as for extremely relative values of "weak" he is far from it, but Garou is noted as posing a particular threat because, while previous monsters relied on brute strength to overwhelm heroes, Garou fights with actual martial arts and specializes in redirecting his opponents' attacks instead of just countering them. Basically, his fighting style is geared specifically towards defeating heroes. Once he goes One-Winged Angel, he becomes this especially in comparison to Saitama, as while he's still much weaker (something he himself admits), he completely surpasses him in terms of martial arts and even manages to force him to fight "Semi-Seriously".
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: For all of his posturing, this is what he really is — by forcing the world to unite against his "evil", he's unifying it. That, and he really isn't a cruel person at all. Deconstructed by Saitama in the webcomic, who notes his plan could only work by defeating Saitama and Saitama would not lose against Garou because Garou lacks the conviction to be The Paragon he really wants to be.
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Played with — Garou has a interesting mindset on what a monster should and shouldn't do, and other monsters question if he's either too human or an outright scary, wild force of nature.
• When He Smiles: Most of the time when he does it, it comes of as Smug Smiler or Slasher Smile. However, sometimes, he smiles to Tareo which comes as geniuine one.
• Wild Card: Garou doesn't have any qualms about massacring weak "villains" or monsters that disappoint him. He also has a weird habit of letting the Heroes he savagely beats up live, simply so they can get stronger for the eventual rematch.
• The Worf Barrage: In the end, his self-evolution-adaptability powers in the webcomic. Each hit of Saitama literally made him stronger and stronger until he became a demonic god-like being... and then it simply couldn't go higher, and ended up regressing him with each subsequent punch ultimately reverting him to his human form. Saitama literally killed his ultimate villain concept of Came Back Strong, one attack at the time. It's implied that it's because deep down, he actually doesn't want to be a monster.
• World's Strongest Man: In his Awakened/Monster Mode, he's already at least as strong as Lord Boros because he's strong enough to wipe the floor with the entire S-Class of the Hero Association and was capable of lasting a significant amount of time in a one on one scrap with Saitama. At the apex of his power, Cosmic Fear Mode, he was able to go toe to toe with Blast and last long enough to witness Saitama's evolution. In the webcomic, it's ultimately unclear how strong he is really because he purposely fights in a way that ensures the people he attacks don't die and only obtain serious injury. In the manga, his full strength is also unclear, considering he simply kept getting stronger, just not as fast as Saitama did.
• Would Hurt a Child: Usually, he will go out of his way to avert this, but he has played it straight on a few occasions:
  • In the webcomic, Garou has no hang-ups about punching Child Emperor hard enough to send him flying through the air. He also taunts the defeated S-Class heroes by threatening to kill the boy who has been used as a hostage throughout the story arc. This is subverted, however, as Saitama calls this bluff, pointing out that Garou is walking away from the boy instead of towards him (Saitama is the only person whose night vision is good enough to see this).
  • In the Manga version Garou ends up killing both Tareo and Child Emperor, although it wasn't on purpose, and he suffers a Villainous BSoD when he realises the gravity of what he's done.
• You Are What You Hate: After finishing his desperate Motive Rant in the webcomic, he becomes outraged that Saitama isn't acting as a proper hero... which means that for all his hatred of heroes, he did have a concept of an ideal hero after all, and his actions, at their core, were born from a desire to make the world a better place, as described below.
• Younger Than They Look: Garou looks like he is in his mid-20s, with the muscular figure to show it; however Chapter 87 reveals that he is only 18 years old.
• Zero-Approval Gambit: Revealed to be his true modus operandi: he believes that only a grand, unifying evil can force the world to set aside their own differences and stop oppressing the weak. In the webcomic, Saitama calls him out on this since not even Garou seems to really approve of it; his gambit was the result of compromise and thus lacks full conviction.

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