"More... More! Raise the temperature higher... I can go higher... Burn myself! In order to become.. who I want to be!"
"Match Three" is the 96th episode of My Hero Academia.
Iida unleashes a new technique, called "Recipro Turbo", and later on, interrupts Ojiro's and Kaibara's one-on-one brawl and sends Kaibara to jail. Meanwhile, Todoroki is backed into a corner where he has to use his father's signature move from his brutal training in order to win against the Close-Range Combatant Tetsutetsu.
Both sides battle furiously; Ojiro holds Pony back, Honenuki comes to her rescue, and after an endurance match, both Todoroki and Tetsutetsu begin to suffer fatigue. Honenuki arrives just in time to prevent Todoroki from melting Tetsutetsu. Then, Iida also appears and saves an unconscious Todoroki before he gets trapped in the softened ground. Four of the students get knocked out in the process, then the match finally ends in a draw with time running out.
Tropes in this episode:
- Battle Amongst the Flames: Tetsutetsu and Todoroki share a pitched one after Todoroki sets the area surrounding them on fire with his "Wall of Flames" move to get Tetsutetsu to back off. It causes some of the installed security cameras to break and explode from the impact.
- Effortless Amazonian Lift: Pony picks up the knocked-out Todoroki with her horn and carries him away in a Bridal Carry manner while riding on her flying horns.
- Heroic Second Wind: Todoroki gets repeatedly punched by a relentless Tetsutetsu, but the moment he remembers his father's instruction of going beyond one's limit and his own desire to become who he wants to be, he forces Tetsutetsu to keep a distance by increasing his flames' intensity and almost melts Tetsutetsu's body.
- I Am Not Left-Handed: When Honenuki was about to go help his teammates after trapping Iida under the hardened ice, assuming that Iida's Recipro has a time limit, Iida proves him wrong as he activates his new "Recipro Turbo" technique, breaks the ice, and attacks Honenuki.
- Immune to Fire: Tetsutetsu reveals that he has trained himself to be able to endure intense heat, and initially, he's able to withstand Todoroki's fire attacks. However, as Todoroki raises the temperature of his firepower, Tetsutetsu's steel melts, and if it weren't for Honenuki interrupting, he would've been roasted.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: Pony knows she can't defeat Shoji when their battle ends up being the defining one among their teams. She decided to place herself out of his reach to force a stalemate, making it so that, while her team won't win, neither will his.
- Large Ham: Monoma starts laughing maniacally when pointing out that both classes each have one win, and with the draw it all comes down to his match.Kaminari: Comes and goes in waves, doesn't it?
- Lighthearted Rematch: Tetsutetsu and Honenuki both ask Shoto and Iida for one at an unspecified future date.
- Mid-Season Upgrade: Iida reveals he underwent one by pulling out his mufflers, which while painful, allowed for him to train so stronger, more effecient mufflers grow in their place. This made his Recipro Burst upgrade to Recipro Turbo, which grants him a greater speed boost and can last for ten minutes.
- Milking the Giant Cow: Iida's up to his usual arm gestures while comforting Shoto, but regrets it and breaks off mid-sentence when his (presumably broken) arm complains.
- Oh, Crap!: Tetsutetsu's anime-only reaction when he realized he was about to get fried.
- Out of the Inferno: Tetsutetsu walks out of Todoroki's "Wall of Flames", unflinching and unscathed, with his steel skin absorbing the heat, much to Todoroki's shock.
- Outrunning the Fireball: Pony runs as far as possible from Todoroki's spreading fire and shouts "Ouch!" from the heat that's reaching her.
- Signature Move: After the match, Shoto muses that he's become known for opening up a fight with predictable massive waves of ice rather than use fire, and that let the 1-B team dominate early on.
- We Win, Because You Didn't: When Pony and Shoji were the only ones still standing, Pony realizes she's not strong enough to defeat Shoji alone and wouldn't be fast enough to run back to her team's cage with his unconscious teammates. So instead, she uses her horns to fly herself and her own unconscious teammates into the air out of his reach to run out the time limit because ending on a draw is better than losing.
- Writing Around Trademarks: In the manga, Recovery Girl offers a Snickers bar to Todoroki, whereas in the anime, they changed it to a random calorie bar to avoid copyright issues.
