Mob Psycho 100 S2 – 12 [The Battle for Social Rehabilitation ~Friendship~]

Welcome one and all to the penultimate episode of Mob Psycho! This week Mob steps up, a Hobo finds his courage and Reigen finds a gun. Lets jump in!

Right off the bat, as always, I have to say Mob Psycho looked fantastic. There has been some disagreement/quibbling on my part about some still shots in the past. But none of that changes how, in motion, Mob Psycho is the best looking series of the season and probably year. The style in all of the important shots is beautiful, and the motion put into even the tiniest scenes is astounding. Often in anime, you will have scenes where the only movement is the mouth as they talk. Occasionally though you get a series, like Mob Psycho, that goes the extra mile. That animates body or facial movement to go with the mouth. Its a small thing, and often when reading subs you don’t notice it. But when you do, like I did this week, it makes you appreciate it all the more.

As far as spoilers go, lets start with Serizawa. Between him and Suzuki, the amount of parallels between characters this week was bordering on obnoxious, but ended up working well. Playing up his hikikomori status and having Suzuki prey on that was brilliant. I think it fit well with his general cinnamon roll of an attitude as well. Serizawa was never a bad guy, just naive and being used by the first person to really understand him. Sure, the throwing feelings in psychic power at each other was a bit hamfisted, but Mob Psycho was never a subtle series. What helped it though was that Mob Psycho didn’t just leave it at that, with yelling and a sudden change of heart. Instead it had them sit down, and talk it out. Its a minor thing, but really helps connect the two characters. If Serizawa parallels Mob though, lets talk Suzuki.

Mob Psycho could not be more obvious with the Suzuki/Reigen parallels if it tried. That it comes hot on the heels of Reigen’s own arc only makes it clearer, if there was any doubt. The mid-cards alone explain the difference in relationships between the two pairs. Showing what Mob and Reigen could have become had they been different people. Yes, Reigen did take advantage of Mob’s powers for his business. In that sense he is similar to Suzuki. But as we saw in his own arc, he does care for Mob in his own way. Giving him life advice, cheering him on, where as Suzuki clearly only ever saw Serizawa as a tool. Like I said, rather hamfisted, but for a series about maturing, opening up and being honest with your emotions, it fits perfectly fine.

Whats interesting about all of this though is that Suzuki also connects with Mob. So he is a sort of evil bridge between Reigen and Mob’s characters. Both Serizawa and Suzuki are examples of what Mob could have become without his support structure. A shut in afraid of his own powers, or a megalomaniac who thinks he is greater than everyone else. That Suzuki has the same power as Mob, giving and taking, yet describes it differently makes this clear. Suzuki see’s it like a bank, lending or stealing power. While I suspect Mob will, next episode, describe it more as the standard Shouenen “friendship power” sort of thing. Suzuki, while also having trouble showing emotions, is the only other character to have his power described as a percentage. All things considered, Mob Psycho is almost beautiful in the simplicity of how it portrays these dynamics.

Haughty pseudo-intellectual ramblings out of the way, lets talk about some “low brow” simply awesome moments of the episode. One of my favorites has to be the Rei-Gun, Reigen with a gun. This was a simply fantastic scene, as Stone Cold Reigen pulls that trigger with 0 hesitation. Really, his whole conversation with Suzuki was a joy, as he tries to once again charisma his way out of a situation. With how many times it has worked before, I was prepared for him to at least get a good punch in before getting blown away this time. But turns out Mob Psycho wasn’t content to let things play out the same. Yeah, Serizawa’s change of heart was quick, but I still liked it. We got hints of his gentle nature when he was first introduce, and Reigen couldn’t save the day again. It’s time for Mob to step up.

You see, last season had a very similar setup to this. Mob was overwhelmed, though then by emotion, and Reigen takes it on himself. First off, nice foreshadowing with Mob sharing his power with Reigen. It wraps around nicely. But secondly, for this finale we see it is Mob’s turn to do the same. To bring reality to the overgrown children and explain how silly their selfish attitude is. I don’t want to comment to much on the actual politics ONE is pushing here, as I fear translation’s could greatly alter the statements. However the gist of it from my understanding is basically, work together, you can’t do it all alone. That Mob Psycho managed to get that message across while keeping the “nakama” trope to a minimum, and actually having people work together, is a great thing.

So, all my ramblings aside, this was a great episode of Mob Psycho. To take a meme from some friends of mine, “holy shit, that Mob episode”. Everything is lining up for a hype finale. I fully expect next week to be about as insane as ep 5, a big showcase where they just let animators do whatever they want. If you want to look at the effort that goes into these, just look at this side by side of key frames to final product. Its truly astounding how much work goes into these. So yeah, this was a good week. And I can’t wait for next week. I often criticize Mob for the small things, but that’s because Mob only has small things worth criticizing. The big things, the ones that matter, story, plot, animation, are all fantastic. And I hope you think so to. See you next week!