Mob Psycho S1E10: "The Heinous Aura ~Mastermind~"

Unless "aura" is somebody's name, then I suspect this is going to relate to the "inhuman aura" that Mob earlier sensed from Koyuma. Probably a whacky side-effect of whatever training or conditioning the Claw espers undergo. Either that, or another member of the Claw's Division Seven elites is going to have a special ability that works by area of effect, like an aura. At any rate, I hope this rescue mission plot either brings something new and worth it to the table, or is over in the next episode or two, because my patience for it as such has pretty much been depleted.

The episode starts with Teru, Mob, and Dimple deciding to split up and search for the way down to the prison level. Not sure why they'd do this, when they've just been through their plans to take point for different types of adversary. What if Mob ends up running into a bunch of mook swarms while Teru comes face to face with the Scars? Dimple operating on his own I could understand, since he's wearing the body of a guard, so he could conceivably pull it off covertly while the other two keep most of the base distracted (the issue of trusting him with a bunch of mildly psychic children aside). That much makes sense, though he's probably completely screwed if he gets caught out, and I guess Mob wasting some mana points on mooks isn't the worst thing in the world, but Teru?

If the show didn't want me to think about these kinds of tactical considerations, then it shouldn't have had the characters literally say them out loud in as many goddamned words just a scene ago. I might have still snarked a little at the logic of their actions regardless, but I wouldn't be nearly as irritated about it, and I'd be conscious of the fact that I'm probably analysing the show in a way it doesn't want to be analysed. If it's actually had the characters discuss this though, then...sorry MP100, but you asked for this.

Observing them splitting up on the cameras, Division Leader Ishiguro rallies a crowd of their cell's "awakened;" artificial espers who have fully completed their activation process. I guess the other mooks we saw before were ones who hadn't completed the process yet? Or maybe ones who failed and are just being used as non-psychic bottom rung grunts. The latter would explain why we haven't seen any powers from them. In any case, these guys do have powers, and even if they're not as strong as natural espers there are quite a lot of them.

The fact that Ishiguro refers to them as "Awakened" is kind of odd, considering that we earlier saw Claw members mocking the bombastic, pretentious name of the "Awakening Lab" they raided. I might normally assume that the show is making a crack at the Claw's hypocrisy, but I don't have enough faith left in this part of the story to assume the author even remembered that detail.

Privately, Ishiguro knows that these guys are only going to be a speedbump for the intruders, but still, every little bit helps. If they can distract the invaders while the Scars get into position for a cheap shot, then the losses will be worth it. Roll OP.

The episode proper begins in what looks like a break room or lounge, where some guards are sitting around watching over Minecraft Steve and playing card games. Looks like they didn't bring Steve to another cell, just a breakroom. Lol, okay then, sure. Steve is doing a pretty good job of looking traumatized and despairing, not letting them suspect that Bill has been in mental contact with him and filled him in on the true, much less horrible, situation. Also, the chatting of the guards confirms that they were prospective Claw initiates who the artificial awakening process failed on, and are thus stuck as non-psionic chaff infantry and support personnel taking orders from the espers forever.

This seems like a really good way to get people to betray you, ngl.

The topic of conversation turns to an experimental new awakening process that they're just testing out at Claw HQ. It seems to induce stronger powers, and to work even on candidates who fail to awaken under the old process. Unfortunately, it also has a high probability of killing you horribly, so they might not be ready to replace their old process with it entirely just yet. One of the successful test subjects actually is doing quite well in the organization, though, and rumor has it that HQ is about to transfer him here to Division 7 in Japan to help them expand their operations.

As they discuss this ominous new development, while wondering if they themselves would want to volunteer as subjects for this new technique despite the risks, Ritsu and the others sneak into the room to rescue Steve.

They manage to untie Steve while the guards are busy talking, but they get noticed on their way back to the door with him. The five mooks who had been spectacularly failing to guard Steve at the table stand up and move to seize them, but the older one drinking by the door tells them to stand back. No, really, he assures them. Stand back. Let the kids escape.

When the other mooks ask him what the fuck, and as the escapees gratefully flee the room with Steve in their company, the older mook tells them that he's been with the Claw for twenty years (dang, how old even if this organization?) and in that time he's never seen a baseline human defeat a proper natural esper. Which...I guess he knows that Ritsu is? Somehow? Even though no one else in the entire facility seems to have gotten the message? Oh why am I even asking these questions anymore it doesn't matter, nothing matters. Anyway, if Ritsu is the real deal, then normies like them just need to bow their heads and let him take what he wants. That's the Claw's whole founding philosophy, after all, isn't it? It's a philosophy that holds true regardless of circumstances, like all good philosophies, isn't it? Whether an esper is with the Claw or against the Claw, people like themselves must do as they say, always and without question.

The other guards ask him what is even the point, then. The veteran chuckles darkly, and says that it's inevitable that espers will conquer the world soon, and when they do the normies who helped them are likely to be given a slightly privileged position above the abject serfdom that the rest of humanity will be reduced to.

The other guards react with starry-eyed wonder and eagerness at the idyllic prospect he just laid out for them.

This would probably be funnier if it weren't heavily suggested that these people were all victims of cult recruitment (if not outright abduction) and an intensive forced indoctrination regime.

Also, are they not even going to hurry up and notify the Scars about what just happened? They don't seem to be doing that. If you don't even do your job AFTER THE FACT, when the enemy espers aren't breathing down your neck, I have a feeling that your position in the new order might not be a privileged one after all. Hell, the common serfs will probably have it better than you, seriously what the fuck.

Cut to Dimple. He finds his way to a big, hermetically sealed door that he suspects might lead to the prison, but then it opens to disgorge the Awakened army. A few minutes ago, Ishiguro confirmed that there were three infiltrators, and was watching all of them on telemetry. However, the psychic child soldiers see Dimple and instantly just assume that he's another random guard. Ishiguro didn't tell them what to look for, I guess, probably because everyone is stupid and nothing matters.

Unfortunately, Dimple's performance is so hilariously bad that even these morons get tipped off and attack. As Teru said, they're individually fairly weak, but working together they can paralyze someone.

Except...Dimple still breaks free and beats them all up. Even though the body he's in didn't actually have any powers at all as far as I could tell, going by what we've recently learned. Because ghosts just have super strength by default when they're in a body, any body, even if they're weakened, I guess.

Anyway, he knocks most of them out and forces the last one to help him through the door. The room immediately behind it is a psi-lab, very X-Com looking, where the artificial espers have their powers induced. Well, it's not a *perfect* match for X-Com grade facilities. In addition to putting you in the futuristic-looking meditation pods, apparently the Claw's method of activating powers in you requires exposing you to extreme pain or trauma. Which they decided to do the cheap, old-fashioned way, with mundane torture equipment. So, one wall is lined with scifi neurostimulation tanks, the other is lined with bloodstained chairs, restraints, and electrodes. Presumably, they just toss you back and forth between one and the other until you either manifest powers, they give up, or you go into cardiac arrest.

Dimple chortles at how, despite all the pain and difficulty the Awakened seem to have put themselves through, their powers are still frankly pathetic. No match for him, a mere fraction of a ghost, let alone a natural esper. Truly, power is due to those who were born with it, not just attained by anyone who works hard enough. He recommends they try bodybuilding instead.

I'm not sure what Dimple is trying to accomplish, climbing all over the equipment and talking shit. I think he may have forgotten what he was actually supposed to be doing. Well, he ends up regretting it. While he's wasting time monologuing and prancing around the room, a newcomer catches up. Young looking, creepy smile, instantly recognizes Dimple as a ghost possessing a guard's body, and asks if he'd consider becoming his pet in lieu of being destroyed. This has got to be the new transfer from Claw HQ; a living refutation of the case Dimple just laid out.

Well, maybe. Dimple could effortlessly kick this guy's ass too, wasting the thematic buildup and ominous framing. I wouldn't put it past the show at this point. Fortunately, I'm also not invested at this point, so at least it won't disappoint me if it happens.

Cut to Teru. He's just beaten up his own pile of Awakened offscreen, and is shaking information out of one of them. He learns that the prisoners have already escaped on their own, and muses that it feels icky using the Claw's own methods - the brute exercise of power over those who lack it, and counting on them to comply on the basis of that recognized hierarchy - but he can't deny that it's effective in this case. He seems almost alarmed at how well this approach can work for someone with power like his own.

I...fuckit, I won't bother. This is a different character. Forget that OG Teru ever existed. Nevermind what I was about to say.

A battered mook gets back up and tries to attack him with a piddling little flame-summoning thing, only to be promptly knocked back out. Teru muses that all the Claw members seem a little...not all there. Overconfident, discombobulated, sort of out of phase with reality. Then, he gets surprised by a giant wall of fire from one of the Scars, and just barely manages to raise his barriers before he can take more than minor burns. The heat keeps coming, though, and it takes all of Teru's power to keep it repelled, while the attacker is happy to keep on going.

Is the show trying to do a thing, where Teru comments on the Claw's not-all-there-ness only to be reminded that he himself just forgot all about his plan to team up with Mob in case of exactly this eventuality and that he's therefore just as stupid and power-drunk as they are?

It might be? Maybe?

Is this the character's stupidity, or the narrative's?

I cannot tell.

Anyway, an incredibly stupid fight scene that thinks it's extremely smart ensues. I know I keep saying this, but I *really* think Mob Psycho just wants to be JJBA at this point. In this scene, it tries to do the classic Stand Battle thing, where a bad guy reveals an overwhelming offensive power and then the good guy has to figure out a solution to the puzzle it presents using his own powers in a clever way. The way it plays out in this case though, well.

1. The problem and the solution both seem to forget that fire consumes oxygen.

2. The solution requires the bad guy to abruptly lose the ability to regulate or shut down his own pyrokinesis output, whereas up until then he seemed able to turn it on and off at will.

It doesn't feel like it's trying to be a parody of that type of fight scene. It feels like it's trying to do it unironically, and fucking it up. I'm not going to say that JJBA never messed up its own gimmicks like this (god knows how much I've criticized some of those fight scenes), but it only rarely did so this obviously.

Anyway, the twit beats the other twit. Yay.

I like the detailing of the burned-up hallway and clinging smoke, if nothing else.

Anyway, with pyrokinesis guy defeated, the two other Scars who were standing back and waiting their turns step forward. It actually does make sense that they would hang back and let the fire dude go first, considering how large an area of effect his fireblasts seem to have; there's no point in letting other people get in the way of his attacks, and they can still hang back and press in on the weakened enemy in the event that he fails. So, this isn't a complaint. Anyway, the newcomers are Glasses and Chinzilla. The former has a katana out, and will presumably be using TK in conjunction with more mundane martial arts. The latter starts making mirror image decoys of himself and moving them rapidly around the room to confuse Teru. Nasty combo.

Cut to Mob, who has been surrounded by twitching wooden mannequins. He's politely asking them if they've seen his brother. They're just standing around him and twitching.

Turns out another of the Scars has a...okay, "doll animation" is such a bizarrely specific power that I don't feel like it even belongs in this show's milieu. Being a pyrokinesis specialist or a telepathy specialist or whatever seems like it could just be down to practicing one trick to the exclusion of other psychic powers you could be focusing on, but I can't imagine any way that animating dolls wouldn't just be a uselessly overcomplicated application of basic telekinesis.

Unless she's actually a necromancer and animating them each with a bound ghost, or something. I guess? I'm pretty sure we've seen ghosts do things like that in the early episodes, but it's been a while.

Hmm. She can also see through them, remotely. And only through them. Yeah, there's definitely something weird going on with this power of hers that makes it much different from the others'.

Cut back to the escapees. They also meet a bunch of the awakened, despite Girl's best efforts at navigating them around enemies, and...Ritsu beats them just as easily as Teru did. We were told earlier that these guys can be relatively dangerous in large numbers, but no, I guess not. Ritsu even comments that they only seem barely - if at all - more powerful than his fellow escapees who were empowered by Richguy's experiments, and says in as many words that they'd actually be more dangerous if they attacked using their bare hands instead of trying to use their pathetic psionics. I guess that was just more propaganda, even though the way Teru described the threat they pose made it sound like firsthand experience. Maybe I'm supposed to ignore the version of him that was in episode 8 as well as the version of him that was in episode 5.

Anyway, they don't get much further before they're intercepted by another kid. He looks and acts like he's around Ritsu's age, but he's much more powerful than the Awakened, and he doesn't have a scar.

Okay, I guess I was wrong before. The guy who accosted Dimple in the lab is just a younger-than-average member of Division 7's Scar team, and this kid is the new successful experiment from HQ. That does kind of take a lot of wind out of the thematic sails of Dimple's scene, but whatever, my fault for still having expectations. Ritsu steps forward to duel the supersoldier kid while telling the others to flee; if he can't beat this guy, he'll at least buy them time, and it's not like they could make themselves relevant in this battle anyway. Hmm, he's being traditionally noble now, but his powers don't seem to be suffering for it. Maybe he's already broken free of the crutch of shame and self-loathing to fuel his psi?

Cut to the girl who can control dolls. Apparently Mob got frustrated and destroyed all her dolls offscreen, and she's mad about it. She goes crying to an older Scar lady, who for some reason was just standing around in the gym pumping iron even though she was present in the room when all the Scars decided to confront the intruders in concert.

So, now she goes to deal with Mob. Oh gee, I wonder how this will turn out? Well, she catches up to Mob (who is still standing on a pile of broken mannequins. How quickly did the Claw ladies move, just now? Or was Mob really just standing around picking his nose for five minutes after breaking the dolls?) and attacks. She's another psi-boosted-martial-artist type like Glasses, it seems, just with fist instead of sword. She manages to actually punch him a few times and draw blood, and I started to think maybe this battle would be somewhat interesting, until it turns out that Mob is just reluctant to hit a woman because Arataka told him that was a bad thing to do.

I'll give the show credit here, the way this is handled is both a breath of fresh air, and one of the few actually funny gags in this snore of an episode. She gets offended, but retains her cool, and explains to him how sexist it is to be that way toward a female opponent who clearly is already initiating violence and has demonstrated an affinity for it. He understands where he went wrong, and they have a bonding moment where they agree to try and kill each other in an atmosphere of mutual respect and sensitivity.

Like I said, it's a pretty golden moment within the episode's swamp of drab grey.

Back to Dimple. Whether or not the doll girl is a necromancer, the guy who intercepted Dimple definitely is also one. He's bound a number of powerful spirits of the kind Mob spent the first 3-4 episodes of the series dealing with to his will, and basically uses them to play Pokemon Trainer in battle. Dimple is exactly the same type of entity as his minions, and he used to be on the upper end of power for such spirits, but in his current state he's no match for even one of these others, let alone a group. Having a human body doesn't make much of a difference.

Necromancer dude repeats his offer to Dimple; abandon that guard's body and become part of his spirit army, and he'll get to keep (un)living. Continue resisting, and he'll be annihilated.

Dimple tries to fight for a little while, but then uses a clever feint to escape. Unlike whatever the hell is supposed to have happened with Teru and the fire guy, this one actually IS clever. Dimple pretends that he's exiting his host and retreating, making the baddie send all his pokemon in that direction, but then turns around and has his host charge at the baddie...only to actually exit it at the last second and retreat in a different direction altogether. The necromancer's spirits are all either running the wrong way, or in defensive positions around him, so Dimple is able to zip away and get a good head start while they're out of position.

Only then it turns out the guy had more minions in reserve, and Dimple hasn't actually gotten a head start at all. Cut away before we can see if he gets away or not.

Meanwhile, of course, Mob beats the punchy lady offscreen. At least we didn't have to sit through it this time.

In the executive office, boss Ishiguro is starting to get legitimately worried. Glasses and Chinzilla managed to capture Teru (from the looks of it, Chinzilla just plain knocked him out with a telepathic trick before Glasses even had to do anything. Or maybe he just distracted him with those mirror images while one of them crept him and sprayed him with that stuff, idk. Anyway, Teru went down fast after beating the fire guy, and in so doing restored at least a modicum of sorely needed menace to the villains). However, Mob is still rampaging (very slowly) through the facility, and the escapees have yet to be recaptured. So, Ishiguro tells his last and presumably strongest henchman to get out there now. Why weren't they all out there to begin with, like they said they would be? Presumably for the same reason that Mob and Teru didn't stick together even though they said they would. Namely, "because fuck you for actually paying attention, nerd."

Restrained, guarded, and possibly de-powered by the Bat Anti-Psyker Spray, Teru tells Ishiguro and the others that they really should just abandon the base and flee now, instead of continuing to fight Mob. And, really, they should abandon the Claw altogether, because its mission is doomed to fail from the outset; it's impossible to take over the world using psychic powers.

Erm...how do you figure that, Teru? Why is taking over the world with psychic powers impossible?

Honestly, it seems more likely than not that someone already HAS taken over the world with psychic powers long before the Claw thought to try.

Maybe he means it in a philosophical sense, calling back to the whole "relying too much on your powers makes you a slave to them" thing, so that taking over the world with them won't actually put *you* in charge of it? If that's what he means, he's got to realize that he's wasting his breath. These guys aren't exactly philosophers, and it's pretty obvious they'd answer that argument with "okay, and?"

Maybe I'm missing something, idk.

Whatever Teru meant, Ishiguro asks him why he won't just join the Claw. He's very powerful, so he'd go far with them. Espers like themselves are special, they should act like they are and take what they clearly deserve from the universe. Teru replies that that mentality is exactly why they can never beat Mob.

I...okay, I'm at a loss to dissect that one. Maybe he's just convinced that Mob is absolutely the most powerful esper in existence, and that therefore you can't beat him if you make everything a direct contest of strength? I don't know that the Claw actually are that blinkered, though. They use their spray and so forth. They aren't *completely* monomaniacal about psionic power levels. Yeah, like I said, I'm clueless on what he means here.

Cut to Mob effortlessly defeating the last and allegedly most powerful of Ishiguro's Scars, and finding Ritsu's unconscious body on the floor in a section of wall cratered by impacts. Looks like his battle with whatsisname the experiment-kid didn't go too well, but hopefully he at least bought the other prisoners the time they needed.

Kneeling over Ritsu, Mob tries to determine if he's okay or not. And also asks himself, aloud, why this had to happen to his little brother. How he himself is responsible for this twice over - first for letting their family situation degrade to such a degree, and second for failing to stop Koyama (presumably, this latter part was due to Mob's policy of always using the minimum required amount of force to subdue an opponent, and underestimating what counted as "subdued" for Koyama. Although...piledriving someone into the pavement from the sky doesn't seem exactly...oh whatever, no display of force actually means or communicates anything that anyone is doing to anyone else, I should just roll a die or something to try and guess how serious a beating was supposed to be instead of looking at the screen for clues). Anyway, Mob's stress meter goes up. And continues climbing as Chinzilla steps up behind him and starts verbally needling him.

Oh, maybe Ritsu isn't actually unconscious on the floor there. This could just be one of Chinzilla's illusions.

Regardless of whether or not Chinzilla is projecting this image (he says he isn't, but I'm not exactly going to take his word for it when he's explicitly talking to Mob and not the fourth wall, heh), he decides to start bombarding Mob with more horrific imagery in attempt to make him...um...I don't know? Be sad, I guess? Or maybe he's hoping to send him into a catatonic fugue or something? Well, anyway, he shows Mob the mutilated bodies of Ritsu, Teru, and all the captives (he obviously doesn't know which, if any, of those captives Mob knows, so he just shows them all in a quick shuffle). Mob seems to realize that this is an illusion. He repeats to himself that it's not real. Unfortunately, rational knowledge of that doesn't seem to be enough to counteract a high-intensity mental bombardment like this.

His stress meter climbs to 100%. Then higher into..."Rejection." Not sure if this is the same thing as the "???" state he entered in the fight with that one character who looked a lot like Teru. Well, whatever "Rejection" means, it causes him to fry Chinzilla's brain in his skull.

Mob and Chinzilla both fall to the floor, comatose. A moment later, Experiment Kid saunters out and proclaims that he knew using Ritsu as bait would work. Ritsu's unconscious body was real to begin with, then. Chinzilla just tried to capitalize on it with additional imagery, and it ended up being a pyrrhic success. Telepathic stuff definitely seems to be the weak point in Mob's powerset; frantic attempts at disbelief seem to be his only defence, at least until his 100+ percent One Punch Man side activates.

The episode ends with everyone captured and brought before Ishiguro. They managed to defeat seven out of his eleven Scars before going down, all in all, which is pretty impressive; he congratulates those of them that are still conscious on that display of awesome might.

Teru is in a state of stunned disbelief that Mob was defeated. Like I said, his faith in Mob's invincibility seems to be based just on Mob having been able to beat HIM once, which is awfully silly. Doubly so because that fight didn't ever happen and Teru isn't even the same character who was in it. Finally, the necromancer dude enters the room, announcing that he's captured Dimple and forced him into a magic jar full of other angry spirits; he's been intending to let everything in there fight it out and see which ones are left whenever he feels like opening it.

So, for now, the Claw seems to have won. I expect it to end the moment that Mob arbitrarily wakes up and arbitrarily is able to act again. End episode.

I made lots of Jojo comparisons in this episode and the ones directly preceding it, but there's a much better one I can make now: this is One Punch Man without the comedy.

Okay, sure, there ARE jokes in it, here and there. Some of them good. The main focus ISN'T on the comedy, though. The funny bits seem like they're meant to just spice up an otherwise earnestly dramatic action sequence. Removing 9/10ths of the gags from One Punch Man doesn't leave you with a serviceable superhero adventure, though. It leaves you with a boring, stupid, limp empty membrane, which is exactly what the Claw arc is. It's a framing device for action-comedy with almost nothing in it.

I'm optimistic that MP100 will get better again once it finishes up this Claw bullshit and goes back to being itself again. I also am quite sure that if MP100 had been like this from the beginning, I'd have had zero interest in it from the pilot onward.