Mob Psycho S2E1: "Ripped Apart ~Someone is Watching~" (continued)

Posting back-to-back to get through my backlog a little faster.


Mob, of course, just stammers nervously when Emi comes on to him. When she insists on walking home together, he babbles something about needing to attend the bodybuilding club session, only for the bodybuilding captain to repeat that really, Mob should take today off. Granted, now it's with a smile and a wink rather than a pitying frown. Most of the people who see them walking away together are puzzled, with those who know Mob wondering if this is just another supernatural event rather than the much more unlikely alternative. But, nope. It really seems to be the much more unlikely alternative after all.

Mob and Emi stroll through some hilariously romantic scenery as hilariously romantic music plays. Like, there are actual swan-boats moving in graceful pairs across the river behind them. Are those boats even a thing in Japan? Google says yes. Okay, fine, so they have those in Japan, whatever, stop smirking at me like that. Emi asks questions about Mob's life, which he answers haltingly, nervously, and with only shakily whispered questions about hers in return. When she asks about his work, he almost tells her the truth before deciding he doesn't want to open that can of worms with her just yet and decides to say he works at a bookstore. It turns out to be the correct lie to tell.

At least, I think? There are a few different ways to read her expression here.

Could be thoughtful, could also be an insincere eye-roll as she leads him on for whatever reason. I don't think it's the latter, but I don't know. She's had a couple of other weird verbal and facial tics so far that could hint at being, if not insincere with her intentions, then at least not entirely honest about what she's telling him. Then again, I guess he isn't either, so it's hard to judge.

Hmm. A moment after this, she tells him that she's writing a novel, and she definitely seems to be sincere about that. Which does suggest that she's the sort of person who would enjoy bookstore work. I guess I was misreading her face, back there. He offers to read it for her, which takes some convincing as she doesn't generally go around showing it off, but he shows one of his rare moments of initiative and displays real interest, which eventually gets her to acquiesce.

Romantic music intensifies. Ducks chase each other frenetically around the pond in a fairly hilarious parody of the usual cliches. By the time they part ways, they've made up their minds to keep doing this for now and see if things eventually go further.

Fuck. Now I'm going to need insulin injections for the rest of my goddamned life.

After a few days of this, Dimple asks Mob what's been going on; he keeps coming home straight after school, but then walking back there again for his bodybuilding sessions. I'm pretty sure Dimple already knows the answer; it's not like he has anything better to do than snoop around after Mob and Ritsu all day, so he likely has seen Mob walking with Emi at least once by now. Or, no, actually he doesn't know; he remains visibly puzzled even after Mob leaves the room without answering.

...

I feel like MP100 has a bit of an...object permanence? Ish?...problem. Characters are basically in temporal stasis unless they're onscreen right at this second. No one learns anything or does anything or talks to anyone else offscreen, even when there's been a timeskip and it seems like they really should have.

Maybe this is an intentional part of the series' psychedelia, but if so I don't find it a very enjoyable part.

...

Dimple isn't the only one of Mob's asshole hangers-on to notice the differences in his behavior and routine. Arataka comments that Mob seems happier than usual, and he seems to actually be engaged with his exorcism work instead of just mechanically going through it like usual. Even Mob's physical comfort and appetite have improved; his parents comment that they can never remember Mob asking for seconds at dinner, but lately he's been doing it almost every evening.

So it goes, happily, for several more days, leading up to Mob and Emi sitting out on the grass together one sunny afternoon. He's finished reading her novel draft (or at least, as much of it as she's written so far) and she's eager for his feedback. In his words: "It's really good...I think. You know lots of big words."

Oof. Is that Mob trying to avoid saying that it sucks, or is it Mob being too repressed and unsure of himself to engage in literary analysis? Maybe both?

Whatever the case, Emi is understandably not happy.

He tries to recover from that fumble, but it's too late. With the barrier cracked, Emi asks the next question that she's been holding back. Namely, that in the week and change since he's been hanging out with her after school, he has yet to say "yes" when she asks him if he wants to be official, and he has yet to propose any additional hanging out at all beyond this daily timeslot; is he not actually interested in her, any more than he's actually interested in her novel? Is he pitying her? Is he just too nice and too spineless to ever say no, even when he knows the answer isn't "yes" either?

Mob apologizes for giving her that impression. She asks him why every other sentence out of his mouth is an apology. What is he constantly apologizing for? It's definitely not helping with her sense that he's just humoring her. What does he ACTUALLY feel about anything? At this point, she's starting to wonder if he even has any genuine emotions at all.

Damn, that's brutal. We know that Mob's time with her has been making him happy in a way that not much else has since the series' start. She has no way of knowing that, though, and he has no way of telling her that won't just seem like more apologetic flailing.

...

Granted, while she's definitely been making him happier, that still doesn't actually mean he IS interested in more than they have. He might be, but he also still has that big crush on Tsubomi. Teenagers can be pretty tunnel visioned about their crushes, and Mob seeing all the other girls around Tsubomi as vegetable people definitely suggests that.

He's happy that someone is interested in him, definitely, but that isn't necessarily the same thing as being interested in them back. So, Emi might actually be correct about him not digging her, albeit for the wrong reasons

...

When he can only stammer, she asks him if this is what happened at the student council assembly too. She thought it was just stage fright, that made him freeze up for the entire five minutes, but increasingly she's been wondering if perhaps he just really didn't have anything to say. Did he only run for student council president because somebody else told him to? Just like he's only been hanging out with her after school because she told him to?

Emi continues to be pretty insightful, as 13 year olds go. Consistently getting things *almost* right about Mob's motivations. Anyway, Mob's silence at her question is answer enough.

And then...she pulls the rug out from under him, and me for that matter, by revealing that she supposes she's a little bit like that herself. She lets her friends dictate almost everything she does...including putting that note in Mob's locker. It was a dare, you see. That's why she seemed kind of stilted in her and Mob's first conversation; she had to make up fake reasons why she was allegedly attracted to his laughingstock-of-the-entire-school five minute freeze at the podium. This was all just a cruel prank by the local Heather pack.

Well. I guess I wasn't reading too much into those weird pauses and eyerolls of hers after all, then.

Of course, she knows she can't pretend that she was just fucking with Mob for that entire week and a half, at this point. She originally approached him as a prank, sure, but then she actually liked his company, or at least she thought she did. Not to mention that when she made the initial approach, she was actually sort of terrified of how much mockery she'd receive if he ended up turning her down. In the days since, she started to feel like maybe, despite starting it for the worst of reasons, she actually had done the right thing for both himself and her. She showed him her novel, after all, which she actually hadn't shown to anyone else yet. But now...well, now she's just wondering which of them was just pranking the other, and how much genuine connection there ever was. Maybe she's just been beaten at her and her friend's own game. Joke's on her. Serves her right for actually caring when she knew she wasn't supposed to.

Anyway, she had fun this last little while, sort of, maybe. But she supposes it's time to stop letting the lie live them.

Mob doesn't say a single word back to her for this entire speech. He turns his head after her as she walks away up the hill, but only for a moment. After that, he just turns back around and stares out at the sky. He sits and stares as afternoon turns into evening and the sky changes from blue to sunset rose. He recalls all the little moments he enjoyed with Emi over the last week. Nothing exciting, at least by most people's standards. Just normal things. Everyday things. Human things. The stuff that fills every day in the life of a normal person, to the point where most don't even appreciate it.

He thought he had it, for the last week. He experienced a simulacrum of it. Maybe it was...sort of?...actually genuine? Or at least, it could have been, if he had seized it instead of letting it slip away?

Meaningless question. It couldn't have been, because he could not have seized it. What happened happened because he is Mob.

I assume that's what he's thinking, at least. The music and cinematography suggest it. But of course, if you actually think about his life for a moment, that clearly isn't true. Mob has real, genuine friends in the bodybuilding club, and no one else told him to make them. He did that on his own. In fact, he denied the annoying telepathy club girl in order to do what he wanted. His life has gotten better and less lonely since then. His limitations aren't insurmountable. But, right now, it's easy for him to feel like they are. That's also part of being a teenager.

Finally, as the sunlight fades, Mob gets up and starts walking home. He doesn't get far, though, before overhearing a group of gossiping girls, including a familiar voice. Emi's so-called friends are teasing her about having sort-of dated Mob for over a week. And also, seemingly, extracted the fact that she's been writing a novel from her; something that she'd never even told them about, let alone shown them. Emi tries to play it off like the novel is just some low-effort side project she's been scribbling in when she's bored, but she's not very convincing.

She's forced to chuckle and make self-deprecating jokes along with the others as the boss Heather tears the manuscript into pieces (it's implied that she handwrote the whole thing, so no backups) and tells Emi that she's helping her be less lame, anyway come on let's go to the arcade.

I think Emi might have been misrepresenting how she ended up being the one sent to prank Mob. She made it sound like she just lost a rock-paper-scissors game, but if she was actually the peripheral omega member of the pack all along then I feel like the selection process maaaay have been more targeted.

Suddenly, Mob walks into the group. The Heathers all tell him he's dumb and stupid and that Emi doesn't want to see him no matter how desperate he is. Mob tells them that that's irrelevant. What they're doing is wrong, and they shouldn't do it. He kneels down, and starts picking up the scraps of her novel.

When asked why, he calmly, dispassionately, explains that he's been thinking about the things he does and why he does them. How he needs to consider his own feelings, what HE wants, instead of just deferring to everyone around him and being led on a succession of strings. Right now, he feels like Emi's novel has enough value that he'd rather it be preserved. Emi's own feelings about this are irrelevant.

Huh. Well.

It doesn't take Emi long to make the obvious calculations. She bids her "friends" goodbye, and kneels down to help Mob gather up the scraps.

The Heathers blow her off, predictably, and go mincing off to the arcade. Emi and Mob spend the rest of the fading daylight picking up scraps. Not talking to each other, just picking up the scraps.

When a wind blows by and throws the assembled tatters into the air, Emi is ready to give up and acknowledge the futility of this whole exercise. Mob summons the flying paper scraps back into his hand, assembles them into their original sheets, and fuses them back together.

Right, I forgot he could do that. We've only seen him do that kind of reassembly trick when he was in his "???" fugue. Is the story going to acknowledge the coordination and data processing aspects of this trick? He stuck those dozens of scraps of paper back together perfectly, seemingly simultaneously, without having to so much as eyeball each of them individually. In the battle with Teru, his ??? alter-ego did the same thing on a near-biblical scale, but ??? might also have super intelligence or whatever to go with the phenomenal cosmic powers. Mob in his usual state, as far as we've seen, doesn't. Has he got some kind of virtual "extra brain" created by and used for his powers?

Or maybe you're just not supposed to think about this, heh. It's probably that.

Emi asks him what just happened. He nonchalantly explains that he's an esper. She looks like she's about to ask the obvious question, but a close-up of both their expressions makes it clear that she's already gotten the answer. Why don't you tell anyone about your powers? Why don't you tell anyone about your writing?

As the two of them start to walk home together, the camera pans down to the base of the grassy hill, where we see something that raises a great many questions about this episode's events.

How much of this all was Tsubomi aware of? Did she have any more active part in causing things to happen as they did? We haven't actually seen her DO anything since that early flashback to her and Mob in elementary school; other than that, she's only existed in the story as the object of Mob's furtive affections. What is she actually like? What does she want? What does she think of Mob (and possibly Emi, if she knows her as well) at this point?

If nothing else, she at least seems well-meaning. I get the impression she knows about Mob's crush and doesn't return it, so she's probably glad to see a sign of him moving on.

As the credits roll, we see Mob return home and have another chat with Dimple. He and Emi still aren't official, and they won't be until Mob figures out his own shit a little better, but at least they're still friends. Dimple tells him that Mob is hopeless, getting taken for a ride by yet another scammer who won't even give him anything, and that he should keep Dimple with him at all times and heed his counsel since he clearly needs it constantly. Mob tells Dimple that he's gross. Go be gross somewhere else, Dimple. Dimple is mad, but there's not much he can do about it.

As far as his own thoughts go, Mob still doesn't think Emi would really want to date him (it's not yet clear if he WANTS to date her himself. Maybe he's still puzzling that out). It's not like anything about him changed since he complimented her vocabulary in lieu of her story. As Arataka has always told him, psychic powers don't make him special. There's no reason they would effect anyone's calculus when it comes to choosing romantic partners.

Cut to Emi, in her room, grinning dreamily up at the ceiling at the concept of dating a genuine psychic.

Heh. On one hand, the philosophy that Mob got from Arataka here is probably more rational and egalitarian. On the other hand, what people are attracted to has nothing rational to it, and novelties always get attention.

Something about the idea of a psychic middle school boy tickles Emi's creative funnybone as well as her romantic one, and she pulls out her pen and paper and starts toying with a new story.

I wonder if Emi is planning to do this one as a comic strip. If so, I guess he never got around to publishing it until after he'd fully transitioned.

End episode.

It's a new note for MP100 to strike. Aside from the self-contained tomato demon skit at the beginning, this could have been an episode from a non-supernatural high school anime. Mob revealing his powers at the end brought things back to the premise, but you could replace that with Mob revealing any interesting and unusual skill of his and the ending would play the same. And yet, it doesn't feel like an intrusion on the series, or like a leave of absence from the main story.

I enjoyed how this story was simultaneously an elaboration on what Arataka has been telling Mob, and a refutation of it. Moreso than in any previous episode, Mob spent this one making good on his intention to develop a fulfilling life for himself without relying on his powers. He goes through the entire post-stinger runtime without using any psionics at all, unless you count letting Dimple talk to him a little bit. But then, at the end, his quest for fulfilment leads him to embrace his powers after all. He can't be complete without doing that, because that power is a part of him.

This might seem like putting a needlessly dark spin on it, but I don't think it's avoidable. Mob has decided that when it comes to the nature (as opposed to the application) of these powers, the Claw philosophy is much closer to the mark than Arataka's. It's not a knife you can put away and forget about when you aren't using it. It's a claw that grows on your finger. Or a wing on a bird. Or a creative like Emi's compulsion to produce art.

...is it just me, or have half the things I've been reviewing lately been really Nietzschean?

Another side to this episode is that it's now clear that Mob's repression and power-related anxiety aren't his only social problems. Or at least, they're not the main root of the problems. Mob is autistic. Not "coded" autistic, or "metaphor for autism." Actually autistic. Based on the other espers we've met it's also completely coincidental to him also having powers. In some ways, I wonder if the powers might have distracted him and his family from getting him the kind of attention he actually needed. In fact, they might have even distracted the audience from Mob's main struggle. It's clever, to say the least.

The fact that I enjoyed this one so much might also have to do with how tired I've gotten of this show's overblown, overextended action sequences. That's obviously a backhanded compliment to the episode, but really, the fact that MP100 can be like this makes me wish that it was more often like this.

Regardless of the fights-to-story ratio going forward, season 2 is off to an even better start than I'd been led to expect.