#and that's not even getting into the parallels between Dimple's literal mind control and Reigen's metaphorical mind control

[brown-little-robin]

PARALLEL!! In S1E8 of mp100, Reigen reveals the delightfully baffling ethic he works by. When a woman tells him that a fortuneteller told her that there was a spirit on her shoulders, Reigen instantly disapproves of someone telling her that and doing nothing about it. And of course he considers himself so much better than this fortuneteller for... also lying to the woman, but giving her a massage. So he's allowed to lie to people, but he draws the line at not helping them. That... that's perfect. That's what he does with Mob, after all. He lies to Mob constantly about being a psychic, but he considers it fine because he's helping Mob by doing so. The woman had real pain in her shoulders; Mob has real pain in his heart. Reigen helps with both by allowing them to think he's a psychic.

Shortly after that, in S1E10, Dimple makes this remark while possessing a security guard:

IT'S THE EXACT SAME ETHICS. (okay, it's slightly worse because it's just harm reduction rather than actively helping, but Dimple is on the right track, okay?) Dimple's allowed to possess people, to steal their bodies (temporarily), but he's not allowed to let them get hurt. Letting the body he possesses be damaged is a step too far. Reigen's allowed to lie, but heaven help people who lie to others without helping them.

Just. Yeah. Dimple and Reigen both use people. Reigen lies to them, Dimple possesses them. Reigen twists the mind, Dimple twists the body. And yet they're both disgusted and offended by people who would use people without care for their welfare. They're better than that. They're not irresponsible.

edit: alt text for images 1 and 2 provided by @princess-of-purple-prose! thanks!

[melissa-titanium]

uh violence ask game

12

ok . ok. i'm gonna talk about my two current faves right now because imFucking deranged

khan. im so serious .he is so fucking interesting i honest to god havent rewatched md in a hot second but if you think about his concepts & how he acts in ep 7 AND HONESTLY EVERY SINGLE EPISODE THAT HE'S IN . he's just. hes just so interesting??? i don't see people talking about him alot for reasons that are totally justifiable but just once i wish to see character analysis that isnt about n or uzi..

i want to know about his dynamic with nori. i want to watch his descent into depression (?) after she died & i really, REALLY want to see his redemption. because he does care. everyone is capable of change, and even if he's had a few hiccups in his appearances in the show, i really think he can improve. he DOES care. even if he's forgotten how to show it. i find the conflict between him and uzi very interesting esp involving n. because i think he understands n's a good friend for uzi but there's that innate fear he's immortalized in his brain after having to put down his wife who was attacked by the very creature uzi's new friend is.

the guy's clearly traumatized. he lost his wife, he's emotionally distanced from his child, he's clearly poured himself into his work. and this is from the . like. ten minutes of screentime he's gotten. like COME ON. even if you have no interest in him you have to admit there's a lot there to unpack. even if you have no interest in HIM, you have to admit it's fucking hilarious that his pringles logo ass pulled NORI of all drones. come on. i'm also very curious because he seemed to be a drone that came from before the core collapsed... assuming he and nori were similar ages, he must have had personal run ins with humans. i wonder what that was like

i can completely understand where people are coming from when they say they dislike him because he reminds them of their dad. but i guess i have a different opinion on him cause of how My dad was? i don't know i don't want to get super personal about fictional robots but to put it bluntly i don't have a relationship with him. a lot of factors in my life that weren't directly his fault lead him to being pretty absent in my life and i guess i connect alot to khan because i kind of. wish. he w as . my dad ? i dont know. khan is like an exact parallel of my dad if he Cared. so like. yes :) i have a weird affinity for khan haha. mr uzi!

ok. mob psycho. other than my absolute faves who are hilarious & underrated , inukawa, goda, mezato and TOME <3333 ... my absolute fave has to be tsubomi motherfucking takane. i have not read the reigen spinoff, but i'm REALLY fucking hoping we get to see more of her in the spinoff. because. she's so interesting. she's so fucking interesting.

the entire series presents her as this unobtainable thing of goodness, the end-all of mob's goals. this is ESPECIALLY emphasized in the show which makes her (in the words of ONE i think) more heroic in appearance... and by that i mean they gave her yaoiful eyes. like they made her really pretty in the show to emphasize how mob's looking at her through rose tinted glasses, which is such a cool detail because as the story progresses we see her with her original comic design as mob realizes she's just a person like him! she's literally the driving force of the entire narrative, but barely gets ANY screentime... in the moments we do see of her, she shows a lot of interesting traits. but BESIDES her interactions with mob, there's so much more i find interesting about her. i've only been into mp100 for a month and ive only watched it maybe 6 times so please forgive me if my information is skewed.

in the divine tree arc... dimple points out how she's very openly honest about her wants and is not afraid to deny someone, no matter how forceful. she's literally the only fucking person next to teru who was described as being able to withstand the mind control. not even fucking reigen could.

she rejects a shit ton of people in one of the arcs i can't remember. but literally the fact that someone asks her "why :(?!" when she rejects them and she's like. oh do you really want to know? and goes out of her way to ROAST THE FUCK out of this random ass guy.

in the confession arc, mezato talks to mob about the things she's learned about tsubomi (which is gay as hell btw. i know she's a reporter but god damn) about the fact that she appears to feel strongly about maintaining her image. she's very polite upfront with friends she talks with, but when she's alone/away from other people seems to drop that facade into something more disinterested/distant... which sort of tracks, considering a lot of people only want to connect with her because of her looks/the popularity she can give them by interacting with them. that gets exhausting, i can sympathize lol. she also seems to have trouble trusting others / feels like she's constantly got to be on guard. maybe her place in the school's hierarchy is really the only thing she has? i don't know, but her reaction to literally. sneezing in front of other people was so overblown it really seemed she thought her life would be ruined if her friends saw her needing a tissue which is so interesting to me.

EVEN RITSU DESCRIBES HOW DISINTERESTED SHE SEEMED IN OTHER PEOPLE when she left them playing hide & seek as a kid LOL. like she's in her own little world. my takeaway from her scenes is that she's constantly keeping everyone else at arm's length because she doesn't trust anyone. to her, everyone just wants to get close to her because they want the positives coming from being near her, not because they want to get to know her. everyone seems to know her behind her mask... which i know i said i wouldn't compare her to mob (and i'm not! i just find this comparison interesting, she's incredible on her own) but they have this in common from my understanding. mob has also hidden himself away from the world via insane suppression & masking because he had an experience that taught him that expressing himself was dangerous. tsubomi hides herself away from the world with masking I Think because she believes it's dangerous/can cause unnecessary grief to get close to other people because they'll always fuck with her in the end (hence the fucking. sneezing scene IDK WHAT TO CALL THAT SCENE HAHA)

so like. mob's infatuation with her is like him grasping at a life that's out of his reach... when in reality, she's not on a higher level than him -- she's just like him. i don't know i'm thinking about this now. okay. i really like tsubomi.

[lost-caticorn]

Why I think Shigeo Kageyama (Mob) is autistic

Quick word before analysis:

I don’t know what the author of mob psycho 100% had in mind when he created this character. This is only me sharing my point of view. Take it for what it’s worth.

Autism is a spectrum, the following characteristics don’t represent its entirety. Also english isn’t my language. I’m just doing my best to convey my thoughts ^^

1. Lies, being fooled, implicit meanings

Since the first episode, Shigeo is a character that appears to be very gullible and is often qualified of “softy”.He clearly has trouble telling if people are lying to him or having malicious intent. He seems to believe everything that he’s told as if other people were as honest as him (sad truth being that they’re not).

Some people might just see this as an endearing character trait or a quirk but I think this is a first hint at autism. Most people on the spectrum have trouble to distinguish between lies and truth or sarcasm and honesty because we have difficulty reading between the lines.

There are so many examples of this side of him like the fact that he doesn’t even suspect Reigen of lying to him about having psychic abilities or him not thinking that Dimple (エクボ) has malicious intent when he follows him around. But I think the following dialogue summarise this point perfectly:

2. meltdown (the whole 0-100% concept)

First of all what is a meltdown? A meltdown is “an intense response to overwhelming situations. It happens when someone becomes completely overwhelmed by their current situation and temporarily loses behavioural control. This loss of control can be expressed verbally (shouting, screaming, crying), physically (kicking, lashing out, biting) or in both ways”.

Shigeo being in a cycle of slowly getting to 100% and exploding with psychic powers is really similar to the way meltdowns work. We see him getting through the day accumulating small things like unexpected events, social interactions, conflicting feelings or an overload of sensations all of which bring him closer to loosing control of his emotions.

In my opinion this sounds exactly like a meltdown.

3.  facial expression

Something quite common for people with autism is to have trouble expressing feelings not only with words but also with facial expressions that don’t match what we’re trying to convey. Mob isn’t expressionless but the changes between his usual face and his others expressions are quite subtle.

4. Lacking social skills

His problems in socialisation are obvious from the start but it becomes even more prominent in the third episode of season 1 with Dimple’s sect. This episode shows us how Mob was always left out of group with children his age because he simply couldn’t read the atmosphere.

In the anime this line is translated by “get a clue” but it doesn’t really match the Japanese words used here “空気を読む” which means “read the situation/sense the mood”. Also I think it’s worth mentioning that in episode 4  he literally names it the “reading-in-the-mood technique” (空気を読む技術). This just illustrates how non-natural this is to him.

Again this is something anyone on the spectrum can probably relate to. Mob is clearly hurt by people constantly telling him to read the mood when he just can’t! 

5. Trouble expressing feelings:

In the same episode with Dimple and his sect, it is made very clear that Shigeo has two difficulties: Reading the mood and expressing how he feels. It’s not that he doesn’t want to smile I’d even say that at one point (when Dimple uses his power on him and it doesn’t work) he wants to laugh like everyone else but he can’t. 

Dimple then assumes that Mob has no emotions which leads to him saying this:

How many times have people on the spectrum heard this because they couldn’t read and express emotions the same way than most people do? My heart sank when he said that to Mob...

6. Monotone voice

I didn’t find a video of just Mob talking to illustrate this but it’s really obvious in the anime (I only watch in VO so I don’t know about the dub). Mob always talk with the same tone except when he’s at 100%

This is also something widely experienced by people with autism who often say something with the “wrong” tone of voice and it ends up sounding mean, sarcastic or uninterested.

7. bad at sports

This might seem unimportant but I found interesting that Mob was introduced to us as someone absolutely terrible in sports because usually heroes in Shonen mangas are more on the athletic side.

While Mob being bad at sports doesn’t automatically means he’s autistic, I think this is a hint more in that direction as most people on the spectrum are often affected by dyspraxia.

What is dyspraxia? Dyspraxia is “a form of developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is a common disorder affecting fine and/or gross motor coordination in children and adults”.

8. Bullied in parallel reality

So season 2 is incomplete for now but I just watched episode 5 and I decided to add this point to my list. Apparently some people are arguing about the accuracy of the version of mob in the parallel reality that Mogami showed him. In my opinion it was very accurate.

Mob’s environnement is perfect for him. His power (even thought he doesn’t use it much in his daily life) helps him connecting with others (his brother, Reigen, bodybuilding club,...). Because he is in such a good environnement he can thrive and become a better version of himself.

Not everyone is born with the chance Mob has. Growing up in a loving family, making caring friends, having kind teachers or meeting an adult that will guide you...These are probably things most of us wish were part of our life. Especially for neurodivergent people that are often confronted to rejection.

In my opinion this episode showed very well how people who identifies with mob’s characteristics are actually treated in the real world. In a world where they don’t have a cool power that creates ties with other people. In a world where the harsh reality of being bullied, hit, ignored, mocked and harassed is common for people that are considered “different”.

This episode physically hurt me while watching but I hope I was able to make a point without being too emotional. 

Conclusion:

So that’s it. These are the main reasons why I think Shigeo is on the autism spectrum. There are still a few but they would be more arguable so I’m going to keep these to myself. Feel free to disagree with my opinion but please be respectful.

In the end I think this show contains so many powerful life advices that can help anyone who’s neurodivergent. Mob is such a wonderful character and I’m glad others are not making a fool out of him like it would have been the case in so many others anime/TV shows.

I’d like to conclude with a quote of Reigen. This is in my opinion one of the best speech in the history of anime:

“Listen, just because you have psychic powers doesn’t change the fact that you’re a human. People who run fast, people good at studying or people with strong body odour. Psychic powers are just another characteristic. You must embrace that as a part of yourself and continue to live positively. The truth behind one’s charm is kindness. Become a good person. That’s all.”

If anyone read this until the end thank you!!