Mob Psycho Season 3 Episode 3: Is Mob’s growth good or bad?

Mob Psycho 100’s third episode really starts to set the final season’s plot in motion, but will this be an ominous character study?

Mob Psycho 100 is finally back, after years of anticipation. Since this will be the anime’s final season, a lot is riding on these episodes to see if it will stick the landing and truly become one of the greats.

The series, which follows a kind-hearted but unconfident middle school boy with apocalyptic level psychic powers, is starting to delve into the wider psychic plots that the series easily balances with more light-hearted beginner episodes, and it seems like this episode is a combination of those two things.

Episode 3 does begin to put the plot into high gear, although it seems like it isn’t just the villains we’ll have to worry about. So without further ado, spoiler warning for Mob Psycho 100!

Mob Psycho 100 is reaching 100%

Mob Psycho 100’s third episode is showing how this season is set to be one of the most conflict-filled yet, but it funnily enough does it with a more light-hearted and uneventful plot-line.

This episode focuses on Mob beginning to think that he’s becoming popular with girls, after he has a charming encounter with Tsubomi. This moment really gives Tsubomi some humorous humanity, which had been missing previously, and will hopefully continue as the season goes along.

The moment is also great at showing Mob’s growth in social skills, although he suddenly begins to falsely assume that every girl out there is into him. This could easily become annoying, but the Mob Psycho 100 is always able to make its flawed characters likeable by making their flaws incredibly funny.

In this case, Mob’s arrogance takes over him physically, as he transforms into a JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure lookalike, and even has another voice actor giving him a deeper voice. If there’s one thing Mob Psycho 100 has always excelled at, it’s leaning into the characters’ absurdity.

There’s no action in this episode, which is a shame considering how great the animation is whenever a telepathic sequence commences. However, the events of said episode seem to heavily imply that Episode 4 will be an action-packed one, since Mob is now at 100%, and not in a good way…

Is Mob becoming like those he has fought?

While Mob’s arrogance in this episode is played for laughs, it does hint that perhaps a darker character arc is on the way.

The first season had him utterly unconfident and unsure of himself, which was obviously the beginning of his character arc, but the show took its time to validate that he was just a kid, and didn’t need to be the all-powerful hero that people expected him to be. The second season had him gain more responsibility over his powers, and take on a hero approach, which was admirable, but also seemed somewhat antithetical to the message of the prior season. Well, this season may be the answer to that, as now Mob seems like he may be getting too big for his britches.

Now he’s talking down to Dimple (who no doubt has a part to play in the episode’s sudden dark turn of events), becoming too high-horsed for Reigen, and is even planning to become the leader of a new religion. This doesn’t seem like Mob at all, and it’s clear that the show is setting up a storyline which will really take his character to task.

It’ll be a case of seeing how Mob can grow into his own confident person while still remaining the same kind boy filled with humility that we’ve known from the start. But it’s easy to imagine that Mob Psycho 100 will succeed in that, it’s just a case of going along for the ride. And it’s certainly an intriguing journey.

Mob Psycho 100 Season 3 Episode 4 will premier on Crunchyroll on October 26.

Want more Mob Psycho Season 3 reviews? Check out our other episodic reviews below

Episode 1 | Episode 2 | Episode 3 | Episode 4 | Episode 5 | Episode 6 | Episode 7 | Episode 8 | Episode 9 | Episode 10 | Episode 11 | Episode 12