We’ve reached the end – I think when I mentioned that I could see this season stopping at the end of the martial arts tournament I had forgotten how much content is really covered before that – a lot less than I thought!
Garou is back on his bullshit – despite the endless string of battles he has fought with basically no rest or recovery (and the poison he has been afflicted with), he is able to prevail against the very coordinated A and B rank heroes who seek to take him down without the aid of the S ranked heroes. Heroes like death gatling feel that their exploits are trivialized in comparison to their elder ranked S class bretheren, despite the strength they possess. They see Garou as a stepping stone to proving how valuable they truly are. Death Gatling’s pleas no doubt come from a place of great desperation; the cracks beneath the veneer of the Heroes Association and its imperfections such as the reliance and dubious nature of their reliance on shareholders have shown that the organization is anything but perfect, and that more sinister priorities lie beneath the surface.
Despite Garou’s victory, there is no time to rest on his laurels as our very own Genos shows up with a vendetta. Striking with the strength of tank top master but with speed far surpassing him, Genos handily puts Garou on the ropes, no doubt his fatigue a piece that is working against him. I laugh time and time again that Genos has become so accustomed to losing his body parts that he finally thought it ideal to weaponize them – turning a great weakness into a strength instead. Resourceful! As if things couldn’t get worse for Garou, he is homed in by Bang and Bomb, who even if he were well rested and healthy would stand absolutely no chance against.
Bang viciously beats him down with no remorse or hesitation – Garou is absolutely unable to do anything to him. This is notably one of the only battles where Garou gets one-sidedly destroyed, as it seems that silver fang is just far beyond what he can handle. As Genos notes, despite the two of them using the same style, the difference in strength is obvious. Hell, that’s before Bomb joins in as well, making the situation even more dire. Phoenixman, an associate head of the monster association, also finds it difficult to intervene to save the hero hunter’s life, hoping to present him before lord Orochi to save his own skin.
Also interestingly, we understand a little bit more of what motivates Garou to do his hero hunting in the first place – a deep seated belief since he was a child. Garou is really just a very, very confused hero – nobody stood for the monsters he liked as a child on the tv programs he used to watch and in fact, stood against them, like monsters themselves. Garou wants to defeat heroes to fight against this darkness, to stand for those monsters who tried their hardest and would fall anyway. Again, he’s really just a confused hero, and I don’t believe that even Garou is aware of the nature of his own motivations. He probably views them on a more superficial level and a way of dealing with his own feelings.
Centichoro (sometimes called Elder Centipede) appears and we understand that he harbors a grudge against Blast, the number one hero who has been all but absentee to this very day – you may recall he did not even appear for the appearance of Boros in the prior season. Apparently Blast had gravely injured the beast – either because he couldn’t defeat him in one blow (which seems unlikely) or wasn’t interested/didn’t. That part is not clear. When all hope seems lost, King is able to distract Centichoro into attacking him, claiming that Blast was here to finish what he started. After the defeat of Genos by the powerful entity, thankfully, Saitama was here to finish what his disciple had started, ending it all in one blow.
I know the theories, but you can’t help but wonder if King disguising Saitama as Blast was a cute way of alluding to them being the same entity (Which is a very popular fan theory). I wish I knew myself! To this day, we’re still unsure of Blast’s identity, who he is, or what his motivations are, but we’re fairly sure he is one who broke his limiter and shares a similar outlook to Saitama.
As we watch Garou get carted off against his will by Phoenixman to go see Lord Orochi, season 2 comes to a close. Personally I thought the animation was fantastic this episode, specifically during the Bang/Garou fight, Genos’s assault on Centichoro, and the final punch by Saitama. In addition, I was very impressed by the music – Garou’s theme and the main anthem that played as Saitama delivered the finishing blow. It might be about two years before we see Season 3, considering where the manga is content wise right now, but you can bet until then I will be reading!
As a production, season 2 is not as strong as season 1. In regards to content however, I would argue it is stronger – ONE is finally done with the intro and writing a cohesive narrative. If you enjoyed the first, I recommend you continue on and enjoy the stellar content – I promise you that animation aside, the magic is still there.
