#tldr; teru pov of mob is threat (bug) -> rival (feigned) -> admiration (devotion) -> rival (real)

[muninnhuginn]

the thing with teru is that for the longest time he struggles to see everyone as on the same playing field.

when he’s introduced he thinks that he’s at the top of the societal pyramid because of his powers. he thinks that mob is merely a threat he has to teach his place and it takes the best part of their fight for teru to reassess that and acknowledge that mob is a rival, but one that he is still above in this world.

when mob collapses and ???% beats him, teru realises that he is insignificant in the wider scheme of things and at the same time he ends up putting mob on a pedestal. teru believes he is insignificant because there’s a much larger power that he must bow to. he puts mob above him, an average person.

and teru sticks to that, with the admiration, the devotion where mob is essentially the new guide by which he tries to live his life up until the divine tree arc. dimple then forces teru to see him as his god instead. and that in of itself highlights the fact that teru’s devotion (whether to himself or mob or dimple) is essentially like worshipping a deity. that’s the kind of gap he sees between “average” people and those he places above them. mob breaks teru from dimple’s control and teru snaps mob back on his pedestal (’you really are amazing’). teru may have worked on himself but he still hasn’t broken from his framework that there are average people and those above them.

fast forward to his second confrontation with ???% and teru’s using his mob-guide to try and preach back to ???%. but he’s still putting mob above him, still thinks mob is untouchable and wouldn’t fail where ‘average’ people would. and then ???% deliberately puts on a show of strength that puts people in danger, he uses his powers against teru despite having previously refused to do so to the point of collapse. and it’s a real pedestal-breaking moment for teru. he thought that mob was such a moral person that he designed his whole new belief system around him. but the person at the centre of this belief system wasn’t the whole truth. that mob was just as much a false god as dimple and teru himself.

still, the philosophy is sound and teru did change for the better as a result. the pedestal and framework is broken, but that’s not a bad thing. any pedestal that high must eventually collapse.

#I think my brain is a little frazzled by other media because I see this pedestalling and my mind goes straight to religious devotion #teru has faith in himself + then in mob. but having faith like that in any one person is folly #having a belief system and wanting to improve yourself though? that stands regardless #mob psycho 100 #mp100 #mp100 spoilers #mob psycho 100 spoilers #tried really hard to make this non spoilery for anime-onlies but as I said. am kinda frazzled rn sorry #tldr; teru pov of mob is threat (bug) -> rival (feigned) -> admiration (devotion) -> rival (real) #it is really neat how teru's arc is basically constant reassessment thinking of it this way #I definitely saw some post about teru and hierarchies the other day I want to refind now