As was the case with season one, it’s taken a few episodes for One Punch Man to really engage all the cylinders.  The first two episodes of this run were fine, with a nice balance of action and humor, but this was the first time I really felt the GAR and threat level of the first season.  ONE does have a way of humanizing all of his combatants, even the villains, so you always feel like you have an idea what they’re thinking (though in Garou’s case that only goes so far), which makes them considerably more interesting.

This was also one of those episodes where  the laundry list of heroes seems to go on forever, some of them familiar and some new  – though to be honest, I’d be lying if I said I was totally confident I remember everyone who popped up in the first season.  Bang did for damn sure, of course – he did a lot more than that.  Turns out that Garou was a student at his dojo, which means Bang has a strong sense of responsibility for what Garou is doing at the moment.  To that end he chases away his other students (including Charanko, played by Masuda Toshiki) and enlists the help of his big brother Bomb (Fukumatsu Shinya) for what he anticipates will be a battle to the death with Garou.

It’s interesting that when Charanko shows up at Genos’ place (also Saitama’s of course) to express his concerns over Bang, Blizzard is there (along with King), so I guess she’s fully a part of Team Saitama now.  Meanwhile Garou is wandering the streets, turning into a sort of One Punch version of Stain the hero killer.  Except he doesn’t seem to be actually killing the heroes (at least from what we can see), just messing them up real bad.  And of course, Stain had a clear a reason as you could hope for – agree with it or not he never hid his motivation.  With Garou we have no idea why he’s decided to become a monster – Bang hardly seems like the sort of master than would lose a disciple in such a way.

Among Garou’s many victims here are Mumen Rider, as ever way more gallant than his skills can cope with, and the S-class hero Tank-top Master (unmistakably Konishi Katsuyuki).  T-t M may not be at the top, but he’s still an “S” (so to speak) – and that definitely doesn’t stand for “slouch”.  That Garou was able to waste even him with so much ease is an indication of just how strong Garou is.  Is Garou just naturally gifted, Bang’s most brilliant student – or is there some other reason he’s become so powerful that he can take out S-class heroes without breaking much of a sweat?

Enter Saitama, of course – though he doesn’t plan it that way.  He visits Mumen and Charanko at the hospital (with bananas), and while there he has a chat with Tank-top too.  Saitama has come to see if Charanko has any strings he can pull to set him up with a top-class martial artist opponent, intrigued at the stories Charanko and Tank tell him about Garou’s martial arts techniques.  Charanko doesn’t, but he does have an entrance ticket for a martial arts tournament he’s entered (with a ¥3000000 first prize), and it isn’t hard to guess what Saitama plans to do even after Charanko warns him against it.

While it’s never expressly stated – for all we know Saitama is merely curious to fight someone new and different – I suspect he’s actually doing research here, preparing himself for what he figures will be an inevitable showdown with Garou.  What happens next would be ironic either way, but all the more so if that’s indeed the case – because Saitama runs into Garou while shopping for a Charanko wig.  He takes him out not with one punch, but one chop (only after being attacked first, mind you) but he has no idea it was Garou he just pwned.  It would be incredibly ballsy if ONE made that the end of the Garou arc, but nah, I know he’ll be back.  And this proves as a revelation to Garou and a reminder from us of just how overpowered Saitama is compared to everybody – and I mean everybody – else in this cast.  I’m sure Garou is going to take that lesson to heart and stew on it for a while, before coming out more pissed off than ever and looking for revenge.