PSYCH Presents “The Amazing Psych-Man and Tap Man, Issue No. 2″ – REVIEW

A mysterious masked vigilante calling himself The Mantis appears to be helping the SBPD bust the Camino syndicate, responsible for much of the cocaine trade in Santa Barbara. As Juliet seems somewhat taken with The Mantis, Shawn’s own motive for unmasking him is to win back her attention.

This episode of Psych stood out for the comic book feel of its opening credits and cuts to commercials. Most of the episode was devoted to unmasking The Mantis. I won’t give away his identity here, but only say I enjoyed how Shawn tracked him down. In an effort to escape the police, The Mantis knocked Shawn out cold and dressed in his clothes to blend into the crowd, leaving Shawn in vigilante garb, briefly believed to be the Mantis. The next day, Shawn found his clothes freshly dry-cleaned, and went to the dry cleaner to retrieve The Mantis’s address.

The Mantis didn’t know how the Caminos were shipping so much cocaine in and out of Santa Barbara, but Shawn figured out they were melting the cocaine into glass. The Mantis needed help to hit the glass factory/distribution center, and, believing his motives were pure, Shawn and Gus stepped up as The Catch and Tap Man respectively.

The episode’s best twist, though, happened after the climactic Camino bust. Shawn discovered The Mantis was actually stealing $10 million in Camino drug money for himself. Fortunately, Shawn’s Catch garb thwarted many of The Mantis’s martial arts moves and justice was done.

This was clearly a themed episode, but it didn’t feel like a special event as others have. I suppose I already see Shawn and Gus as heroes of a sort, so only the comic book graphics seemed particularly special to me.