Yeah, but he chose a troublesome moment to pull off one of his cool guy acts, since it left him all beaten up before he even met Accelerator. But then again, it gave him some Misaka lap pillow time, so with the end well, everything was brilliant.
It's not just your perspective. Like I said before, this arc could have used a bit more aggressive cutting. The part with the exlosives girl and Meltdowner were jolly good additions to the story we already know, but otherwise it's still a story we know, nothing changes that, so it could have been told more briskly.