I think in a Deutritium-Tritium fusion reaction a lot the energy is in the neutron. And since neutrons are neutral you can't really directly convert that into electrical energy.

Yep, for D-T 80% of the energy is in neutrons. Helion is using D-D/D-He3, and for that it's about 5% in neutrons, and most of the rest in fast-moving charged particles.

So they have a simple way to extract electricity directly. They squeeze the plasma with a magnetic field from a copper coil, then there's an explosion of charged particles, which pushes back against the magnetic field and causes electricity to flow in the coil.

D-D (which they are going for right now) is still 50% neutrons. D-He3 is the only aneutronic reaction, but it has tons of other issues.

As I said, the combined reaction generates 5% of its energy as neutron radiation. The reason it's only 5% is that D-He3 is a much more energetic reaction.

The main issue with D-He3 is that it's more difficult.

That's what I said. But all things equal, D-D is definitely not the best path for direct energy production because of the vast amount of neutrons.

That's the "thermal middleman" part they're trying to cut out.

By analogy, compare Concentrated Solar Power versus Photovoltaics.