Erased Season 1 Episode 12 Recap

It’s already dark, but Mr. Yashiro is still preparing for another attack. While he walks on the hanging bridge, he gets surprised Satoru is already there. “I didn’t expect you to get here first, Satoru,” he says. He admits he‘s in the middle of getting everything ready to kill Satoru. Mr. Yashiro says he was expecting Kumi to arrive first, then Satoru. But because Satoru has discovered his plans again, Satoru is outside the trap, while Mr. Yashiro is inside it. Satoru asks his teacher to end things finally. But instead of giving up easily, Mr. Yashiro has other plans. “Am I evil? No, I know. That’s how the world would measure me,” Mr. Yashiro says. He tells Satoru that maybe they should end things that night.

Mr. Yashiro takes out a detonator and takes a few steps back. He presses the button, and a loud explosion happens. They get separated in the middle of the hanging bridge. “The last thing for me to do is to end this all with both of our deaths. I reject being punished by a worldview I don’t accept. And, Satoru, what you will get in exchange for your life is my end in the form of my death,” Mr. Yashiro says. But Satoru refuses to give up. “You won’t get any of that,” Satoru replies. He runs to Mr. Yashiro and hugs his body. Then he pushes him until they fall off the bridge to the river. Mr. Yashiro looks at Satoru one more time before escaping, but before he can swim to the river bank, he realizes the police already surround him.

When Kenya visits him in prison, Mr. Yashiro admits he’s always been waiting for Satoru to wake up. He adds only Satoru understood him, so when Satoru fell into a coma, he felt alone. “When Satoru finally awoke, I was so happy. I couldn’t stop crying,” Mr. Yashiro says.

January 2010 — Kenya reads the newspaper about Mr. Yashiro being sentenced to death. Satoru comes to his office to learn more about it. Kenya says Mr. Yashiro is guilty of over 30 murders in total. Most were past the statute of limitations, but they charged Mr. Yashiro for the eight murders and attempted murders in Chiba. He says Mr. Yashiro confessed to all of those.

Satoru achieves his dream and becomes a successful manga artist. He has also published a lot of books. He thinks of all his friends back when he was a kid and looks back on how they influenced him. While he sits under the overpass, it starts snowing. A girl takes shelter under the overpass as well. When the girl looks at him, he realizes it’s Airi. “Could I join you until the snow passes?” Airi asks him. Satoru nods and smiles at her.

Our Thoughts

When we heard Mr. Yashiro’s confession, it seems like he really did develop an obsession with Satoru. But maybe the obsession started when he couldn’t kill him. He talked about watching over Satoru and waiting for him to wake up from his coma. Then after he woke up, Mr. Yashiro wanted to kill him again. We just couldn’t understand Mr. Yashiro well. He said he felt lonely when Satoru was in a coma because Satoru was the only one who could understand him, but at the same time, he wanted to end Satoru. If Satoru died, would Mr. Yashiro finally feel satisfied? Or would it make him feel worse because he wouldn’t have anything to obsess over? In the end, he got caught and was sentenced for his crimes. We were surprised to hear he‘s guilty of over 30 murders. We didn’t know it was a lot.

So, no matter the timeline, Satoru is always meant to meet Airi. We thought it would be him and Kayo, but then Kayo married someone else, and they have a baby. We wonder if Kayo would have ended up with Satoru if he didn’t fall into a coma. If they ended up together, maybe Satoru wouldn’t meet Airi. We didn’t see Satoru meet his other childhood friends except for Kayo, Hiromi, and Kenya. It would have been fun if he got to meet Yuuki again.