Erased Season 1 Episode 4 Recap

After Kayo fails to come to school, Satoru goes to her house. No one answers the door, so he returns to where he has seen her before, but she’s not there either. Satoru looks hopeless when he notices the footsteps in the snow. Mr. Yashiro tells the students Kayo moved to Sapporo to live with her grandmother. He adds there is no reason for anyone to feel sad for Kayo. Sachiko tells Satoru it’s not his fault Kayo’s gone. “I couldn’t do anything for her. There had to be more. More I could’ve done for her,” Satoru says. Satoru sees a poster of a missing child, Aya Nakanishi. He didn’t expect the next one will go missing so soon. He realizes the timelines are starting to converge.

When Satoru revisits Kayo’s home, he sees Kayo’s mom taking the garbage out. She smiles as she puts the garbage into the bin, then returns to their house. Satoru waits for her to get in before he checks what she has thrown away. He sees Kayo’s name tag and a pair of blue gloves inside the plastic bag. He remembers the birthday gift Kayo has promised to give him. It’s only been a week since Kayo disappeared, and it’s not even clear if she’s dead yet. Satoru looks horrified, so he screams as he runs back home; then suddenly, a revival happens. He looks at his bloodied hands and realizes he’s back in 2006. He manages to escape before the police see him. Satoru returns to their apartment and finds that the police are already there. He thinks of showing up and telling the truth to the police, but he thinks no one will believe him; he has to find the killer himself.

Airi shows up, takes his phone, and turns it off to avoid getting tracked. Airi brings Satoru to her apartment since she lives alone. “Because there’s no way you killed your mother,” Airi says. Airi hands Satoru the book he got from the bookstore. He sees the book has changed when he flips the page to the kidnapping case. Kayo is 11 in the book and went missing on March 3rd. Satoru thinks he’s changed the future, so he goes to the library the next day to learn more about the case.

Airi’s boss tells her he thinks Satoru can’t kill his own mother. He even tells Airi to help Satoru if she sees him. When Satoru returns to Airi’s apartment, he doesn’t realize his boss is watching him from afar. Airi grabs her boss’ phone as she sees he‘s about to report Satoru to Detective Watanabe. He tells Airi he’s just worried about her. Airi slaps her boss and breaks his phone before walking away. Because their boss already found out, Satoru can no longer stay with Airi. “Tell the police I threatened you to hide me,” Satoru tells Airi. She hands Satoru her phone and then tells him to wait for her while she gets money at home.

While Satoru waits for Airi, the phone receives a message from Sachiko’s number. The message reads: “This is Satoru. Wait in your room. I’m coming over now.” Satoru realizes the person with his mother’s phone is the killer, so he runs to Airi as fast as possible. The killer goes to Airi’s apartment. She manages to push him away and run to the balcony. While she thinks twice if she should jump or not, the killer comes and pushes her. Airi falls to the ground and hits her head. While Satoru runs to save Airi, their boss sees him. The killer is still inside the house, but Satoru doesn’t see him. He looks down from the balcony and sees Airi. He runs to help her. “Don’t move her! We have to keep her still and call an ambulance,” their boss says. Satoru protests, but their boss thinks Satoru has already caused too many problems for Airi. When Satoru puts his hand in his pocket, he finds the piece of paper he took from his mom. He opens it and sees a contact number written on it.

Our Thoughts

Well, this is getting weirder and scarier. Why did the killer try to kill Airi? What’s his reason? First, he made it look like Satoru killed his own mother. Then he goes for Airi. Was this really about the kidnapping? If it was about the attempted kidnapping, it should be over when Sachiko died. But we think maybe the killer is not after Sachiko after all. Perhaps he is after Satoru. We feel sorry for Airi. She’s still too young. She’s lucky she didn’t die. Satoru came just in time. But if he didn’t manage to get there in time, would the killer kill Airi?

In Kayo’s case, we doubt she went to live with her grandmother. If she really lived with her grandmother, why didn’t she take her things with her? And why was her mother smiling as she threw Kayo’s things in the garbage? Kayo must be in a difficult position, but no one could help her. Satoru was just 11 years old and already felt bad he couldn’t save her. What were the adults doing? Did none of them pay enough attention to actually know something bad was happening to Kayo? We don’t know if Satoru will stay in 2006 or return to 1988. We look forward to finding out.