Erased (Boku Dake ga Inai Machi)

There comes a time when paying attention to small detail really pays off. By working in a book store, I have access and knowledge to the latest novels, comics, manga, movies, games, and toys.

While I was searching for a manga for a customer, I noticed a thick manga with solid white on the cover and binding. There was a little girl and a little boy on the cover as well, and the white appeared to be snow. The manga was called Erased. It was very intriguing to look into, but I had to get back to work.

Later, I found myself watching an endless loop of The Office. However, I needed something new to experience. I saw that Netflix added some new TV shows and movies, and there is was again. The title Erased popped up first, and I guessed it was the manga I saw earlier that day. The episodes were only twenty-seven minutes long, so I shrugged and said, “Meh, why not.”

Three-hundred, twenty-four minutes later and I was dead. I had such an emotional rollercoaster with this show I had to watch it all the way through despite the time in the morning. It’s not easy finding a show that’ll hook you through thick and thin on Netflix, at least for me.

Erased is about Satoru Fujinuma who discovers he has the ability to go back in time to moments he lived only minutes ago or years ago. This ability allows him to prevent his mother’s murder and kidnappings of former classmates. However, he has no control of the ability. Yet, somehow, fate has a mission in store for him to change the future.

Even though this show was based off a manga, it reminded me of Stranger Things.

I really enjoy stories where kids, teens, and adults have limits in what they can control and conquer. When a teen is chosen to save a planet from destruction it becomes over dramatic and unbelievable. However, when you have a teen seeking out help for a task they can’t do alone, then it becomes relatable.

That said, this show is similar to Stranger Things because there are kids and adults working together to handle dark situations and tasks. The story jumps between Satoru being a twenty-nine-year-old man and a ten-year-old boy. This is because of Satoru’s ability to jump through time, which he calls revival.

These revivals are happening for a reason and it’s his mission to figure out what. Yet the answer stares him straight in the face, literally. All the classmates that were kidnapped and murdered are still alive.

Twenty-nine-year-old Satoru remembers the kidnappings and murders, and ten-year-old Satoru has to uncover the murderer’s identity with the help of his new friends and even mother.

From a production point of view, this show had such great lighting and scenery symbolism. There’s a lot of symbolism in this film, but I’ll still with two for now. The first is the significance of snow. This show is heavily involved with the winter season. Snow is constantly falling which covers the murderer’s tracks and represents a blank page for the future. At times, I could feel the cold because of the icy, wet, and snowy scenery. When you can feel what the characters are feeling, not just emotionally but physically, the set designers and location scouts have done their job.

The second symbolism is constant flashing of the neighboring towns and factories. It shows that despite their being so much innocence in the air from the children playing or singing, that the world is still a gritty and dark place. Not all communities are picture perfect. Even the safest of towns can have pedophiles and murderers.

I highly enjoyed this show and seriously hope more stories like this come out in the future. I think I might borrow that manga book of this show and compare notes.

#Erased #Manga #Netflixoriginal #JapaneseStrangerThings