This review appeared at Speculative Faith, with a few changes.
I
usually don't consider time travel stories among my favorites, though
there are some exceptions. My favorite Discworld story is “Night
Watch”, where Sam Vimes goes back to a time when Ankh-Morpork was a
boiling pot of revolution. My reasons for abandoning “Doctor Who”
are mostly that the series has abandoned me by pushing their social
crusade—in a real sense, “Torchwood” is the reason I no longer
like “Doctor Who”.
All
of that to say, while I didn't start watching “Erased” because it
had a time travel element in it, that element didn't drive me off,
and in the context of this story it worked very well.
Summary
Satoru
Fujinuma is a man in his late 20s struggling to break into the world
of manga artists. Occasionally, he'll experience what he calls
“revivals”, where his life will rewind itself for a few seconds
or a few minutes. He's aware when this happens, and uses this time to
try to prevent something bad from happening, such as in the first
episode when he prevents a runaway truck from hitting a boy crossing
the street. When he comes home one night to find that his mother has
been murdered, he experiences a very drastic “revival”, one that
sends him back to a few days before his 11th
birthday. This was the winter one of his classmates, a girl named
Kayo Hinazuki, went missing, and her body wasn't found until after
the snows melted. His return to the past is also just before she goes
missing, and thinking there may be a connection between his mother's
murder and the death of his classmate and other children in the area
at that same time, he tries to prevent Kayo from getting killed.
The
time travel element of the “revivals” is intriguing. Satoru still
possesses the mind and memories of his 29 year old self, but he's in
his 10 year old body. This does cause some amusing situations, and
some problems, too. For example, his older self has forgotten where
he and his friends had their “secret hideout”.
But
it also allows him to see things that his younger self had missed.
When he notices a bruise on Kayo's leg, and then reads a composition
she wrote about wanting to be alone on an island, he realizes that
even before she was killed, bad things were happening to her. So his
attempts to save her life also end up being attempts to get her out
of an abusive home.
Btw
it's the name of Kayo's composition, “Boku Dake ga Inai Machi”,
that is the Japanese title of the anime and the manga it's based off
of. The translations I've seen of this title go something like this,
“The Town Where I Am Missing”.
Finding
New Mistakes to Make
I'll
try to avoid too much that might be spoiler material, but what comes
next might fit that category for some people, so be warned.
Satoru's
first attempt to change the past failed, and he got booted back to
the present into the middle of the same predicament he had left. He
does discovers that he had been able to make a few small changes, but
nothing significant. Then, when he gets another chance, he is able to
keep some things from happening, but makes other mistakes that are
costly to him.
I'd
guess I'm not the only person who's ever wanted to jump back in time
a few minutes or a few hours and redo something. I've thought it
would be helpful, though, really, I'd likely just be trading one set
of mistakes for another. I'd probably spend most of my redos
exploring new and creative ways to really and monumentally mess
things up.
Mother
and Child
One
thing that's evident early in that story is that the relationship
between Satoru and his mother is strained. The reasons seem to range
from his own lack of success to some things that happened during the
kidnapping spree when he was a child.
One
of the things I liked during the series was seeing his view of his
mother change. Returning to the past after seeing her dead reminds
him of many of the good things they'd had that he'd forgotten about.
It's good to see them on good terms. And I'll not spoil the last part
of the story, except that it shows her love for her son in a
particularly strong way.
On
the other hand, there is another mother-child relationship that is
very much worse. Some of the series' most disturbing scenes involve
what Kayo's mother does to her, and how she tries to cover it up. The
contrast between the two mothers is most clearly shown when Satoru's
mother allows Kayo into their home while Satoru is trying to hide
her, particularly the breakfast scene. I'll just mention it here, but
let you watch it for yourself, if you wish.
God
of Second Chances?
I
remember something from when I was a kid. It was Sunday mornings, and
sometimes there would be these church services on television. On one
of them, there was a man who often sang a song with lyrics which were
something like “Our God is the God of a second chance”.
That's
not the last time I've heard such an idea. It seems to be fairly
popular. But is it true?
Because
the truth is, the revivals of “Erased” are fictions. We don't get
replays or rewinds, we don't get to go back to the last saved moment,
the past will always be the past and never again be the present. The
things we did wrong yesterday will always be done and be wrong.
Although
I can understand the point trying to be made, I'm not sure it's a
point that's true. The truth is, there are no second chances. God
doesn't give us chances to redo what we did wrong yesterday, or even
five minutes ago.
God
isn't the God of second chances. It's more accurate to say that
Christ is our only chance. As Christ said, “I am the way, the
truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, but by me”.
King
David could not undo his adultery and murder, he could only confess
his sins to God and ask for mercy. “ Have mercy on my, O God,
according to your loving kindness. According to your great
compassion, blot out my transgressions...Against you, you only, have
I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight...Wash me thoroughly
from my iniquites, and cleanse me from my sins.”
God
doesn't give us rewinds, but he has redeemed those who are His.
Conclusion
“Erased”
is a very engaging series. The time travel element is done
intelligently, and the story is told in a way that does well in
increasing the tension and the stakes. There are some disturbing
scenes where ugliness is shown, but also ones where kindness is well
displayed, too. I can give it a strong recommendation.
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