Erased......(Boku Dake Ga Inai Machi)

There is something about Japanese Anime and the way they are written and the way their art style is.They have the ability and the guts to show the most gruesome and graphic events that any other major and traditional forms of entertainment media just cannot and they also have the ability to tell stories that deals with very dark and messed up real life events in a very mature way which not only plays with our emotions at the core level but actually rips our heart out.I am very happy that I found Erased which is the anime adaptation of a manga of the same name and I am not surprised that it became one of my favorites in the anime universe.

Erased at its core is a proper suspense thriller/murder mystery that keeps you at the edge of your seat throughout the entire run time of 12 episodes and it keeps getting darker with each episode.Not only it is a perfect and dark murder mystery involving a serial killer who kills children for fun and was never caught but it completely shifts the entire narrative by adding a very important Sci-Fi element known as 'Revival' and the biggest strength of this anime is that the 'Revival' element is actually very limited and it is not an easy get out of Jail free card for our main character Saturo Fujinuma. Saturo(29 tears old) is a struggling manga artist that has a very dark past in which, three of his classmates were killed by a serial killer back in his elementary school days(When he was only 11 years old).Saturo is a great main guy because he is not just a main character and infact he is not a character at all!He is a human,and a broken one too.He is an introverted guy and does not really care about other people and he does not really understand the emotions of other people.He feels guilty of the fact that he was not able to save his classmates back in elementary school days the events had very traumatic effect on his mental health to the point that he blocked the entire event without getting closure.It is almost as if he shut an entire part of his imagination and got himself trapped inside a bubble which effected his manga career and he pretty much blocked the people around him.All these improper qualities make him a very interesting and realistic character who is very believable.But his life completely changes when the killer from his past resurfaces and hence begins a very convoluted and dark game of cat and mouse.

The First 4 Episodes

The first 4 episodes are straight up masterpiece in terms of everything.The storytelling is phenomenal in these episodes as the anime quickly builds up all its important characters and sets up the threat of the serial killer and how dangerous he can be.These four episodes are very tightly paced and very tense and it is almost anxiety inducing to actually watch them.The feelings of a future looming threat is build up very beautifully and you all ways know that something bad is about to happen and by the end of the fourth episode,all of the tension is finally released as it ends with a shivering,scary,terrifying and gut wrenching cliffhanger.The rest of the remaining episodes are also good but they do not really hold that well compared to the first four episodes.

Child Abuse & Its impact on the Mental Health of a Child

The anime deals with a very sensitive and horrifying topic of child abuse and how it mentally breaks a child completely and how the mental breakdown pushes them away from the society.The maturity with which this part of the story is told is phenomenal.My emotions were getting the better of me as I was failing to hold them in.You know the writers did a phenomenal job when this plot is actually very disturbing to watch despite the fact that it is not really too graphic and does not really show any gore.We see a cute little child who is completely broken from the inside,a child who is living but at same time is dead from the inside,a child who has given up on life and does not see even a single ray of hope,a child who has no friends,a child who gets made fun of in school,a child who cannot fight back but most importantly a child who is no longer safe at home!
It is really scary to see the different phases of mental disruption of a child and kinda shows how difficult it is for children to reach out for help because they are just children and they are probably not even aware of what is happening and why it is happening and this anime shows all of it with complete maturity without glorifying it.

The Butterfly Effect

The concept of The Butterfly Effect are present throughout this anime.The anime really puts a lot of emphasis on choices and how even seemingly small choices have very large impact on upcoming incidents.You will always wonder how things would have gone by if Saturo did things differently and made different decisions and this creates a feeling of uneasiness and dread.

This anime was beautiful!It made me laugh but it also made my cry,it horrified me but it also gave me hope,it is dark and twisted but it also has a ray of light at the end of the tunnel,it has a Sci-Fi element of 'Revival' that is very important but at the same time it never overpowers Saturo or gives him too much advantage since the killer is as smart as Batman(no pun intended) .It was a proper murder mystery and was a complete roller coaster of emotions and had beautiful and strong lead character and really unique serial killer and I loved every moment of it and it is one of my favorite anime.And of-course the most important part,this anime has the best intro sequence ever!

Trailer(Japanese) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZzMOC-4k6M (spoilers in the comments)