Boku Dake ga Inai Machi: The Town Without Me

[Kraco]

Btw. why was Kayo so shocked when Satoru said "That´s because I chose not to lie to you"? Without the contect of knowing about Satoru´s real age, what´s so shocking about it? It´s cute, if anything.

Because they are both liars. Satoru were even when he was going through his life the first time through, so his special power alone doesn't matter. He has said he's always acting like somebody else in order to get along with people and not look like a social outcast (when he did stop acting after school as an adult, he became what he really is, a loner). That's why the hockey dude, for example, told him that he hates scumbags like that who underperform basically out of pity (since Satoru thought it would be unfair for a hockey player to lose to some random layman in ice skating).

It doesn't need to be mentioned why Hinazuki is a liar. Of course for her the reason is much bigger, but perhaps that gives her the perspective that stopping lying is a big deal. Not that Satoru still could tell her that he's a time traveller... They might be kids, but Haruhi is the only person who would immediately believe it.

[shinta|hikari]

Well, I'm pretty sure that's a very embarrassing line to say and hear regardless of age or situation anyway.

[KrayZ33]

I... I-I'm not sure if my heart is able to- .

Please, just let this show have a happy end.
What was that at the end (last 5 seconds). GAWD help me.

Show's still so good. I really wonder what will happen to Yuki.

[MFauli]

episode 4 is out
------------------------

Fuck everything, if Hinazuki is dead! :/

Oh god, if that´s the case, I hope Satoru gets some Steins;Gate like ability to re-try at will. Screw this. Omg, how happy she was at the birthday party. I want her as a pet and keep her forever, in a 100% non-sexual way. So cute. Sooo cute. Argh.

If she´s dead, then unless the murderer is a special kind of sick fuck, it´s gotta be her deadbeat father. She was at home, afterall.

Tbh I expected that other girl that stole the money to be killed in Hinazuki´s stead. And Satoru´s solution was half-assed either way: Saving Hinazuki from dying on that one day still meant that her murderer would be walking around free. There´s some guy out there with the urge of killing children. That needs to be taken care of to truly change the future.

Wah, fuck. I hate this so much right now. Can I please have a Hinazuki plushie? :/

[Kraco]

I'm really liking the moments when Satoru only planned to think something in his mind, yet ended up uttering it aloud. It's quite fascinating because usually I dislike such scenes due to the lack of realism (I reckon you need some kind of a brain disorder to do that in RL). Here they are very nice because it's always some embarrassing line that makes Hinazuki like him all the more.

Nothing less than a cliffhanger was to be expected from this episode. It was evident early on.

[shinta|hikari]

I want Kayo as a pet and keep her forever, in a 100% sexual way. So cute. Sooo cute. Argh.

I just hope Kayo isn't dead. But even if she did die, wouldn't Satoru's ability kick in this time like how it did for his mother even with the delay?

[MFauli]

Oh, what I forgot to include in my posting above: This episode made me wonder if there´s maybe something wrong with Satoru´s memory. Now, hear me out. I realize that it´s normal not to remember every day of your childhood. But it seemed weird that when you´re in a specific situation that you DO remember to some extent, that you just forget about what follows. Satoru was so fixated on Hinazuki, yet he forget that he met her in the museum originally, too? That scene felt as if some outside force was making him act a certain way, as if he had no choice.

It shouldn´t be THAT hard to think up alternate actions that don´t mimic the original past.

[shinta|hikari]

He wasn't fixated on her in the previous timeline, so most of those memories are fuzzy or gone. Not only that, memories are flimsy things anyway. People change and interpret them however they want, and usually that departs from what really happened.

[David75]

It was fairly obvious the happy end wouldn't comme so easily. After all he didn't switch to his present 29 years old self.
And I think Hinazuki isn't dead yet. Satoru needs to rack his adult brains a lot and think of ways to find and save her.
As said above, saving Hinazuki isn't enough, other girls need to be saved.
I also thought the other classmate could become the next target. Satoru feels like a pivotal element in the events.
The only question is what details matter so much in his 29 years old self they play a role when going back to his chilhood.
Why the long wait and why is it possible to act when he's still a child to everyone else ?

[Kraco]

It was fairly obvious the happy end wouldn't comme so easily. After all he didn't switch to his present 29 years old self.

What makes you think he will? As far as we know, he hasn't previously. The jumps have been so short earlier that once he solved the whatever issue, he was already back to the starting point objective time wise. Logic dictates the same applies here as well. In the first place, if he really manages to change history, it's possible his own history will change a lot. There would be nowhere to jump back to. If everything goes the luckiest route possible, looking at how well he gets along with Hinazuki, the new 29 years old Satoru might already be a father of a couple of kids. He can't very well simply jump to such a reality without knowing anything about it. He has to live up to it.

On the other hand, if this story is really cruel, Hinazuki won't even be a key factor for the current case. In the end he jumped because his mom was murdered. The case ought to be solved by catching the murderer before that particular murder happens. So, Hinazuki could be merely a single cog in the great machine he needs to unravel enough for the police (or some other factor) to deal with the criminal sufficiently. Hinazuki's death could serve as a step for him to reach that goal. Although I'd be really sad if that was the case.

[Ryllharu]

The trigger was the murderer returning to kill his mother, because she had seen him trying to abduct another child in the present.

Satoru was so fixated on breaking the timeline at the beginning by just changing the past, that he's missing the obvious. It's not saving Hinazuki or his mother, it's stopping the murderer at the beginning. It's the only explanation for why he was sent back so far. He will probably keep failing until he prevents the murderer from taking a victim at all.

It would be truly awful if he had to relive it all each time, and seeing his mother killed again just to try once more. I'm sure it will happen at least once over the course of the series, but I think it's too early for that. That's why I think Hinazuki isn't dead yet, but what he changed so far is only delaying the start of the chain. He has to find the murderer first. But now he has time to start looking for suspects.

Even if Hinazuki disappeared on March 1st, She wasn't found until much later when the snow melted, and they imply she was pretty easy to identify, so she wasn't decomposed that much. She was murdered much later than when she was abducted. Satoru has to stop the murder, the abduction can probably still happen any time.

edit:
I think he should be focusing on Jun next. He made for such an easy scapegoat for the murderer. That way, if he fails and ages back up to the present, there will be different clues to identify the actual murderer when a different scapegoat takes the blame.

[Kraco]

I think he should be focusing on Jun next. He made for such an easy scapegoat for the murderer. That way, if he fails and ages back up to the present, there will be different clues to identify the actual murderer when a different scapegoat takes the blame.

It's the famously incompetent Japanese police we are talking about. I bet the murderer didn't need to do anything at all for the police to arrest and accuse Jun. The cops just catch the very first person who seems plausible and then force a confession out of him and/or railroad the case through so that they can tell the public the serial killer has been caught and someone within the police forces gets a promotion. It's inconsequential if the real killer is still at large or not.

[David75]

It's still pretty difficult to know who's the murder. Jun might not be the murder, but could be a partner in crime.
I just hope the solution really has details in the episodes prior to the reveal.

I wonder, should Satoru get killed if his powers will transfer to someone else.

Thinking back to Kenya, it might be he's a leaper too, trying to save Hinazuki and the other girls. But it might be he failed several times already, explaining his tired/slightly contorted face.

[Ryllharu]

@Kraco: I'm more thinking that they'll have to work around an actual alibi that Jun has for the delayed start of the abductions. In the original timeline, there are eyewitnesses that see him sitting alone all "creepily" on the same night she disappeared. Since they might actually have to try a little harder, these new details might appear in the "10 Most Infamous Unsolved Cases!" book. The kidnapping-murders of these girls is a super famous case that still gets a lot of attention.

Any clues Satoru can gain from a failure if he jumps back again (and from the OP I think we can expect he will) will help him greatly the next time around.

@David: I'm kind of thinking it is more than one person as well. The potential abductor and the killer of Satoru's mom looked quite different. I can't believe that it is just a matter of him being dressed for work versus trying to be incognito while kidnapping kids.

Right now I'm wondering if it is a pair of brothers or something. The kidnapper being slightly less competent, and the other sibling murdering the kids to cover it up and not leave any witnesses. The kidnapper not having any interest in murdering, and the killer taking pleasure in covering the kidnapper's tracks.

Nevermind, they're clearly the same person and his mother recognized him.

[Kraco]

That would be kind of novel as far as I'm concerned, with psychopath stories not being my favourites.

[MFauli]

Well, if we wanna talk potential murderers:

First of all, it has to be somebody that makes it "exciting" to have him be the murderer. Which is why it´s not the teacher. After that one overly ominous scene, it´d be too obvious, thus boring. I´m not sure if they said anything about it, but was there anything implying that it had to have been an adult culprit? If so, Satoru´s friends aren´t an option, either. Hinazuki´s parents also fall under the "too obvious"-category. Yeah, they´re despicable sub-humans, but that´s all.

I think there´s ... hm, four possibilities atm:

- it´s actually Jun. Satoru firmly believes he´s not guilty, so him finding out the opposite would be very tragic and heart-breaking
- Hinazuki is the murderer. No idea, how she killed the other girls, but she´s the first to disappear, right? Would be rather "wtf"
- but speaking of "wtf": It could be Satoru himself. Maybe Satoru´s fuzzy memory is intentional, and he forgot about his own doings from a mental trauma. Again, the "how" is the big questionmark here. That would also explain why his mother was killed: Revenge
- a yet unkown perpetrator.

[Ryllharu]

Uhh...you're dumb.

Jun is on death row...but the kidnappings have still been happening, just lower profile. Satoru's mom recognized the kidnapper at the store when she was with Satoru, and vice versa. The two of them stopped it when Satoru jumped back without ever figuring out why. But his mother did figure it out. She might not know exactly what Satoru does, but she clearly recognized his reaction to having jumped. The kidnapper then killed her because he knew he had been seen. He smirked at Satoru because he knew that Satoru would be blamed for killing his own mother.

Satoru was not the one kidnapping kids in the present day. Same perp. Again, his mother figured it all out, but knew she couldn't officially report it because the statute of limitations had expired (btw, wtf Japan, murder has an 18 year statute of limitations!?). Stupid Civil Law countries. Common Law is obviously better.

[David75]

Back to the culprit:
Should Satoru prevent him/her from starting his crimes, on what basis can the culprit be stopped if there are no crimes they can be punished for ? Or if it's only a short time jail crime ?
Unless the culprit is totally disabled (death, or near vegetable state), just stopping the 3 crimes we know of isn't enough.

[shinta|hikari]

Naruto Punch of Friendship.

[MFauli]

Uhh...you're dumb.

Jun is on death row...but the kidnappings have still been happening, just lower profile. Satoru's mom recognized the kidnapper at the store when she was with Satoru, and vice versa. The two of them stopped it when Satoru jumped back without ever figuring out why. But his mother did figure it out. She might not know exactly what Satoru does, but she clearly recognized his reaction to having jumped. The kidnapper then killed her because he knew he had been seen. He smirked at Satoru because he knew that Satoru would be blamed for killing his own mother.

Satoru was not the one kidnapping kids in the present day. Same perp. Again, his mother figured it all out, but knew she couldn't officially report it because the statute of limitations had expired (btw, wtf Japan, murder has an 18 year statute of limitations!?). Stupid Civil Law countries. Common Law is obviously better.

None of that excludes anybody I mentioned from being the culprit. Almost two decades between then and now. The murderer now doesn´t have to be the same as back then.
And the mother most definitely has NOT figured out anything about anybody being the murderer - IF SO, she would have reported it or otherwise made it public. It´s absolutely laughable to claim she kept quiet just because of some law expiring. She´s portrayed as a responsible civilian, so warning people about this sicko that, if you´re right, just got lucky about the law expiring by now, would have been the least she would have done. ALSO, if the law expired, there would have been no reason for him to kill the mom, eh? If it´s indeed the same culprit, that only put himself in danger again for another 18 years.