"Octo: Kanjou Sousakan Shinno Akari" drama, episode four recap

 

 Air Dates: July 8th until September 9, 2022 on NTV  Thursdays at midnight

Episodes are 43 minutes in length, subs are being done by Kaizan Subs

Main Cast: Most of the action takes place at the East Kanagawa police station. We really only saw the top two characters in the first show so will be updating these bios.

Marie Iitoyo as Akari Shinno.... 28 year old detective who has been at the station for a year. The recaps will explain it better but Akari has this 'unique ability' to read people's emotions, she can do that by the colors coming out of their eyes which only she can see! Akari does come off as an introvert for outside she wears a hood and inside never looks at someone's eyes, that's because she doesn't want to know what their emotions are. At the age of thirteen her parents were murdered by a intruder at their home, that's when Akari got the ability to read emotions and since then her sister has been in the hospital.

Kodai Asaka as Ryo Kazehaya.... Akari's new partner but isn't what he seems to be. Kazehaya is actually a spy sent by a director named Hirayasu at the National Police, his mission is to spy on Akari and the rest of the staff at the East Kanagawa station. But he has taken a liking towards Akari and think they'll make for a solid team. The 'demotion' was because Kazehaya found his old boss dealing drugs and the upper brass covered it up.

Takashi Yamanaka as Kohei Kumokawa.... Deputy Chief at the station who really believes in Akari's talents which can't be used as evidence in court.

Eiichiro Funakoshi as Mamoru Hirayasu.... A director at the National Police Force and why has he sent Kazehaya to spy on the station?

Mikoto Hibi as Satoko Kitamura.... Female detective at the station, after four shows we really haven't seen enough of her.

Kouki Nishida as Takahiro Nanjo.... Was a male detective at the station but think we may not see him after the third episode. In that show Nanjo was forced to resign because of a stalking incident which took place a year ago at his old precinct.

Asami Usuda as Yuki Komoto.... Akari's psychiatrist and she knows everything about the way you can read emotions from others. Don't think she has this ability though and not sure why Akari has been visiting her for so many years. Could be because of her parents deaths plus to get advice on her unique talent of reading emotions.

Rena Matsui as Shiori Shinno.... Akari's 35 year old sister who we didn't see in this show but know she's in the hospital, has she been there since her parents were murdered? Think so which will be explained in the beginning.

 Guest Stars

Eri Tokunaga as Asami Sakumaki.... A nurse at the East Kanagawa hospital who has been charged with killing an elderly woman patient. However Asami confessed right off the bat and was the reason to cover up something else about the killing?

Yoneko Matsukane as Hanae Katsuragi.... The elderly patient who was killed but seems she had a terminal disease and didn't have much longer to live, did Asami do her a favor?

Harumi Shuhama as Kanna Katsuragi.... Daughter of the above woman who is in her forties. Kanna is a popular cook who has written some books and appears on many food shows but it seems the didn't care all that much about her dying mother.

Promo video for episode four

Previous recaps

Episode one .... Episode two

 

 Updated the bios a bit and as noted we may not see Nanjo again after what took place in the last episode. Wrote this and the above one up a few days ago but held on to them as not to get ahead of this drama whose episodes air on Fridays. Every show has gotten a bit better but the stories are veering away from what the theme of the drama was supposed to be. Which is of how Akari's unique talent for reading people's emotions was to solve these cases and it really only did in the first show. We do see her read people's emotions which are by the colors coming out of their eyes. So Akari does play a part in solving a crime but not a large one and it's mainly been because of the efforts of her new partner Kazehaya that these cases have been solved. This was an easier case for the new team as the suspected killer of an older woman confessed right off the bat!

 

 Before we get to this episode's case there was a short scene that began the show off and didn't even last two minutes but it raised a few questions. In the top two screenshots is a man named Hirayasu and have mentioned him quite a few times already but he's still a mystery. Hirayasu is a director at the National Police Organization and has sent Akari's new partner Kazehaya to spy on the East Kanagawa station with the emphasis on her! Hirayasu had worked with Akari's father fifteen years ago on the force, fifteen years ago are when her parents were murdered and Hirayasu was also at the parent's funeral. That second screenshot appeared to be a flashback from a few years ago and Hirayasu was congratulating Akari on becoming a detective. Also in that screenshot is her sister Shiori who is in a comatose state. So now I'm wondering if Kazehaya hasn't been sent not to spy on Akari but to make sure everything is fine with her, perhaps Hirayasu isn't the devious character we thought he was.

 On to the case which is about a woman of about 75 in age who had been killed at the East Kanagawa Memorial Hospital. Her name was Hanae, that's her in the third screenshot. The one below that was a video at the hospital which showed a nurse who wasn't supposed to be on duty coming out of Hanae's room, shortly after the alarms went signaling her vital signs had stopped. Arrested soon after was the nurse who had been in charge of the woman, she's in the bottom two screenshots and her name is Asami Sakumaki. Seems like this should be an easy case to solve as Asami has made it easy for Akari and Kazehaya.... she confessed to the crime immediately!!!! You can see her comment in the bottom screenshot and Asami at first seemed off her rocker as she really enjoyed killing someone, where do Akari and Kazehaya go from there?

 So obviously Akari's emotion reading wasn't needed to solve the case but perhaps to explain why Asami did the unforgivable deed. Happiness(yellow) was the color Akari could read from Asami's eyes during this first interrogation, maybe killing a person really did elate her. But towards the end of the questioning Anger(red) also began to appear which is when Akari and especially Kazehaya were probing a bit deeper into why the killing took place. What Asami had done was to slip into Hanae's room with a syringe and inject air into her IV which quickly did it's job, Hanae had been very sickly anyways. Finding the true Motive is now the pair's main objective, a nurse wouldn't just kill someone out of the blue for no reason. The only person that Akari and Kazehaya could interview was the woman above who is Hanae's fortyish in age daughter, Kanna.

 She's a popular cooking expert having written some books and often appearing on food shows. Kanna did appear on TV saying how upset he was with the killing and wants this woman Asami brought to justice but it did appear to Akari there's more to Kanna than meets the eye. Especially the eyes as Kanna didn't show any emotions of being sad for the death of her mother, the more Akari and Kazehaya probed the more it seemed Kanna was hiding something.... she was and it was very sinister! As mentioned a few times prior Kazehaya is a very efficient detective and it almost cost him his job in the last recap. He doesn't have any concrete proof but to him it seems Asami may not have planned this killing by herself, could she have been working with Kanna? To the daughter that notion was absurd as she says above but by now there's no doubt to Akari and Kazehaya there was much more to the case than met the eye, soon Kazehaya finally was able to find some key evidence. Plus during her second questioning Asami also denied she worked with Kanna and she was telling the truth.

 As mentioned it's the diligent work of Kazehaya that's mainly been responsible for solving the recent crimes which was the case in this show too. But Akari's ability to read emotions does play a part in things and what it's really done is to make the suspects open up a bit more about their crimes. There had to be a reason why Asami would take the life of a patient as she had always been a model nurse. There was a witness who had noticed Asami and Kanna in an argument a few weeks back, shortly after Kanna had asked for a new nurse for her mother.... because of what was said in that spat? For now Asami is mum on what took place but she'll soon reveal everything for us, now for the team of Akari and Kazehaya it's a trip to Kanna's house to have a talk with the daughter of Hanae. What Akari has noticed all along was how there were no emotions of sadness or anger about the death of her mother, that's very odd and she's still wondering if Kanna hadn't planned this death out with Asami.

 While at the house Akari 'accidentally' knocked over a small box, from it popped out a prescription for a Gastric medicine which Kanna quickly hid again. Upon some investigating about the drug Kazehaya has found out that while it's not lethal it does have side affects, especially for an elderly person as it can cause dementia! If I committed a crime wouldn't want Kazehaya to be the detective as he'll search under every rock though of course can't tell you 100% of what he did. But Kazehaya has found out that the mother Hanae was beginning to suffer from dementia and to him it couldn't be true, Kanna was giving her mother the drug?! Well it was true and as you can see above there is a name for what Kanna had been doing. She's a popular celebrity cook who had been telling her audience the horrible shape her mother was in and how Kanna was patiently working to make her better! Those were all lies and Kanna had been hoping to get sympathy from her fans for being such a loving daughter, to Kazehaya after corrupt law enforcement officers a person such as Kanna is the lowest of the low!

  Once again Asami was brought in for questioning, it'll be her final one before being sent to prison awaiting trial and does she finally want to open up about what really took place? Asami was told about the discovery of Kanna giving her mother Gastric medicine, did she know anything about that? Asami did and when she started to tell her story the floodgates opened. Yes, she did get into an argument with Kanna and more than once, it was because she kept wanting to bring snacks for her which were not allowed. One time Asami happened to knock over the box of snacks, she realized later on in those pastries were doses of Gastric and Asami knew it could cause dementia in older patients. She told the woman Hanae about the medicine and Hanae hadn't realized until then why the way her brain worked was rapidly going downhill, what could they do about it? Not very much according to Asami who really did care about Hanae and was a top notch nurse, Gastric appears to be a medicine which doesn't stay in your system long even though it causes such damage so there was no evidence against Kanna.

 But even so Hanae's condition was going down so quickly there was nothing that could be done to save her. In that top screenshot above Hanae had refused Asami's offer to go to the police, just after that she asked Asami to be the one that killed her! Hanae was in such pain from her terminal illness and Aasmi thought why let her suffer so badly for another month or so, the following night is when she injected her IV with a syringe of air killing the older woman who at least died in peace. That was Asami's story, she also told the pair of Akari and Kazehaya how she was abused by her mother growing up but not in a physical way. Asami tried to be a doctor but just couldn't pass the exams, she felt becoming a nurse would then please her mother. That wasn't so and Asami really despises this woman, so much that killing Hanae was a payback to her mother as it would humiliate her to no end. That's where the emotions of Happiness from Asami had been coming from, the Anger part was towards Kanna. So Asami was eventually led away to prison while Kanna got off free for her actions but as Kazehaya told her the guilt will be with her forever.

 So ends this recap and though I don't explain every detail these posts are hard to make any shorter. So while it's not going as I thought it would it's still been a decent drama which has gotten better with each show. Finished this up on Wednesday and published this on Friday, wanted to wait until the fifth episode aired so it won't be too long before the next pair of recaps. More than any other recent drama viewing the screenshots will be a big help in following the story.