Dear Child – Season 1 Episode 4 Recap & Review

Rules

Episode 4 of Dear Child begins during happier times. This is Jasmin during her regular life, getting dressed and leaving her house. She goes for a job interview at an advertising agency and seems to make a good impression. The man from the interview tells her she’ll get a call the next day. In the parking lot, someone walks up behind her and attacks. Once she’s subdued, he puts her in the trunk of a car.

At present, Jasmin looks in a mirror and dabs ointment on her face. She still hears the man’s voice in her head and has to shake herself out of it. Her father Ulrich enters and helps her pack. The doctor comes as well and tells her fourteen days is too early to leave. But Jasmin insists she’s fine.

On the drive back home, her father talks about people Jasmin knows but she isn’t interested in hearing from them, even her ex-boyfriend, Kai, who cheated on her. Her father asks her to come live with him but she refuses. When he tries to bring up what happened to her, she says she doesn’t want to talk about it.

Gerd meets Aida in the forest near the house. They’ve found the remains of a person —more precisely, a skull. The rest seems to have been consumed by wild boars. Karin Beck is driving when she hears a news report about the body. She calls Gerd for confirmation but he tells her he doesn’t know whether it’s Lena yet.

Ulrich drops Jasmin off at her apartment. Someone knocks on her door. It’s a policeman from the area who informs her that they will be around in case she needs help. Jasmin tells her father she will be fine and goes upstairs. Somebody watches her from a car. In her apartment, she keeps hearing the man’s voice. She then removes the shard of glass Hannah gave her and looks at it.

Karin goes home to find Matthias watching the news about the body found in the forest. She admits she thinks it’s Lena. Matthias breaks down.

Aida finds Gerd sitting on his own in the forest and tries to comfort him. She hands him a mock-up of what the dead man must have looked like. Aida thinks there are more perpetrators but Gerd doubts the theory. When Aida ignores a call from a family member, Gerd advises her to not. When he leaves, Aida notices the strip of pills that fell behind.

At Benedikt’s clinic, Hannah and Jonathan learn how to use the stairs. When Jonathan gets scared, Hannah whispers to him that he won’t be able to come home with them once ‘Dad’ comes to pick them up. He breaks down in tears and Hannah once again tells herself she did all the right things. Nearby, a bespectacled boy in a wheelchair watches it all.

Ruth visits Hannah and gives her a gift, a book titled Fairy Tales from 1001 Nights. They go outside to read and Hannah shows the book to the nearby security camera, showing off her gift. Hannah tells Ruth that her grandfather visits every day and will take her home. Not Jonathan, though.

When Ruth asks who Hannah was showing the book to, she says she was showing her father. He’s watching through the camera to ensure they are following the rules. If they follow the rules, everything is fine. If you don’t, you’re punished. At her apartment, Jasmin waits till the clock strikes exactly 6 pm to eat her food. When Hannah goes back in, Ruth calls Aida. But somebody indeed seems to be watching from the camera.

The coroner tells Aida and Gerd that the skull is not Lena Beck. It’s another woman but the hair tie she was wearing had a couple of Lena’s hairs. This woman died 15 months ago. Jasmin was taken 5 months ago. The detectives gather that somebody else had to be there for the 10 months in between.

They decide to search for other missing women. Aida thinks Gerd might be too close to the case. She gives him the pills she found and says she knows a friend who takes them.  

Gerd gives the news to Karin and Matthias. They assume that Lena is dead, seeing as she is the first of all these women. They’re also frustrated that the perpetrator hasn’t been identified. Gerd retaliates and describes the task force that has been relentlessly working. He shows Matthias the mock-up of the dead man but he doesn’t recognise him.

Ruth comes back to her house to find that the electricity is out. When she flips all the switches in the fuse box, she hears a sound in another room. She goes to investigate.

Jasmin wakes up at exactly 7 am. We see a flashback where the kids are hungry but are waiting for their father, who seems to be away for a while. Jasmin splits a chocolate bar between them and then plays pretend with them as if they’re going on an airplane. Back in her apartment, Jasmin frantically dyes her hair brown.

During breakfast, Matthias tells Karin that he’s taken time off work. He tells Karin to meet Hannah but Karin can’t bear of thought of seeing her, much less living with her. She reminds her of Lena too much.

Benedikt and Aida come to see Hannah and Jonathan. Aida shows Hannah the mock-up of the dead man and she says it’s her father. But it turns out, she calls all the men Aida shows her, her father. Aida asks if she was ever on her own and Hannah says they were alone for eight breakfasts after which their mother came back again. Meanwhile, we see Nurse Ruth lying dead on the floor of her house.

Jasmin’s neighbour leaves groceries by her door. She says Jasmin’s father left an envelope with money and a list. Jasmin opens the door to quickly grab them and then slams the door shut again. The bag is full of all the things she had back at the house. Including the chocolate bars and the box of bleach.

While meeting Hannah, Matthias asks her if Lena ever said anything about him. She says Lena told her they are the best grandparents there could be. Aida is alerted to Ruth’s death. It looks accidental but Ruth had tried getting in touch with Aida the day before, which makes her suspicious. So, Gerd goes to see Jasmin who hides the bag of groceries.

Gerd asks Jasmin if there is only one man or more. She insists there is only one. When Gerd shows her the reconstructed photo of the man, she remembers — he’s not the perpetrator, but the driver who hit her with his car. She remembers he was going to call her an ambulance but then was struck from behind by somebody else.

The voice in her head gets the better of her and Jasmin lies to Gerd. She says he is the perpetrator. Meanwhile, the actual criminal is buying a new stuffed cat and a snow globe from a store.

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The Episode Review

This is a really good episode, primarily because of Jasmin’s trajectory. She goes from a victim who is struggling to bring back any semblance of her regular life to caving to the voice in her head. It just goes to show how powerful such brainwashing can be and the show is doing a great job of depicting her trauma.

The kids continue to be sufficiently creepy. Hannah is clearly set in her ways and knowing her ulterior motive makes everything she does a little unsettling. Jonathan, on the other hand, shows a bit more humanity. This again, is an interesting change in the story. Maybe Jonathan will break out of the brainwashing first?

A stand-out scene is the flashback involving Jasmin playing pretend with the kids to distract them from their hunger. The entire thing is shot quite well and gives you the sense of the escape all three of them need. The multiple perpetrators and the reveal about the dead man actually being the car driver is another brilliant ending to an extremely engaging episode. Looking forward to the last leg of the show!

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You can read our season 1 review of Dear Child here!