Children of a Lesser God Recap: Episode 4

Episode 4 of Children of Lesser God is just as creepy as the rest. Actually, this episode might be even creepier than all the others. I couldn’t even look at the screen during several parts. This episode covers serial killers, cults, end of the world stuff, superstitions, and creepy small islands off the coast of Korea. It is so creepy. More background is revealed in this episode as we finally find out what Jae-in’s sister was researching before she died, we just don’t know why she was researching it. And we start to understand the relationship between the prosecutor and the killer. The prosecutor gives me the heebie jeebies. Arghhh, this entire show is just so creepy!

Characters: Shorthand Character Chart
How to Watch: On Demand Korea (N&S America)

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CHILDREN OF A LESSER GOD RECAP: EPISODE 4
OPENING
We open at the scene where the serial killer just died. KD saw a vision after she touched him, she saw that at the moment when JI’s sister died, she wanted to give him something. A policeman comes up and says they should leave if they are done. But JI yells at him, he told him not to shoot him! He could have arrested him without killing him! The killer didn’t even put his finger in the gun. But the policeman just shoots the gun two times and puts it in the killer’s hands. JI tells him that he is fabricating the scene! But the policeman just says to remove JI from the scene and to clean up the scene.

JI walks off and we cut to KD drawing something. Ji asks her what she is drawing, she says it is a rabbit, or perhaps a duck. It was animal-like. This is what his sister wanted to give to him. It was a book. “A rabbit or a duck” It is the kind of drawing that can be both. JI knows what she is talking about, it is either a rabbit or a duck and once you fix your idea about it, you are unable to see the other one. So, this is what she saw? KD nods so they go back to his old apartment.

APARTMENT
They go to KD’s old apartment which is still preserved as if he is still living there. It is crazy dusty inside though. JI says he hasn’t come back in 2 years, but he owns this house. His parents died a long time ago, so he only had his sister. JI walks around the house and remembers seeing his sister’s death. He tries to be okay, but he isn’t really okay. But KD goes around talking about all the plugs and all that in the house and all the bills.

JI tells her that he is in a sad mood right now, but KD tells him that he shouldn’t be trapped in the past, it is time to face the current world. JI says he was running away from this place for two years. He opens her bedroom door and starts looking something, but it isn’t there, did it disappear? He is looking for a birthday present that he got her when she became a reporter.

Flashback to him giving her the pen. She jokes that he spent a lot on her. He wonders if she will be able to get married because he couldn’t buy her a new face. He also buys her the book with the duck-rabbit and writes her a note: happy birthday, beauty dies early so you will live happily forever. But he gave her the book because the truth is different from what you see, there is truth behind the surface and he wants her to see the truth that you cannot see.

JI thinks back to the killer (Apollo) and says he has to look for something.

REPORTER
JI asks one of the reporters what Su-in was researching before she died. The friend says she was looking for a person that was lost 22 years ago. But the friend thinks it would be a miracle if she found a person lost for 22 years. Su-in says she wants to find her and find out if she is alive or dead. The friend wants to know why she is looking for her and Su-in says this child might open a Pandora’s box. JI is interested in this child, so the reporter tells him that the sister went to the countryside to do an interview/investigation about her.

Meanwhile, KD looks at the CCTV and sees that the killer looked at the CCTV and showed the key in his mouth. Then we see that the cops will have a meeting around the case.

Cut to JI trying to put all the clues together about this new clue he has with his sister and the duck-rabbit image. He wonders who can control a crazy serial killer? Perhaps there was a deal, the serial killers’ DNA was switched with a street person. He thinks back to when they had to let the killer go, two years ago. So, it wasn’t a mistake, it was a deal. So why did he come back 2 years later? That must be why the cops killed him.

KD runs up to him at that moment and tells him that he has to look at this. She shows him the USB and JI starts to look at it. But KD gets an urgent call at that time, they are going to have a meeting about the case and will blame Han Sang-gu (Apollo) for everything. KD and JI run to the meeting and tell them that they shouldn’t have the news report. Something is fishy, they don’t just kill people. JI shows them the image of the CCTV. It wasn’t an accident, someone helped him escape and that is the person who helped him kill his sister.

All the cops think this is just his imagination. But someone tells him to shut up. A person went into the interrogation too, who wants to kill him the most. Actually, JI pointed a gun at him, too. Then the conversation turns to Ah-hyun. What about her? They ask if they watch the news or not…the victim is awake and says that the killer stabbed her. JI wants to know why she would say that, it is clear that AH stabbed her from the evidence. Two people here should know who is behind all this. He stares at them all and then leaves.

The police continue to prepare for the briefing. They tell the news that Han Sang-gu is dead after trying to escape. He threatened the police which is why they shot him.

Cut to the college woman looking at the news in the hospital. A man tells her that she will have all the money she needs in the bank for medical school. They will also continue to support her after graduation. She says she wants to open her own clinic after graduation and mentions that it is good to be a chaebols daughter, she can do this to her so simply and get away with it.

PROSECUTORS OFFICE
We see the chaebol daughter, AH, talking to Ha-min. He is questioning her about the cause for her abduction, but she says she doesn’t want to talk about it. He tells her that she has to answer these questions as a formality. He asks her who stabbed the college girl and she says it was her. But he writes Han Sang-gu. He asks what the situation was, and she says that it was a game on who will survive. She picked up the knife…if one can survive then her life is more precious than that poor girl. She thinks Han Sung-gu is doing everything that he experienced. Ha-min says people learn to hurt others while they are getting hurt. AH says that must be why he is doing this…(what)….not looking at her straight.

KD and JI show up at the prosecutor’s office just as AH is leaving. JI starts talking to her, how did she buy that girl. AH says she gave her a future, but it doesn’t mean that she did anything. If he wants to know, then he needs to be born again with rich parents. She leaves smugly, and JI goes into the prosecutors’ office with KD and HM. JI wants to know why HM didn’t use the evidence with the blood. The prosecutors say that math was there, so he only understood half of what was there. The blood mark might be big evidence in another case, but it is different in this case. Both people are the prime suspect, so that blood mark as evidence was employed in 2008 and he went through all the cases. It is a rare case where it is picked as prime evidence, so bring him something else if he wants to put her in jail. HM tells JI that they are on different sides, but JI likes his style. HM says JI is the super genius policeman that failed after his family member died. He only has his self-pride now which is why he doesn’t even know what his position is. Sorry, you are not my style. HM tells JI that he wants to talk to the policewoman alone. JI tells HM that he knows this case is deeper rooted than he initially thought and leaves the office chuckling.

HM asks KD what the killer wanted her to remember and she says that he wanted her to remember a name…Apollo. The affects HM, he wants to know why he told her to remember the name, but she doesn’t know.

JI AND STREET FRIENDS
Then we cut to JI ripping up all his information and everything from his makeshift office and leaving. He goes to talk to his street friends and tells them that his sisters killer died. They tell him that he suffered a lot. A halmoni gives him some veggies and another man gives him his favorite clothes (a sparkly jacket). JI says that isn’t his style…really, it isn’t his style. But the man just puts it on him and they tell him to give them a speech. JI starts to talk about going to the health center and the Korean economy…but the people just tell him to take those things and leave.

JI speaks with the shaman man separately. If JI needs anything then just tell him, they have nothing, but they have a wide network. He should also be careful of water, don’t go near water okay?

PROSECUTOR
Someone gives HM all the information he asked for. We find out that he asked for all of Kim Dan’s information. Perhaps he is starting to remember her?

POLICE ACADEMY
JI meets with the head of the police academy, it looks like they were close. They talk about the mess that JI is in and how no one believes JI. The friend says that the police should protect their own organization and to protect something people can do anything. The man says he is old and out of fashion, then he asks JI if he has any feelings about his sister’s case. JI says he only has an idea, Su-in was investigating something, but he doesn’t know exactly what it is. He wondered if he knew anything since she went there almost every day to eat with him. He says it looked like she had something going on, but she didn’t tell him.

PROSECUTOR AND KD
The prosecutor is at the cremation of the killer and KD is there as well. They both wonder why they are each there and HM says the killer doesn’t have anyone and has no money and on paper it is not a funeral, just removing the dead body. KD says people treat him like an object? HM says he is a killer, but he is also the remains of a human being, that is why he goes there sometimes. He wants to know why she is there.

KD says she actually doesn’t know why she is there now. She can’t forgive him ever (flashback of her holding his hand as he died and him saying Popeye is waiting). She wonders what that was as the cremation starts to take place. The cremation finishes and the ashes are dumped in a designated area in the building.

HM and KD leave and KD tells him that he looks more humane now since he attends these funerals. HM says he was super-duper poor when he was little. It starts to snow so HM says, when he sees snow he is always hungry because it looks like rice powder. KD thinks the same thing, she hopes it would be rice. She holds her hands out to hold the snow and HM asks her if she would like to have a meal with him one day. He looks sincere as he asks her this, but we don’t see her answer, we just see them looking at each other for a moment.

POLICE
A man walks in, in a complete police uniform. It is JI and he is fully decked out in his police clothing. I don’t know what it is about this, but this looks hilarious. JI goes right up to the head and says he has an order to go back to the station as of today. His resignation letter was never accepted.

Flashback to JI telling his father-like sunbae that he wants to go back to the police department, can he support him? The policeman says it goes against his principle of no school-money relationships….but, his resignation letter was not accepted, just in case.

Cut back to JI in this outfit that looks so funny. He says he wants to reinvestigate the serial killer case. Work, work, work! Everyone leaves because this situation is ridiculous. Someone tells him not to do too much. JI tells him that when dogs are too starved, they don’t care about poop meat. He will do it. He sits at his desk.

KD looks at him like he is a pitiful person? He wants to know why she is looking at him and she says that he looks like a different person. JI says people tell him that he has the face of a person who can’t be refused. But he wishes that she distinguishes personal life and work life. She says that she wanted to tell him that he doesn’t have a good liver because his face is so yellow.

He asks her for the case for the serial killer and she brings him everything she has. But he thinks, this is it? She tells him that she will look in the archives. But then KD comes back and says someone already took all his archives and things and went to burn them all at the church.

KD and JI run to the church to keep all the things from getting burnt. They get there right in time to try and put the fire out. Lots of items are burned, but they discover the book that JI gave to his sister. He tells Su-in that this is the book that he gave her as a present. He flips through it and we see the note about a missing kid, then JI remembers that his sister was looking for a lost little girl.

On the note it says,

I found Byul, Popeye
– Apollo

JI thinks back to what the killer said. Then KD pulls out the image of the child and KD says that is her. JI wonders why the girl that the sister is looking for has the same face as you. Also, how did you know the name Apollo and who is Popeye? Who are you?

She says she doesn’t know what is going on. He asks her if she was lost when she was 7 and she says no at first, but then she says, actually I don’t remember anything.

THREE BAD GUYS
The three influential people meet each other in a tiny street restaurant. They talk about the preparation for the presidential election and the politician says he is just a politician. Having a dragon dream doesn’t mean a king will change, he is just following the citizens wish. Do-gyu wanted to take him to a nice place, not this old place. But the candidate says old places have nice tastes and this place is 40 years old. He doesn’t like a lot of change. Dg takes this in. And the other guy says he learned his lesson.

The pastor asks how the chairman’s daughter is and the chairman says that she is fine because of her. The dead girl has a crazy brother though. Chun Jae-in from the police academy. He followed the killer for two years and went back to the police department. The candidate says there is a sea cucumber who throws up his intestines when someone threatens it. While the enemy eats the intestines, the sea cucumber leaves. The bible says that you need to keep your mouth closed to save your life. Whoever opens their mouth wide will die. The pastor speaks banmal with this rich chairman and tells him to be careful with his mouth.

KD’S HOME
KD looks through all her old pictures at home. Her father wants to know what she is doing, so she tells him of what happened. The father thinks that picture might just be a look alike. He never lost her, not once. KD says that is probably true. But she wonders why appa put boy clothing on her all the time, did he want to have a boy? The father says there was a rumor, if you raise a child as a different gender than they will grow up healthy. She was always sick, so he tried everything. KD wants to hear about it and the father says KD used to throw up all her milk and he lost the album of her when he was little. They only have one picture of her as a baby.

KD laughs but she wonders if the lost album is a coincidence or not.

KD AND JI
KD tells JI that this kid must be a doppelganger, that explains it. She says they have a doppelganger app so she can find them now. But JI thinks she is just crazy and starts to mock her about it, why is she so superstitious. She writes his name in red (meaning he will die) and he grabs it right away, don’t do that! They start to talk about the $50k reward for the missing child and say that this was a lot of money back then. The parents must have been rich.

They decide to drive to where his sister went which is forever away from where they are right now. They finally go to the local police station in the area where the man there helps them find what they are looking for. But then they find out that the police report they had is missing. The policeman also died several years ago. JI wants to find the mother, can the local policeman check that? He tells them to wait a moment as he leaves to check. He comes back with the information; the mother was on a tiny island.

JI asks the man if he saw a girl reporter asking for the same things and he says he remembers her, she went to the island as well. JI goes to the island and thinks back to what his sister wanted to tell him all those years ago. But he gets seasick as the boat rocks on the waves. They finally dock at the island

JAMI ISLAND DAY 1
JI hops on land and starts throwing up immediately. He drinks some water and the people on the island ask him to help them carry some things off the boat. But JI falls several times as he tries to carry all the heavy items. The ajumma’s have no problem though. JI asks them if they know about a woman on the island. But they also say that she couldn’t have a baby. Her husband died in a vegetable state, so she shouldn’t have a baby, that is why she had an affair and left.

KD pulls out the photo of the girl they are looking for and the woman say that they don’t know that girl. But they tell him where the woman used to live, and he has 3 hours to find what they want before leaving. They say the island isn’t touristy, so they will have a hard time there. JI says he will be okay he has had a hard life (living on the streets) and they leave. The ajummas joke that JI is hitting on KD. KD says he said that he told them that just to see how they would respond. He tells her not to look back at them. Then we see that the women’s jovial laughter turns hard as they stare at these newcomers.

EMPTY HOUSE
KD and JI find the empty house and start to walk around it. It doesn’t look like this person was rich enough to afford a 50k reward. KD finds some books that are all about cults and the end of the word. She wonders what they should do since they don’t have the police report. They keep looking around the place and find out that there are a lot of empty houses around there. He looks around them all then he tells KD that they should leave.

JI accumulated a lot of trash, so he took all the trash with them and looked through it all. All the trash belonged to the 90’s so they think something must have happened on this island. Then a scary looking guy with a rifle walks past them and JI asks if he has a license for it. The man wants to know what of it and JI says he is a policeman to the man says they have wild hogs around.

Meanwhile, KD has found a woman nearby and wants to ask her a few questions. This woman wants to know if KD came back, child? Why did she come back now? She will be a shaman and accept the gods soon, she shouldn’t go out like that. KD wants to know if this woman knows her and she says, of course, she knows her. But another man shows up then and asks if they want to stay at their meenbak? His mother has dementia and just says that she knows everyone. They ask him how many people live there, did a lot of people leave the island? He says he came there after IMF in 1997 and he heard that all the farmland got destroyed, that is why they all left.

They go inside the meenbak and look around, they will be sleeping there tonight. The man gives her some towels and she thanks him for it, but then we see a note fall. The note says that they should leave this island right now.

KD shows the note to JI, they can’t leave the island though because the last ship already left. Then some people come up and say that the town mayor invites them to eat with them. They all sit to eat and drink together, but JI says that he can’t drink (maybe he suspects something?). But KD drinks it. KD wants to flip the fish, but one of the ajummas stops her, she says people never flip fish on an island because it means that the ship will flip. They are very superstitious, almost like a religion, old fishermen are like that. Then they start to talk about other superstitious things, like how today is the day of death.

JI searches all the superstitious things on his phone and hears the women says they hide their shoes or a ghost will come back and all those things. They say it is scary right? JI starts to drink the wine right away. He gets drunk and his hand starts trembling. He looks super drunk as he stumbles into his room, but he sees someone stealing his shoes. He thinks back to one of the superstitions that one of the ajummas said…if someone steals shoes, it means someone will die in the family. He freaks out and yells, ghost, ghost, ghost!!!!! He yells that a ghost took his shoes! As KD comes in.

KD starts looking for it and they both see the ghost, KD says it is there it is the ghost!! He picks up something and they walk around to where they saw the ghost. It is so spooky as they walk around outside looking for it. Then KD pulls back a curtain and they see the halmae from before with the shoes.

They take the halmae back inside and make sure she is fine. But before they leave the halmae tells them that they are all punished by God. KD wonders who? The halmae tells her that those people talked about the end of the world all the time and they all died. JI asks her if she knows the child from the photo and she says that is Byul. Her grandmother was the best shaman in the village. She was so good, they could even avoid the sea waves if they followed her. The halmae wants to know where the girl is and the halmae says that Sul-hee is…

But then some of the townspeople come in and ask what is going on. JI says she came to his room while he was sleeping so they brought her back. KD and JI leave, and the man comes out as well. He asks if his mom said anything about judgment day and the punishment from the gods. It drives him crazy. He says he can’t tell them all the details, but he should leave this island right away. KD asks if he wrote the note and he says, yes.

But then someone yells at him and tells him that a light is off, so he checks it out right away.

We cut to JI in his room, his cell phone died so he starts to charge it. Meanwhile, KD starts to have a nightmare in her room where she is stepping on blood. She thinks this is that scene again. She knows it instantly and she shouldn’t look back. But she looks back and sees her appa. He tries to choke her, and she wakes up holding her own neck.

JI looks for something about the island on his phone, but he doesn’t have a signal all of a sudden. Outside, we see that someone cut the internet line. While inside, KD looks at the rain falling outside.

KD – I started to realize after visiting this island that we are not visiting this island, but that the island is calling me.

JI thinks, if the ships stop then this island will be a closed-off place.

Cut to the halmae dead(?) on the beach.

Fade Out

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