Migi to Dali – 06

「誰が親鳥殺したの?」 (Dare ga Oyadori Koroshita no?)
“Who Killed the Parent Bird?”

Episode 06 of Migi to Dali lifts the veil that shrouds Eiji’s family as Migi and Dali do more investigation into their connections to their mother. But because Migi is currently the Hitori under the family’s watch, he must act as much like a toddler as possible if he’s going to be able to escape their household.

WELCOME TO THE FAMILY, SON

It’s hauntingly surreal to see the lengths that the brothers have to contend with in order to survive night after night in Eiji’s household. While Dali is off hiding in a holed-off part of the house and staving off dog kibble, Migi is forced to humor Eiji’s mother as she expects him to behave like he’s five years old.

It’s funny to see exactly how far Migi goes to lower Eiji’s mom Reiko’s guard by chomping on his toys and deliberately falling head-first onto the floor. The entire dinner scene was hilarious because of how much his naivety gets under everyone’s skin at the table. Migi is just rattling off incriminating questions once Reiko passes it off as part of his “asking” phase, and Dali is left reeling in exactly how rattled everyone got.

I also appreciated the tonal shifts that kept occurring throughout the episode as it teetered between comedy and thriller for the most part. For every goofy or unsettling thing that Migi is subjected to, there is the undercurrent of Eiji’s family becoming frightening and lethal if they don’t play along. Migi’s babbling in this episode became increasingly funnier once he realized being in-character meant just half-assing a drawn-out baby babble.

Likewise, something as funny as egging on the smart kid about whether he pees the bed winds up being terrifying once he tries to test Hitori’s resolve to stick with his ignorant toddler act.

PLAYING HOUSE

The freakiness amps up even further once Migi and Dali decide to spend their last night pretending to be a specter of their mother’s ghost. While no one in Eiji’s family is close to finding out who is behind her appearance, each of them has a unique response that paints a picture of their relationship with Metry.

Eiji’s father Akira has a very interesting response to seeing her phantom as he seems to treat her like she’s still around. On top of this, he is also highly affectionate as he holds her close and mourns her absence. It’s one of those details that immediately has me thinking that perhaps they got too close to each other and wound up getting caught by his wife. He was also the quickest to try to convince his wife not to try hunting after Metry in the house.

Speaking of Reiko, it’s easy to see why she’s earned the reputation of being the scariest member of the family. Everything from brokering Hitori into captivity to conditioning him into accepting the life of a toddler is some freaky stuff. But the real kicker is that she also leads Migi and Dali to believe she thinks Metry might still be alive. This is not a good thing as she is set to kill the phantom upon believing she’s out to grab something from their home.

But at the moment, it’s Eiji who has the most suspicion attached to him. He has the closest connection to Metry as a young boy in her care, and vividly remembers the missing button being in Hitori’s care. To make matters worse, he’s the only person in their family that immediately clocks the Metry phantom as a ghost, confirming that he knows for certain that Metry died.

It does make me wonder exactly what his role would be in her death if he distinctively knows for sure that she’s dead. He looks too young to have chased her in the snow with his covenant, so he either had been told in advance that she wouldn’t survive the night or was personally involved in a conspiracy to cover her death up. With Oregon Valley under surveillance by Eiji’s family, it’ll be scary to see exactly how far Migi and Dali will be able to investigate this before being back under the family’s watchful gaze.