Summary
The students consider their options in the fourth episode, landing several of them in jeopardy, while the carnage continues to spill out into the streets.
This recap of All of Us Are Dead season 1, episode 4 contains spoilers.
If there’s one group of people I really wish would fall victim to a zombie attack, it’s social media influencers, so the opening of this episode gave me my wish somewhat, following a braindead videographer as his quest for clicks leads him directly into mortal peril. Speaking of mortal peril, as Cheong-san speculates with On-jo that his mother is probably out there selling chicken, Gyeong-su and several other zombies are eating her on the lawn outside. As she’s feasted upon, she sees the helicopter that arrived at the tail end of the previous episode fly overhead.
All of Us Are Dead season 1, episode 4 recap
The chopper doesn’t matter, it seems — it just flies off, leaving the students alone to discuss what just happened with Na-yeon and Ms. Park. When there’s a lull in the conversation, they all realize they need the bathroom. This seems like a minor issue, but it’s worth thinking about. After some ridiculous suggestions from Dae-su, it’s On-jo, echoing her father’s advice to separate one’s bathroom from their bedroom in a survival situation, that hits on the idea to create a toilet in the recording studio. In a smart bit of juxtaposition, we see her father doing exactly the same thing with the stranded city councilmen.
Speaking of On-jo’s father, he has an interesting conversation with one of the politicians when he tries to leave in order to save On-jo. As she says, people like them have it hardest during crises, because they have to save the most people, not the people most precious to them. It’s hard to say, at the moment, if she’s really speaking on behalf of the greater good or her own wellbeing after having seen his usefulness, but it’s worth a thought.
As the carnage continues to spread and drive further wedges between the students, we also check back in with Mr. Lee and get some more justification for his actions. He first learned how badly Ji-sun was being bullied after he tried to kill himself, and from there he saw how ineffective the system was at dealing with the issue. The school wanted him to play it down to protect the school’s reputation, and all the while the bullying got worse. He pressed Ji-sun to fight back, but he didn’t have it in him. Realizing he couldn’t change the system, Mr. Lee instead endeavored to change his son. He created a monster, and that monster is now making everyone pay for their complicity.
You can tell that Detective Jae-ik sees some of the logic in what Mr. Lee is saying, but he also thinks that there are some things that should be paid for in life, not with death, and he correctly assumes that Mr. Lee wanted to change the world, not watch it die. When they leave the interrogation room in an effort to evacuate and discover the police station has been overrun with the undead, Mr. Lee is confronted with the fruits of his labor for the first time. He sacrifices himself to save Jae-ik, imploring him to retrieve his laptop from the school science lab — it might hold the key to a solution.
It’s worth rounding up some disparate threads before we continue. Up on the school’s rooftop, Eun-ji and Cheol-su are surveying the devastation as they have been for a couple of episodes now, mostly happy about the students who have relentlessly tormented them meeting a grisly fate. Gwi-nam is unfortunately still alive and manages to fight his way to the principal’s office, and in a downstairs bathroom, Ha-ri, the school’s archery team captain, sets off — with a reluctant Mi-jin in tow — to find her brother, who is one of the juniors upstairs.
Meanwhile, the kids consider their options. Pretty soon, they’re going to have dehydration to contend with. They have no idea what’s happening outside, the extent of the crisis, or whether anyone is coming to save them. Do they wait, run, or get out? The computer has been thrown out of the window, of course, but that isn’t the only one in the building. There will be access to the internet via one of the phones in the teacher’s office, so that’s where they’re going to head next. Eun-ji and Cheol-su make the decision to move, too, since as part of Gwi-nam’s extortion scheme, he scheduled a post on Cheol-su’s social media to automatically publish Eun-ji’s nudes at 9 am unless he paid him off, and she can’t allow that to happen, even with everything else going on.
As Su-hyeok and Cheong-san make their way to the teacher’s office, they hear Eun-ji screaming in the corridor outside, since she roamed right into a pack of zombies who all tore chunks out of her. After they get a taste, though, they seem not to want another. The boys find her smashing up all the confiscated phones in the office, presumably unaware that this wouldn’t actually stop the photos from being published. As she continues to smash the devices, one skitters away, and Cheong-san dives to retrieve it. Eun-ji spots him, though, and goes ballistic, drawing all of the nearby zombies to their location. Su-hyeok is able to fight his way back to the window, but Cheong-san, who manages to grab a phone, has to run into the corridor.
In the city council building, On-jo’s father manages to stave off some zombies using a hose, battling his way up onto the roof. He buys time for the others to get there, though, and seemingly gets bitten in the process, though his elbow pad might have saved him. It’s left deliberately unclear for now.
Meanwhile, Cheong-san sprints into the principal’s office and finds Gwi-nam tying him up. Cheong-san starts filming on the phone he recovered, threatening to send the video straight to the police, but when he pushes Gwi-nam too far, the student slashes the principal’s throat. He immediately rounds on Cheong-san, trying to take the phone off him, but he’s able to flee. Gwi-nam, though, throws the knife at his retreating back, and as the episode ends, the blade embeds itself in Cheong-san.
You can stream All of Us Are Dead season 1, episode 4 exclusively on Netflix.
