Detective Conan 23
July 24, 2008
It’s a real shame that I’m still running a volume behind on this series. I still like it a lot, but I’m definitely a lot less enamored with it than I was initially, and I’m just sort of settling into a comfortable routine with things.
There’s one case that takes up most of the volume, and it takes up six chapters, which is sort of unusually long. Unfortunately, it was hard to follow, and the logic at the end didn’t really make that much sense to me since too many elements were drawn in and it quite literally could have been anybody. I mean, everything at the end made sense… but I don’t know, it just didn’t feel quite like a Detective Conan case. Plus, Heiji showed up again, and I don’t really care for him that much. It’s one thing to accept that Ran, Kogoro, and Conan are always at the scene of the crime, it’s another thing entirely to accept that someone from across the country happens to be there about half the time, too.
The plot of the case isn’t bad, though. On a private liner, there are ten people who are let onto the boat. Very quickly, a link between the one of the passengers and the ringleader of an old robbery/murder is established. Just as quickly, he’s eliminated, and it becomes clear that someone else on board the boat was also in on the old robbery. Heiji is taken out in spectacular fashion at one point.
The first case was a much simpler Detective Boys mystery that I wound up liking a lot. While the kids are watching a movie in a theater scheduled to be torn down the next day, the new owner, who’d been bullying the staff, seems to hang himself in front of the projector in the middle of the movie. Conan basically has to prove that the man didn’t commit suicide.
The third story starts out with a much-appreciated self-referential joke, then goes on to become a race against time for a man who’s chained to a toilet with a police officer.
It was an okay volume. I’ve had better, and I definitely could have used… I don’t know, a few more references to the plot, or maybe even some Shinichi/Ran, but such is the nature of the series.
July 31, 2008 at 2:06 am
Okay volume for me as well….I think sometimes Conan gets a bit too convoluted.
But anyway…like you, I’m pretty passive on it right now, and am just waiting for the plotlines, which will be coming in…about ten more volumes.
But anyway, it’s pretty good and I have a lot of emotions and time and energy invested in Detective Conan so no way I’m going to drop it at any time in the year it’ll take to get it out.
July 31, 2008 at 10:15 pm
Yeah, you said it. I don’t think there’s anything the series itself could do at this point that would make me stop reading it. It’s got its formula, and I like the formula, and even if it uses it on every page of 60 volumes, it’s good enough for me. It’s unfortunate the plot comes second, but I guess that’s just how it rolls.