"Tantei☆Hoshikamo" drama: Episode three recap

 

 Air Dates: April 26th until June 28, 2021 on NTV, Tuesdays at 1:00 am

 Subs were done by Jumping Storm/hsjhoshi at LJ

Main Cast: Very small one really, just the top two characters get much screen time though the third person does to an extent and so don't each episode's 'victims'.

Daiki Arioka as Hoshi(kamo).... His full name is Hoishikamo but is always called Hoshi in this show so will refer to him by that name. Hoshi is a private detective whose office is in a second hand goods store that was left to him when his parents died, he's close to thirty in age. He's quite frightened of women and has rules set up to how close they can get to him. Hoshi doesn't appear to need money that badly and is extremely frustrated that most cases he gets are cheating ones between spouses.

Yuki Katayama as Tsugumi Karato.... Hoshi's new assistant at the store and also for his detective cases. She hired herself for those positions and also had hired Hoshi as an investigator in the first show to track her 'stalker'.

Yoshinori Okada as Detective Soda.... Local detective for the police force and such a bumbler you wonder how he ever got that position. 

Keisuke Horibe as Joe.... Hoshi's sensei/mentor but have only seen him for a minute in the first two shows.

 Links to the previous shows, would read the first recap if you haven't to see what's going on:

Episode one .... Episode two

 This should be the easiest and shortest drama I'll ever recap but sure I'll find a way to screw it up! Have also viewed the fourth episode and what a zany/oddball drama this has been but not to a high enough extent which may make it better. Each episode has been enjoyable but will admit it's not a must watch but at 23 minutes a show you're not giving too much time up. Main reason for viewing this has been Yuki who really looks good in this series. Am also watching her 2020 drama "Kyoufu Shinbun", have recapped the first four shows and will have the final three within the week, on to this recap.

 Besides the cases Hoshi and his new assistant Tsugumi solve there is a secondary storyline. Only three minutes of this show was dedicated to it so let's get it out of the way. In the fist episode an unnamed man had been murdered, the crime scene was telecast and Hoshi was the only one to notice a major clue. That's of a red high heel shoe behind the victim, not even the detective in charge Soda had seen it. Soda has brought Hoshi in for questioning a few times as his case is going nowhere and Hoshi has given him some solid pointers. Hoshi was 'arrested' in this episode by Soda because the man's identity was found out, it was a detective named Kurotani who Hoshi had known at detective school. Hoshi never got along with the man who worked at a different precinct, Hoshi mentioned to Soda instead of 'arresting' him why not investigate the cases Kurotani had been working on?

 That wraps up the short scene and wish more time was devoted to that murder case. Think it will by the end of the series and bet Hoshi comes out as a semi hero. On to this episode's tale which I'll give the title of 'The Case of the Missing Time Capsule'. Above you see five women who are all 25 in age, ten years ago when they graduated from middle/junior high school they buried a time capsule which they were going to unseal after ten years. However when they went to dig it up the capsule had disappeared, can Hoshi solve this mystery? That he can and it really wasn't a difficult case, none have been through four shows and these are the five women.

 If you read either of the first two recaps you may remember Hoshi has a huge phobia around females. They have to be at least 30 cm away plus can't look at his face for more than five seconds, he even has to keep reminding his assistant Tsugumi of those rules. So that's why the bottom screenshot above is so hazy as Hoshi was sitting behind plexiglass so the women wouldn't stare at him and be more than 30 cm away. In school this group of five had been in the drama club and all had seemingly become good friends. All are doing semi well at their careers but to date none of they have been overly successful. The time capsule consists of messages the women wrote each other when they were fifteen plus some predictions on how their lives would turn out.

 They may have been close at one time but do they truly trust each other? That's because all are accusing the next gal of digging up the time capsule and getting rid of it! They were arguing irately back and forth and it almost seemed a melee would break out. After Hoshi and Tsugumi calmed the ladies down the five admitted to one thing.... all had at one time dug up the time capsule!!!! The first woman to do so was Aki but she had dug it up four years ago to make sure it was still there, it was so she buried it again in the same spot. In the last two months the other four women went to the same spot but when they dug for the capsule it was no longer there, what happened in those four years? That's unknown to Hoshi who told the group they should head to the school but when they left his office is when he was 'arrested' by Soda and that school journey was put on hold.

 Still don't understand what happens to Hoshi when he goes into a trance to 'look' for clues, when he comes out of it he yells 'The Shining First Star' which you can see above. After that he asked the girls a few more questions about the letters which did reveal some details about how the females felt about each other but have zero idea how he used those clues to find the time capsule! A mini problem is when a show is only 23 minutes in length it's hard to go into more depth, five more minutes would be helpful. So it's time for Hoshi, Tsugumi and the five women to head to their old school but prior to that Hoshi had taken his own solo trip to do some investigating.

 And that paid off well as Hoshi has found out where the capsule may be. It originally was buried across from a statue of a Tanuki(raccoon) but that's now been replaced by another statue. Plus the landscape had been changed a bit so the women never thought to dig across from the new statue. As you can see above Hoshi pointed out the spot and they went right to work, took longer than it should have but they did find their cherished time capsule. During that time Hoshi had his back to the females so they wouldn't look at him for more than five seconds. So once again a case is solved by the unknown super sleuth however there was a slight catch at the end as the five women would rather not let the letters come between them again. So they've asked Hoshi to safeguard them and they'll see him again in ten years for them! So that concluded this episode and it's kind of a nice breather writing up shorter recaps, the one for the fourth show is the next post.