Air Dates: January 10th until March 28, 2022 on Fuji-TV, Mondays at 9:00 pm
Total of twelve episodes, first show was seventy minutes in length but the others will be the usual 46 minutes. Blitz Fansubs is once again doing this drama, they're also doing another current series I'm viewing and recapping.
Ratings:
Episode one, 13.6% .... episode two, 12.7%.... Episode three, 13.2 %.... Episode four, 13.3%
Episode five, 10.0% .... Episode six, 10.2% .... Episode seven, 12.3% .... Episode eight 10.6%
Episode nine, 11.6% ... Episode ten, 12.0% ... Episode eleven, 11.1% .... Episode twelve, 11.2%
No doubt the drop in ratings for two shows was due to the Olympics.
Main Cast: The series takes place in Tokyo and most of the action revolves around cases being investigated by the fictional Otonari police station. However all of the stories and cases will end up involving the 21 year old college student Kunou and unlike other dramas will be using the character's last names as that's all they've been using. A huge plus for this series is that it doesn't star any of my fave actresses or Idols. But I've seen all of the cast in many other dramas and they're all superb actors, so far superb describes this drama!
Masaki Suda as Totono Kunou.... In real life Masaki turned 29 in February but plays the 21 year old Kunou who is attending the prestigious Toei university. He's such a loner but doesn't act like a nerd or outcast at all, he makes sure others know he's never had a job, girlfriend, any other friends nor socializes in the least. But somehow Kunou has the intelligence of a Sherlock Holmes and let's others know how to solve their life problems. But not in an egotistical way as he is a down to earth guy though on occasion others have wanted to beat Kunou for telling them how to live properly. The name Totono is a play on words as it means neat and orderly which seems like another apt description for him.
Sairi Ito as Seiko Furomitsu.... The only female detective at the Otonari station and was looked down upon by her male counterparts. So much that Furomitsu had written a letter of resignation up in the first show but after meeting Kunou changed her mind about quitting. She is a dependable person whose confidence is growing with each show.
Matsuya Onoe as Yuto Ikemoto.... Detective at the station and in a way kind of a goofy man. In the first episode his wife had a child though his marriage wasn't going all that smoothly, that is until meeting Kunoe who gave him some solid advice though he himself has never been married nor had a girlfriend. Ikemoto was the only one for a while who treated Furomitsu as somewhat of an equal.
Michitaka Tsutsui as Mariaki Aoto....Inspector at the Otonari station and is kind of a hard man to figure out. Aoto is a bit quiet though there could be some good reasons for that, he was once a Deputy Inspector but got demoted for a case where he targeted the wrong suspect. That happened seven yeas ago but Kunou remembered the case and told Aoto where he may have gone wrong.
Guest Stars: There's been many known actors making some guest appearances.
Eita Nagayama as Garo Inudo.... To learn more about Garo read the second and third recaps, his sister had been murdered and along with his two cousins Garo tried to find the killer. Which did happen and the trio got their revenge but are on now on the run from the law. Kunou and Garo got along so well together and it's possible Garo has a hand in the some of the events that took place after his disappearance. Him and his two cousins have made a return for the final two episodes, his sister's murderer was nabbed and eventually killed(!) but there was much more to the story than her actual death. But the police are on Garo's tail for the murder of his sister's killer so with his two cousins has been on a yacht somewhere near Tokyo.
Yukin Kunota as Haya Inudo.... Garo's cousin and the older brother of the next man. The two brothers had helped Garo with the investigation into Anju's death and were the two main men in the episode two's bus hijacking. Haya is a very intelligent man and at first had been using the alias name of Sakimoto.
Ryohei Abe as Otoya Inudo.... Younger brother of the above man but not nearly as smart and actually seems more like a thug but is still an important ally of Garo's.
Junior Chihara as Gento Hagui.... We didn't see him 'live' in these final two shows but his story from the fifth show plays a vital part in this last mystery. He had been a serial killer twenty years ago who had been killed by a detective but doesn't seem many know that last fact.
Takumi Kitamura as Hiromasa Tsuji.... Curator of a Wooden Puzzle Box museum who had known Garo's sister until her death. He claimed at the end of the eleventh show to be the son of the above serial killer but is that really true? He goes by the nickname of Koma and also Jute which is hard to explain but both have the same Kanji symbol, will give more details about that in the recaps. Tsuji appeared to be a nice man at first but was he taking his father's place being a serial killer?
Mai Shiraishi as Anju Inudo.... Garo's sister who had been murdered three months earlier, we just saw flashbacks of her in these two episodes.
Eiichiro Funakoshi as Misao Bizenjima.... Older inspector at the Shibahama Police HQ and is leading the investigation for this new rash of serial killings.
Wakana Matsumoto as Toa Nekota.... Female at the Shibahama station and her boss considers her to be an ace detective, she became Furomitsu's partner for this show.
Natsuko as Rumi Yokota.... Had worked with Garo's sister for a brief spell at an underground casino, she was only in this episode for she was the killer's fourth victim!
Previous recaps
Some flashback screenshots from this episode which actually took place in the third show. The mystery in the second and third episodes was to find the killer of Garo's younger sister Anju which did happen, it was the bus driver in the first screenshot. But there was a whole story besides her murder as to Garo it seemed Anju had kind of a 'death wish' and had been meeting some secret person named Jute, to plan her own death? That's one of the stories for these final two shows and while I will refer back to some of the incidents which took place in the second and third shows think it would help if you read the recaps of them.
Whew, that above took so long to write up as there's so many guest stars for these final two shows. Do copy the main character's info over from post to post but that still took a while to do as I also needed to look back at the secomd and third episodes. So while the last recap's story was the oddest to date this episode also had something extremely odd. That's of our main hero Kunou only being on screen for about five minutes and won't discuss him in this recap, he was on a trip to Osaka to view an art exhibit. Think the reason for Kunou not being part of this first show is that the series was supposed to end after ten episodes. But it proved to be very popular and two more shows were added in. Read that Suda at the time of this episode's filming was doing another drama which is why we saw so little of him, hope he makes a triumphant return in the final episode.
Besides adding in so many guest stars also needed to make this intro slightly longer. Right above is Garo and he was the main focus of the second and third shows. His sister had been killed though Kunou solved that case but after Garo, along with his two cousins, killed his sister Anju's murderer. Since then the trio have been on a yacht in Tokyo Bay(?) though have never been nabbed by the police?! So this story kind of picks up after the fifth episode where we learned of a serial killer named Hagui who had done his killings twenty years prior. At the beginning of this show it said this was set four months ago so does that mean four months from the end of March or when the last show ended when the date was the first week of January? The exact dates may not matter but the action takes place between the fifth and sixth shows, are you confused yet????
So while we saw so little of Kunou this was still a fine episode and the story continues on into the next show. Least we got to see more of the detective Furomitsu who is played by Sairi Ito who is an actress I've always liked. You can see above what has been happening, there's a serial killer on the loose in the Minato ward of Tokyo who has killed three women, it'll soon to be four. All of the victims seemingly had no connection to each other and there were so few clues to go on. But there was possibly a vital clue which is that on the latest victim some blood was found on her clothes from a knife which wasn't her own. Somehow the blood belonged to the 17th victim of a serial killer from twenty years ago and that case was discussed in the fifth recap. Hagui was this serial killer's name who ended up killing eighteen women who were presumed to be prostitutes, the weapon for the 17th victim had never been found. Hagui himself had been killed by a detective twenty years ago but it seems the entire team at the Shibahama Police HQ did not know that.
That's the name of the station in Minato and the detective Furomitsu from the Otonari station has been sent there on loan to help out with this case. As mentioned really no clues have been discovered, there was that mark of blood on the latest victim but where would the killer have gotten the knife from a killing that took place twenty years ago? In the middle screenshot above is the main inspector at the Minato station who is Bizenjima and what an intelligent man he is as he can remember almost every case he's been on for the last 25 years. His most trusted detective is the woman in the bottom screenshot, her name is Nekota who Bizenjima considers to be an ace detective. She'll be teamed up with Furomitsu who was been a bit intimidated by the older detectives at the station. Nekota has discovered a possible second clue about the latest victim where she saw a video of a young woman pushing a suitcase towards the intersection where the latest victim was found and that video was just minutes before the body was discovered. So does that mean the killer shoves his victims into such a small suitcase and could the culprit somehow be this unrecognizable young woman?
So while all that was going on at the police station we saw the long awaited return of Garo. Him and his two cousins are wanted by the police for the killing of his sister Anju's murderer, they've been staying on a yacht in Tokyo Bay but hard to believe they haven't been noticed. Garo got a tip about an underground casino that may be connected to a mysterious man that Anju knew before her death, he goes by the name of Jute but is that a real name? So while Anju had been killed by a bus driver Garo still felt that was just a random act and that actually his sister may have had some death pact with this Jute person. At the casino Garo did find some info about his sister from a waitress named Rumi, none of the waitresses used their real name. She told Garo that Anju had briefly worked there and had used the name of Ai, Rumi also added in that Ai had said her counselor suggested working there which was extremely odd. Garo got some possibly useful information such as of Ai seeing a counselor which he didn't know about and had plans to see her again which couldn't happen for Rumi two days later became the fourth victim of the serial killer!
When Garo heard of that killing he realized he would need some help in trying to find this mysterious Jute man and whether or not he had connections to his sister's death. So of course Garo couldn't go to the police so what he did was to make an anonymous call to the Shibahama station where he heard Furomitsu was now working for a while. Garo told her about the underground casino and how the new victim Rumi had worked there. Furomitsu did recognize the voice but just couldn't place where she had heard it before. Against her better judgement Furomitsu went to this gambling den without notifying her superiors, to her dismay Furmomitsu was arrested at the casino when the police raided it! She was put in her place the next day by her new boss Bizenjima and I'm not really sure how the unit learned about the casino as you wouldn't think Garo would have called them too. When Garo had met this woman Rumi she had dropped her phone which he picked up, the camera focused on that so had the feeling it would become important later on. Which it did as the police have drawn Garo's fingerprints from the phone and upon hearing his name Furomitsu told her team she now realized who made that anonymous call, it was none other than Garo! Plus the police have learned him and his cousin Haya had just visited the Wooden Puzzle Box museum.
In her room Anju had many wooden puzzle boxes which she had purchased at the museum. Garo was able to open all of them save for one and inside something was rattling around. So him and Haya had paid a visit to the museum where they met the assistant curator Tsuji who will turn out to be an extremely important character. He knew Anju quite well and went out often with her for tea which was a complete surprise to Garo. But Anju had stopped visiting about a month before her murder and Tsuji told her brother that Anju had started to become very depressed. Tsuji couldn't open the box and suggested another place to visit but by the end of the show Garo hadn't gone there. Garo did ask the curator about this man named Jute but right at that moment a phone call had come in and the question was never answered. Furomitsu, along with the ace detective Nekota, also visited this museum once they heard Garo had been there. The pair didn't get much info from Tsuji but he looked so nervous in front of the detectives which Furomitsu did notice but didn't pry any further. However his name has gotten her curious so Furomitsu told Nekota she would be going back to the station alone to check on some theories.
The pair had also checked out about the young woman pushing a small suitcase that may have held the body of the third victim. While they didn't get any concrete evidence according to a homeless man at this 'camp' that person is no young lady but is really a man but had kept his face hidden at all times. But despite all of this investigating not much progress has been made on the case and the supervisor Bizenjima is getting quite irate at his team. Been a long recap but we are down to the last ten or so minutes. That evening Nekota received a call from the curator Tsuji who said he remembered a few things about Garo and Anju, could she stop by at 8:00 pm when the museum closes which she said yes to. Meanwhile Furmomitsu was working on her own theory which was a success though slightly confusing. All four of the women recently murdered by this serial killer had worked part time at the casino but on a more important note all had the Kanji symbol for JU in their name but that symbol can be pronounced several ways. Tsuji's first name is Hiromasa but his workers also call him Koma which has the Kanji symbol for JU. And to Furmomitsu's dismay her new partner Nekota also has that symbol in her name, she tried calling her to no avail.
Final scene of the show and also the final segment, need to make the first ones a tad shorter. As you can see above Furmomitsu had tried calling Nekota to warn her not to make that visit to see Tsuji at the museum but she had left her phone in the car, why does that happen so often in dramas? While Nekota may be an ace detective she wasn't on this occasion as she walked right into Tsuji's trap. He was on the back lawn of the museum claiming to be searching for one of his contact lenses. When Nekota went to give him a hand it was the worst mistake of her life as Tsuji wheeled around and stabbed her violently in her stomach while continuing to twist the knife around. Unless help arrived soon she would be a goner and luckily it did as arriving on the scene was Furomitsu and while she didn't jump in to save her new partner she did call the Shibahama station for help. Noticed in this scene that Furomitsu is very frightened of blood and that's not a positive for a homicide detective.
So as Nekota lay helpless on the ground Tsuji left for a few moments, he changed into the clothes of a woman and also had that small travel suitcase we saw earlier. So that homeless man was correct in saying the police should be searching for a man and not a young woman. So it was just a matter of time until Nekota became Tsuji's fifth victim and would be shoved into the tiny suitcase. But with a minute to go in the show her savior arrived and as you can see above it was Garo. He had seen Tsuji at the casino while be was dressed as a woman and noticed the real Tsuji walked the same way. So to Garo this was a man of interest and until now had no idea that Tsuji was a serial killer but may have played a role in his sister Anju's death. So this scene with Garo holding Tsuji down ended this episode and also this long recap, next post is for this drama's final episode. Oooops, almost forgot to add this in which is that Tsuji claimed to Nekota to be the unknown son of the serial killer Hagui. He had killed eighteen women 22 years ago and is this story possibly true, that was explained in the final episode.
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