Inkspot Fancy

Sorry for tons of updates. Trying to group them to avoid flooding anyone's wall. I'm like a month behind. :(

Case Closed vol. 30

This starts off with a murder mystery on a train and ends with a story about Genta being convinced someone's after him, and the start of a story involving a pottery class, but the real highlight of Vo. 30 for me was a story that brought a number of detectives together in a remote house and presented with a number of mysteries to solve - all of them deadly.

This was one of the stories that I felt would have been as well served by being made into a movie as by being turned into episodes of the show. Not that the episodes were bad, but the story actually had a lot going for it. One of my favorites.

Case Closed vol. 31

I'm probably going to just start highlighting my favorite entries in the volumes at this point, because while a lot is done to try and make all the cases seem unique, there does get to be a bit of sameyness after a while, and the less memorable cases fade into the background easier and easier over time.

In the case of this volume, it's definitely the return of the Gunma police officer. Mouri arrives at a hotel to solve a mystery only to find that he's already there. But the fake Mouri doesn't last long, and now they've got a new mystery on their hands.

Yamamura is not one of my favorite characters, but I love his fanboy side-kick-role when Mouri is around.

Case Closed vol. 32

You can pretty much guess that if a book has Kazuha and Heiji in it, it's often going to be my favorite in the book. I just adore the way the two of them play off one another, and in this book, we not only get them but we get to learn a little more about Heiji's dad, a policeman himself. Conan and Heiji involve themselves in the mystery of a series of mysterious deaths at a historic castle. But Heiji's dad is tryingto get them to leave well enough alone.

I kind of like it when I find myself shouting at a character for doing something dumb while at the same time knowing that it's exactly what the character would do, not some OOCness for the sake of the story.

Case Closed vol. 33

Ahh, Sato and Takagi. <3 In this volume, my highlight is the case of a mysterious robber. Takagi and Chiba are on the case, but it seems that everyone who saw the person saw someone different. Still, no real problem... until you ad din a side plot. Sato's mom, tired of waiting for grandbabies, threw a bunch of folders with info on potential husbands at Sato, and to appease her, Sato agreed to meet with one, picking it at random out of the pile.

But the person is someone she knows, and Sato ends up making a foolish bet - if Takagi doesn't come save her from the meeting by sundown she'll agree to marry this guy.

I liked this story because more Sato is always welcome, but also because it says some really interesting things about Conan, who chooses to try to help Takagi solve this relatively innocuous case before time runs out.

Case Closed vol. 34

Oh, Miss Jodie. Nothing in this book is a particular favorite of mine, but I find Miss Jodie to be an interesting character. She sometimes seems to be just like Conan - acting childishly and silly, but occasionally letting slip a clever, intense and calculating side. Who she is and what she wants are interesting to me even when the story itself isn't totally fascinating.

Her story is the best of this volume to me, partly because it also featured Heiji. :) The mystery isn't that good, but man, the experience of watching the characters all play off one another.

Case Closed vol. 35

It was nice to get a Genta-centric story a few books ago, and in this one Mitsuhiko gets his turn at center stage when he disappears one Sunday and the Detective Boys have to try to track him down. But when they get to the forest where he is, they find some people they didn't expect- the Gunma police, on the track of a murderer.

Detective Boys stories at this point in the series are starting to get a little hit or miss, but I think I still prefer the generic ones of those to the generic Ran and Mouri ones. I really like both Ran and Mouri, but the kids are just fun to read about. :)