Review of Mikeneko Holmes no Suiri Ep 1

Katayama Yoshitaro (Aiba Masaki), the 2nd son of the Katayama family, feels deep down that he's not suited to be a police detective but has to do so because of his late father's wish that there must be at least one police officer in the Katayama household. His elder brother Hiroshi isn't keen on becoming one (despite being rather smart) and would rather stay at home to write novels with the dream of winning the Edogawa Ranpo award one day while living on the rental income from an apartment he inherited from the ancestors. On the other hand, the youngest sister in the family Harumi does part-time jobs and would joins forces with Hiroshi to make Yoshitaro stay in his job despite his strong reluctance.

Yoshitaro attempts to submit his resignation but somehow, his boss Kurihara doesn't seem to be taking this very seriously and has misplaced his resignation letter thrice. His colleague Nemoto regards Yoshitaro as an eyesore and hindrance to their work since the latter has a fear of heights, blood, ghosts and women. Yoshitaro's junior Ishizu likes to belittle Yoshitaro at times but would also help him out when the need arises. Ishizu loves to hang around with the Katayama siblings and would openly show his affection towards Harumi who rejects him point blank.

The first episode features a murder case at Keishin Female University where a professor was killed. At the orders of Kurihara, Yoshitaro is sent to investigate another case at the same university along with Ishizu. On the night when he's supposed to keep a lookout at the female hostel on campus from a cafe, Yoshitaro leaves his post halfway because of a fire alarm and goes home after helping to put out the fire. The next day, Yoshitaro gets a shock when he is informed that a murder took place at the place where he was supposed to be keeping a lookout from!

As the name of the drama suggests, the actual detective work isn't done by Yoshitaro himself. It doesn't mean that the cat Holmes tells him the answers directly but rather gives hints for him to arrive at the truth behind the case. It's quite interesting to see the interaction between Yoshitaro and Holmes (be it in the cat or human form) especially when Yoshitaro has a hard time trying to figure out what Holmes is trying to convey at times. It looks like Yoshitaro is the only one who can see Holmes in the human form so it could be that Holmes is deliberately showing its human form to him.

First impressions on this drama:

1) If not for Holmes, this would be an ordinary suspense/investigative drama about a guy who's not really suitable to be a police detective. It's good that Aiba is the one playing Yoshitaro because I really like his interaction with the cat and he's had this reputation for knowing about and being in contact with many types of animals through his animal-themed variety show. It does feel like he's enjoying the time spent with Holmes so as a viewer, I think this feeling makes the drama more appealing that it should have been.

2) After watching the first episode, you would get the impression that Yoshitaro really depends on others in order to solve the case. At least for Holmes, it was dropping hints to him and this made him think. However, in the earlier part of this episode, his brother played by Fujiki Naohito was practically solving a major part of the mystery for him based on his "expertise" gained from reading suspense novels. Yoshitaro might get more time in future episodes to try solving the cases but I have a hunch that the people around him are going to appear more like they are the detectives and will be feeding Yoshitaro with the answers rather than letting him do it. Hmm...hopefully, we will see a change in his attitude towards police work and that means taking more initiative to solve the case rather than wait for people to do it for you. Granted this is just the first episode, I guess it can't be helped since we needed to see how much Yoshitaro wanted to quit and was so reluctant in getting involved in the investigations which would be contrasted with how he evolves over time.

3) Episodic stories don't really work for me. I think the drama is emphasizing the fact that it's supposed to be an entertaining piece of work rather than a suspense-filled detective story. And I happen to like those tense storylines with lots of twists. However, if the storyline is going to be so easy to see through for the rest of the season, I don't think I would enjoy this drama very much since it just doesn't feel very gratifying at the end when I could guess much of it before they revealed the answers.

It looks likely that I'll stick around for a couple more episodes but I'm really not certain about seeing this to the end. Maybe I'll have a clearer idea by episode 3 or so.