This time, our "detective trio" investigates a case which takes place in a theatre. At the beginning of the episode, Enomoto goes about his usual routine and explains how people are misled by their assumptions which leads them to miss out the important things. It will be worth noting that this short introduction clip contains a small trick which most people can't spot unless you hear Enomoto explaining it towards the end of the episode. This is something which has been used and widely discussed in many detective/suspense dramas but the concept never becomes stale because it's always a blind spot in human nature to miss what's in the surroundings when they are focused on something else.
Aoto asks Enomoto out to watch a stage play titled "Mishitsu ni torawareta otoko" (A man trapped in a closed room) at the invitation of Mizugi Rina, a secretary working in Serizawa's law firm who also happens to be the daughter of Serizawa's senior. Rina knows that her father objects to her acting so she has to keep this a secret. Enomoto obviously has no interest in stage plays but agrees to come along since he finds the title intriguing. Aoto is very impressed with the performance before the play and keeps exclaiming her excitement but Enomoto remains cool as a cucumber. When they finish watching the play, Aoto remarks that she didn't know the truth behind the mystery until the end while Enomoto remarks nonchalantly that he knew what happened at midpoint. They keep waiting for Rina to come out of the theatre but she's still nowhere to be found so they go to look for her with the assistance of a staff member. It is then that they find that one of the founding members of the theatre group Yakushiji was murdered by a wooden pole used to hit his head.
Serizawa hears from Aoto what happened and is worried about what might happen if Rina's father hears about what happened especially if her boyfriend is one of the murder suspects. He wants nothing to do with the case but Aoto manages to twist Serizawa around her finger by threatening to tell Rina's father that Serizawa failed to keep an eye on Rina and report her acting activities to him. Serizawa has no choice but to let Aoto get Enomoto continue with the investigation.
However, this case turns out to be more troublesome than expected and Enomoto has no idea what the murderer could have done to commit the crime. As Aoto goes around talking to the key personnel in the case i.e. Onitsuka (Sakamoto Masayuki), Hatakeyama (Horiuchi Keiko) and Ioka (Kiriyama Akito) who were also performers in the same segment as Yakushiji, she realises that Ioka (Rina's boyfriend) was likely to be the ghost writer of Onitsuka in exchange for a chance to act on stage.
At the same time, Onitsuka pays a visit to Enomoto on the pretext of asking about security systems which he would like to incorporate into his next script. Aoto tells Enomoto to ask Onitsuka indirectly if he might have been involved in the murder. Enomoto's lack of interest in knowing who's the culprit prompts him to ask Onitsuka bluntly (maybe he wants to get it over and done with?) and visibly startles the latter who starts to stutter. However, during their conversation, Enomoto does pick up an useful lead which indicates that Onitsuka would not have written the script for the play and Ioka should have been the ghost writer.
As Serizawa starts to get uptight about Rina's father asking him about his daughter again during the next meeting, he hurries Aoto to try to solve the case as soon as possible. While observing Onitsuka at the theatre, Enomoto realises something and checks it against a video recording of the play he watched with Aoto. Unexpectedly, Aoto also gets a lead from Hatakeyama that leads them to confirm that Onitsuka is the killer of Yakushiji.
Apparently, Yakushiji found out about Ioka being Onitsuka's ghost writer for an award-winning stage play and blackmailed him for money. This had been witnessed by Hatakeyama who happened to be present at the theatre. In order to stop Yakushiji from having his way, Onitsuka planned to murder Yakushiji and made use of the stage to create a scheme which would help him deflect suspicion. He had no intention of getting Ioka to be his scapegoat and was confident that Ioka wouldn't be implicated since there was no evidence that he could have killed Yakushiji.
I have to admit, this episode didn't excite me at all. Sakamoto Masayuki's appearance as a guest should have spiced things up a little especially when fellow artistes from Johnny's come together in the same drama/movie. The interaction between Enomoto and Onitsuka was sorely lacking and I thought it might have been better if we had been shown more of their conversation at Enomoto's office. That would have given an opportunity to provide some much-needed sparks in this episode. Even the showdown at the end of the episode felt like Onitsuka had no chance of defending himself against Enomoto and the latter literally had the whole stage to himself.
The use of humans' assumptions in suspense stories like this isn't a new concept and it depends very much on how the writer chooses to use it. Frankly speaking, it's always a given that we know who the culprit is in this drama. At least, that's what I'm seeing so far after 6 episodes. However, that scene of showing Onitsuka on stage practising the exact movements which would bring attention to himself was unwarranted. It was almost like he was telling the whole world that he was capable of doing that. To give the character the benefit of the doubt, he might not have been aware that Enomoto was sitting in the audience observing him but to me, I felt that there wasn't a need for the scriptwriter to show that to the viewers, at least not in that setting. If Enomoto had chanced upon Onitsuka practising those moves somewhere without others present, that would have gone down better with me.
At the end of this episode, we see Enomoto picking a lock AGAIN and it seems like this has nothing to do with his work. What's with that smirk after breaking the lock? ^__^ Somewhere in this episode as well, it is revealed that Koono feeds Enomoto information about the progress of police investigations. Are they getting too close for comfort? Does Koono have a motive for being friendly with Enomoto? After that revelation about Enomoto possibly being a criminal, nothing has taken place in this episode so I would look forward to more hints about Enomoto's background.
The next story takes place in the suburbs and has a hint of something supernatural going on. Given that this drama is not about spirits or the supernatural, the murder must have been the work of a human being so knowing this, viewers probably won't get spooked by whatever goes on.
No comments:
Post a Comment