Although SPEC is said to be a sequel of Keizoku, the key concept is somewhat similar yet different. The first half of SPEC and Keizoku focus more on single cases while the second half has a central theme or should I say main villian who the leads have to fight against. SPEC's central theme is about SPEC-holders i.e. humans who have special powers which they use to pursue their own agendas or to guarantee their survival against people who want to eliminate or make use of them. On the other hand, Keizoku was more about a single villian who had a longstanding feud with one of the leads and he had the power to place people under hynopsis. Some of the characters from Keizoku are back to reprise their roles in Keizoku although they've moved on in certain ways to reflect the passage of time.
We begin with introducing the first lead Sebumi Takeru (Kase Ryo) who was the leader of the SIT unit of the police. He was leading his team on a mission where one of his subordinates Shimura suddenly turned against him and fired gunshots directly at him. Amazingly, time seemed to have come to a standstill then and by the time Sebumi realised it, the bullets had actually taken a U-turn and hit Shimura instead! Although he tried very hard to explain the truth during the police inquiry into the incident, nobody believed him and Sebumi had to be transferred out to the mystery case special division (known as Misho for short). At the same time, Shimura's younger sister Mirei (Fukuda Saki) doesn't believe Sebumi as well and regards him as an enemy whenever he comes to visit her brother.
On his first day at Misho, Sebumi finds himself greeted by Nonomura Koutarou (Ryu Raita) who used to be the section chief of Keizoku and is now the chief of Misho. Besides Nonomura, there is another police officer who we see not in the office but in a restaurant gorging on gyoza!
Touma Saya (Toda Erika), a Misho investigator who graduated from Kyoto University, boasts of an IQ of 201 and loves to do research on physics and eat her gyoza with lots of garlic. Touma carries a huge red suitcase on wheels and has her left arm in a bandage for whatever reason. As she had forgotten where she left her wallet, she is dragged to the police station by the restaurant owner who demands payment for the huge bill she racked up. The first meeting between Sebumi and Touma get off on a sour note as Sebumi views Touma as a tardy and messy weirdo who can't possibly be a good police officer while Touma sees Sebumi with interest (because of the incident with Shimura) and disdain for his rigidness at the same time.
Just then, a female police officer Miyabi (Arimura Kasumi) who also happens to be Nonomura's lover, comes to Misho with two guests Gokitani Haruki (Kaneko Ken) and his secretary Waki Chihiro (Kamikawa Takaya) who have a problem on hand. It turns out that Gokitani who is a politician and the CEO of Gokitani Group was told by his fortune teller Reizen Toshiaki (Tanaka Tetsushi) that he would be killed during a celebration party held by his company and that he would have to pay a sum of JPY 200m if he wishes to avert the disaster. Touma is intrigued by the prophetic powers that Reizen apparently has while Sebumi feels that this is merely a hoax for Reizen to extort money from Gokitani. Nonetheless, the Misho trio i.e. Touma, Sebumi and Nonomura head to look for Reizen in order to find out more.
Reizen is an extremely popular fortune teller so it takes a while before the Misho trio are ushered in to meet him. He sticks by his story that Gokitani would definitely die at the party if the latter does not listen to him and even offers to predict what would happen to Touma and Sebumi at 9pm that night. Just as Touma and Nonomura get ready to leave after the meeting, Sebumi suddenly whips out an arrest warrant which he had applied for prior to the visit and used Nonomura's stamp without his knowledge. He takes Reizen into custody and thinks that this will be a foolproof plan because the latter cannot harm Gokitani if he is being monitored. Reizen remains cool about it and tells Sebumi that this will be futile though. Sebumi thinks nothing of Reizen's powers and even dumps his prophecy note away.
While munching on her all-time favourite gyoza again, Touma is surprised to see Chii Satoshi (Shirota Yu) coming to the same restaurant. Apparently, Chii is Touma's ex-boyfriend and he keeps reminding her to be careful when working on cases or else something bad might befall her like what happened to her left arm. When Chii asks Touma if they can reconcile, she rejects him outright. Suddenly, Touma remembers the note which Reizen gave her and is surprised to see that he had guessed correctly that Chii had come to look for her at the gyoza place. This seems to make Touma believe that Reizen does have the power to predict the future and he wasn't making stories out of nowhere.
On the day of the celebration party, the Misho trio make arrangements to ensure that nobody would have the opportunity to harm Gokitani by screening and testing the food and drinks he will be consuming. However, despite their efforts, Gokitani still collapses due to a heart attack which stuns everyone present. Sebumi refuses to believe that Reizen could have predicted Gokitani's death but what's baffling is that, there seems to be no element of foul play.
Just then, Touma seems to have an idea to solving the case and starts writing calligraphy of the keywords in the case. When she's done, she rips the stack of papers and throws everything into the air as she tries to reason things out. As the shreds of paper fall to the ground. Touma declares that she has found the answer.
Meanwhile, Waki heads back to the ballroom where the celebration party was held at with a can of tennis balls where he is surprised to see Touma waiting for him. Touma starts to explain why she's there and how she arrived at the conclusion that Waki was the murderer of Gokitani. In actual fact, Waki had misled the Misho trio that the only possible way for Gokitani to die of poisoning was through his intake of food and drinks. Little did they expect that Waki, who had been a doctor in the past, actually used an injection into Gokitani's thigh to cause a cardiac arrest. Touma compliments Waki for his exceptional intelligence and for managing to conceal his murder weapon at the ceiling of the ballroom. In his haste to destroy the syringe which he had thrown up to the ceiling, Waki demonstrates his extraodinary physical power which also reveals the fact that he is a SPEC-holder.
Waki gloats over the fact that Touma no longer has the evidence to catch him but the truth is, she had already retrieved the real syringe used by Waki along with Sebumi who had been filming their conversation and what Waki did without him knowing. Seeing that his game is almost up, Waki uses the tennis balls and throws powerful shots at both Sebumi and Touma which knocks her out and Sebumi to suffer a dislodged shoulder. Just when Waki is about to fire gunshots at the two of them, time suddenly freezes and a young man Ninomae Juuichi (Kamiki Ryuunosuke) appears without them knowing. It seems like Ninomae has the power to freeze time and he's rather unhappy that Waki is intending to kill Touma and Sebumi at such an "early stage". He then turns the bullets in the opposite direction towards where Waki is and when the flow of time is restored, Waki is struck by all the bullets which were meant for Sebumi. Having witnessed this once again, Sebumi can't believe that the same thing which happened to Shimura has taken place again.
At the same time, Tsuda Sukehiro (Shiina Kippei), the chief of the Public Security Bureau's Zero Department (Zero-ka), comes to take Reizen away from the police cell without telling the latter where they are going. Reizen fears for his life as he seems to be able to predict that Tsuda doesn't have kind intentions but there is nothing he can do about it while in captivity. Tsuda remains tight-lipped on where they are heading or what he intends to do but he has an evil smirk on his face when he sees how apprehensive Reizen looks. In order to ensure his own safety, Reizen decides against asking more questions as they head towards an unknown location.
In the hospital, Mirei is taking care of her brother and is shocked to see images of what happened during the shooting when she touches her brother's forehead. This makes Mirei extremely shocked because what she sees is exactly what Sebumi has been telling everyone! She takes a double-look at her brother again, afraid to approach him in case she sees more of these fleeting images...
Frankly speaking, it wasn't too difficult to guess who was the killer in this case because the problem with suspense dramas is, if you see a rather prominent actor playing one of the supporting roles, you can more or less see who the villian should be. I think what was more interesting were how these SPEC-holders used their powers to achieve their aims and the concept of SPEC-holders seem to be skewed towards the fact that these are people who happen to be able to use their brains in a different way from other people and that there is really nothing supernatural about them. Reizen's prophecy looked as if he wanted to get money out of Gokitani while Waki was clearly not content to be in Gokitani's shadow as well. We might get to see a few more SPEC-holders who are motivated by their personal interests but I am guessing that some of them might come together towards the end of the story for a greater purpose. In the first episode alone, we are seeing four SPEC-holders including Mirei who seems to have the power of psychometry. I think there will be a galore of SPEC powers as the drama progresses so I'm keen to know what kind of variations there might be. Ninomae is another mystery so his importance (maybe as the mastermind?) in the story will be gradually revealed.
Since this drama is said to be a sequel of Keizoku, familiar faces from the Keizoku series would definitely help in exhibiting the link between both dramas. Nonomura and his lover Miyabi (the Miyabi in Keizoku was a senior high-school student, I think) are the only "original cast" members from Keizoku so I don't really get such a strong sense of linking between the two dramas. Moreover, the Keizoku department back then had a few more supporting cast members while Misho is just made up of three people. It's a bit lacking in that sense because we don't see that many "colourful" supporting characters. Then again, I would also prefer SPEC to be standing on its own and attracting people on its originality since it's an entirely different story with two different leads this time. Comparisons with Keizoku are inevitable but necessary since TBS had promoted it as a sequel initially.
Talking about the leads, Toda Erika and Kase Ryo seem to be doing quite well even though this is just the first episode. They bicker and trade insults about each other but it is expected that they will become great partners as time goes on. I think they work well together (in terms of the acting and how they interact in their roles) but I don't foresee them being romantically-linked unlike Shibata and Mayama back in Keizoku (also had to do with the fact that Nakatani Miki and Watabe Atsuro were reportedly romantically-linked then). Then again, Shibata and Mayama weren't dating in the story but there was some sort of the romantic spark between them. At present, I find it difficult to imagine Touma and Sebumi having that kind of relationship as well. Talking about their differences, Touma and Sebumi are as different as chalk and cheese e.g. she uses a huge luggage bag while he uses a paper bag to hold his stuff, one is prim and proper while the other is simply messy and tardy. With these stark differences, it will no doubt bring about more sparks between these two as they join forces to deal with the SPEC-holders who are coming their way.
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