I’m still not sure about Kitsutsuki Tanteidokoro, a situation which seems to happen with at least one show a month into every season.  It’s annoying, but at least this time around there’s no rush.  I’ve already waded into the distant past for coverage, so another week or two deciding about a current series that’s actually current is not a big deal.  But if a series can’t close the deal after four episodes, it’s pretty rare (though not unheard of) that it winds up being anything of real substance.

It’s a function of anime mystery series that as often as not, the mysteries are the weakest component.  So even if that’s true with Kitsutsuki Tanteidokoro I’m not going to hold that against it.  This time we finally get around to the ghost at the Ryounkaku that was teased in the series descriptions.  It’s clearly tied in to a friend of Ishikawa’s named Yamaoka, hailing from the same hometown as he and Kindaichi-san.  An ex-newspaper reporter, he was apparently instrumental in helping Ishikawa come to Tokyo (and loaned him money, of course).

The whole matter concerning Yamaoka, the murder of the girl he loved, a yakuza with a scar on his throat and the ghost at the Juunikai is a perfectly serviceable mystery.  I’m not sure it meets the Knox Rules – at the very least, I don’t think we had enough information to piece everything together ourselves.  But the payoff – the reason Yamaoka-san started the rumor about the ghost – is a good hook.  It’s certainly not enough to carry an episode but as usual, the character side of this series (and most like it) is more interesting than the mystery.

A bigger concern for me is that I’m still not certain how I feel about that element.  Ishikawa is a real piece of work – I get that he’s a magnetic personality, and that Kindaichi is probably in love with him.  But from a viewer standpoint he’s very hard to feel any affection for.  He’s a shameless leech and manipulator, and clearly feels no remorse about using others to help him satisfy his desire for mundane comforts.  And the fact that Kindaichi is such a pushover for it makes it hard to feel much sympathy for him, either.  It’s an interesting dynamic for how unapologetically dysfunctional it is, but for me at least these two aren’t especially enjoyable to spend time with.  We’ll see if that changes in the next couple of episodes – like I said, I’ve got time.