The Living Dead: Case Closed, vol. 88 by Gosho Aoyama

The 88th volume of Gosho Aoyama's Case Closed traditionally begins with the conclusion to the story that closed out the previous volume, which placed two recurring side-characters from the pop-culture world of this series, Yoko Okina (pop star) and Ryusuke Higo (soccer player), on the scene of a murder – an Italian restaurant that was recently opened by a high school teammate of Higo. A body was found in the storage room and the story ended with Conan figuring out the cunning killer made use of a simple tool to create "an instant alibi."

I'll grand that the trick to whip up an instant alibi is clever, in theory, but how it was put to use here comes across as cheap and silly. Almost like it was written around the idea, which is not a recipe for a good detective story. Regrettably, this story is a good example. I found the little side story of Richard Moore and Anita being devastated over the news that their celebrity crushes are dating each other slightly more interesting than the case itself. Inspector Meguire is becoming a very entertaining, quasi-self aware side-character who has becomes tired of the formula and tropes of the series. Meguire is beginning to see Conan as a little grim reaper stalking city's crime scenes and begins to tire of the whole "Sleeping Moore" act (Sleeping Moore: "but you can't overlook how ludicrous that theory is" Meguire (thinking): "not as ludicrous as these performances..."). So mostly a poor showing in the opening story, but the next one is somewhat of an improvement.

The second story returns to the setting of a previous case, Drop-Dead Delicious Ogura Ramen, where Conan solved an impossible murder by poison in vol. 73. This time, Conan is in the company of Rachel, Serena and Masumi Sera when they learn from the owners about "a big crime went down" in the neighborhood – "a woman down the street was robbed and killed." Apparently, the murderer was chased down to the noodle shack and three customers present were questioned, but no arrests were made. However, the two police women who discovered the crime, Yumi Miyamoto and Neako Miike, keep returning to the noodle shack to ask questions. You guessed it. Conan happened to be there are at the same time as the three suspected customers and one of the now regular visits from the two police women. Conan has to deduce whom of the three customers is robber/murderer based on how they over season their food and why that person was seen, shortly after the crime, swinging a garden hose in front of the building ("...like some kind of weird ritual"). There was tape residue found on one end of the hose, but why would the murderer "tape something to a hose and swing it around instead of making a fun for it?"

A good question and the answer is not half bad, better integrated into the story than the instant alibi-trick from the previous story, but both tricks obviously came out of the same brainstorming session. So the plot can feel a bit cluttered, but overall, a small improvement over the previous story with some minor developments of the larger storyline going on in the background.

Fortunately, the third story is a return to form and reads like a parody of Yamaguchi Masaya's Ikeru shikabane no shi (Death of the Living Dead, 1989) and Masahiro Imamura's Shijinso no satsujin (Death Among the Undead, 2017)! Richard Moore takes Conan and Rachel on a "pilgrimage" to a deserted, rundown lodge the woods, which has become legendary as the location where Zombie Blade: Feast of Death was filmed – a "sleeper hit" with horror fans starring Yoko Okina. Harley and Kazuha also turn up at the lodge ahead of the film crew and cast members to shoot a teaser of the long-rumored sequel. Harley tells Conan there was a strange incidents a few days ago nearby, when a couple hit something with their car and when they went to look "a zombie in tattered clothes with its neck all broken" crawled from underneath the car. So they left cartoon smoke. The cast and crew of the film have a haunting, of sorts, of their own.

They all used to be members of the same college horror club. Eight years ago, they came to the very same lodge to shoot a horror movie for the school film festival, but the brother of the current director decided to turn their horror movie into a Scooby Doo-style locked room mystery ("...twist will be that the zombie is a human killer in disguise"). And came up with a trick to make a corpse disappear from a room like "it was revived as a zombie and walked out." Joji Naito demonstrates his trick by disappearing from a room with every exit guarded and observed, but he never reappeared and a subsequent search of the room turned up nothing. Four days later, the group returns to the lodge to discover Joji somehow reappeared in the room, sitting against the wall, dead from dehydration. In the present, the producer unexpectedly commits suicide and filmed it on his phone, which includes Conan and Harley finding the body. So murder seems out of the question, but then the story takes an unexpected turns ("they're coming through the window!") and a second body is found. This death is also captured on video, but shows the victim was attacked and killed by the dead producer! And his body has disappeared!!

An incredibly fun story and the best from this volume, but could have been a series classic had the video-trick been more credible. The idea is solid enough, in principle, but (SPOILER/ROT13) na rvtug-lrne tnc vf gbb jvqr gb pbaivapvatyl hfr byq sbbgntr sbe n gevpx yvxr guvf. The solution to the impossible disappearance from the guarded room (“that's the room with the disappearing corpses”) is good and quite appropriate for a horror-themed detective story. Edgar Allan Poe would approve! So, overall, a pretty good and above all entertaining story.

On a side note, I can sometimes understand why some part of the Conan fandom, who are not necessarily detective fans, get frustrated with the slow-moving or even lack of development in certain areas – like the Conan/Jimmy/Rachel angle. Rachel hears Conan talking to Harley on the phone recording and notices how similar Conan sounds like Jimmy when talking normally ("was that Conan? It sounded like Jimmy"), but gets easily sidetracked by Harley ("da kid's copyin' me"). I know I drummed on about this twenty, thirty volumes ago, but, now nearly 90 volumes deep into the series, it has to be said Aoyama wasted an important character and storyline. Over the first fifty volumes, Rachel should have become increasingly suspicious, uncertain and worried before trying to figure what Jimmy is up to, who Conan really is and eventually putting them together. That should have been her case to solve. Not wandering around for hundreds of stories in a daze obliviousness with occasional flashes of lucidity.

Anyway, this volume ends with a story that will be concluded in the next volume and begins with Serena suggesting to Rachel and Masumi they form an all-girl band. So they end up at a sound studio that rents space where bands can practice and run into another girl band. And, as to be expected, one of them gets murdered. What should have been a open-and-shut case is wide open, because the surveillance camera was partially covered by a phone on a selfie-stick and a mirror had been covered. Both would have shown the murderer strangling the victim. I loved how Inspector Meguire calmly observes, "we've got the kid detective, the girl detective and the barista detective," who are respectively Rachel, Masumi and Toru Amuro. Not sure what to expect from this story as it could turn to be either pretty average or something surprisingly good. I'll find out next volume which has at least one story that already sounds very promising.

So, on a whole, this volume is slightly disappointing and without the third, zombie-themed story it would have been below average, but, to be fair, there only two complete stories in this volume. Judged only by those two complete stories, it's actually a pretty good, solid volume. Not the best in the series, but good enough and look forward to next few volumes. Hopefully, Saguru Hakuba reappears one of these days, because I'm still unwilling to entirely let go of my pet theory.