But the OP and ED — not so great.

Summary:

Izumida Jun’ichirou is a thirty-three year old man who works as a lieutenant for the Metropolitan Police Department in the Criminal Investigation division. He dreams of Yukushiji Ryoko, his counselor, standing far away a meadow smiling gracefully, until she draws out a gun and shoots herself in the head. Izumida suddenly awakes and wonders why he’s been having the same nightmare over and over again. Ready for work, he arrives but is immediately scolded by Ryoko for not greeting her properly. She decides to take him shopping with her, and left with no choice, he follows, noting that wherever she goes, something supernatural always occurs.

Taking a taxi to their destination, a man suddenly runs into the front of the car and collapses on top of it after instantly aging and then becoming mummified right before their eyes. At once, Ryoko and Izumida hop out of the car until Ryoko notices a figure hiding in the alleyway. Ryoko pursues the suspect but gets distracted when the suspect’s ring falls off, which then results in the suspect escaping to the Tower of Babel. Before Ryoko and Izumida can investigate the building, Ginza, who’s head of the Minister of Health, Labor and Welfare, accompanied by his three men, forbids them from doing so. One of Ginza’s men try to attack Ryoko after she insults Ginza, so then she uses this to her advantage by threatening Ginza that she’ll arrest this man for public harassment.

Ginza gives up and allows her and Izumida to search the building for the suspect, but in return she can’t do anything to his men. Finally coming to an agreement, Ryoko and Izumida look into the building but Ryoko doesn’t want to search for the suspect any more since the ring will help them. While Ryoko searches for the right bathing suit that fits Izumida’s liking, she asks him what he thinks of the case. He responds that it may be somewhat similar to the “Visitor from Fog”, also known as the Karuiza case, because the side-effects of the victims’ are alike. After swimming for a while, Ryoko and Izumida receive data about the ring. Apparently it’s from a cult called Tsukuyomi Party that believe in Tsukuyomi, Goddess of the Moon, and it’s run by a young kid called Kougetsu Reikou. Ryoko’s disappointed that this information has nothing to do with the suspect’s intention of poisoning those six people.

Later on, the pair pay a visit to Professor Tatsumi, who’s good when it comes to paranormal phenomena and supernatural cases, since he has an open mind. He explains that the victims were poisoned; however, the food was contaminated before it was even cooked. Therefore, the QTR, or Mr. Ginza and his gang, are responsible because they take care of the imported food. Ryoko seizes this chance to raid his place. When she and Izumida leave the building, a woman standing on a bridge hopes that some day Ryoko will play with her again just like the old times.

Suddenly, Ryoko and Izumida are encountered by Kishimoto and his counselor Muromachi Yukiko, who is Ryoko’s rival. Ryoko learns that Ginza is holding a party, which is why her co-workers are there: to guide visitors into the building. Ryoko manages to get her hands on the invitations, but Izumida leaves after a letter request from Yukiko to meet in private. Ryoko lets him go as the waitress serves him a drink — the waitress being the suspect and a member of the cult group. When Izumida arrives at the secret place, he finds that Kishimoto is being held hostage by Ginza’s men. Izumida easily defeats them and rushes back to Ryoko, fearing that she’s drinking poison. When he gets there, Ryoko has a pistol pointing at the suspect.

Thoughts:

I had a choice between Koihime Musou or Yakushiji Ryoko no Kaiki Jikenbo, or Ryoko’s Case File for short, so my expectations for this episode were pretty high considering the fact that it won’t be long before I get sadly capped again. Anyway, this episode was brilliant — and as the title says, the best I’ve seen this season. The OP and ED themes aren’t really worth mentioning since there’s nothing great about them, but they definitely suit this anime’s theme. The characters don’t particulary stand out either and are rather “dull” — very realistically human. That being said, the entire show is almost like watching an episode of NCIS or CSI because although the case is identified as a paranormal phenomena in the beginning, it later on just becomes one of those “original” ones where there’s a mastermind behind all the incidents and there’s nothing really supernatural going on (I don’t think, or maybe there is). The episode ended with a cliff-hanger, but I didn’t feel the furious urge to know more, and for sure, I’m going to get bored with this series soon if it doesn’t hurry up and throw in a huge twist. The small fight scene was awesome even though it lasted for only a few seconds, but if it had lasted longer, it would have been epic. I’m definitely following this series, which means I might not follow Someday’s Dreamers after all, if Blade of the Immortal is horrible, that is. This is the only anime so far that has amazed me, compared to the other ones. The artwork isn’t really nice either, but it’s easy to get used to. Regarding voice-overs — no one gives a crap, as long as the anime’s not mute.