Case Closed Volume 1

Case Closed volume 1

Jimmy Kudo, high school junior, idolizes Sherlock Holmes and solves mysteries for the police department in Case Closed, a long-running manga action comedy by Gosho Aoyama. After trailing bad guys to a mysterious meeting, he’s knocked out and poisoned. Although the villains meant to kill him, they instead turn him physically into a six-year-old boy.

He winds up working with an incompetent private investigator, the father of the girl he has a crush on, while a mad scientist tries to turn him back to normal. (Supposedly. Although in later books he keeps giving Jimmy cool spy toys, he doesn’t seem to make much progress… because he can’t disturb the book’s premise.) Their first case involves the kidnapping of a businessman’s daughter, and Jimmy’s biggest challenge is to present his deductions in a way that the adults will listen to.

Case Closed volume 1

The big-headed little Jimmy is very cute, and similar exaggeration is used to establish the other characters and their motivations. Jimmy has a hard time getting used to his smaller, weaker body, but he makes up for the lack with clever improvisation, like riding a Great Dane to the rescue.

Jimmy was used to doing things on his own, but as a kid, he must adapt to asking for help. The only plus comes when Rachel, his crush, unknowingly confides her feelings for the older Jimmy to the younger. When Jimmy solves a second case, involving a young pop star with a stalker, by throwing his voice and pretending to be Rachel’s father, that deception sets the tone for future volumes.



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