Kodomo Keishi Ep 06 Review

While initially showing promise, Kodomo Keishi (コドモ警視) is starting to show the same grinding repetitiveness that Kodomo Keisatsu did. As usual, they start by showing us who the culprit is:

I still don’t understand why they do that, and wish they wouldn’t. Just once, they could skip showing us. Worse, what they show him doing has to be the lamest crime they’ve covered to date – he was drawing long nose hairs on pictures in a textbook.

The initial classroom scene is normal as well.

Making some slashes at Hazama (Marius Yo) with an air-sword, Yumi (Minamino Saki) tells us that the suspect’s father has produced a TV show.

That’s . . . interesting. But as Hazama again slips out of her range, he bumps into the new teacher we saw at the end of the previous episode. I had thought that the new teacher would be a worthy opponent who could eventually set up something interesting for Hazama – perhaps in the finale. No such luck – from what Hazama says in this scene, I gather she was sent by his superiors in the police, perhaps to check out what he’s spending all of his time on.

With Hideyoshi looking less than stellar thanks to the efforts of the culprit . . .

. . . Hazama’s teacher once again tries to interest him in the case. I’ve finally determined the teacher’s name – Konno Toshifumi (Hamano Kenta). You’ve got to figure that Hazama is totally uninterested this time, though. I mean, Konno will be having him investigate who clogged up a toilet next.

In this case, Yumi showing up works to Hazama’s detriment, as he has to agree to take the case to keep his teacher from giving away his secret to Yumi.

Hazama has three teachers to confer with now, including the new arrival . . .

. . . but even though there are quickly some leads, and this is hardly a tense case like the one with the apparition . . .

. . . he still makes the regular visit to Takamura (Shaku Yumiko). With so little of interest going on, I was hoping that Konno, who is infatuated with Takamura, would walk in on them. Getting jealous of Hazama, he would start plotting against him (don’t ask me how – I just want something different to happen, dammit!). No such luck, though.

At a parent-teacher conference, we discover why Konno wanted Hazama to find some concrete evidence – the culprit’s father is intolerable. They call him a monster parent, but that usually just means a parent who has a distorted view of their kid and who is overbearing on teachers. This guy is just plain obnoxious.

Hazama confronts them with his case . . .

. . . but the father predictably defends his son.

At least it doesn’t become a shouting match between him and Hazama – that would have been awkward to watch. Instead, he wisely picks a bigger and better target.

I have no idea what this is supposed to prove:

To crack through the suspect’s alibi, Hazama has his usual encounter with a character from Kodomo Keisatsu:

It’s Hayashi Maiko (Honda Miyu) this time:

Moving on to the robed phase . . . .

I hate to say it, but there was nothing about this episode worth watching, if you’ve already seen a couple of the previous episodes – not even something silly like the twin thing from the episode before this (which at least brought out some interesting reactions from the characters).

Even worse, there was so little for Hazama to do, Marius-kun’s acting came off as flat, so even those who were watching to see whether this uber-young idol could act didn’t get much to tune-in for.

I really wanted the new teacher to be a more active force opposing Hazama, giving him something real to stress over. Instead, she was entirely a background figure this time. I hope they have a plan for her, and didn’t just throw the actress in there because her agent had a friend in the casting department.

But I’m still curious on that score, so I’ll keep tuning in hoping that even if they stick to the same formula, the writers will at least give Marius-kun a little more to do in the later episodes. We’ll see.