is what Superintendent Ryoko Yakushiji does. She kicks ass in them too.yaku1

It’s not often I find something that utterly captivates me, but this anime series managed to, in the best way possible. It’s called Yakushiji Ryoko no Kaiki Jikenbo (薬師寺涼子の怪奇事件簿) or Ryoko Yakushiji’s Strange Case Files (hereafter referred to as Yaku). It follows the exploits of Superintendent Ryoko Yakushiji of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police in her investigations of unusual cases, the kind regular cops can’t handle. Her sidekick: Long-suffering Assistant Inspector Junichiro Izumida.

First, some background. It is around the present day, with two major security firms making up 80% of the market share in Japan and throughout Asia, one is JACES and the other is the NPP (Japan Private Police, Japan -> Nippon). JACES was founded by Ryoko’s grandfather before WW2 as the Japanese Empire Security Service, and so, with her father currently head of the company, she has it’s considerable resources to call upon where the police fall short.

More on Ryoko: A Law graduate from Tokyo University, she is multilingual, well-versed in the use of firearms and a competent martial artist. She looks like this (front and centre, in red):

When you have so many defining traits in one character, there exists the possibility that said character will spontaneously turn into a Mary-Sue. From the outset, this seems to be the case. Ryoko just might be the most arrogant female lead I’ve seen in an anime of this genre. She orders everyone around because she can (and also because JACES has informants everywhere so she has all kinds of dirt on people), and freely makes use of her familial connections to further her own ends. Nevertheless she is in fact a supremely competent investigator and has a strong sense of justice, regardless of how she achieves it.

Asst. Insp. Izumida begins some episodes with a narration, usually ‘I am Junichiro Izumida, and I am Ryoko Yakushiji’s …, or so it seems.’ with ‘loyal retainer’, ‘butler’, ‘confidant’, or whatever else might be pertinent taking the place of the ‘…’. He seems to be the one through which we see most of the series, with a few monologues detaling his thoughts on her treating him like a slave. As you might have guessed, he’s standing back to back with her in the picture above. However, he is utterly loyal to her, and it is shown that she possesses considerable leadership abilities. She also happens to be infatuated with him which makes for a couple of amusing scenes and a very poignant turning point in the plot.

yaku2

Working alongside him are Asst. Insp. Mario Abe, another subordinate; Inspector Maruoka, an older man who has also been placed under Ryoko; and a uniformed officer, Satomi Kaizuka, who handles most of the paperwork. They provide some colourful dialogue here and there but this 13 episode series doesn’t provide enough screen-time to properly flesh them out.

While Ryoko works in the investigative section of the Metropolitan Police, her onetime classmate and sometime rival, Yukiko Muromachi, also a superintendent, is part of the security section, and their jobs often cross since Ryoko’s investigation of corrupt officials brings her into contact with men Yukiko is supposed to be escorting. Yukiko is the straight (wo)man to Ryoko’s disregard of the rules, and much of their conflict arises from this. However, they have some fun conversations which eventually show how much they value each other as colleagues. This is especially true in the last episode, where Yukiko snaps in the heat of the moment, going completely nuts because she envies Ryoko’s ‘gung-ho-ness’ and dual wielding assault rifles to great effect. She recovers later on though. (Dang.) In the pic above, she’s in blue with glasses. She’s assisted by Akira Kishimoto, a weak-willed and, frankly quite useless character who idolises Ryoko.

Ryoko being the rich girl that she is, has maids. Not just any maids, but a pair of them imported from France. So French maids… Yay. Of course this is a chance to showcase her multilingual skills, and we are treated to some oddly accented conversations between the three of them. And her maids aren’t just maids, more like spec ops people posing as maids. This again, is used in a near comic scene towards the end of the anime. Lucienne (blonde, hacker) and Marianne (NRA rep girl with guns) are dangling off a helicopter in the pic above.

Enough about the characters, though it is quite a character driven drama. There are crimes occuring in Tokyo. Strange ones. Am I being redundant? Ah, well.

This may sound like your average supernatural crime thriller, but it’s not. It is firmly grounded in science, or at least pseudo-science. People dessicating on the street? It’s not a curse but actually an experiment with hormones or something! People commiting suicide for no reason? Nothing paranormal about it – a previously unknown species of cricket that emits radio waves that cause depression when received on a cellphone! You’re thinking ‘what?!’ right now, aren’t you.

This could have been a comedy had it chosen to be, with the amount of suspension of disbelief one has to put up with to watch it. However, it chooses to take itself completely seriously, and with excellent voice-acting (except the aforementioned French bits) making for expressive and believeable characters, it really took me by surprise.

When I looked it up on Wikipedia, I learned that this series was originally released as light novels, beginning in 1996, and also a manga in 2004, this anime, however, only came out in July 2008. All three follow different continuities and plots, albeit with the same main characters. Ryoko’s Case Files was created by none other than Yoshiaki Tanaka, of Legend of Galactic Heroes fame.

LoGH is renowned in Japan as being their answer to Western space opera, it is an unusual thing, in that it spanned 110 direct-to-video episodes over the course of 9 YEARS (1988 to 1997). Hence it is possibly the longest-running OVA series ever. I’d love to watch that some day, but it’s really a bit too much. However I’ve heard a lot about it’s complex plot, deep characters and brilliant pacing, and Yakushiji Ryoko no Kaiki Jikenbo seems to follow this formula.

The thing that immediately caught my attention, even from the first episode, was the opening and ending themes, or rather lack thereof. Most anime are characterised by utilising pop idols to gather publicity through the use of singles as themes. This anime does not. The opening and ending credits are jazz/swing pieces with a little scat singing and a healthy dose of style, providing an excellent intro and outro to every episode. The background music is in the same tone and helps with the immersive nature of this kind of crime drama, as I mentioned, I was drawn in from the start.

The artwork is another area where I’d like to compliment the creator and animators. As a commenter in a forum mentioned, it is almost vector-like in it’s use of light and colour, and the cliched phrase ‘less is more’ comes to mind. Focus is practically always on the characters, although if you choose to pause at any time (your loss – breaking the flow of the story) you will see that backgrounds are just as lovingly detailed.

Plotwise, it seems relatively episodic from the beginning, though in the last two episodes (actually a two-part), almost everything seen earlier makes an appearance. I mentioned earlier that this series is grounded in fact, but I lied a little, there are some pseudo-scientific ramblings about alchemy and such, but for me it’s not a major bone of contention. I might also mention that Ryoko is nicknamed (by her subordinates) WTED Ryoko with WTED standing for Walks-Through-Even-Dracula because she fears nothing, and SLD (Summons-Like-Dracula) because strange occurrences tend to be drawn to her (I.e. she ’summons’ things from the nether).

This is on my ‘Best of 2008′ list, for three reasons: tone, content and Ryoko herself. A must watch. Period.