Many days late, I apologise.

Reiko whines about having to go to work on a Sunday and declares that "Criminals should be prohibited to do crimes on weekends." Kageyama smartly points out, "My lady, criminals should be prohibited to do crimes at all times." 

The corpse in the hotel room was left wearing nothing but his underpants. Reiko is highly disturbed but manages to convince herself that she's looking at nothing but flowers on the roadside, waving to her. She convinces herself so much that she ends up smiling (hahahah) er while looking at his underpants. 

Kazamatsuri teases her about enjoying too much and she makes a face. She learns from the coroner that the culprit had taken the clothes off the body after he/she killed the victim, and that the ashtray was the weapon used. She inquires why the body had no clothes, and Kazamatsuri announces that he knows the reason but his reason is, "Maybe this is the work of a professional assassin…and this is the style of the assassin?" 

They go on to get their testimonies and at night, when a crowd of reporters swarm around him (Reporters this time, because the victim was a high ranked government official), he says, "No comment. But I have something that will interest you guys. When he was killed, the room was locked. Yes, so this means that it's a murder in a locked room." He then speeds away in his car, all smug with himself, while everyone has the -.- face because hotel rooms' doors lock themselves automatically. 

As usual, during dinner, Reiko starts talking about what she has learnt. They interviewed the victim's secretary and learnt that a meeting was suddenly cancelled so he had a lot of free time. He went back to his room to check on his things, and here they learnt that he had lately been running around to companies that were suspected of involving in black money and illegal transactions. Reiko and Kazatsumari had their red tea, and Reiko was surprised because the red tea was so good — turns out it was Kageyama who brought along top grade tea leaves with him and was the 'chef'. He comments sadly, "If you had stayed longer, there will be pancakes." Lol!

They then learnt from a cleaner that he had seen a tall man leaving the victim's room at about 11.30pm (estimated time of death was 11.00pm) He used the room plate to estimate a height. The two of them went on to find the people whom the victim last called before he died, and realised that they were all women. The first woman was a newscaster who had broken up with the victim because he cheated on her so many times, and every time, he would kneel to beg for forgiveness. They had even gone for a trip to the beach together. 

Kageyama was at this point of time, snapping many shots but Reiko looks at the photo and finds out that he only took pictures of the Q-queen, the shortest heroine in the world standing at 1.59m. They went on to the second female who was going out with the victim with marriage as prerequisite. She was the daughter of a bigshot in the industry. They had a call because she wanted to wish the victim good luck in his work and that night, she spent the night alone. Kazamatsuri led slip about another girl who had gone to the beach with the victim but was stopped by Reiko. The female went to stand at the window, and here Kageyama interjects with, "I tried my best…" and produces a photo of only the second female…and no Reiko. Lol! 

They found the third female who remembered towards the end of the session, that the victim had acted weirdly during their last get together session with all the university students. She had excitedly suggested bowling as an activity after dinner, but the victim slammed his fist on the table and insisted that there should be no bowling. Here, Kageyama produces yet another photo with no Reiko and Reiko sulks, "If you want to take photos, take a good one!" After they returned to the parking lot, a scary man appeared, only to introduce himself as the victim's bodyguard. He told them that he had seen a woman of about 1.60+m enter the victim's room at 10.30pm. Kazatsumari insisted that the bodyguard was the killer but he protested that he really respected the victim "who was someone who would not go for golf nor high-end Japanese restaurants." 

The end of the recounting session. Kageyama knows that she's just waiting for his deduction and tells her so. She proudly tells Kageyama that she will solve this case herself and she will pull the culprit out. 

Upon which Kageyama does that thing again — leaning down to her and say,

\

"I think, my lady, it's better that you back down." 

Reiko does her thing — being super calm, before exploding ten seconds later. She throws the Q-queen poster on the floor and fires Kageyama. Kageyama quickly defends his poster with a —

"You can scold me if you want, but Q-queen did nothing wrong!" Hahahaha Reiko recoils a little with a "Don't say that with such a serious expression." Exactlyyy lolol. 

Anyway, as usual, Reiko puts down her pride and gets Kageyama to solve the crime. So here we go. 

Kageyama tells Reiko about the existence of secret shoes, those shoes that allow men to put on 15cm of height without people realising it. He deduces that the victim had such shoes as well, but Reiko is doubtful. Kageyama then tells her to recall the testimonies and that the victim did not like going for bowling, golf and Japanese restaurants. "What do all this have to do with one another? That's right, they all involve the taking off of shoes." 

Reiko continues, "So the woman who is about 160, can put on those shoes, and become the 180 man that the cleaner saw, is the criminal?" "That's right." Kageyama then tells her that he already knows the height of the three females —  by taking photos of them standing next to the the Q-queen photo. So….

This means that the third female is out of the picture. Lol, have you ever seen someone who is disappointed at being kicked out of the picture? 

Reiko can't decide if the first or the second female is the culprit but Kageyama is certain that it's the second female. He starts to recount his deduction, added with his own imagination. So the victim called the second female over and while talking, he accidentally said another girl's name (to which Kageyama interjects with a "You should always call the woman 'you' so that there will be no mistakes." hahaha) . Kneeling on the ground to beg for mercy, he exposed his shoes which she pulled off and started laughing at. However, he got so angry, he started strangling the female so in her defence, she killed him with the ashtray. She then put on his shoes and wore the clothes from the cupboard, but she realised that the police might realise something was wrong if only the shoes disappeared, so this was why she took off all the clothes, so that the lack of clothes would grab their attention more than the lack of shoes. 

Being smart, she also knew that the victim wouldn't only have one pair of shoes. She tried searching the whole room and found the shoes in the safe (which explains why the safe was open when the police found the corpse). Reiko asks why then this culprit couldn't be the first female, to which Kageyama explains that the first female had already gone to the beach with the victim, which means that she already knew about the victim's true height. 

Reiko looks at Kageyama, "I'm going, Kageyama," and he smiles. They go straight on to the second female's house, right to the place where one can burn things. (somewhat like uhm…a barbecue pit?) Kageyama is sure that the shoes will still be in the second female's house because there is no recycling on weekends, which means that the second female will try to dispose of the shoes in her house –> burning. The second female could not stop them from searching and before long, Kageyama has what he wants which is the sole of the shoe.

The second female breaks down and says that she couldn't forgive him because when he begged for mercy, he said, "Don't tell your father." This led her to realise that he indeed, only liked her for her money and status. Kageyama also told her that being short was the victim's inferiority complex, which was why he reacted so strongly. 

Kazamatsuri appears with a (as usual) "I know that she murdered him all along, Hosho," but Reiko hung up on him.  A few seconds later, she walked out of the house, with Kageyama behind her, but Kazamatsuri didn't recognise her and even took a photo of her back, saying " We met again."

Kageyama says that there's always people who try hard to overcome the things they feel inferior at and Reiko replies that she doesn't dislike this kind of people. Kageyama turns his head to look at the seat next to him…where there are loads of photos of Reiko with a very serious expression while solving cases. He smiles aww, and says "Me too." Reiko asks if he has a girlfriend and he replies, "There's only one woman whose name I love."

"Who?"

"You."

Reiko opens her eyes in shockkkkk when Kageyama breaks the shock with a, "One should always say 'you', that way there will be no mistakes." 

The two of them laugh and they return home.

-the end-

I finally figure out what it was about this drama that didn't really appeal to me, even though it should, because it's in the genre I like.

So 1. I like to watch a capable lead, meaning the one solving the cases is the one truly working his/her brains. But here, all I see is Reiko depending so much on Kageyama, even he realises it. I just hope that they will work towards an ending where Reiko can solve her own cases! 2. This is not much of a problem with the drama per se, and you could almost say that I'm just fussy. I don't really like the repetitive theme of Reiko going to the crime scene, they got the testimonies, she went home for dinner, recounted the testimonies, got insulted by Kageyama, put down her pride, got told to finish her dinner first, Kageyama revealing the truth, "I want to go there now, Kageyama", and so on.

It's fine if you only have a repetitive line, like Ken-zo in Proposal Daisakusen, because people might even find it cute, or look forward to it. If they hated it, they knew that at most, they only needed to suffer for one line. But to have the same structure (look, structure, not line) for the three episodes meant that your entire episode is no longer a surprise. People know the order of things, so it doesn't keep them in suspense anymore!

Which brings me to the third point. This has everything to do with me, and not with the drama I guess, but I prefer episodes where characters live in the present. Meaning, they go to the crime scene, they solve the crime, and yay everyone's happy. Everything's moving along the same timeline. This helps to build suspense and tension! However, Nazotoki Wa Dinner No Ato De works along the basis of flashbacks and recounts. This kills the suspense in the story, not to mention that the constant moving back and forth on the timeline makes the whole thing less like a crime/mystery genre, and more like a … I don't know, storytelling session.

Am I being too harsh?

I don't know, but yes this is why I probably wouldn't like this so much. I must admit, these revelations might have partly gotten something to do with the Meitantei Conan that I've watched (which worked on a basis that I like) and Bloody Monday.

However, despite this long rant, I don't think I will drop the drama. After all, it IS supposed to be the genre I like, and I guess I will hang on till the very last!

<3thoughtsramble