Waiting for the annual theatrical version of Detective Conan has become a 'habitual action'. In the past two months, the vast number of "anime fans" have also welcomed a wave of surprises: previously, the popular release of New Haicheng's "Journey of Bell Buds" on March 24, with the box office exceeding 550 million yuan; On April 20th, the movie version of "Slam Dunk" was released, reigniting the passion of countless "80s" and "90s" on the stage. Both works are expected to challenge the box office record of Japanese films released in China.
Between "Ringo's Journey" and "Slam Dunk", in addition to the scheduled April 7th release of "Heike Monogatari: Inu", there is also a surprise Conan theatrical version. However, the film is not the 2023 "Detective Conan: The Shadow of the Black Iron Fish" (released in Japan on April 14th), but "The Undead on Baker Street", which was released more than 20 years ago and is still considered the "pinnacle masterpiece of Conan's theatrical version".
As the sixth theatrical adaptation of Conan, "The Undead on Baker Street," directed by Kenji Kodama, has a compact plot, profound ideas, sincere emotions, and accurate prophecies that are still relevant today. The Dead on Baker Street "tells the story of Conan and others participating in a high-tech game launch called" Cocoon ", and 50 children of Japanese political and business celebrities accessing the virtual world through devices, but encountering an unimaginable crisis.
During the event, the game developer died in murder, and the game was taken over by the artificial intelligence "Noah's Ark". In the end, only Konan and his team survived in the "19th century London" scene. Unless key clues to solve the case are found, all players will lose their lives.
In the film, the two main plotlines of "Searching for Jack the Ripper" and "The Mystery of Genius Youth's Suicide" are intertwined. On the one hand, the film allows Conan to imitate Sherlock Holmes on the streets of London in the 19th century to investigate cases, and on the other hand, it criticizes the class stratification and factionalism of Japanese society. The plot reaches its climax in the revelation of Jack the Ripper's identity and bloodline.
The Undead on Baker Street is not only a seamless story, but also touching with details such as the brief appearances of Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty, the interaction between Conan and his son, and Xiaolan's self sacrifice. Looking back at 'The Undead on Baker Street' 20 years later, the various ideas in the film, such as DNA exploration, artificial intelligence, digital life, VR devices, and metaverse, have now become a reality, which makes people admire the creator's foresight.
After more than 1000 episodes, the plot is filled with water
Since the release of the first theatrical version of "Time Ignites Skyscrapers" on the big screen in 1997, the Conan series has maintained an average annual production of one theatrical version, including last year's "Halloween Bride". Now, 25 theatrical versions have been released to audiences. The plot, characters, and comics in the theatrical version are both independent and continuous, and sometimes linked with the TV version animation.
The Bride of Halloween "is a continuation of the 2004 special" Shocking the Police Department with 12 Million Hostages ", which grossed a staggering 9.48 billion yen in Japan, surpassing" Fist of Blue "'s 9.37 billion yen and ranking first among all Conan theatrical releases. The Chinese box office of 'The Bride of Halloween' also reached 200 million yuan, with a rating of 7.3 on Douban, slightly reversing the previous criticism from fans that 'the theatrical version only has major scene effects and no plot or reasoning'.
In the eyes of many "post-90s" and "post-00s", compared to earlier years, Conan is no longer "good-looking", especially in the TV version after more than 1000 episodes, with a more conservative and youthful art style, "completely unafraid, and without even the scene of the victim" dying in peace ". And as more characters appear, the gap in strength between the positive and negative sides widens. Creators such as Gosho Aoyama are not in a hurry to advance the main storyline, but instead arrange many daily cases unrelated to the main storyline, causing many Conan fans to worry.
What is even more unbearable for fans is that the quality of these daily cases is worrying, and compared to works from more than a decade ago, both the modus operandi and reasoning ability have significantly declined. A large amount of water flooding in the plot has led to the collapse of the characters in Conan's world. Detectives such as Conan and Costume have many "CPs". The villains of black dress organizations such as Qinjiu "catch internal demons" every day, and the situation that "villains' characters are forcibly washed white because of high popularity" will also occur, which makes many "Conan looks at the growing audience" unable to resist roast.
Box office and reputation are inversely proportional
Correspondingly to the decline in the quality of manga and TV adaptations, Conan's theatrical versions are becoming increasingly Hollywood blockbusters, with producers investing more budget and resources to make box office earnings higher than each other. Although the early Conan theatrical version gained high praise for its detective plot, its box office performance was not ideal. The first theatrical version of "Time Ignites Skyscraper" only grossed 1.1 billion yen at the box office, while "The Undead on Baker Street" had a high reputation, but its domestic box office in Japan was only 3.4 billion yen that year.
In 2011, Kong Wen Jingno's "15 Minutes of Silence" began to prominently highlight action choreography and explosive scenes, weakening the element of deduction. The content arrangement became increasingly Hollywood oriented, and the box office also skyrocketed. In 2016, the box office of "Pure Black Nightmare" was 6.3 billion yen, and in 2017, "Tang Hong's Love Song" was 6.8 billion yen. After 2018, the theatrical versions of "Zero Executor", "Fist of Blue", "Halloween Bride" and others skyrocketed to 9 billion yen.
The price for the continuous high box office of the theatrical version is a decline in reputation. The plot of 2021's "Scarlet Bullet" is stiff and far fetched, with a lot of explosive effects piled up in the film, and the Douban rating is only 5.6. In addition, in recent years, scenes such as "sniper rifle hitting high-speed train in motion from 800 miles away", "skateboard chasing car", and "football playing satellite" in theatrical versions have left audiences puzzled. The other two best-selling films, "Zero's Executor" and "Blue Fist", only received ratings of 5.7 and 5.8, respectively.