Detective Conan (Case Closed) Canon

[Drolyt]

Alright, I've been wondering. Are the Detective Conan movies, OVAs, and J-Dramas considered canon? Some of them would have profound effects on the story if they were. I doubt that there's an established canon list like for Star Wars, but does anyone know if any of them are based on manga chapters or if the mangaka was involved with them? What about filler episodes? Thanks in advance for any replies.

Final Note: It strikes me that Detective Conan doesn't seem to be one of the more popular anime here in the states, for some reason most people are only familiar with martial arts shonen whereas in Japan a series like Conan would be considered more mainstream (whereas things like Naruto and Bleach are reserved for kids and otaku). At any rate if anyone is confused Detective Conan is an Anime about a famous high school detective that is obsessed with Sherlock Holmes gets turned into a kid by some experimental drug and has to solve cases even though he is a kid and nobody will listen to him. Some hilarity also ensues.

[Atelm]

I believe the author's only commented on the movies with his personal opinions on how well they were made, were they entertaining. Nothing of them being canon or not.

But considering some of the stuff that happens in the OVAs and especially the movies, it is for the best to just ignore them when it comes to the manga (canon) storyline. Same deal with a lot of the anime episodes, because most of the anime is pure filler. Which in some cases has lead to the anime adapters making huge plot mistakes early on, and having to go back and fix them. Examples of this include the murder of Sherry's sister, and giving Gin and Vodka wrong names.

Though one has to note that events and characters from the anime, but not the movies themselves, have been referenced and made apperances in the manga afterward. Shiratori is one good example, he originally appeared in the anime only but he soon appeared in the manga as well as a canon character.

Still, when it comes to things such as

Ran landing a plane in Magician of the Silver Sky, or Irish, the extra B.O member, in Raven Chaser; it's best to just assume that they didn't happen.


As for Conan's popularity Stateside, don't really know. Might have something to do with the fact that the American releases of both the anime and manga are "Americanized" and edited. Over here, where we get the series unedited it is quite popular as far as I know.

[Lord Seth]

As for Conan's popularity Stateside, don't really know. Might have something to do with the fact that the American releases of both the anime and manga are "Americanized" and edited. Over here, where we get the series unedited it is quite popular as far as I know.What were the edits? I know they changed that name, but that was for legal reasons.

[Atelm]

All of the characters, not just Conan, got their names changed. Plenty of the locales were changed from Japan. A load of the Japanese cultural references, including crucial puzzles and wordplays in some of the mysteries, were Americanized leading to issues all of its own.

I've only read a few volumes of it, then just happily switched back to the Finnish version. Harley Hartwell from Canada indeed... :smalleek:

The mangaka even comments on this in one of this forewords in one of the volumes, lamenting the changes made and wishing the translators and localizers "good luck" in their practically impossible task of removing all things Japanese from the work.

[Fri]

I first read Meitantei Conan at Elementary school.

Now I almost finished college.

Good god.

Now, my own personal canon is, almost all case happened in parallel universes. Only cases closely related to the main story, like Black Organization stuffs and Kaito Kid cases are what actually happened in the main timeline. But even then, Conan should be a teenager already right now....

[Atelm]

Yeah, considering the series has been going since '94. He's already exceeded his previous age. :smallbiggrin:

Though, if ignores the time illogicalities, it's supposed to be assumed that everything happens during one year. But considering the numbers of events and cases, it really can't. Therefore, the illogicalities have to be ignored.

But really, if realism is something one wants to ponder on within the series. I'd put forward how the "Detective Boys", the three actual 6-year-olds, have come across literally hundreds of gruesome murder scenes and bodies, yet still have remained unscarred mentally. :smalleek:

[Fri]

how the "Detective Boys", the three actual 6-year-olds, have come across literally hundreds of gruesome murder scenes and bodies, yet still have remained unscarred mentally. :smalleek:

That's what the detective boys want you to believe :smallamused:

At least Ayumi will grow to be a yandere.

[Atelm]

That's what the detective boys want you to believe :smallamused:

At least Ayumi will grow to be a yandere.

I always tell myself that Conan is subconsciously training himself three future Moriarty (read: Kaitou Kid, except these three would murder) replacements in the form of those three, whenever they tag along somewhere with Conan and Ai and end up witnessing yet-another-murder. :smallamused:

[Drolyt]

I believe the author's only commented on the movies with his personal opinions on how well they were made, were they entertaining. Nothing of them being canon or not.

But considering some of the stuff that happens in the OVAs and especially the movies, it is for the best to just ignore them when it comes to the manga (canon) storyline. Same deal with a lot of the anime episodes, because most of the anime is pure filler. Which in some cases has lead to the anime adapters making huge plot mistakes early on, and having to go back and fix them. Examples of this include the murder of Sherry's sister, and giving Gin and Vodka wrong names.

Though one has to note that events and characters from the anime, but not the movies themselves, have been referenced and made apperances in the manga afterward. Shiratori is one good example, he originally appeared in the anime only but he soon appeared in the manga as well as a canon character.

Still, when it comes to things such as

Ran landing a plane in Magician of the Silver Sky, or Irish, the extra B.O member, in Raven Chaser; it's best to just assume that they didn't happen.


As for Conan's popularity Stateside, don't really know. Might have something to do with the fact that the American releases of both the anime and manga are "Americanized" and edited. Over here, where we get the series unedited it is quite popular as far as I know.

Okay, thanks. Another thing I was considering was just thinking of the manga and anime as seperate continuities.

What were the edits? I know they changed that name, but that was for legal reasons.
They changed everyone's name, numerous place names, etc., and refused to use any culture notes despite them being crucial to understanding certain cases. Also, while I believe they are still translating the manga only the first five seasons of the anime is available in English, and only 50 episodes ever aired on television, meaning that anyone who's really interested has to either import the DVDs or use less than legal means to watch it.

All of the characters, not just Conan, got their names changed. Plenty of the locales were changed from Japan. A load of the Japanese cultural references, including crucial puzzles and wordplays in some of the mysteries, were Americanized leading to issues all of its own.

I've only read a few volumes of it, then just happily switched back to the Finnish version. Harley Hartwell from Canada indeed...

The mangaka even comments on this in one of this forewords in one of the volumes, lamenting the changes made and wishing the translators and localizers "good luck" in their practically impossible task of removing all things Japanese from the work.
The manga was changed too? I'm used to edits to anime that come stateside, but usually the manga is more faithful. I guess I'm scratching my plans to buy the English version, even though I usually prefer to support the people who create my favorite media.

I first read Meitantei Conan at Elementary school.

Now I almost finished college.

Good god.

Now, my own personal canon is, almost all case happened in parallel universes. Only cases closely related to the main story, like Black Organization stuffs and Kaito Kid cases are what actually happened in the main timeline. But even then, Conan should be a teenager already right now....
If you ignore all references to time and assume each case takes a single day and they have a case every day they have still been at it for about a year. I'm not sure how one should interpret that.

Yeah, considering the series has been going since '94. He's already exceeded his previous age.

Though, if ignores the time illogicalities, it's supposed to be assumed that everything happens during one year. But considering the numbers of events and cases, it really can't. Therefore, the illogicalities have to be ignored.

But really, if realism is something one wants to ponder on within the series. I'd put forward how the "Detective Boys", the three actual 6-year-olds, have come across literally hundreds of gruesome murder scenes and bodies, yet still have remained unscarred mentally.
You'd be surprised. It isn't unreasonable to assume those kids would at least need some counseling, but it is not necessarily the case that they would be severely mentally scarred. Besides I can count on one hand the number of cases they were involved in that they actually saw a corpse or something similar. So I see where you are coming from, but maybe the kids just have extreme mental fortitude or something.

[Atelm]

The manga was changed too? I'm used to edits to anime that come stateside, but usually the manga is more faithful. I guess I'm scratching my plans to buy the English version, even though I usually prefer to support the people who create my favorite media.


Yes, the manga was changed that's what I was talking about.

You could import the UK release of the manga, I believe those are unedited. Not 100 % certain of that, however.

[Drolyt]

Yes, the manga was changed that's what I was talking about.

You could import the UK release of the manga, I believe those are unedited. Not 100 % certain of that, however.

I'll check into the UK version then. Thanks.

[Lord Seth]

They changed everyone's name, numerous place names, etc., and refused to use any culture notes despite them being crucial to understanding certain cases. Also, while I believe they are still translating the manga only the first five seasons of the anime is available in English, and only 50 episodes ever aired on television, meaning that anyone who's really interested has to either import the DVDs or use less than legal means to watch it.Meh, I liked the Americanized names more anyway. It's been so long since I saw the anime I can't remember anything about whether culture notes were necessary, but I don't recall having any problems with that either.

[Drolyt]

Meh, I liked the Americanized names more anyway. It's been so long since I saw the anime I can't remember anything about whether culture notes were necessary, but I don't recall having any problems with that either.

The mangaka has an obsession with the various tricks you can pull off with Kanji. 1 out of every 5 or so cases somehow manages to rely on Kanji to make sense. There's also various wordplay tricks and cultural references that are necessary, not necessarily to understand the cases but often enough to understand exactly what's going on. A big one is the whole thing with Heiji and Osaka. That kid is obsessed with Osaka.

As for the name changes, they aren't really detrimental to the show on their own, but the entire process of "Americanizing" foreign shows annoys some people.

[Joran]

The mangaka has an obsession with the various tricks you can pull off with Kanji. 1 out of every 5 or so cases somehow manages to rely on Kanji to make sense. There's also various wordplay tricks and cultural references that are necessary, not necessarily to understand the cases but often enough to understand exactly what's going on. A big one is the whole thing with Heiji and Osaka. That kid is obsessed with Osaka.

As for the name changes, they aren't really detrimental to the show on their own, but the entire process of "Americanizing" foreign shows annoys some people.

Yeah, there's some stuff lost in translation. The manga-ka also loves making puzzles based on shogi, which is completely incomprehensible to Americans like me. Another one required that someone figure out that "Can-Do" was supposed to be said in English... sadly, it was already in English, so yeah, that didn't quite make sense. I read the manga and about every other mystery actually makes sense and is solvable for me.

I think at least in America, Detective Conan would be considered a kids' show, but it's so gruesome that it isn't considered proper for kids to watch. The first episode, someone gets decapitated for goodness sakes. Compare Detective Conan to Scooby Doo...

One of the worst deaths I saw on the show was someone duct taped to the bottom of a bathtub and it was slowly filled with water over the period of several hours until the person drowned. Yikes.

[Kato]

*scratch*

Okay, can't say much on the topic since it has been quite a while for me...
But some general notes...

Localication. We had it in Germany only very slightly. Names were kept (very glad for that. I just dislike it even though I understand Americans have more trouble with the original names. But figuring out cases on your own, as you'd like to do was often impossible even with the japanese parts kept in because I don't speak Japanese (hardly) and know about nothing about shogu or anything which is often neccessary. That's a little sad, but meh.

What really started to annoy me was the plot not advancing at all. Okay, not not at all but way too slow. They are probably still as close to solving the Black Organization thing as in the beginning...

About Detective Boys getting scarred for life... I think people underestimate what a otherwise healthy mind an handle. It's not like they watch people getting slaughtered they just see a dead body. Which often enough is in good shape. Otherwise... yeah, we'd have a trio of Dexter Morgans omehwere in Tokyo running loose.

[Starscream]

Didn't he do a crossover with Lupin III in one of those? I think it would have a pretty big effect on the canon if those two universes are coexistent.

[Drolyt]

Didn't he do a crossover with Lupin III in one of those? I think it would have a pretty big effect on the canon if those two universes are coexistent.

Not really. Conan is already coexistent with Magic Kaito, which is essentially Lupin III with magic (they even refer to Kaito kid as the modern era Lupin, referring of course to the original French Lupin). The fact that Lupin and the gang exist in the same continuity as well wouldn't affect much. Although it is interesting to note that in the Lupin III vs Detective Conan movie apparently both the actual Lupin III and the manga about him exist.

By the way, that special was awesome (it was a TV movie, and got amazing ratings in Japan). Although I'm a long time fan of both series, so I might be biased. For some reason Lupin III isn't that popular in America (I hear that it is ridiculously popular in Italy though), but it's like apple pie to the Japanese, even for non-otaku.

[Starscream]

By the way, that special was awesome (it was a TV movie, and got amazing ratings in Japan). Although I'm a long time fan of both series, so I might be biased. For some reason Lupin III isn't that popular in America (I hear that it is ridiculously popular in Italy though), but it's like apple pie to the Japanese, even for non-otaku.

Lupin III is my single favorite thing to come out of Japan ever. Better than sushi, Godzilla, Haruhi and Nintendo combined.

Has the Lupin vs. Conan thing been subbed or dubbed at all? Because I keep hearing good things about Conan and have been thinking of checking it out. Since I'm already a Lupin fanatic, a crossover between them might be a good start.

[Drolyt]

Lupin III is my single favorite thing to come out of Japan ever. Better than sushi, Godzilla, Haruhi and Nintendo combined.

Has the Lupin vs. Conan thing been subbed or dubbed at all? Because I keep hearing good things about Conan and have been thinking of checking it out. Since I'm already a Lupin fanatic, a crossover between them might be a good start.

It's been subbed. I don't think it has been dubbed, at least not into English. Most of the Detective Conan stuff isn't available in English, basically from the Anime only the first 4 or so seasons have been released in a badly mangled dub. I'd link to the sub for you, but I'm not sure we are allowed to do that.

[Fri]

Lupin III is my single favorite thing to come out of Japan ever. Better than sushi, Godzilla, Haruhi and Nintendo combined.

Has the Lupin vs. Conan thing been subbed or dubbed at all? Because I keep hearing good things about Conan and have been thinking of checking it out. Since I'm already a Lupin fanatic, a crossover between them might be a good start.

Just telling that Meitantei Conan is the detective manga equivalent of Dragon Ball. Just saying...

[Drolyt]

Just telling that Meitantei Conan is the detective manga equivalent of Dragon Ball. Just saying...

What do you mean? Dragon Ball is many things, and a good read, so it is more or less impossible to know what you mean by this.