Meitantei Conan Movie 06: Baker Street no Bourei

At first I'd like to say: Best Conan Film Yet!!

I've seen all the Conan movies currently (which I could find) subbed (11), and this movie, "The Phantom of Baker Street" was the movie I enjoyed most.

Let Detective Mouri drag Conan (Shinichi), Ran, Professor Agasa and the Detective Boys with him to another party where he was invited to, with lots of kids, celebrity's and known people from the anime. Don't forget the highly anticipated murder which will occur....

Then you get a good story for Conan to solve, but what's more? This isn't a regular party, this is a party for kids to test out the ... beta-cocoon, a game terminal formed like a cocoon, which takes on the five senses we humans have, then they let the people think they're somewhere else, we got several stage's, Paris Dakar Rally, Treasure Hunters and more, and of course a theme for a Conan movie, England, a 100 years ago, the time, where Sherlock Holmes lived.

But, before the actual story, with Conan begins, we get an intro, of a very young protagonist in the computer world, he created one of the best A.I. systems in the world, but he couldn't take it anymore, his step-father pushed him to his limits, and he decided to let the program free, he let it escape via phone line, and then ended his live.

Now, when Conan enters the game, Ran and the remaining Detective Boys find a way to get tickets for the cocoon beta test too, together with some snobs we meet in the beginning they visit the old england, while the other kids go to different stage's, but then an error occurs, the A.I. "Noah's Ark" has the game and pretty much the whole building under his control, if all 50 kids die in the games, fail they're objectives or run out of they're time limit (if they have one, like Paris Dakar), they'll vanish from the game world and are put to sleep, if really all 50 lose, they'll die,cause these kids are the future, but everyone is corrupt, so the A.I. wants to change their minds, not to follow in daddy's footstep.

Pretty cool story huh? Well, there's another story in each game world, Conan and the gang have to solve the mystery of JTR (Jack The Ripper), and then capture him, sacrifice's are made, puzzle's are solved, death is around each corner. If they.. succeed, they will find the killer of the one who created this game..

So you get it, a cool story within a cool story, then about the art, the style's the same as in the series, yet better animated, and more things are realistic now, movements, carriage's and such. The sound, the ending is sweet and beautiful (mixed with the movie) and all the sfx's and such are amazing!

The characters basically stay the same, we can yet see another horrified and afraid Kogorou (Det. Mouri), which I think is a good side of his, we can see what he will sacrifice to save his daughter (not so much in this movie, but there's a hint.), we can see Professor Agasa from a side we've not seen him before (not totally). The rest stay the same, new introduced characters are basic type's too, like the murderer, the victim(s), and the snobby, irritating, dumb rich snobs which are introduced.

An anime movie where you can't take you're eye's from, when it's not humorous, it's intresting, when it's not intresting, it's exciting, when it's not exciting, it's beautiful.

One of the best anime movie's I've seen.. yet.

Absolutely brilliant!!!

Story: 4
The story in this Detective Conan film was definitely the weakest part of it for me. It makes many attempts to do something, but doesn't follow the rules required to do that thing. One thing it tried to do was have a suspenseful mystery, but the film reveals who the murderer is early on, creating a mystery story that doesn't really matter, because we, the viewer already know who did it. The method the murderer used also didn't end up being very interesting. Aside from ruining the mystery elements, the film also does a poor job of creating suspense and tension. The newly introduced ... characters are put in life-threatening situations, but because they're in the same situation as the main cast, there's never any reason to be worried, because you're always assured that they're going to survive with them. What we're left with is a story about an adventure in a game world, that ends up being moderately exciting, but nowhere near as exciting as it could have been if a proper mystery was in place alongside it.

Art: 8
The art was pretty decent. It goes one step above the Detective Conan TV series, and does end up having some nice looking moments. However, there are also some pretty mediocre looking CGI shots in there as well. However, those CGI shots make up a minority of the film, and they're pretty easy to ignore. For the most part, the art is pretty acceptable, and looks pretty decent, even by today's standards.

Sound: 7
The soundtrack doesn't stand out, but it also doesn't get in the way. It's pretty average. The audio mix is pretty average as well. The voice acting (I watched it in Japanese) is what you'd expect to hear from Detective Conan. It's quality work, and is enjoyable, but also doesn't amaze.

Character: 8
Your standard Detective Conan characters are here in spades, and they're all just as interesting as they are in the TV series. There's a few new characters introduced, but none of them manage to be very interesting or deep, so for that, the characters lose a few points from me. Still, this is easily the best aspect of the film.

Enjoyment: 5
This managed to be a pretty average experience. I felt like the lack of suspense made it much more tepid than it otherwise would have been, and if it wasn't for Conan & crew being such an interesting and eclectic cast, I would have been somewhat more bored with this film.

Overall, I give Detective Conan: the Phantom of Baker Street a 6/10

From Detective Conan Movies 1 to 15, I like this one the most. The virtual reality concept is interesting and it's set in London which is a nice change. Also includes Jack the Ripper and Sherlock Holmes which made it more interesting.

There is an in-game culprit and real life culprit (in Conan's world) which is pretty cool. The culprit is predictable and the mystery wasn't extremely complicated but it was still exciting to watch.

In terms of art and music, it's decent. I didn't really pay much attention to it at all while watching.

In general, I find the older Conan movies to be more ... interesting.

Although it's taking place inside a VR game, I would have expected quite a bit of mystery from a Detective Conan movie set in the era of Sherlock Holmes. Even more since said game is about investigating the case of Jack the Ripper, one of the great unresolved real-life murder mysteries. But what do we get instead? Conan first goes to Holmes' place (who is currently absent due to his investigation of the Baskerville case), then goes to meet Moriarty, has him kinda summon the culprit, and off we go to the showdown. Bah. Holmes appearing literally out of thin air on the train didn't ... help either.

Art and animation are quite good, as one would expect from a Detective Conan movie. However, the story was a major disappointment for me, so I won't keep the DVD.

The Phantom of Baker Street has always been one of my favourite Detective Conan movies. I like its characters and story.
The idea of a virtual reality game such as Cocoon and an artificial inteligence like Noah is really fascinating and may be products that will be created in the future.

But there has always been one part of the story, that I do not understand until today. Schindler is supposed to be a descendant of Jack the Ripper, but why should that be a problem for Schindler and his company? It is not as if he were responsible for who his ancestors are. How would people ... make Schindler responsible for that in any legal way and why should they? That doesn't make sense to me at all.

This movie used to be one of my least favorites in the series. Back then, I found it to be weird and somewhat contrived. I understand that this statement may displease some fans. After all, Detective Conan: The Phantom of Baker Street is unarguably a very popular movie among them all and is often considered the best one in the whole series. To this day, I still don't necessarily agree with these opinions. That said, I can finally see why it is that people love this movie so much and why it is still worth recommending to this day.

One of the things I found to ... be very fun about this movie is how it implemented the fiction of Arthur Conan Doyle into the world of 19th century London. The environments of industrial London are very well designed and the fan service for Sherlock fans is, admittedly, a pretty fun treat. The movie felt a lot more like an action-adventure story than the usual "stay-in-one-place" murder stories in most movies.

One of the things that I originally didn't liked was the perpetrators motivation to trap all of the children under threat of death. Even now when I do understand what he really meant to do, it still feels kind of weird, ya know? You don't just go saying things like that only to reveal that you meant completely different. Among other criticisms, the fact that the whole movie takes place inside a game is pretty silly, I thought Yusako's case in the real world was basic(the fact that he had to wait for Conan to reveal the culprit's motive was contrived), most of the dialogue is pretty clumsy and hammy(e.g., the villain revealing his goal), and how there is barley any lack of tension when one of the characters gets offed in the game.

My criticisms may look many, but I assure you that this movie is still quite good. If you just choose to let things be as they are and not worry too much about it, then The Phantom of Baker Street can still be a fun, good time.