a review of

if you’re expecting something that really leans into the columbo aspects you’ll probably be disappointed (the investigation has more of the structure of an ace attorney game than a columbo episode), but this is a satisfying-enough jdrama-style slightly-comedic detective tv movie about a guy with the coat and light affectations of columbo. yes columbo exists in-fiction and everyone ribs him about it, he tries to play it off as a coincidence that he just likes the coat, but the coat-flourishing scenes tell otherwise. a nice detail for japanese columbo-heads is the guy who plays imaizumi on furuhata ninzaburo showing up as this iteration of shinano no columbo’s chief of police. i might see where the rest of these go, but really it has me curious about the earlier iterations, especially the 1982 and 1995 ones