Himitsu - The Revelation - Episode 3

While the opening half of this two-parter dealing with the assassination of a US President had little in the way of revelations, the conclusion of the story in episode three of Himitsu - The Revelation lived up to its name by revealing that said President... Just couldn't stop looking at men's bow ties. At least, I think that's what the revelation was.

Okay, I jest, that wasn't it at all, but funnily enough it seems that the writers of this story simply couldn't bring themselves to spell out what they really wanted to say, so instead just made it painfully obvious from the very beginning of the episode without ever blurting it out. You could call it trying to be clever I suppose, but I got the feeling they were just being a little coy.

Anyway, that aside, the pacing for this episode just felt very, very wrong, with a sudden ending that wasn't an ending but then was again. After all that build-up, it all felt very unsatisfactory and not a little untidy - Again, you could argue that this is simply portraying the nature of the kind of MRI investigations carried out in this series, but again I'd counter that with my assumption that it's just some rather weak scripting.

I still rather like the concept of Himitsu - The Revelation, and the format does have some potential as well as bringing up the odd moral quandary about whether anyone should be looking at the deepest, darkest secrets of a person's psyche, even if it means catching a killer. However, I'm beginning to worry that the series is going to become too burdened down in the personal problems of the investigating team - Indeed, even this whole potentially ambitious storyline surrounding the death of a president seemed to end up as little more than a pastiche for Aoki's feelings for his sister, which really did nothing but add an unnecessary layer to a plot that didn't really need it. With the end of this episode bringing more personal revelations about a team member, it looks like we probably won't be focusing on solving murders alone in this show for a while yet.