Shinichi Kudo

Background

At the beginning of the series, Shinichi is a fairly famous high school detective who frequently helps the Tokyo police solve murder mysteries.

One day, Shinichi brings his friend Ran to a local theme park called Tropical Land, to celebrate her victory in the Metropolitan Karate Championships. He later ends up solving a murder case there.As they are leaving, Shinichi heads off alone to follow a suspicious man in black, Vodka, who was a suspect in the earlier murder. Shinichi witnesses a blackmail exchange between Vodka and a company president in a secluded area just outside the park, but is too engrossed to notice Gin, Vodka's partner, sneak up from behind. Gin knocks him out and forces him to swallow a new experimental poison known as APTX 4869, and they then leave him to die. However, instead of killing Shinichi, a rare side-effect occurs: his body shrinks into that of his six year-old self.After escaping from well-meaning but skeptical park security, with nowhere else to go Shinichi heads home. He there runs into his next door neighbor and close family friend, Professor Agasa, who warns him that he must keep his identity secret because the Black Organization will kill him and others associated with him should they discover the truth.

Conan Edogawa

Shinichi comes up with the alias Conan Edogawa from Arthur Conan Doyle and Edogawa Rampo and pretends to be a distant relative of Agasa's, who places Conan in Ran's care.Ran's father Kogoro Mouri owns a Detective Agency, which may allow Conan to run into a case involving the Black Organization. In the meantime, to protect his identity he is forced to play the part of a first-grader, including enrolling as a student at Teitan Elementary. Three classmates befriend him and pull him into creating the Detective Boys after which he tries to keep them out of trouble between using Kogoro as a mouthpiece to solve crimes and searching for how to get his old life back.

Personality

At the beginning of the series, Shinichi is a 16-year old student at Teitan High School. He is already well-known as a brilliant young detective, the "Savior of the police force", for solving many difficult cases that the professionals could not.[3] Shinichi was born to Yusaku Kudo, a mystery writer, and Yukiko Kudo, a former movie star.[8] He is extremely intelligent, and even from a young age, was very intuitive and observant. Due to the influence of his father and the general laissez-faire environment at home, he has long been an incessant and persistent reader, especially of mystery novels.Yusaku started taking Shinichi to crime scenes as a child, which inspired him to be a detective. Due to his genius and often blunt, informal approach, Shinichi can be rude and arrogant. However, he cares deeply about human life, unable to understand how any reason could be sufficient motive for murder, and is convinced that driving a culprit to suicide is no better than murder itself.The few times he has been too late to save a life haunt him throughout the series.

Besides his intelligence, Shinichi is an extremely skilled soccer player, having been professionally scouted at school but choosing to stay at the amateur level. He initially played to hone his reflexes and often juggles a ball to clear his mind, but he is also an enthusiastic fan of the sport in its own right. Shinichi is also known for his inability to sing, but was revealed to have perfect pitch. He is also shown to play the violin in Movie 12, taking after his idol, Sherlock Holmes. He is well-educated in English, as he once conversed with and translated for an American diplomat, and later solved a case in London without evidence of any language barrier.

Prior to his transformation, Shinichi enjoys being in the spotlight, reveling in making local headlines and receiving fan-mail, and has a flair for the dramatic like his mother that can be seen every time he sets out a deduction in pieces building to a climax. Throughout the series, Shinichi's predicament forces him to gain a sense of humility. Despite his popularity with the masses and his schoolmates, he has very few close friends — Ran, Agasa, Heiji, Ai, and to some extent the other Detective Boys (and if you're really reaching, Kaitou Kid and Sonoko).

Appearance and Skills

Shinichi has a striking resemblance to his father, Yusaku Kudo, sporting the same dark brown hair, slightly paled skin, and facial structures. The only traits he doesn't share with his father is the mustache and round glasses. The only physical feature he inherited from his mother, Yukiko Kudo, is his blue eyes. Besides his high school uniform, he also wears fine suits, with a tie, or regular clothing, which vary to his choice.

Shinichi's skills as a detective are near the level of the greatest detective in history, Sherlock Holmes, which he's often nicknamed as the, "Modern Sherlock Holmes". He has a keen eye for details, and can spot any "strange points", in a case, that most people tend to ignore or not take into account. This comes from his photographic memory, of being able to remember every abstract of an investigation. Shinichi can also solve a complicated case, just by the littlest hints outside the crime scene, basically, he has the ability to "think out of the box". Shinichi also has knowledge over subjects that help him solve cases, that many people don't know of, this trait was probably because of his insistent reading as a child.

Besides intelligence, Shinichi also has amazing athletic ability, mostly from soccer, his favorite sport. In order to defend himself from criminals that would try and hurt him or those around him. Shinichi is very skilled at soccer, with only one kick, he's able to accurately shoot any small item, with enough force and power, to the intended target, often, leaving them unconscious in the process. Aside from soccer, Shinichi exhibits a knack for handling firearms, due to his father taking him to firing ranges from time to time. This is seen in the second movie when, as Conan, Shinichi fires at Ran to render her useless as a hostage, though his aim is precise enough to spare her life. Also, during the Clocktower Heist, Shinichi is able to shoot and dislodge the support beam of a giant projection screen, which Kaitou Kid had placed in order to fool a crowd of onlookers, from a moving helicopter.

Also possibly due to his soccer training, Shinichi has been shown to be extremely nimble. For example, in the sixth movie Conan is seen to fight with various antagonists, and he even holds his own against Jack the Ripper, a notorious serial killer who bests even Ran in combat. In the fourteenth movie, Conan does a backflip on his skateboard in order to avoid being killed by the blimp's hijackers. This is also evidence to the fact that Shinichi (or rather, explicitly Conan) shows a proclivity for skateboarding. Oftentimes, mostly in movies, Conan is seen riding his skateboard with extreme dexterity.

Ran, despite being a practiced and acclaimed martial artist, claims no one has a better round house kick than Shinichi. This is likely due to his soccer skills.

Though Shinichi is 'Tone-Deaf', and can't sing, he has the ability of 'Perfect Pitch'. Also, to be like his favorite detective, Sherlock Holmes, he plays the violin. This was confirmed in movie 12 of the 'Full Score of Fear' when he played "Amazing Grace" for Ran. However, he is stumped on what Ran meant when she said, "He has a funny habit when he plays."

Plot overview

Because the main plot revolves around the fact that Shinichi has become 'Conan' and is forced into hiding, Shinichi himself appears rarely in the series. However, Conan is frequently shown calling Ran using his voice-changing bow tie to sound like Shinichi. In these instances, it can be said that the character of Shinichi, albeit in the body of Conan, is appearing, since these phone conversations allow Shinichi to be himself, however briefly.

Transformations back into Shinichi

Shinichi appeared in the pilot episode, but by the end he had been transformed into Conan, thus beginning the series' plot.

His next appearance was in Volume 10, when a strange detective from Osaka named Heiji Hattori arrived at Mouri Detective Agency looking for Shinichi in order to determine which of them was the better detective. A strange combination of having a cold and drinking baijiu that Heiji had brought along allowed Conan to briefly grow into Shinichi once again.

Antidotes

In Volume 26, Conan was able to become Shinichi using an Antidote (prototype) that Ai Haibara synthesized. As himself, he tried to surprise Ran by disguising himself as a character in her play, but was interrupted by a murder case and ended up revealing himself to his entire high school. Heiji Hattori covered for him and Shinichi was able to spend about 48 hours as himself, albeit with a brief collapse about halfway through, and turned back into Conan just as he seemed to be about to confess his feelings to Ran.

Shinichi's next appearance was not until Volume 62, when, while on a case with Heiji, Conan went missing and 'Shinichi' seemed to appear. However, the 'Shinichi' is actually someone who had gotten plastic surgery to look like Shinichi Kudo, and was actually trying to blame Kudo for a murder. Then the real Shinichi, who had been hiding in the forest until he could clear his name, appeared.

It was revealed he had been temporarily restored by another of Haibara's prototypes.[18] After the case, however, Shinichi transform back to Conan, but luckily, Haibara secretly followed him there and give him another antidote, saving him from revealing his identity to Kogoro, Ran and Kazuha. While driving home from the case, the group was stopped by another murder which Shinichi and Heiji investigated together, despite increasing pangs that warned of his iminent reversion to Conan.

After the case resolved, Ran tried to stop Shinichi from leaving, saying she had something to tell him. Shinichi stopped her, saying "According to my deductions, what you have to say and what I have to say are the same thing." Ran seized his hand while he was transforming back into Conan, and though Haibara knocked her out with Conan's wristwatch, she refused to let go of his hand. Haibara and Professor Agasa had to cut and re-pin Conan's shirt onto him because Ran was still clutching his hand.

Most recently, in Volume 71, the Mouris and Conan were invited to England by a rich top-notch British woman, Diana Kingstone after Kogoro had found a cat under the table in Poirot Cafe, and it was revealed to be Diana's. However, since 'Conan Edogawa' doesn't have the proper credentials to fly internationally, Ai gave him a prototype pill that Shinichi and Agasa could fly low-profile to England on the same plane that Ran and Kogoro were flying. Ai gave him a second prototype pill for the return journey, but Conan used it while Ran was pursuing him. They came as close as they ever have to openly confessing their feelings for each other, Shinichi told Ran he loved her, but Shinichi soon fled to become Conan again. For the return trip to Japan, it was revealed that Ai had expected him to use his second pill, and had brought extras which allowed him to return to Japan.

Flashback Appearances

Shinichi has appeared in several flashbacks, most notably the flashback of his trip to New York City with Ran when they were sixteen in Volume 35. There, they met Vermouth and Shuichi Akai for the first time.

In Volume 55, a flashback revealed that first-graders Shinichi and Ran had been given a riddle by the Kaitou Kid, Toichi Kuroba.

Non-Canonical Appearances

In Movie 7, Heiji was injured and Kazuha kidnapped; her abductors threatened to kill her unless Heiji showed up for her. Believing Heiji to be unable to do so, Conan contacted Ai and asked if there was any way for him to briefly become Heiji. Ai gave him medicine to simulate the effects of a cold, then the same Chinese liquor that had changed him in his and Heiji's first manga appearance. Conan became Shinichi for approximately an hour, but according to Ai he was extremely weak and sick for the entire time.

In OVA 9, Conan takes another prototype antidote. However, it proves less effective than the prototype she used during the Desperate Revival arc; Conan became Shinichi, but only for a few hours, and remained in a feverish state, unable to wake up until he had reverted back to Conan. During his time unconscious, he had a vivid hallucination that he had grown to age 17 again as Conan and that Ran, aged 27, was about to marry Tomoaki Araide.