My "Middle Brother" identity theory

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jimmy_kud0_tv2

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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by jimmy_kud0_tv2 »

I'm reserving judgement until the end of the case, because that is where things usually get confirmed 100%
Spoiler:
If Shuukichi actually comes out of his hidey-hole and goes to eat Ramen and Masumi points at him and says "thats my middle brother", I'll concede. Because somehow I still feel like Gosho is building up to some kind of sneaky switch-a-roo thing, because otherwise he could have just stuck Shuukichi in this file and gotten it over with already.
I hope that I can find someway to contribute to the community even if it's just random crack theories and looking things up for people who can't find the information they need.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:I'm reserving judgement until the end of the case, because that is where things usually get confirmed 100%
Spoiler:
If Shuukichi actually comes out of his hidey-hole and goes to eat Ramen and Masumi points at him and says "thats my middle brother", I'll concede. Because somehow I still feel like Gosho is building up to some kind of sneaky switch-a-roo thing, because otherwise he could have just stuck Shuukichi in this file and gotten it over with already.
Spoiler:
True—better to wait to be sure.

But what "sneaky switch-a-roo?" Isn't the only thing Gosho could do to show that Shukichi's not the middle brother, at this point, is to introduce a clone character? Masumi's description sounds too specific to be made up—it isn't the vague description we got in Bumper Brawn/The Suspect is Makoto Kyogoku (Files 859–861/Episodes 744–745). She and Yumi are literally saying the same thing, at the same time. What is the point of Masumi even speaking to Yumi about this, if Shukichi isn't the middle brother? Why would she trick Yumi? It's the same problem with her lying to Shinichi/Conan about the very concept of a second brother—what is the point?

Also, going by your own words:
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:the end of the case... that is where things usually get confirmed 100%
Why would Gosho reveal it, beyond a doubt, in the first file?
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
“Education never ends... it is a series of lessons, with the greatest for the last.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow
"I have decided to stick to love... hate is too great a burden to bear."
— Martin Luther King Jr. (A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr)
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by wrd »

Spoiler:
Well, I think we are pretty much done with the middle brother identity, and this is good.
And yes, I'm still disapointed with how this whole thing was handled, but I think the damage was already done since the "kichi-nii" hint; and no, no clone or other fact will undo it, if anything, it will make it worse.

So indeed Shuukichi is the middle brother, hopefully Gosho would keep focusing on uncovering the truth behind the Serakai family for the time being so we can get it out of the way, before totally delving in the RUM arc.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

wrd wrote:
Spoiler:
Well, I think we are pretty much done with the middle brother identity, and this is good.
And yes, I'm still disapointed with how this whole thing was handled, but I think the damage was already done since the "kichi-nii" hint; and no, no clone or other fact will undo it, if anything, it will make it worse.
Yep, you hit the nail on the head.
wrd wrote:
Spoiler:
So indeed Shuukichi is the middle brother, hopefully Gosho would keep focusing on uncovering the truth behind the Serakai family for the time being so we can get it out of the way, before totally delving in the RUM arc.
Spoiler:
Well, he'll have to focus on that, once it's officially confirmed that Shukichi's the middle brother within the next two files—it's the next logical step.
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
“Education never ends... it is a series of lessons, with the greatest for the last.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow
"I have decided to stick to love... hate is too great a burden to bear."
— Martin Luther King Jr. (A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr)
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by Touichi Kuroba »

I agree with Jimmy, something about Shukichi being the Mid Bro just doesn't click, I wouldn't jump on the bandwagon so soon, Gosho's upto something here.(Unless Ofcourse, Masumi tells us that the name of her brother is Shukichi Haneda or Shukichi himself makes an appearance himself and calls Sera his little sister.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

Touichi Kuroba wrote:I agree with Jimmy, something about Shukichi being the Mid Bro just doesn't click, I wouldn't jump on the bandwagon so soon, Gosho's upto something here.(Unless Ofcourse, Masumi tells us that the name of her brother is Shukichi Haneda or Shukichi himself makes an appearance himself and calls Sera his little sister.
Spoiler:
You don't have to jump on a bandwagon. It's just there are only two possibilities of how the middle brother question will be answered—either Shukichi's the middle brother, or Gosho's going to introduce a character that matches Masumi's description, and he's going to be the middle brother.

We've waited for two-and-a-half years for this question to be answered—it really wasn't much of a mystery, and it's still not going to be if Gosho introduces a Shukichi clone out of left field. Gosho could have been "up to something" long ago, but it's a little late now. If Shukichi's not the middle brother, then he was just a red herring character, whose potential will be thus wasted, because the odds of him being involved in the plot if he's not the middle brother are quite low—at least there's a chance for him as the middle brother to play a role in the plot.

If Gosho always intended to introduce a Shukichi clone out of left field, then why did he even bother creating Shukichi to begin with? Again, it's not much of a mystery. If that was his plan all along, it simply would've been better to introduce this Shukichi clone instead of Shukichi in File 847 and simply reveal the fact that he was the middle brother by the end of it—it wouldn't have even become a mystery, then... thus, no obvious mystery.
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
“Education never ends... it is a series of lessons, with the greatest for the last.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow
"I have decided to stick to love... hate is too great a burden to bear."
— Martin Luther King Jr. (A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr)
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by jimmy_kud0_tv2 »

literally just dumping this here so I can find it easier later

Its a side by side view of the last pages of 702 and 902 which both have a final panel of Okiya smiling.
In one he is smiling at Scar Akai, and the other he is smiling at Shuukichi.
200 chapters apart to the page. I don't know that is relevant to anything,
but since this thread was originally about Okiya/Akai, It may as well go here.

http://jimmy-kud0-tv2.tumblr.com/post/1 ... ya-smiling
I hope that I can find someway to contribute to the community even if it's just random crack theories and looking things up for people who can't find the information they need.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:literally just dumping this here so I can find it easier later

Its a side by side view of the last pages of 702 and 902 which both have a final panel of Okiya smiling.
In one he is smiling at Scar Akai, and the other he is smiling at Shuukichi.
200 chapters apart to the page. I don't know that is relevant to anything,
but since this thread was originally about Okiya/Akai, It may as well go here.

http://jimmy-kud0-tv2.tumblr.com/post/1 ... ya-smiling
Well, if the implications of File 702 match those of 902, then Shukichi is Rum... yeah, no. (Ready to be quoted in case this somehow happens :-X )

It is odd that these similar smiles by the same character happened 200 chapters apart, but the situations are completely different...

Their reactions, in all probability, are either Shukichi's mother and brother being proud of him, or they're just big fans of his.

I'm not trying to rebuke you—I hope that's not how I'm coming off.

Also—Shukichi's phone has been shown to be black (File 929), and seems to be same model as the middle brother's (File 860)... and the same as Shuichi's/Subaru's (File 843 and File 898). Going by that, they're the two leading candidates.

The kicker, though, is Masumi's description of her brother (File 928)—unless she's lying (and the question would then be, "why?" And this goes for even thinking of making up a second brother when Shinichi/Conan first asked her about it (File 859)), Shuichi/Subaru can't be the middle brother. Going by this description (again, if she didn't just make it up), her second brother is Shukichi, himself, or someone who looks and dresses like him and uses the exact same phrase as him (a clone, for all intents and purposes).

You asked why would Gosho introduce a character and then have that character be the only suspect for another character, whose identity hasn't been revealed, yet—creating an alternate identity for a character that's obvious—and I ask, why introduce a character out of left field to be this mystery character? Just to say, "Yeah, Shukichi was a red herring! It wasn't obvious!"? There would be better ways to do that—have Shuichi/Subaru be the middle brother, as you suggested. The problem I have with that, though, is Masumi making the whole "middle brother" thing up and Shuichi having yet another surname (why go from Akai to Sera and then back to Akai, again?). For the former, I know the out-of-universe reason would be that Gosho wants to drag things on, but is there any benefit for Masumi in this ruse of hers? Unless Gosho plans to involve Shukichi in the main plot, regardless of whether he's the middle brother or not, I'm apprehensive about him just being a red herring.

Masumi being Shuichi's sister was obvious, too—true, when she was introduced, there wasn't a character introduced just afterwards that we would come to call "Akai's younger sister," who would appear as a voice during a phone call or through texting, and Gosho would keep dragging such a thing on without answering the question for nearly three years, even though "Akai's younger sister" was assuredly Masumi—and MG really looks like she's going to be Masumi's and Shuichi's shrunken mother. Maybe it is occam's razor with Shukichi—maybe he simply is the middle brother. You ask, if he is, then why would Gosho create an obvious mystery that didn't need to exist? As a counterpoint, I ask, if Masumi knows Shuichi/Subaru is alive, and has been in contact with him, then why would Gosho create a (kind of less obvious, perhaps?) mystery that didn't need to exist? In both cases, Gosho didn't need a mystery, to begin with—at some point after Mystery Train, it could've been made known to us that either Shuichi/Subaru and Masumi had a brother, Shukichi, a world-class Shogi player whose personality was quite the juxtaposition/contrast and was Yumi's on-again/off-again boyfriend, or Masumi knew Shuichi/Subaru was alive, and was in contact with him—the mystery is pointless in both cases... and yet, we have one.

My point is that the pointless mystery concept applies for both scenarios—the Shuichi/Subaru can't be called more likely to happen because it, too, is the outcome of a pointless mystery, just as much as the Shukichi outcome.

EDIT (9/13/15):

For an explanation as to why, if Shukichi's the middle brother, Masumi doesn't know where he lives—they could've agreed to not tell each other where they were staying, and just agreed to pick a random place to meet when they wanted to talk in person. This is assuming that MG was shrunk in Japan and Masumi was in America when it happened, and MG was staying with Shukichi until some point after Mystery Train (Files 818–824)/before Steamy Relations (Files 856–858)—a more specific range for MG moving from Shukichi's apartment to Masumi's apartment would be from between Blush Mermaid (Files 828–830) and Yumi's Love Story (Files 847–849). Perhaps MG moved in with Masumi just before or just after Our Territory (Files 844–846).

Given that Masumi apparently arranged a meeting with her brother (File 876), before canceling it, she may not know where he is/what he is doing, but she can clearly see him. While her text, just after saying she'd cancel the meeting, may have been her telling MG to hide, why would she make up something about meeting her brother? It gives Ran and Sonoko the impression she's canceling on their account—why make them feel like they're interrupting something, even though Masumi says she's fine with it? Just to unnecessarily deceive Shinichi/Conan because he's there, with them? Lies of omission are typically what she tells to Shinichi/Conan—she asks him if he thinks they've met when he asks the same question to her, she shows him MG but doesn't tell him who, and she gives so many hints that she knows his identity but never says anything. Her lying about her mother's whereabouts is one thing... making up a second brother that she doesn't really have?... that's another thing, entirely.

As for Shukichi's apparent surprise when Shinichi/Conan quoted him in File 849—let's remember, at the end of File 848, he thinks to himself that Shinichi/Conan has solved the case. Let's also remember that after he appears shocked at being quoted, he, in a playful and innocent tone, says "Did I say something like thaaat?" It seems to me he's just pretending to be surprised that Shinichi/Conan quoted him. When he looks at Shinichi/Conan at the end of File 848, it's the first time we see him do so. Who knows what ran through his mind between first seeing Shinichi/Conan (likely after he came out his room at the end of File 847) and making the "well-prepared move" comment in File 848? Did he just say it, or was it on purpose? He must've realized that no one but Shinichi/Conan would get the meaning of it—again, his confidence in Shinichi/Conan at the end of File 848.
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
“Education never ends... it is a series of lessons, with the greatest for the last.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow
"I have decided to stick to love... hate is too great a burden to bear."
— Martin Luther King Jr. (A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr)
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by jimmy_kud0_tv2 »

DCUniverseAficionado wrote:
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:literally just dumping this here so I can find it easier later
I don't know that is relevant to anything,
but since this thread was originally about Okiya/Akai, It may as well go here.

http://jimmy-kud0-tv2.tumblr.com/post/1 ... ya-smiling
Well, if the implications of File 702 match those of 902, then Shukichi is Rum... yeah, no. (Ready to be quoted in case this somehow happens :-X )
It is odd that these similar smiles by the same character happened 200 chapters apart, but the situations are completely different...
Their reactions, in all probability, are either Shukichi's mother and brother being proud of him, or they're just big fans of his.
I'm not trying to rebuke you—I hope that's not how I'm coming off.
I'm not really sure how to reply to your long post.
I was posting those images here so I could find them later.
I wasn't trying to use it to say "Shuukichi is Rum", because I don't actually think that.
Hence the "I don't know that (this*) is relevant to anything"

I'm probably going to respond to a few of the paragraphs later, just not yet.

EDIT:
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:Going by this description (again, if she didn't just make it up), her second brother is Shukichi, himself, or someone who looks and dresses like him and uses the exact same phrase as him (a clone, for all intents and purposes).
One thing that I find interesting about the descriptions is that, the quote aside, the other descriptions are things that are removable. Round glasses, facial hair stubble, and being handsome but wearing things like a messy jersey. Shuukichi has proved that these descriptions are removable himself. During the Shogi case he fit none of these. I'm quite curious why Masumi hasn't given a physical description beyond the idea that the middle brother is not supposed to resemble the mother, but presumably resembles the father, who we haven't seen. Tall?, short?, fat?, thin?, features that would be unique to one person and only that person? I mean to be honest, Gosho could literally throw out Eisuke with facial hair and a jersey and that would fit the physicalities we have so far. (I'm not saying that he would actually do that, but as an example that someone could fit the descriptions without being a "clone") I'm not even using this as an argument for/against Subaru/Shuuichi, I just find it interesting that the descriptions are not as uniquely his and can be taken off.

In kind of an off topic comment, I love how this phrase is Shuukichi's "favorite phrase", but we only ever see him say it in that one flashbak in his intro case. I was really hoping after how it got brought up in 928, and how Shuukichi appeared by flashback and by phone in 929, that he would appear in the chapter after that and say the thing, whether Masumi and Yumi were there or not, just so we could have an accurate panel of him saying the full phrase. In the intro chapter he didn't actually say the "at memorization" part. The memorization part was just implied by the action he had just completed, namely the memorization of the locker code.
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:The problem I have with that, though, is Masumi making the whole "middle brother" thing up and Shuichi having yet another surname (why go from Akai to Sera and then back to Akai, again?).
There is actually no proof so far in the series that "Akai" was the original family name. When Conan tried to ask about the original family name during the Red Woman case he didn't even get to finish asking the question because they were interrupted by Sonoko. Yes, Masumi seems to have reacted to the word the same way that Conan did, but she does not give the context to her reaction. We know that she has heard the name "Akai" most likely but we don't know how she would know it is connected. For example, you can conceive a situation where Masumi and Shuuichi grew up with an unknown family name. After the father died you have them both switch to the family name "Sera" while Shuu is in high school. When Shuu graduates high school, Masumi is still quite a bit younger than him, at least by 9 - 10 years maybe more. Shuu then changes his last name to Akai when he enters the FBI as a way of differentiating himself from his family. No one would be able to say that he is connected to that family other than the person who recruited him. If it turns out that his father was connected to the FBI, the it also could have been to differentiate himself from his father.
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:In both cases, Gosho didn't need a mystery, to begin with—at some point after Mystery Train, it could've been made known to us that either Shuichi/Subaru and Masumi had a brother, Shukichi, a world-class Shogi player whose personality was quite the juxtaposition/contrast and was Yumi's on-again/off-again boyfriend, or Masumi knew Shuichi/Subaru was alive, and was in contact with him—the mystery is pointless in both cases... and yet, we have one. My point is that the pointless mystery concept applies for both scenarios—the Shuichi/Subaru can't be called more likely to happen because it, too, is the outcome of a pointless mystery, just as much as the Shukichi outcome.

The first post of the thread was an attempt to give it a purpose. I was proposing that the reason that I though that it was Shuuichi/Subaru was because of the line of events. Shuuichi witnesses his sister in close proximity to Conan, Bourbon is also in close proximity to Conan. Even if he thought that Masumi was capable of handling herself, she is still in danger being near the BO. Between Detectives Nocturne and Mystery Train you have Yusaku's Cold Case in which Shuuichi figures out that Conan is Shinichi and that Shinichi, who is rumored to be dead, can still keep in contact with "the living" through cell phone contact despite having an alternate identity in person. Then somehow, via the Mystery Train case, or soon after, Shuuichi finds a way to prove to her that he is alive and create a way to get into contact with her. Masumi certainly could not say that she was talking to Shuuichi, he is "dead". It would also be really awkward if she said she was in contact with "Subaru" because Conan knows who "Subaru" really is and would know what that means. This means that Masumi has to say something else. (((Now as I said in a post either earlier up this page, or on the page before, there could still be a situation in which Shuukichi could still be a brother, but Shuuichi could still be the one on the phone))). Masumi says these things about a middle brother in order to not let on who she is actually talking to. This creates a situation where the reader can't be shown who she is talking to either, because it would kind of force it to all come out in the open to quickly compared to the actual plot. Plus there was the whole idea of we were still waiting for the official reveal that Shuuichi was even alive to begin with because Scarlet Return had not happened yet. Plus, even if Shuuichi is talking to Masumi, she may not know that Shuuichi is Subaru. Subaru still wears a voice changer during Cold Case and on Mystery Train, she was passed out. Hence the "i don't know where he is" stuff.
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:Given that Masumi apparently arranged a meeting with her brother (File 876), before canceling it, she may not know where he is/what he is doing, but she can clearly see him. While her text, just after saying she'd cancel the meeting, may have been her telling MG to hide, why would she make up something about meeting her brother? It gives Ran and Sonoko the impression she's canceling on their account—why make them feel like they're interrupting something, even though Masumi says she's fine with it?
Masumi literally only brings up that she was supposed to meet her brother after Ran and Sonoko ask to to go to her hotel room. It literally lines up with the idea that she needed a reason to pull out her phone and send a message. If she actually had planned to meet with her brother, but instead messaged MG to tell her to hide, wouldn't that mean that the brother will show up to the meeting and be left alone.

Another off topic comment. After reading that chapter again, I noticed something I didn't before. When they hear the yelling and rush off to the scene of the crime, Conan throws his backpack down in front of the door to Masumi's hotel room. Its then that we see that the door open with a hand attached to the knob. Then later we see MG in the hallway in the crowd. However we never actually see Conan go back for his backpack. I would be interested to know if Conan would have reacted from his backpack being further away from the door, because the door have had to open further to let her out and push it further away. Also, I wonder if she went through his backpack. I guess none of it was relevant, or maybe even Gosho didn't think that much into it?
Last edited by jimmy_kud0_tv2 on September 15th, 2015, 7:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:I'm not really sure how to reply to your long post.
Well, Chekhov once said that one of my posts came off to her as a stream of consciousness, so... ^-^
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:I wasn't trying to use it to say "Shuukichi is Rum", because I don't actually think that.
As I said...
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:I'm not trying to rebuke you—I hope that's not how I'm coming off.
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:Going by this description (again, if she didn't just make it up), her second brother is Shukichi, himself, or someone who looks and dresses like him and uses the exact same phrase as him (a clone, for all intents and purposes).
One thing that I find interesting about the descriptions is that, the quote aside, the other descriptions are things that are removable. Round glasses, facial hair stubble, and being handsome but wearing things like a messy jersey. Shuukichi has proved that these descriptions are removable himself. During the Shogi case he fit none of these. I'm quite curious why Masumi hasn't given a physical description beyond the idea that the middle brother is not supposed to resemble the mother, but presumably resembles the father, who we haven't seen. Tall?, short?, fat?, thin?, features that would be unique to one person and only that person? I mean to be honest, Gosho could literally throw out Eisuke with facial hair and a jersey and that would fit the physicalities we have so far. (I'm not saying that he would actually do that, but as an example that someone could fit the descriptions without being a "clone") I'm not even using this as an argument for/against Subaru/Shuuichi, I just find it interesting that the descriptions are not as uniquely his and can be taken off.
That is true—it's a disguise, in a way...

If one were to use this as a point for their argument, though—if she describes him anymore than that (personality), it'll really give it away... bye-bye mystery... not that it was much of one to begin with.
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:In kind of an off topic comment, I love how this phrase is Shuukichi's "favorite phrase", but we only ever see him say it in that one flashback in his intro case. I was really hoping after how it got brought up in 928, and how Shuukichi appeared by flashback and by phone in 929, that he would appear in the chapter after that and say the thing, whether Masumi and Yumi were there or not, just so we could have an accurate panel of him saying the full phrase. In the intro chapter he didn't actually say the "at memorization" part. The memorization part was just implied by the action he had just completed, namely the memorization of the locker code.
He's only appeared three times (9 files out of the 10 that comprised the 3 cases he's appeared in). Just how many times does he need to say it? Just by having him say it in our first direct exposure to him, as well as his and Sakurako's first and only interaction, implies that he may use it upon first meetings, or within the span of a first few meetings—this would leave quite the impression on the person he met... indeed, Sakurako remembers the encounter with just a little thought. We get to see/hear Shinichi/Conan introduce himself quite a bit, due to him being the protagonist, who's been around since File 1 (2, technically) but its still not that many utterances of "Edogawa Conan, tantei-sa/da!", when you think about it, in 932 files. Shukichi's only been around for 85 files, and has appeared in 9 of them.
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:The problem I have with that, though, is Masumi making the whole "middle brother" thing up and Shuichi having yet another surname (why go from Akai to Sera and then back to Akai, again?).
There is actually no proof so far in the series that "Akai" was the original family name. When Conan tried to ask about the original family name during the Red Woman case he didn't even get to finish asking the question because they were interrupted by Sonoko. Yes, Masumi seems to have reacted to the word the same way that Conan did, but she does not give the context to her reaction. We know that she has heard the name "Akai" most likely but we don't know how she would know it is connected. For example, you can conceive a situation where Masumi and Shuuichi grew up with an unknown family name. After the father died you have them both switch to the family name "Sera" while Shuu is in high school. When Shuu graduates high school, Masumi is still quite a bit younger than him, at least by 9 - 10 years maybe more. Shuu then changes his last name to Akai when he enters the FBI as a way of differentiating himself from his family. No one would be able to say that he is connected to that family other than the person who recruited him. If it turns out that his father was connected to the FBI, the it also could have been to differentiate himself from his father.
Does he really need to differentiate himself from his father? If his father had BO connections, then maybe, but the FBI?... I don't think so.

Apart from that, I agree—there could be yet another surname Shuichi had (Sera, Akai, Moroboshi, Okiya,????).
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:In both cases, Gosho didn't need a mystery, to begin with—at some point after Mystery Train, it could've been made known to us that either Shuichi/Subaru and Masumi had a brother, Shukichi, a world-class Shogi player whose personality was quite the juxtaposition/contrast and was Yumi's on-again/off-again boyfriend, or Masumi knew Shuichi/Subaru was alive, and was in contact with him—the mystery is pointless in both cases... and yet, we have one. My point is that the pointless mystery concept applies for both scenarios—the Shuichi/Subaru can't be called more likely to happen because it, too, is the outcome of a pointless mystery, just as much as the Shukichi outcome.

The first post of the thread was an attempt to give it a purpose. I was proposing that the reason that I though that it was Shuuichi/Subaru was because of the line of events. Shuuichi witnesses his sister in close proximity to Conan, Bourbon is also in close proximity to Conan. Even if he thought that Masumi was capable of handling herself, she is still in danger being near the BO. Between Detectives Nocturne and Mystery Train you have Yusaku's Cold Case in which Shuuichi figures out that Conan is Shinichi and that Shinichi, who is rumored to be dead, can still keep in contact with "the living" through cell phone contact despite having an alternate identity in person. Then somehow, via the Mystery Train case, or soon after, Shuuichi finds a way to prove to her that he is alive and create a way to get into contact with her. Masumi certainly could not say that she was talking to Shuuichi, he is "dead". It would also be really awkward if she said she was in contact with "Subaru" because Conan knows who "Subaru" really is and would know what that means. This means that Masumi has to say something else. (((Now as I said in a post either earlier up this page, or on the page before, there could still be a situation in which Shuukichi could still be a brother, but Shuuichi could still be the one on the phone))). Masumi says these things about a middle brother in order to not let on who she is actually talking to. This creates a situation where the reader can't be shown who she is talking to either, because it would kind of force it to all come out in the open to quickly compared to the actual plot. Plus there was the whole idea of we were still waiting for the official reveal that Shuuichi was even alive to begin with because Scarlet Return had not happened yet. Plus, even if Shuuichi is talking to Masumi, she may not know that Shuuichi is Subaru. Subaru still wears a voice changer during Cold Case and on Mystery Train, she was passed out. Hence the "i don't know where he is" stuff.
Yep—this theory could very well turn out to be true... I just said it couldn't be called more likely (not trying to pull a strawman and say you said that).

If Shuichi/Subaru is the middle brother, I don't think Masumi knows his secret identity.

The only purpose of Masumi lying about having a second brother and his description is to drag the plot (is that bad? that's up to you—plus, Gosho's been doing it for awhile). So she'd be lying to Ran, Sonoko and Yumi whenever the topic of her family, and thus, her brother, came up? This is to deceive Shinichi/Conan, mainly, right? Because he's with them? For what purpose? Did she hear Yumi talking about her boyfriend and just happen to think of a fake description that matched Yumi's description of Shukichi on the spot because Shinichi/Conan is in the room? Hadn't he already been sufficiently convinced that he had a second brother, even when she first said she had one. Other than tricking us, and shattering many head canons and rendering so much fan art non-canon, unlike what was the case with Masumi, what would be the point?

I know she's waiting for "the time" to come (File 846) before revealing her past connection to him and Ran, at least—her lies about MG (likely her mother) are fairly simple: just say she's in America while hiding her in her apartment... but making up a family member ex nihilo goes beyond both of those. I guess your explanation as to why mostly fits. She wouldn't know that Shinichi/Conan is working together with Shuichi/Subaru—who wouldn't tell her what he was up to or where he was, explaining those two statements of hers about him, as well as who he was working with/trusts—and thus, wouldn't have a reason to tell him who she was really talking to. Though, why would he let on that he knows Shinichi/Conan? Wouldn't that make it more likely that Masumi would find him out, which he clearly doesn't want?... though we still don't know what his response to her in File 861 consisted of. However, this is not my main problem.

This is a pointless mystery—all three possibilities have been zeroed in on: Shukichi, someone else who wears round glasses, has a stubble, dresses messily, and has the same favorite phrase he does, or Shuichi/Subaru—it's not suspenseful, and the plot isn't moving anywhere... it isn't even being hinted as to what this middle brother question is going to lead to. No matter who the middle brother is, we may be left, more or less, where we were when Masumi was introduced, but with Shukichi, there's a new character that'll be added to the mix—I just want him to play a role beyond being a red herring in this pointless mystery, even if he isn't the middle brother—with Shuichi/Subaru? It's even less of a change, in fact—he and Masumi still will have not talked and she will still be in the dark about the BO—essentially, the middle brother question will be even more pointless if it turns out that he's actually Shuichi/Subaru. Why create a red herring character for a situation/question that lacks the stakes of previous situations (Vermouth arc, for example), when you just could've told the readers that Masumi knew that Shuichi/Subaru was alive and was in contact with him? Again, unless Shukichi is going to be a part of the main plot, there's no Jodie option for him (government agent) as the red herring character—he's just a smart shogi player who happens to be Yumi's on-again/off-again boyfriend, and who MG and Shuichi/Subaru just happen to like so much that they, characters who are typically very serious, will get happy enough, in the former's case, to creep out Masumi. Being a fan of Bourbon isn't the same as being a fan of a Shogi player—one's a drink, an inanimate object, and the other's a person.

Unless involving him in the main plot was part of Gosho's game plan all along, having him turn out to be just a red herring will make this pointless mystery even more pointless, and could easily send Shukichi the way of Ariade... and that's a waste.
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:
DCUniverseAficionado wrote:Given that Masumi apparently arranged a meeting with her brother (File 876), before canceling it, she may not know where he is/what he is doing, but she can clearly see him. While her text, just after saying she'd cancel the meeting, may have been her telling MG to hide, why would she make up something about meeting her brother? It gives Ran and Sonoko the impression she's canceling on their account—why make them feel like they're interrupting something, even though Masumi says she's fine with it?
Masumi literally only brings up that she was supposed to meet her brother after Ran and Sonoko ask to to go to her hotel room. It literally lines up with the idea that she needed a reason to pull out her phone and send a message. If she actually had planned to meet with her brother, but instead messaged MG to tell her to hide, wouldn't that mean that the brother will show up to the meeting and be left alone.
Why even bring up this fake middle brother anymore than absolutely necessary? He didn't even need to be mentioned at all—Masumi could've just texted MG without a word. She could've just made the "secret boyfriend" joke if they'd asked.

Plus, we cut straight to the hotel after she starts texting—we don't know how many messages she sent.
jimmy_kud0_tv2 wrote:Another off topic comment. After reading that chapter again, I noticed something I didn't before. When they hear the yelling and rush off to the scene of the crime, Conan throws his backpack down in front of the door to Masumi's hotel room. Its then that we see that the door open with a hand attached to the knob. Then later we see MG in the hallway in the crowd. However we never actually see Conan go back for his backpack. I would be interested to know if Conan would have reacted from his backpack being further away from the door, because the door have had to open further to let her out and push it further away. Also, I wonder if she went through his backpack. I guess none of it was relevant, or maybe even Gosho didn't think that much into it?
Judging from Shinichi's/Conan's position, at the time (File 876, Page 13), the backpack looked to be away from the door enough to not be affected when it opened. If not by then or earlier, by File 879, he'd realized that a little girl that looked like Masumi was staying with her in her hotel room—the picture, Masumi blocking him from bedroom, the girl watching him and the bug getting smashed were what tipped him off... the backpack, had it been shown (which he easily could've), would've been just another indication. He has the backpack by File 878, just before Masumi smashes his bug, so Gosho must've not thought it important.

EDIT (9/19/15):

I've thought over this question, again, and it really does seem like Gosho is heading for a twist where Shukichi is revealed to be a red herring, and Shuichi/Subaru is revealed to be who Masumi's been in contact with since File 856. Masumi has no reason to tell Shinichi/Conan that she's been in contact with Shuichi—since he hasn't told her what he's up to—and the times she isn't in contact with Shuichi/Subaru (all the times outside of Steamy Relations (Files 856–858), Bumper Brawn (Files 859–861) and A Killer in Ramen Ogura (Files 928–930), where she is clearly in contact with someone) but claims to be in contact with her second brother could all be faked (texting/even calling MG, or just pretending to talk to a person over the phone). She could've made up everything about her supposed middle brother so no one questions why she's in contact with her supposedly dead brother—even the description she gave to Yumi could've been faked... she just could've been surprised because, coincidentally, her made-up description matched Yumi's real one of Shukichi.

I'll say it again, though—I don't like this twist. It will provide no character development or plot advancement—it'll just show that Shuichi/Subaru has been in contact with Masumi since File 856. Gosho didn't need to put this mystery in here—I'll feel better if Shukichi plays a role in the Rum arc plot, but I'll still feel sore about how Shukichi somehow isn't the middle brother... for me, at least, it fits quite well. I guess I've seen too many fan arts... :-[

I won't be surprised if this happens... but I'm not looking forward to it. I just hope that Gosho's pulling a "fake people out into thinking its a fake when its really not" when it comes to Shukichi being the middle brother.
Last edited by DCUniverseAficionado on September 16th, 2015, 8:48 am, edited 1 time in total.
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
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― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by ectogenesis »

First of all, hi! I'm new here. I've been looking through threads the past few days and finally decided to register and start posting!
Spoiler:
Regarding the middle brother, in light of the recent manga chapters, I've been thinking... Can it be possible that both major theories are correct? Shuukichi is actually the middle brother, but hasn't actually been in contact with any of his family up till now, and Shuuichi has been posing as his own younger brother to talk to his younger sister for some reason. Maybe he just wanted to keep up the charade that he was dead, or to not drag Masumi into further trouble, etc. When he left her his contact info, either during Mystery Train or some time thereafter, he adopted the guise of "Kichi-nii" (with a second phone of course), who, if he really is Shuukichi, is arguably the less dangerous of the two brothers for Masumi to be in constant contact with. It should be no problem for Shuuichi to pretend to be a family member for one phone call, since he has the voice changer, and then afterwards he just instructed Masumi to contact him via text unless something urgent comes up. During the Ramen case, Shuuichi could've just been talking to some FBI member on the phone, or simply wasn't prepared to mimic his brother for another long phone call, so just hung up on Masumi, and the two phone calls (Yumi-->Shuukichi and Masumi-->Shuuichi) just happened to be perfectly synced. It's happened before, after all.

That would mean that Masumi wasn't lying about the description and the catch phrase (because having the same physical description is one thing, but the same favorite saying too is just pushing it for a red herring), but she actually doesn't know which brother she's been contacting. That would also explain why "Kichi-nii" apparently won't tell her where he is or provide for her, despite Shuukichi being in a high-profile and low-danger profession and living in a nice condo.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

ectogenesis wrote:First of all, hi! I'm new here. I've been looking through threads the past few days and finally decided to register and start posting!
Welcome! Hope you enjoy being a part of these forums! :)

I did the same thing before my first post, by the way. ;D

You don't need to put spoiler tags on this—since the Ramen case is out in English, you should be fine... just keep unspoilered talk about things like the middle brother question in the Story Discussion (Manga Spoilers) section... use spoiler tags in the General Discussion Section and everywhere else.
ectogenesis wrote:
Spoiler:
Regarding the middle brother, in light of the recent manga chapters, I've been thinking... Can it be possible that both major theories are correct? Shuukichi is actually the middle brother, but hasn't actually been in contact with any of his family up till now, and Shuuichi has been posing as his own younger brother to talk to his younger sister for some reason. Maybe he just wanted to keep up the charade that he was dead, or to not drag Masumi into further trouble, etc. When he left her his contact info, either during Mystery Train or some time thereafter, he adopted the guise of "Kichi-nii" (with a second phone of course), who, if he really is Shuukichi, is arguably the less dangerous of the two brothers for Masumi to be in constant contact with. It should be no problem for Shuuichi to pretend to be a family member for one phone call, since he has the voice changer, and then afterwards he just instructed Masumi to contact him via text unless something urgent comes up. During the Ramen case, Shuuichi could've just been talking to some FBI member on the phone, or simply wasn't prepared to mimic his brother for another long phone call, so just hung up on Masumi, and the two phone calls (Yumi-->Shuukichi and Masumi-->Shuuichi) just happened to be perfectly synced. It's happened before, after all.

That would mean that Masumi wasn't lying about the description and the catch phrase (because having the same physical description is one thing, but the same favorite saying too is just pushing it for a red herring), but she actually doesn't know which brother she's been contacting. That would also explain why "Kichi-nii" apparently won't tell her where he is or provide for her, despite Shuukichi being in a high-profile and low-danger profession and living in a nice condo.
Yes, that actually could work... I mean, Gosho gave us the "Sera-chan calls 'Kichi-nii'" and "It's 'Kichi-nii!' hints, and that name still hasn't appeared... I doubt that Gosho's trying to mislead us on a plot question through these... it's not like he's serious all the time on AC, but he's never (or very rarely, at least) told such a falsehood—such a falsehood would not be one of omission or omission + misdirection... it would be straight-up lying to us. I feel he's going to pull a twist where Shuichi/Subaru is revealed to be the one texting/receiving calls from Masumi... but if Shukichi actually was the middle brother, it would mean those hints weren't straight-up lies to us. Masumi calls Shuichi "Shu-nii..." she wouldn't call him "Kichi-nii," too, so who could the hint be referring to but Shukichi?... or his clone... :-\

Shuichi/Subaru and Masumi would definitely agree on a false identity for him, if they were in contact—all the better if its their brother, who they know well and wouldn't have to lie about.

It'd only be a second phone in the anime (they'd have to make up such an explanation, or disregard what they showed in Episode 745—the middle brother's phone, shown in Episode 745, is completely different from Shuichi's/Subaru's white one (Episode 723/Episode 783), while both the middle brother's and Shuichi's/Subaru's phones are both the same model, and black, in the Manga (Shuichi/Subaru – File 843/File 898, Middle Brother – File 860).)

I suppose he could have Agasa give him a voice changer that lets him have Shukichi's voice, if he felt it necessary.

Masumi would still have no idea that Shukichi's Taiko Meijin, though... her reaction in File 901 that MG was watching Shogi was one of surprise—if this theory is true that Shukichi is the middle brother but Shuichi/Subaru has been posing as him to keep in contact with Masumi without arrousing suspicion is true, Masumi would still have no idea what Shukichi was doing... right?
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by jimmy_kud0_tv2 »

DCUniverseAficionado wrote:
Yes, that actually could work... I mean, Gosho gave us the "Sera-chan calls 'Kichi-nii'" and "It's 'Kichi-nii!' hints, and that name still hasn't appeared... Masumi calls Shuichi "Shu-nii..." she wouldn't call him "Kichi-nii," too,
Image taken from Baidu thread on the topic of the two types of "Kichi" kanji
Image

Image
woops it seems that the two kanji in the picture above are reversed from the way I mentioned them in the screen capped text here.

Also another thing pointed out by the people there is that the old version of the kanji where the top line is smaller...
technically the two lines by themselves form the kanji for the number 2 (二)
So Shuukichi's name does technically have the nubmer 2 kanji in it.....

However we have also seen Gosho write the kanji for "kichi-nii" and it looks like to me that the top line is actually the longer one
I'd also buy the idea that he drew them the same length, but I would not buy the idea that the bottom line was longer.
meaning the kanji he used here is technically not the same kanji found in Shuukichi's name.
Image

The biggest problem again, as you have said, is that the "Kichi-nii" stuff still hasn't appeared in the manga yet
so all of this post I have made is still technically speculation.



.
I hope that I can find someway to contribute to the community even if it's just random crack theories and looking things up for people who can't find the information they need.
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by DCUniverseAficionado »

So you're suggesting Gosho wrote, instead, "Sera-chan calls big bro" and "It's big bro!", for those two hints? (Which would support the theory that Masumi's been in contact with Shuichi/Subaru)

What do you think of ectogenesis' idea that Masumi has beeen in contact with Shuichi/Subaru, but Shukichi is the middle brother and Shuichi/Subaru has been posing as him, rather then Masumi making up that she has a second brother?
“Life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generations, and leading to the most outre results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”
“Education never ends... it is a series of lessons, with the greatest for the last.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and His Last Bow
"I have decided to stick to love... hate is too great a burden to bear."
— Martin Luther King Jr. (A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr)
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Re: My "Middle Brother" identity theory

Post by jimmy_kud0_tv2 »

DCUniverseAficionado wrote:So you're suggesting Gosho wrote, instead, "Sera-chan calls big bro" and "It's big bro!", for those two hints? (Which would support the theory that Masumi's been in contact with Shuichi/Subaru)
no no no Kichi (吉) means "luck", the "big/great luck" was an example where it was used. the "big" is the other kanji (大)

DCUniverseAficionado wrote: What do you think of ectogenesis' idea that Masumi has beeen in contact with Shuichi/Subaru, but Shukichi is the middle brother and Shuichi/Subaru has been posing as him, rather then Masumi making up that she has a second brother?
I have actually said something similar several times
I've put this in several posts I have made on other threads, but when I went looking for them I forgot which threads
this one was copied out of a post above from Sept 14th/15th :

"((([....] there could still be a situation in which Shuukichi could still be a brother, but Shuuichi could still be the one on the phone)))"

Basically each time I said it though I left it as it is seen quoted here rather then further expanding on it the way that Ectogenesis did.
I hope that I can find someway to contribute to the community even if it's just random crack theories and looking things up for people who can't find the information they need.
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