Yusei Hamabe was just shy of 10 years old when his father took him to see a film he describes as ¡°one of the most important experiences of my life.¡±
That film was 2014¡¯s ¡°Detective Conan: Dimensional Sniper,¡± the 18th in an annual anime franchise based on Gosho Aoyama¡¯s ¡°Detective Conan¡± manga. The experience inspired the young Hamabe to join a legion of dedicated fans who have made ¡°Conan¡± one of the bestselling manga series of all time and whose yearly cinema pilgrimages have turned the film series into a box-office phenomenon. The 29th entry in that series, ¡°Fallen Angel of the Highway,¡± is set to hit screens in Japan on April 10, and there is little doubt it will become one of the top-earning films of the year.
¡°Detective Conan,¡± also known as ¡°Case Closed¡± in some territories, was first serialized on Jan. 5, 1994, in the pages of manga magazine Weekly Shonen Sunday, where it still runs today. It revolves around a detective named Shinichi Kudo who becomes stuck in the body of an elementary school child, and who surreptitiously solves crimes under the pseudonym ¡°Conan Edogawa¡± while living with his childhood friend and her father, a private investigator.
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