Housekishou Richard-shi no Nazo Kantei

Possessing a deep knowledge of mineralogy, Richard Ranashinha de Vulpian is a young and handsome British jewelry appraiser who owns a small shop in Japan. One fateful night, Seigi Nakata, a righteous college student, saves him from drunks who were harassing him due to his good looks. Upon learning of Richard's identity, Seigi hires him to appraise a pink sapphire ring that was left behind by his deceased grandmother.

Before long, Seigi becomes a trusted part-timer at Richard's shop. Together, the duo solve various jewel-related requests from diverse clients of different backgrounds. Step by step, they unravel the hidden motives and feelings that lie within the gems in order to understand and empathize with the little stories behind each piece of jewelry.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

de Vulpian, Richard Ranashinha Main

Sakurai, Takahiro Japanese

Nakata, Seigi Main

Uchida, Yuuma Japanese

Tanimoto, Shouko Supporting

Hanazawa, Kana Japanese

Sasu, Mami Supporting

Kobayashi, Yuu Japanese

Yasaka, Hajime Supporting

Tamura, Mutsumi Japanese

Claremont, Henry Supporting

Kaji, Yuuki Japanese

Okita, Ayumi Supporting

Yuasa, Kaede Japanese

Hata, Toshiko Supporting

Kanou, Chiaki Japanese

Miki Supporting

Toujou, Hisako Japanese

Sasaki, Yoshitsuna Supporting

Miyake, Takahiro Japanese

Oowada, Tomoyuki Producer

Kananiwa, Kozue Producer

Watase, Shouta Producer

Aijima, Gouta Producer

Reviews

Feb 27, 2024

build-a-buta

Recommended

Housekishou Richard's biggest asset is its novelty, which it wields very well. It falls off towards the end, but a bit more on that below.

Story: First, this anime is more a slice-of-life than mystery, and should be treated as such. Each episode is warm and more serves to expand the audience's perception of people and what's possible than to get them to unravel a big, complicated plan. And because it's more of a slice-of-life, the stories depicted are fresh and unexpected, and take a vastly more liberal tone with the characters than many of its conservative peers in the same genre. To which, it ... should be noted that included in that liberalism is a "take-it-however-you-like" approach, adding enough scenes to nudge you into thinking about a possibly queerplatonic relationship between the main characters. As this is an underlying, building theme, it can be uncomfortable for viewers who are not prepared for/interested in it.

My biggest complaint is--as it seems to be the case with many animes--towards the last few episodes. There's a great build-up near the end, leaving the remaining unrelated episodes to fall a little flat. It's greatest/most involved plot was unfortunately a little contrived, but more spoke towards a situation than, again, a complicated or even compelling story.

Animation: Lackluster. Not a complete eyesore, but not stellar, either. That does include Richard, the most "eye-catching" person in the series. I do like the look of the gems, but it clashes with the mundane animation in the series.

Sound: Unremarkable, sans Sakurai. Next.

Characters: Richard steals the show for me, and my love for him carried me all the way to episode 11. He's full of contrasts and telltale quirks, and that's what makes him stand out. He also balances out very well with Seigi, who...has all of the altruistic recklessness of Watanuki Kimihiro and only 50% of his success. I found myself with a bad case of Second Hand Embarrassment with some of Seigi's actions, but somehow, the duo manages to pull through to the end. Unfortunately, other to tell a story or prove a point, most of the side characters have a one-dimensional purpose, and we don't see them more than once or twice. To varying degrees, Seigi, Richard, and Tanimoto endure development over the 12 episodes.

Conclusion: It's a quick, soft, novel, and digestible watch (see: slice-of-life). Its background liberalism caters well to those who like a little fanservice and nuance, but is still conservative enough to check a few boxes...although that does get muddy later on, especially with its implications. It tries to strive for a little of everything (Drama, Romance, Mystery (???), etc.) but doesn't quite pull off anything fully. As a result, you might watch it once, but chances are, you might not be interested enough to watch it twice.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Dec 8, 2020

LeachieGekuu

Mixed Feelings

I'm not really sure how to feel about this show. on one hand, I enjoyed watching it and I was never particularly bored or felt like I should drop it. On the other hand, it doesn't really seem to have many redeeming qualities that make it worth watching. The story was good for the most part. I enjoyed the representation of many different types of people with their own types of problems and the gem lore. But I never felt like the side characters were more than just their surface problems and identities. design-wise none of them really stood out to me. I can't see ... myself actually remembering them a month after finishing the show. This really brought down the art score for me, and that plus the mediocre at best sound probably brought the show down from a seven to a six for me. The art was particularly bad for me in Seigi's design. His face was just too long or something and it gave me weird vibes. Although his design does generally fit his character: very boring.

The elephant in the room for this show is, of course, the big gay. Although I am not an expert in the art of queerbaiting, I do not believe that this show is doing that. Many shows that are particularly bad for this type of thing generally don't acknowledge gay people at all and kind of skirt around actual representation. I believe in this show, that the main point was that their relationship is open to interpretation. I think they could be super best friends who are super comfortable with each other, or they could be beginning a relationship. I think that this is up to the watcher. All in all, I think if you are looking for a more casual watch that's somewhat educational I would recommend this show. If you are looking for gayness, then there are certainly shows with actual gay relationships
that are better, but you still might get something out of it.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Jan 2, 2021

terriblegeometro

Not Recommended

This was almost painful to watch.
While the premise of the series was actually kind of interesting, the story and characters were handled very poorly and the series was overall a great disappointment.

Plot: I feel like its a bit of a reach to say this show is a “Mystery” when most of the mysteries they encountered felt like family therapy sessions and were solved by the characters just speaking together.

After a while the plot suddenly takes on a more dramatic route involving crazy family drama and a bunch of very stereotypical “I’ll disappear from your life forever and its better this way” lines, but ... in the end that doesn’t even matter as throughout the whole series, no one’s actions ever have any consequences.

Characters: The character writing overall seemed very stereotypical, especially the whole “hero of justice” thing...seriously? Both the main characters felt very bland and uninteresting and as a result of this almost inhuman.

The relationship “development” between the two was especially dreadful to watch and felt as if the entire script was written separately by two people with no communication between eachother one of which wanted them to be a couple and the other one just wrote them as friends, many lines contradict eachother, and their relationship seems extremely unbalanced and awkward.
At this point i don’t even know if this should be considered queerbaiting or just bad writing.

I’d also like to mention the main character’s girl-friend. For a brief moment i got quite excited that there was a character in the series with aro/ace traits, but apparently not, she just needs to “not give up on relationships and find the right man”. (I’d comment more on that entire scene but i am not sure how to do that without spoilers)

Art and sound: The artstyle was pretty decent i guess...? There was nothing really wrong with it and the colour palettes weren’t unpleasant to look at.

The soundtrack was extremely boring and there was nothing very memorable about it but i would rather say that’s a matter of taste.

Overall i think this was a waste of time so unless you specifically enjoy mineralogy or stories about family drama or really like the characters i wouldn’t recommend.

Reviewer’s Rating: 2

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