Ameku M.D.: Doctor Detective

Episodes 1-3

Medical mysteries, as a sub-genre, exist in a really weird place. While they're still usually fine if you're the type who just likes to go along for the ride, if you're the type who likes to make an effort to figure out the mystery then you'll find yourself at a disadvantage if you haven't also been to medical school. But also, there's a pretty big wrinkle to all this: more than arguably any other flavor of mystery, it's so easy to get away with doing whatever you want in medical mysteries by just making stuff up. After all, how many people in the audience are really going to notice at all, let alone right away?

I'm not a medical professional, so I can't speak firsthand to how real or not the medicine and science of Ameku M.D.: Doctor Detective (henceforth Ameku) is thus far. But even if I don't know much about medicine, I do know a lot about history. For example, I know that bones that are even a few hundreds of years old can get pretty brittle—let alone bones that are several millions of years old. I have a really hard time believing that fossilized dinosaur bones would readily be able to tear someone's leg off. Crush them? Depending on the circumstances and bones, sure, maybe. But tear an adult man's leg off? I very much doubt it. ANN's own Rebecca Silverman seemed to feel similarly in the comment section of the Winter 2025 Preview Guide, where she posted: “I was feeling pedantic enough to ask my friend who's a paleontologist about the whole T-Rex thing, and she said it's unlikely that a man of his age and fitness could have lifted the skull, but it's even more unlikely that he could have used it to chop off a leg." And if the series is doing something like this, it makes me skeptical of how it's handling (or not handling) its medical accuracy as well.

Admittedly, an element of plausibility won't matter to everyone when approaching a mystery series. But I'm the type who likes, if not trying to solve the mystery, knowing that it's at least solve-able by the audience. And if the audience literally can't hope to solve it because the series is operating on made up rules that are never firmly established, then there's no point even trying to solve the mystery. And it zaps a mystery series of a lot of the potential fun to be had. I might be more willing to look past this if the mysteries themselves were more interesting, but the wind doesn't seem to be blowing that way. I'll give the first mystery credit where it's due: it's implausible, sure, but it's certainly creative. But also, it's not so creative that it distracts me from how unrealistic, and thus unsolvable to the audience, it is. And the second mystery was just plain basic and boring. I don't know if it's true that epilepsy can sometimes cause seizures that make it look like you're just walking listlessly. But I did find myself thinking, “it's probably something to do with epilepsy” pretty early on in the third episode. And while I do like the smug feeling of knowing I was right so quickly, I also don't get much satisfaction from this as a mystery—it feels way too simple and obvious. And of course it feels that way, it's only a single-20-minute-episode mystery. It'd be hard for it to avoid being either overly rushed or overly simple. I hope that as the series continues, it goes back to two episodes, if not more, per mystery.

A mystery series can sometimes supersede having less interesting mysteries if its detective is likable enough, but so far, I'm just not a fan of Takao. She seems less the quirky genius at the intersection between Dr. House and Sherlock Holmes, as much as she seems selfish and obnoxious. Sure, Dr. House is too, but at least he's also a compelling character—so far, the only unique quality Takao has as a protagonist is her teenage appearance. Plus, at least House commits to having its protagonist being a huge jerk to people, patients and co-workers alike—he's supposed to be hate-able. Meanwhile, Ameku doesn't seem to be making a conscious effort toward making its detective genuinely disliked, in-universe or out, on purpose. And I say “genuinely” because there are characters who seem at least annoyed with her, but perhaps not fully and completely disliking her (EX: her being banned from the psych ward). Combine this with some less-than-engaging mysteries, and she doesn't even seem as smart as the series wants her to come across. She's left then without any redeeming qualities.

On a more positive note, though, I think the production value of this anime is solid. The animation looks good, especially during the opening theme. Speaking of which, while not my favorite, Ameku still definitely has one of the better opening songs this season (no surprise there, since it's by Aimer). I also want to highlight the translation for this series—being a medical mystery, there's a lot of words coming up that people who don't work in a medical field likely encounter on a day-to-day basis, which I imagine would make translating this series trickier and more time consuming than usual.

In summary, while it's not completely terrible, I'm just not impressed with this anime so far. There are only three episodes out right now, so there's still plenty of time for it to turn itself around. But the mysteries just haven't been terribly engaging, and Takao is nowhere near being the cool or charismatic detective that often defines their respective series. Still, I'd love to have my mind changed as this anime continues. I guess all we can do for now is wait and see if that happens.

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