A Shonen Jump Classic Launches Massive Anniversary Celebration With New Promo Movie

It’s been a massive year for Gosho Aoyama, with the latest anime adaptation of Yaiba from Wit Studio currently taking the Spring 2025 anime season by storm, but his other iconic shonen series is getting plenty of love as well, with Case Closed – also known as Detective Conan – celebrating its 30th anniversary with a special animated short film with more celebrations on the way thanks to Shueisha and Weekly Shonen Jump. With a brand-new Conan film also being released this year and the unexpected collaboration with Japanese McDonald’s locations, it’s a great time to be a fan of the monumental mystery series.

Originally serialized in 1994 and still ongoing as of writing, Detective Conan is one of the most recognizable Shonen Jump series of all time, having well over 270 million copies in circulation, with individual collected volumes within the series frequently ranking on Japan’s best-sellers list. The series’ enduring charm owes quite a bit to Aoyama’s signature writing style, being capable of crafting compelling mysteries while having enough personality to give the franchise Scooby Doo-like eccentricities to keep readers hooked for decades.

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Detective Conan Is the Perfect Zany Mystery Series For Diehard Manga Collectors

While the Detective Conan anime adaptations are absolutely incredible, for new fans looking to get into the series for the first time, especially those who enjoy reading manga, the original manga is a masterclass example of a series that’s able to stick to the exact same gimmick for decades without losing its identity, or become boring over time. Detective Conan follows Shinichi Kudo, a genius high school detective who often works alongside police to solve crimes. One day, while aiding in an investigation, he’s attacked by a member of the Black Organization and, in an attempt to murder him, give him an experimental drug. While it doesn’t kill Shinichi outright, it does shrink his body down to the size of an elementary school student. To keep himself safe, he takes on the name Conan Edogawa and begins living with his childhood friend and her father, a private detective. From that point forward, he tags along with the P.I. to solve mysteries and uncover as much as he can regarding the Black Organization.

Thanks to the simplicity in its setup, despite having well over 1,000 chapters, Detective Conan is incredibly easy to pick up and take breaks from, so the storytelling never feels as though it becomes overdone. Plus, with the main character’s condition not being treated as something with a time limit, there’s no pressure on Aoyama to try and bring up Conan searching for a cure to turn him back to normal, and is instead able to put a bigger focus on telling a compelling, detached mystery with a set cast of supporting characters. It’s a formula for success, and it shows; in addition to Detective Conan‘s success in print, its multiple animated adaptations, especially feature films, have broken box office records in Japan, with the 2024 film Detective Conan: The Million-Dollar Pentagram ¥15.80 billion –around $100.51 million USD – making it Japan’s highest-grossing domestic film that year.

Source: Oricon US