Jimmy Kudo

Jimmy Kudo, also known as Shinichi Kudo (工藤 新一) in Japan, is the protagonist of the anime and manga Case Closed, known in Japan as Detective Conan (名探偵コナン). He later takes on the alias Conan Edogawa (江戸川 コナン) after Arthur Conan Doyle and Edogawa Rampo. Jimmy Kudo was a well known High School Detective who helped solved cases which the police could not. One day, he investigates a suspicious man. Later he is attacked and forced to swallow a poison called the APTX 4869 which turns him back into a child. Now he lives with his friend and love Rachel Moore as Conan Edogawa who helps her father Richard solve cases, hoping that they will run into a case involving the strange men from the Black Organization who forced him to take the poison.

Personality
At the beginning of the series, Jimmy is a 17-year-old student at Teitan High School. He was already well-known as a brilliant young detective who closed many difficult cases that the professionals could not. . Jimmy was born to Booker Kudo, a mystery writer and Vivian Kudo, a former movie star. . He is extremely intelligent, and even from a young age, was very intuitive and observant. Due to the influence of his father, and the generally laissez-faire environment at home, he has long been an incessant and persistent reader, especially of mystery novels. Booker started taking Jimmy to crime scenes since sixth grade which inspired him to be a detective. Aside from Jimmy's intelligence, he is also an extremely skilled soccer player. At first, it was to hone his reflexes but he grew fond of the sport. Jimmy is also known for his inability to sing, but was revealed to have perfect pitch. He apparently can speak English, as he once conversed with and translated for an American diplomat.

Jimmy is a good friend to Rachel Moore whom he has known since kindergarten. Jimmy has not found any interest in other girls. . After changing into Conan, Jimmy sometimes calls her over the telephone and imitates his normal voice with the voice-changing bowtie, so that she does not worry about him. . He convinces her that he is off solving a very difficult case and will return once the investigation is concluded. Jimmy/Conan is not without sexual fantasies regarding Rachel; the most obvious example being his getting nosebleeds or blushing--manga shorthand for lust-- when he sees her in a bathing suit, or when Rachel pulled him into an onsen with her. Jimmy is actually in love with Rachel but he's not good at expressing his feelings towards her.

Jimmy also has a strong sense of justice as he constantly tries to arrest the Black Organization as well as blaming himself when a murder occurs before him. His sense of justice can however sometimes cause him to be skeptical, as he was initially with Anita Hailey.

Plot Overview
At the beginning of the series, Jimmy brings his friend Rachel to a local theme park called "Tropical Land," to celebrate her victory in the Metropolitan Karate Championships. He later ends up solving a murder case there. As they are leaving, Jimmy witnesses a suspicious exchange between an unknown man and Vodka in a secluded area just outside the park. He leaves Rachel and investigates but does not notice Gin who knocks him out and forces him to swallow a new experimental poison known as APTX 4869. . They then leave him to die. However, instead of killing Jimmy, a rare side-effect occurs. It shrinks his body to his appearance back to that of his six or seven year-old self. In desperation and confusion, Jimmy heads back to his house and runs into his next door neighbor and close family friend, Dr. Herschel Agasa who warns him he must keep his idenitity secret, as the Black Organization will endanger his life and others associated with him.

Jimmy comes up with alias Conan Edogawa and pretends to be a distant relative of Agasa's who places Conan in Rachel's care. Rachel's father Richard Moore, owns a Detective Agency which may allow him to run into a case involving the Black Organization. He is signed up at Titan Elementary to further protect his identity and makes friends with kids and forms the Junior Detective League. As the story progresses, Conan later befriends biochemist Anita Hailey. Anita Hailey (formerly known as Shiho Miyano) grew up within the Black Organization and is a former member of it along with her sister. She is the creator of the APTX 4869 drug but took the drug in order to escape from the Black Organization. Conan has run into the Black Organization multiple times, but was unable to capture them in due to Gin's cleverness.

Throughout the series Conan has temporarily returned back to normal several times. First he returns to normal after drinking alcohol while infected with a cold. He quickly turns back into Conan after solving the case. The next time is after taking the prototype antidote for APTX 4869. After two days, the antidote wears off and he becomes Conan again. Much further into the series, Jimmy accidentally takes a prototype antidote for APTX 4869. The antidote wears off 24 hours later but he is given another one by Haibara to keep his identity secret. After another four hours, he becomes Conan again.

APTX 4869
APTX 4869 (四八六九), code named Prototype Detective, is a fictional toxin and a derivative of an experimental immortality formula developed by Shiho Miyano, which is used by the Black Organization as an untraceable, lethal poison. APTX is an abbreviation of "Apotoxin," and, as the name implies, it involves the activation of an uncontrolled apoptosis which causes death by the destruction of cells. In addition, it can also activate telomerase. However, in very rare cases, it causes the apoptosis of non-neural cells only and the apoptosis would stabilize at some point, causing the victim's apparent age to be decreased. Jimmy, the series' protagonist, is such a victim; later Shiho Miyano, who chooses to attempt suicide by using her own drug, becomes the second.

Throughout the series there are several instances in which the APTX was temporarily neutralized and Jimmy and Shiho were returned to their actual age forms. The main ingredient for this reversal is a component found in Chinese ginseng root schnaps, which Hailey has already incorporated in a prototype antidote for the APTX. It is to note that in the instances where Jimmy or Shiho changed back, the recipient was suffering from a common cold while the component was ingested, indicating that the immune system somehow has to be taxed for the antidote to work.

Gadgets
Conan uses many inventions made by Hershel Agasa to help him solve cases discreetly. One of them is a voice changing bowtie, which he often uses to imitate a person's voice in the process solving the case. Every so often, he also has to use it to reassure Rachel by mimicking his original voice in a phone call. To assist him further, Agasa invented a wristwatch that is able to shoot a tranquilizer dart and act as a flashlight. This is generally used to put Richard to sleep so Conan can solve the case though Conan may use it to take out a culprit as well. To help capture criminals, Agasa invented special shoes for Conan that is able to enhance his kicking power to superhuman levels; enabling him to kick objects at culprits. It has also been shown to be useful with breaking objects or jumping. Agasa also invents a special belt that is able to lever objects or deploy a soccer ball to be used with the shoes. Agasa later creates a pair of multipurpose computerized glasses, which can be replaced with bulletproof lenses allowing Conan to track down objects, listen in on conversations, zoom into targets, and gain infrared vision. He also invents the Junior Detective Badges, allowing Conan to talk with the Junior Detective League wirelessly and track them down if necessary.

Appearances in other media
Besides for his anime and manga appearances, Conan is the protagonist for all the movies and the video games based on the Case Closed series. Some anime parodied, lampooned and even mentioned him. Some of them include, Yakitate!! Japan, Black Cat Inuyasha, Hayate the Combat Butler, Proposal Daisakusen,, Sonic X, Crayon Shin-Chan, Kaiketsu Zorori, Eyeshield 21, Angelic Layer, and Zan: Sayonara Zetsubou-Sensei. He was used as a character to promote people to follow the law in Japan, due to the popularity of the series.

Reception
In the survey "friendship" developed by rankingjapan.com in which people had to choose what anime character they would like to have as a friend, Kudo ranked third. In a Newtype poll from 2001, Kudo ranked fourth in the category "Top 10 Most Popular Male Anime Characters in Japan."