What’s it about ?
A back-alley team of Private Investigators. Who happen to have super-powers, and occasionally fight super-powered crime.
(There’s a manga version being published concurrently.)
Characters
Nice is nominally the PI agency’s leader, but it’s like herding cats, and his occasional stubborness doesn’t help. A running joke is that he’s terrible at managing his finances. His case this episode : investigating the disappearance of several college girls. (He also effortlessly foils a bank robbery while making a withdrawal.) His power : listening to music makes him super-fast, I think.
Murasaki is his purple-themed partner. He’s much more suave and sophisticated, but just as stubborn. He takes the case that will actually provide them some decent money : protecting the safe of a rich family, whose patriarch has died without explaining how to open it. His power : either super-strength or super-resiliency, I can’t quite tell.
Also working with them : laid-back Birthday (electrical powers) and Dr Ratio (x-ray vision that lets him see weak points in enemies), who both take a bodyguarding job.
Rounding up the agency’s cast : Koneko, who acts as their secretary, and Hajime, a gluttonous girl that even the opening titles have no clue what she brings to the table. Also : the owner of the restaurant they operate out of.
Art is a police detective who’s old friends with Nice. He seems delighted to have the team’s help for what the police don’t have time to deal with. (He’s the one footing the bill for the first case.) There are hints he’s got a hidden agenda, though.
As it happens, all three jobs are actually different angles on the same case ; they solve it together by the episode’s end.
Production Values
Very stylish indeed. The wild colour shift for the slo-mo power activation sequences are especially pretty.
Overall Impression
Hey, that’s actually quite good ! The mystery story is well-constructed, the characters produce some lively banter, there are some decent jokes, and the fight scenes are fun to watch. That it’s not actually an adaptation of anything even gives me hope that it’ll be able to properly pace its story out (an issue that has plagued many recent shows also directed by Seiji Kishi).
So far, so good. Let’s see how it develops.
