A long take on what RUM arc does wrong compared to prior arcs

[u/Anokata-4869]

Till date we have Vermouth, Kir & Bourbon as major BO agents (prior to RUM) with their own arcs. Generally a character's face would be introduced in a action packed thriller episode (vermouth at end of pisco arc, kir during her assassination attempt, bourbon at mystery train), while their motives, actions & counter measures taken by Conan to defeat them were all explained at once at the arc finale when Conan finally outwits the agent.

In RUM arc, RUM's face was revealed in a action packed case of FBI serial murder, but Conan uncovering his identity was pretty anticlimactic. No explanation on what he was doing, what were his motives, did he achieved them, and why organisation's 2nd in command was out there on field mission himself. There are no big reasons for RUM to take disguise of kanenori.

Prior to RUM arc, the motives & actions of BO agents were clearly defined and their arcs climaxed with great nail biting thriller and layered revelations. Involvement of BO agents into conan's life felt natural as people close to him were targeted by BO & Conan was never approached directly.

First I am gonna list motives, actions and how Conan tackled every BO agents prior to RUM, and then argue what goes wrong with RUM arc, and could have been done to make it better.

Arcs prior to RUM:

--> Vermouth got lead on sherry when pisco died. She had known about drug's effect and thus investigated primary schools too and pinned down sherry's location. Then disguised as Arraide sensei and planned to kidnap haibara, at the same time she sent invitation to shinichi's home & addressed him as conan. Conan had to save haibara as well as had to establish that shinichi is still missing to BO. Conan tricked vermouth & BO by disguising himself as haibara and sent hattori (disguised as shinichi) to cruise party, who eventually removed his disguise in front of BO(vodka) on cruise and established shinchi is no where in contact with anyone. Conan defeated vermouth in epic showdown of episode 345.

--> Then Kir was on her mission to assassinate a politician & Conan got involved along with FBI. Conan helped FBI to capture kir. BO eventually came for rescue and seemingly defeated FBI by successfully extracting kir. Finally Conan & Akai reveals that kir was from CIA and was planted back into organization to get leverage upon BO, & it was all a carefully treaded plan to get a hook on BO. Akai also dies at hand of Kir to convince BO about kir's loyalty, but FBI & Conan gets a leverage on BO in form of kir.

--> Then Bourbon came with a clear motive of confirming akai's death and to confirm if FBI had not done any dirty play. He met jodie as burned Akai shuichi to see her reaction, & occasionally bumped into other FBI agents. During the process he got lead on sherry (when haibara took antidote to become adult again) and he decided to capture her (two reasons: get closer to elena's daughter and get promoted in BO). In mystery train Conan saves haibara with help of kid and learns Bourbon's identity, but Bourbon encountered okiya subaru & got suspicious of Akai's death again and decided to stay and investigate further.

--> Eventually bourbon got information about kusuda Rikumichi and uncovered the plan carefully treaded by Conan & Akai. He realises Akai shiuchi is okiya subaru and goes directly to confront him at shinichi's mansion. Here Conan & yusaku devises a plan and outwits bourbon and make him believe that okiya subaru is just some normal person, while Akai shuichi appears at Raiha pass and takes down PSB.

RUM Arc:

Up untill here, everything is great, but after this gosho forcefully implants RUM. At the end of scarlet revealation arc where kir sends a message about RUM. That arc had nothing to do with BO, there were no urgencies, no events concerning BO that their 2nd in command had to go out on field mission.

Initially every BO character remains mysterious but eventually gosho cleares their motives & actions in their arcs finale. But with RUM arc Conan has finally discovered RUM's identity and RUM has fled the situation with no consequences & no events which directly concerns Conan. And we still don't know what he was trying to achieve while disguised as kanenori.

The whole story about haneda kojhi & RUM's 17 year old mistake of leaving akasa alive, was mentioned later in series only after it was established that RUM is on move.

RUM was not after wakasa from start either as he noticed wakasa only after school trip arc and then tried to kill her. He knew of mary being drugged with apotoxin, but was not after her either, as he came to know about her whereabouts and shrinking very recently after his cover was blown to everyone.

RUM has just responded to every plot progression after taking disguise of kanenori, but why he became kanenori in the first place, why did he became kogoro's apprentice, why did he interectacted with Conan in all the cases & why he talked about shogi peice to conan. He neither knew about Conan nor suspected him in any way before meeting him. Then why, 2nd in command of such big organisation was living his life disguised as waiter & kogoro's apprentice.

I always thought RUM was out on field to analyse the full situation about rats in organisation, and being 2nd in command of BO, he would do some really devastating things to conan's group. I wanted RUM revelation for Conan to come with certain urgencies, panic & threats.

What could have been done better

It would have been so much better if RUM would have identified almost every secret i.e. about bourbon being psb, Akai being okiya subaru, vermouth protecting Conan, bourbon's tea party, haibara's being sherry, Conan being shinichi everything except kir. It would have brought the terror of BO back, and an immense pressure & threat on almost every character. Whatever yusaku's tea party plan discussion was, RUM should be able to make it futile. Conan's team should have lost at almost every front, then it would really feel like someone bigger than gin is on move. You don't make RUM bigger than gin just by showing RUM is able give better deduction than gin during FBI serial murder case. There gosho just made gin dumber to show rum is better. RUM arc should have ended with conflict being dragged to open ground and everyone to be in do or die situation. This way RUM arc should have really lead to the final showdown arc for the anime. Also, RUM could have missed about kir (as she is usually away from Conan) and finally she could play a good role against BO. Kir must have a big role in blow against BO, as whole red vs black arc, and Akai dying at Raiha pass was about to get a hook on BO, so that hook must work at end.

Rant on RUM arc

There was so much potential to make RUM a good villain & give him a proper revelation, but gosho decided to lowkey reveal RUM's identity casually by camel, and then that dumbfuck RUM couldn't even take out camel, seriously camel? And when wakasa showed up, he used morse code for car accident at wall, and not on wakasa. He just fled the situation, came back in helicopter and disappeared again. No counter by rum, just casually, haha you got me, bye bye .....

He abandoned his post so casually as if he was on vacation doing nothing, and when got caught, he ran his ass off.... I understand gosho is milking the series for money, making some irrelevant plot points to drag the story. Like seriously, gosho used his every brain cell in connecting all the characters to each other by some means, but didn't even bothered to give RUM a proper purpose, or give proper mind battle between RUM & Conan. This way story is getting dragged and finally RUM appears to be an incompetent person for his post. Korn & chianti have also not done anything of significance but we have to believe that they are indeed good snipers because they are in BO. BO has really lost its charm for me after RUM's revealation to conan.

Final thoughts

There is much plot development and story progression in RUM arc which is genuinely good. How sera is revealed to be Akai's sister, amuro finally figures that okiya subaru is indeed Akai shuichi, how Shin-ran started dating after school trip, how Bourbon intruded into shinichi's house & met yusaku, How mary was shrunk, how sera saw Conan at Wimbledon and came to Japan, how haneda kojhi died & kuroda's involvement along with asaka, mystery with amanda's dying message, morofushi being hiro's brother, getting info about Boss suspects and latest chapter about haibara and wakasa. Everything is good in RUM arc except for RUM, which futiles entire arc as he is the key antagonist of this arc.

RUM just responded to events of story progression and did not have his own motives & achievements for being disguised as kanenori. I hope gosho gives answers for this and end the RUM arc, as it has already dragged on so much. There are many great plot point left for final arc such as, return of tsutomu, MI6 joining Conan, interference by kojhi family, actual purpose of apotoxin, actual purpose of silver bullet, vermouth' secret, kir's blow to organisation, using one extra antidote which Conan has, Ran's Birthday (which gosho is keeping for some major plot event), yusaku's tea party plan and Boss's suspects.

I don't know if RUM arc has ended or will still continue, but if it has ended then it has been the worst arc in terms of BO involvements.