In Case Closed Shinichi appears at the beginning of the series as a gifted 16-year-old student at Teitan High School in
Tokyo. He was already well known as a brilliant young detective who had closed many difficult cases that the professionals could not. He is also secretly in love with his childhood best friend
Ran Mouri (Rachel Moore), but refuses to admit his feelings due to both stubbornness and shyness. Later while on a date with Ran to a theme park, Shinichi leaves Ran and follows two suspicious characters,
Gin and
Vodka, suspecting they are criminals. Gin ends up attacking Shinichi and forces him to drink an experimental poison known as which is supposed to kill him without leaving traces for the police to find autopsy, and then leaves him for dead. However, instead of killing Shinichi, a rare side-effect occurs, causing his body to regress into the form of a young child with his intellect and memories intact. With advice from
Dr. Hiroshi Agasa, Shinichi adopts the identity of Conan Edogawa, devised from the names of
Arthur Conan Doyle and
Edogawa Rampo to prevent Gin, Vodka, and their syndicate, the
Black Organization, from returning to kill him and those around him. For this reason, he chooses not to reveal his true identity to anyone else, to keep them safe. Shinichi pretends to be a distant relative of Dr. Agasa's and is placed in the care of Ran and her father,
Kogoro Mouri (Richard Moore), who owns a detective agency. Shinichi and Dr. Agasa feel that some clues regarding the Black Organization may possibly filter through the agency, allowing Shinichi to learn more about them to ultimately bring them down. As for Shinichi's disappearance, Conan has to constantly find creative ways to fool Ran into believing he is off solving a very difficult case and will return once the investigation is concluded. This becomes increasingly difficult as she begins to suspect who he really is. As a child, Conan must attend Teitan Elementary, where he inadvertently forms a detective club called the
Detective Boys (Junior Detective League) with friends he makes at the school. Conan is forced to adapt to his new daily life and becomes accustomed to attending elementary school while secretly helping Richard solve crimes with the use of his gadgets invented by Dr. Agasa. The most prominent of these are: his voice-changing bowtie, allowing him to impersonate anyone's voice; his customized glasses which allow him to track and listen through his
covert listening devices; his super sneakers which multiply his kicking force; his wrist watch stun gun, which allows him to tranquilize Richard or a criminal; his Solar Powered skateboard as well as a soccer ball dispenser belt, super strong/elastic suspenders, among others. Conan eventually meets
Heiji Hattori (Harley Hartwell), a detective from
Osaka who is seeking to challenge Shinichi in a deductive battle. After drinking
baijiu while sick with a cold, Conan reverts to a teenager and rectifies a deduction made by Heiji. In their second encounter, Heiji is able to deduce Conan's identity as Shinichi Kudo and confronts him about it. The two later become good friends. As the series progresses, Conan befriends biochemist
Shiho Miyano, a former member of the Black Organization and inventor of the APTX-4869 drug. She and her sister had grown up within the organization, as their scientist parents had been members too, before their deaths. After her sister was killed by Gin, she took the poison to commit suicide. However, like Shinichi, her age regressed and she shrank back to a small child's size. She then escapes and adopts the pseudonym
Ai Haibara (Anita Hailey). Dr. Agasa ends up taking her in, and she vows to help Conan take down the Black Organization. She later invents a prototype antidote to the APTX-4869 allowing Conan to temporarily become Shinichi again, which Conan uses on occasion to fool Ran when she suspects his true identity. During the events of ''
Holmes' Revelation, Shinichi, while in his original form, confesses his feelings to Ran in London. In The Scarlet School Trip,'' Ran returns those feelings by giving Shinichi a kiss on the cheek. Conan's investigation of the Black Organization leads him to discover the American
FBI's existence in Japan, as they are also investigating the syndicate. The head of the syndicate, often referred to as 'that person' and 'boss' by syndicate members, who is at least one-hundred and thirty, is Renya Karasuma. However, the FBI and Conan are currently unaware of this. His collaboration with FBI agents
Jodie Starling and
Shuichi Akai allows them to capture organization member
Kir. They discover she is really an undercover CIA agent and return her to the organization to continue to spy from within.
In other media Shinichi Kudo has appeared in all of the
feature films of the series, both the
original video animation series (
Shōnen Sunday Original animations and the
Magic Files), the two-hour cross-over
television special Lupin the 3rd vs Detective Conan, and is the protagonist in all
Case Closed-related video games. He is the protagonist in the
novels of the series. In the 2006–2007 live-action series, he is portrayed by
Shun Oguri as a teenager and Nao Fujisaki in child form. In the 2011 live-action movie and
TV drama series,
Junpei Mizobata portrays the teenage Shinichi. In 2006, the Japanese government used Conan in campaigns to help promote crime awareness among children. Targeting the same audience,
Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs used Conan and his friends in two pamphlets: one to promote the ministry's mission, the other to introduce the
34th G8 summit held in the country in 2008. Conan and his friends were also featured in the sixth installment of the Anime, Heroes and Heroines commemorative stamp series issued by
Japan Post in 2006. ==Reception==