Reviewing 3rd Season of Kyojo: A Dark Police Academy J-Drama

At the end of season 2 we learn how Kimichika Kazama lost his eye, as well as how his student, Akihira Tono, died. Kyojo Zero, also known as the third season of Kyojo fills us in on the things we missed as well as what pushed Kimichika Kazama into becoming the harsh instructor he is today. In Kyojo Zero our favorite teacher's position is not what we expect. Instead of getting to see him directly in action as a detective, we see that Kimichika Kazama is a supervisor. Still teaching but in a less hands on way. Strictly dedicated to duty, stern, a man of few words but with sharp observational skills, I'd argue he talks less in this season than the previous ones combined and he is far more mysterious, it being harder to tell what he's feeling or what's on his mind, so the previous seasons let us know how strongly he felt about this past given that he often yells.

One of his students named Nakagome Kenji sums up his job in this season perfectly.

"He's like the repair shop that takes the faulty goods that the precincts have given up on, fixes them, and sends them back."

And in season three that's exactly what Instructor Kazama does, detectives are handed over to him for him to supervise and instruct, or he gives them the ultimatum of demotion. So yeah, he still loves those white withdrawal papers, hahaha.

Viewers expect season 3 to heavily revolve around Akihira Tono who we learn about in previous seasons, but he's only one of the many detectives we encounter, the show has a revolving door cast, every second one detective leaves, another walks through the door. We get to learn about the personal lives and backstories of each student as they work on different cases alongside Kazama. We also get to see other colleagues of Kazama and interesting criminals. We even get to see the face of the Ice Pick Killer, but nothing about Supervisor Kazama himself.

In season three we encounter a spectrum of criminals. Those who are morally good but go too far and those who have already committed crimes. Surprisingly though, most of our criminals are ordinary people, some of the murders are accidental while others are carefully and meticulously planned. Each time the criminal becomes offensive and rude when confronted showing their commitment to resist authorities and shamelessly continue on with their normal lives.

Of the detectives, a few stood out to me.

I'd say the most competent detectives of the season were:

1. Akihira Tono - A student forced upon Kazama. Sadly he had the weakness of freezing up when criminals get violent due to his own trauma. Even in final incident, he made the grave mistake of turning his back and blocking Kazama's line of sight with his umbrella- which Kazama mentions in previous seasons. (I find it interesting how in Kyojo Zero he's very calm but in previous seasons he yells more, making you know what happened really upset him more than he showed.)

2. Michiko Kanera- A woman with sharp intuition when it comes to making guesses about the relationships of the opposite sex. Her signature line being "It's just a hunch tho..." We don't get to see her physically fight but she's still competent enough to rival Akihira Tono. We do ironically get to see that she's somewhat of a hypocrite, the reason she's so sharp is because she has horrible luck with men, her latest boyfriend not only being a shameless mooch but secretly a criminal who helped deliver drugs. She discovers this on a case and tries to cover up his identity since he's connected to her, but gets caught and demoted. However she seems to work her way back up after reflecting and repenting, so I'm looking forward to seeing more of her because she was interesting, I loved her character.

Michiko aside there were two other students who stood out to me.

3. Nakagome Kenji- a sloppy, hot headed fellow who we learn had the unfortunate experience of being kidnapped as a child, he was returned home but his Mother began to suffer from dementia, forever stuck in that moment of when she lost her son, despite him being right next to her at times, driving him insane with fury. The kidnapper was caught but he's still left angry, not knowing what to be angry at. One of the cases forces him to understand his Mother better proving to be rather therapeutic for him and mellowing him out. I'd argue that aside from Akihira Tono his story was one of the saddest ones, one that makes you reflect on your relationship with your parents.

4. (I think her name was Hayata Seiko?)

A woman who was a bad mother, repents and dedicates herself to focusing on child abuse. Her story is actually terrifying. Her ex-husband would harshly spray down their daughter with cold-water whenever she told a lie or gave trouble at home in her absence, sometimes she'd be sleeping when this happened and sometimes not, she explained her line of reasoning for not doing anything was that both she and her husband worked long shifts and would always come back home exhausted. She would constantly be pestered by her daughter to play and do things when all she wanted to do was sleep. Her husband's abuse made her daughter quieter and less fussy, making days more bearable, but eventually she came to her senses, detesting herself for this, so she divorced him and tried to create a new life for her and her daughter, in which we can see they've become much closer since then, her daughter becoming more independent too.

Not all cops are good people, but some do repent. Hayata Seiko contemplates quitting the force but she wants to use her experience to help other abused children, and we see she's good at it, as well as Kimichika Kazama who she comes to respect.

At the end of season 3 Supervisor Kazama encourages her to work in the child abuse sector like she wished. I think it's highly likely that he wants her to look into the childhood of the Ice Pick Killer. Perhaps he was abused as a child turning him into the monster he is today?

We got to see snippets of the Ice Pick Killer and he's not what we expect either. He had the opportunity to kill Kazama but he didn't. It seems his goal is to mock the police and also harm those close to Kazama. Perhaps he was failed by the police in the past, and has bitter feelings towards Kazama and the police but not enough to murder Kazama, or at least just yet.

Kazama's lack of response, of not immediately prioritizing the Ice Pick Killer case also made others question him. I think at the time Kazama had faith in his comrades and believed that his colleagues would catch him, but the lack of professionalism from two rookie cops end up ruining the whole operation, when they finally caught him they had to release him due to one-sided police brutality being recorded by a civilain, a clip in which the Ice Pick Killer did not fight back, perhaps orchestrating the event to get off scott free.

"Please don't hate the police." Is one of the things said to him towards the end when he packs up his things to transfer to the Police Academy. In previous seasons however we know, that the events of this season resulted in him doing just that.

Kazama takes his hatred for police incomepetence and transfers to the school, as throughout the season we see he is called to teach, in different cases he encounters there are some cases in which culprits got away with crimes due to the negligence of other cops. It's clear here Kazama feels driven to correct the corruption from the roots, which is why he decides to quit and become an instructor at the Police Academy.

We also know from the events of the previous season and this one that Kazama is strategically raising talents and hoping to put together a task force that will perhaps be able to take down clever criminals like the Ice Pick Killer.