Make sure to leave your questions for our Post Mortem episode down below! Want to see your Unsolved fan art featured in an upcoming Post Mortem? Submit it here: bzfd.it/3kpb9Z7
For post mortem: Japanese police is notorious for closing cases any way possible to keep up appearances, beating the confessions out of the suspects and convicting innocent people. This was definitely done to humiliate them publicly. Maybe someone with a grudge? Someone whose friend or relative was a victim of the police brutality and incompetence? This feels personal
that's such a good point. I think the woman and child voice message was a very intentional message meant for the public, to make them reconsider their views on who the real criminals were. I don't think the monster w 21 faces ever wanted the money, or to truly hurt any of the public. The wanted to make a point about the police and the companies themselves
Why does heroin scare him do you think? Also...avocado pits but not armpits? I agree with being scared from just about everyone under age 23. Well 8-23. Kids are cool. But older kids/teens/young adults these days make for terrible human beings (for the most part...not trying to generalize or stereotype or whatever lol)
@@jeremygalloway1348 i dont think it was heroin exactly but the act of some random person coming at him with a needle of heroin/drugs and injecting him
For clarification: the reason the Japanese police force has such a high percentage is because they often torture suspects into confession, and they arrest people who aren’t the actual criminals.
@@Lenin941FN yeah America, the country with the largest prison population on the planet, is super interested in spreading anti incarceration propaganda.
For Post Mortem: My theory is that the culprit is a victim of police incompetence. They just want to prove to the public how even though most of crimes are solved in Japan, a simple corporate terrorism with given hints can't be solved. It's not mentioned here but they also stopped after the head of police killed himself.
For the record, while most crimes in Japan are “solved”, that doesn’t necessarily mean they were actually solved. The Japanese police have a pretty nasty track record of just arresting people who they feel they can pin a crime on so that it goes in the books as a successful case. It’s more important to secure an arrest and close the books than to actually catch the true culprit.
The part about humiliating the police...the fact is with such a high conviction rate, there will always be innocent people and people with minor demeanors put in jail. A lot of Japanese media that involve the law are written with this in mind. To me, it's difficult to overlook the idea that perhaps they just wanted to show the police they couldn't force solve everything as a kind of revenge.
Or to show the public that the police actually can't do their jobs. If their high numbers rely on putting innocents in jail, they essentially are scapegoating all the time and aren't actually connecting the dots to find the one responsible. Not to say that all cases are handled like this, but way too many are, and that could be why this group did these acts and taunted the police this way. "If you're as good as you say you are, catch us!" and the fact they never did speaks volumes.
Yeah, that’s kind of what I was thinking. And then if they HAD made a false arrest, the actual culprit would act again, probably with some sort of message amounting to ‘wrong answer’
The reason Japanese police had such a high “success” rate when it came to solving crimes is that it also had one of the highest rates of wrongful convictions, and even to this day has a 99% conviction rate; which means that if you are on trial in Japan, you are almost definitely going to be convicted.
@@tamarkb6833 Measures of wrongful convictions aren't the most reliable. The US certainly has more than they should (the police are terrible there), but statistics about it are only from cases where wrongful conviction is legally determined. In a lot of other countries like Japan, retrials may be much rarer. Not defending the US, just defending proper use of statistics.
@@tayloranderson7547 I’d like to think the child on the phone was actually at the center of it all and it was just a criminal ring of children that wanted free candy.
How do you set the age of a ghost? Is it the age they died at, or the age between their birth and now? Because depending on that a ghost might be under or over 23
For Post Mortem: Apparently Japan's high rate of cases solved, was attributed to them not properly investigating many cases, and labeling them solved much too quickly.
The US, UK, and South Africa have the highest rates of serial killers, but likely also have the best policing. Crime stays between nations are the hardest to trust.
Thats why Detective Conan and Kindaichi exists. Because the Japanese police are incompetent and couldn't grasp the simplest clue presented in front of them. Carlos Ghosn escape is another example for failure of Japanese police in their handling of case.
Fun fact: The writer of that kids book, Edogawa Ranpo, isn't bis real name. It is a pen name that is literally the Japanese pronunciation of Edgar Allan Poe. Edogawa was a big fan of him, and was inspired to write because of him.
For postmortem: Why didnt you mention that the police captain set himself on fire because he was so ashamed that he couldn't solve the case? That event led to the monster with 21 faces to stop because they respected that so much. Such a important part of the case so I'm surprised yall left it out.
@@mirilizz4389 yeah after the police captain died the monster with 21 faces sent the final letter. It said something like, "After hearing of the captain's death we wanted to give our condolences. We have decided to move on to other things. Anything else that happens is not from us but probably someone trying to copy us. After all we are the bad guys so we have bigger things to do than bully food companies."
Missing facts: "Having entered the home of Katsuhisa Ezaki, the two masked men tied up his wife Mikieko (35 years old) and his eldest daughter Mariko (7 years old). Mikieko offered the men money and one of them responded, "Be quiet. Money is irrelevant." they never wanted money.
this case givin me strong “money heist” vibes. the criminals being smart, always one step ahead, every move seemingly being calculated and in the end them not getting caught. it’s funny to see something so unbelievably fictional had actually happened irl before
@@drzennox3690 the funny part is how unrealistic the story is and yet it happened irl. also these guys didn't kill anyone and the only moment they hazarded murder was with the cyanide incident, of which everyone took seriously and no one was injured but the company itself. yeah they kidnapped a man and i doubt it is easy to recover from being abducted so i aint defending them, im just saying they murdered no one and their story seems as fictional as arséne lupin or aj raffles
@@drzennox3690 tell me you weren’t listening when the entire video said NO ONE DIED without telling me 🤗 as for money heist, it’s not based on a true story, so i don’t know why that stick got lodged..
I love this one because it really just sounds like one of those riddles that are near-impossible to figure out, but if it is cracked, it's going to suddenly seem all-too obvious. Also, I personally think that this was definitely the work of a group, rather than a individual.
Agreed. I have formulated a strangers on a train scenario for some time now, back when I actively posting on Reddit. I think it was disgruntled employees from both companies who decided to create the persona of the Monster with 21 faces in order to get back at the companies for reasons I think were personal. If I was working on this case in the 80s I would request the names of all former employees from both Glico and Morinaga and ask questions from their former co-workers about habits of said former employees like which train they took, where they liked to eat after work, the small things that could help build a profile of the members and thus finally identify the members.
@@thememan1387 watch terror in resonance, has A LOT of the same themes as this and after watching this I think it was probably inspired at least somewhat by this event
@@franciscasilva8406 Yeah it's funny to see that his morals don't really succeed in this situation, because this entire spree also really just screwed over people like him
24:36 They actually did figure out who the Somerton Man was!! He wasn't a secret spy or anything, he was just a dude that was really sad and lonely who wrote a lot of poems about death and was violent with his wife :/
@@bizarreabstractions Apparently it was taken down for a community guideline violation? But if you go to the Season 6 Marathon it’s still there. It’s the last episode, timestamp 1:57:05 :)
POST MORTEM: Judging by how aggressive the letters were toward the police and their inability to solve the case, do you think that maybe the whole thing was some elaborate plot done just to humiliate them? The tips given in the letters could have been false; used to lead them on a wild goose chase and make them look even more incompetent than they already looked. And if Miyazaki is involved (which would make sense given his anti-police history), he could have had some of his old buddies from his past helping him out, and they banded together to give him an alibi, thus allowing him to get away and humiliate the police even further. Granted, I don't know what his alibi was so I don't how well the last part works. The only question that remains from this theory is why would they target the candy companies as well?
Idk maybe the rebels were morbidly obese children who blamed the candy company for marketing to them as children and giving them a lifelong addiction to sweets? Idk I just feel like they are a petty group who only need any petty reason to target a large organization.
Maybe targeting the candy companies was just a means to get through to the police. Food affects everyone and candy especially, because they were targeting children indirectly, so there's an even bigger concern. We also have to look at the status the police has in Japan, it's pretty high. The Japanese people usually don't question them, they trust them, and thus, the argument of the perpetrators saying they are wasting tax money could actually be a huge deal, as it means that they are playing with their people's loyalty.
What if the group of 21 faces had a backup with the police. So they always knew when it was a trap. In combination with the revenge action, it mainly reminds me of the plot of "Now you see me".
@@wurmturm If they have their own practice, then yes they are being paid per procedure. And if they are a junior dentists employed at a senior dentist's practice, then they would be getting a wage, but if no one comes to get dental work done then where would the money for their wages come from?
For the Post-Mortem: I'm surprised you didn't mention that the group only stopped after the superintendent of the police, Yamamoto, killed himself in shame. That's when the last letter was sent, a few days after, in which said that they give their condolences and are stopping now. Love you both, #Shaniac
Yea I feel like that's why they stopped. Even when they threatened to poison people they clearly labeled the tainted ones and sent a newletter, I think someone actually dying crossed a line for them. Corporate sabotage and murder are two completely different levels.
side note: 11:25 is prob one of my fav moments of this show, hearing the pure excitement in shane’s “we’re gonna talk about our favorite candy aren’t we?” to just utter disappointment in his “oh ok” when him n ryan weren’t on the same page😭😭 so cute
Any one think it could have been a disgruntled cop trying to embarrass his current or former colleagues? Would explain how they were always one step ahead of the police.
And what if the child of the cop was also affected in the milk thing. Because the letter really showed resentment, and i think parents of those children would have more resentment especially if their children weren't even 2 years old yet
@@Angel12068 being a cop and having something like that happen to your child. would seriously make you question the justice you have worked so hard to enforce.
For post-mortem: to me this def feels like it was done to humiliate the police force. From the letters taunting them to all the negative press the police got. I mean, the reason the rates are so high for catching murderers and thieves is because they often force evidence to fit suspects! Could this be a job to expose their incompetence and correct their reputation? Also I agree with Shane, it’s a bloody good cause, sign me up baby!!!
This is what I thought as well but it’s a shame that so many part time workers were let off but other than that I also agree with Shane that it is a good cause
I know right!? What a great cause! I love it when terrorists go and terrorize corporations that provide and employ thousands of hard working individuals! You just love to see people get stripped of their hard-earned money, by no-life retards, and who have to bring down others, instead of picking themselves up by their bootstraps and improving their own life!
That was exactly my point , since they couldn’t pin the crimes on someone (since they would continue sending letters poisoning etc) they looked incompetent since they probably pin whatever crime on some nobody with a weed charge but with these types of crimes they get stumped
I think the police were only taunted to bring attention to the case. The "thieves" wanted publicity to hurt the corporate reputation and the stock of those companies.
Yes, as people have previously mentioned, the Japanese police forces runs on a "guilty until proven innocent" mindset as opposed to the general "innocent until proven guilty". While Japan has the highest solved crime rate, it also has one of the highest wrongful conviction rates.
@@sergeantsupreme4395 it's one of the few things people in other countries know about the Japanese legal system. Plus, I don't know about everyone else, but I had formulated a comment while watching and needed to post it or else I wouldn't be able to focus on the rest of the video. My mind wouldn't let me. I don't think there's any harm in people expressing what they know. They're having a discussion, albeit not a linear one.
I agree with you, I really liked the fact that there was mostly no violence, but the fact that many people lost their jobs because of this is undeniable. When it was time to recoup losses, the bigwigs weren't really inconvenienced, only the part-time workers: students, women with families, etc. Those people were really collateral victims. At least it was just before the Japanese Bubble so it wouldn't have been too hard finding another job I guess.
For postmortem: I think the kidnappers allowed Ezaki to escape. They clearly weren’t interested in killing him or torturing him. Maybe they decided that starting their criminal escapades with a kidnapping would ensure they would be taken seriously from the get to. Once that was achieved, they let him to go on his merry way.
Post-mortem: The reason why the rate of solved cases in Japan was so high is because the Japanese police is notorious for violently forcing confessions out of suspects. There have been multiple reports of that. This case remained unsolved isn’t because it’s impossible to solve (hence the letters calling the police “idiots”), but simply because a crime this large-scaled hindered them unable to just pin it on anyone.
I knew an ex special forces guy that claimed to keep a ceramic knife in a shower because you never know when you might have to defend your home and anything else would have rusted in the shower. I remember thinking he was crazy until these two gave their explanation of how they would defend themselves in the bath. I guess I'll be buying a ceramic knife now.
it's moms/nannies, their name is from a child's book, they targeted candy companies, they warned the public so that no children were harmed, and the phone call is from a female and child. Not to mention that they could easily have an inside on either the police or with candy companies from husbands/employers
@@SE_000 fair point but I would like to put in the a theory that it was a bunch of teens. Since depending on the age they Could drive, and due to them not actually owning things could learn to steal items. It isnt suspicious to have a bunch of teens hanging out. Also if they have parents working in the industry they could spy or ask questions and most would believe they are just interested in their parents jobs.
You know, I once saw that Japanese court systems almost always prosecute whoever is in on trial. So maybe they have a 97% closed case percentage but there might be a lot of innocents sitting in their prisons
3:55 the messed up part about such a high conviction rate for murders is that in Japan if they can’t find the real killer sometimes they would pin the murder onto someone who might have been caught for a petty crime not even related to the murder to keep their stats high
@@marinetter.8423 for example cannabis wasnt even considered a drug, until prohibition era america after ww2 made huge laws against drugs, and what caused the shape of their anti drug culture today, along with police culture of brutality. Japanese prisons are still much more humane than american ones
For post mortem: I can’t tell if the criminals have beef with the candy industry or if the crimes were intended to expose the highly accomplished police as being ineffective and bumbling. Or maybe they were just dentists sick of filling cavities… who’s to say.
if their main goal was to humiliate the police maybe they picked candy companies because they knew business would eventually recover? or maybe they picked an industry that wasn’t essential (not everyone eats sweets, plus if they wanted to wreak havoc on the public maybe they would pick toilet paper companies idk)
"Some men aren't looking for anything logical like money, some men just wanna watch the world burn" Sorry, but this entire thing seems like a comic book plot, and I am living for it.
For post mortem: The fact that this group managed to waste so much of the police's resources and man power on this case makes me wonder if the whole thing was a smoke screen for another crime being committed elsewhere...
I like the theory of the small children growing into adults and then getting revenge on corporations, would be nice if they were actually 21 different people with a single goal in mind of only chaos while... being polite enough to warn people about the poison. The letters to the police were funny though lmao
Especially in the days before the widespread access of the internet. Not a lot of opportunities to meet up with people who were victims of that incident during the time the Monster was active. No I actually have my own theory, one which I have posted on this very video. Basically it’s undoubtedly a strangers on a train situation and the goal was to ruin the reputations of Glico and Morinaga as payback for some reason I’m not sure yet. Maybe the people felt they were unjustly fired or demoted. Maybe they blamed those companies for the breakdown of relationships, who knows. I’m not a big supporter of the Yakuza theory because it doesn’t really seem like something the Yakuza would tap into. Mostly they focus on illegal ways to make money and also it was specified the kidnappers said they didn’t want the wife to pay when the head of Glico was taken.
Or they accidentaly found one another, and then try to find another victim, so they can be a group of the same understanding sharing their life just to chit chat maybe and then it turn south, someone with the urge to revenge start to make them feel the same hatred. Started an organization, eventually meet the manabu miyazaki as their leader, and he teach them how to infiltrate the enemy and other strategies they need for their revenge.. just my thoughts.. because the manabu also manage to make the anti police the maybe he make them to be anti police too. That explained to them embarassing the police in public. When you have rage in your heart, you can be easily controlled. Just my thoughts folk....
@@mirandagoldstine8548 nah you forgot something. Ppl in the old times have their own way for something like this. And maybe with the some luck in their side they found each other. And from mouth to mouth they actually found each other. Who can say no to the group of same people whose have same accident like them ? Imo..
@@katielowe7970 I just tried to sub. But was already Sub'd (noticing also I wasss without notifications...) Yet ive never seen a single video ffrom the watcher channel. Lol. Im super excited bc now I can bingeeeeeee
So, one of the things that I didn't see mentioned here was the possibility of The Monster (or their hypothetical inside man/men) shorting the companies they're targeting. We're all familiar with the normal way stocks work. You buy then at a certain price and then sell them later, hopefully when the price increases. That's going long (there are other ways of going long, but that's the basic way). When you short a stock, you basically borrow stocks from somebody else, sell them for however much they're worth, and you do so with a promise that you'll return the same number of stocks in a month or a year or however long the contract was made for when you shorted. That's a simplification, of course, but the main thing is that if the stock price goes down, then you've made money -- you sold when it was high and bought when it was low to pay back your debt. (Of course, if the price goes up, then you lose money) Shorting a stock is usually very risky. However, it's far less risky if you *know* that a stock is going to go down in price. That's usually because of insider trading but what if you're an enterprising criminal group? One who knows how to threaten and terrorize and make a big splash in the news and really drive down the price of a stock? If such a group were to short a stock -- and have enough people do it over a long enough period of time that it seemed like natural, everyday trading -- and then hit the company they were shorting, they could make a whole lot of money without having to ever pick up the ransom money and expose themselves to danger. The Monster seemed to take great pleasure in making corporations and police look like fools, while playing the media like a fiddle. It seems like they had some issue with authority. So why not thumb your nose one last time at the system you hate by exploiting it's own rules to make a fortune as well? While the cops are looking for a pickup man trying to grab a bag of ransom money, you're walking out the Tokyo Stock Exchange in broad daylight with all the money you (to all outside appearances) made legally.
This also makes sense when you consider that they never actually picked up any of the money, but continued doing all of this anyways; they didn't actually need the money from the companies directly if they were making bank from stocks and it had the added bonus of hurting them over a longer term than payouts would have.
For Post Mortem: In situations where you can’t find a pattern in the data given, it can help to look at what's not there. For example, the Monster with 21 Faces targeted many companies but which companies were not targeted? Is there a company that profited off of their competitors’ lower sales? Or even outside of the industry, is there someone or some company who could’ve benefited from lower candy/food sales?
Though so too. Not to crush Shane's Robin Hood fantasy, but I would bet my left arm that this was orchestrated by some other huge corporation that would profit off their competitors' stocks plummeting.
Idk, but also look at who didn’t profit either. The police for example. Candy is a thing that almost everyone consumes, so the police would not get any hints of the kidnapper’s knowledge on things ( ex. If they would rob a medical company, maybe they’d go on a completely different route to solve the case). By attacking a so widespread industrial element as candy and candy facturies, the police would get more humiliated.
Post mortem: I don't believe the kidnapping was ever meant to be successful. "The monster" never seemed like they wanted the public to get hurt, hence why Ezaki was able to free himself. Most moves were meant to send a message to police, not to scare the public. Idk maybe this is obvious and I'm late getting the memo lol
@@screechfrogge2597 It's a thing for BU unsolved for Shane and Ryan to possibly address this on a video for the Q and A Here's the link: th-cam.com/video/2GK2PqLhJ0Y/w-d-xo.html But yes Post Mortem in Latin means After death
“i do think it’s funny to have a little laugh at a big corporate entity like this. you think you’re impenetrable? HUH? look what i can do!” “you do have this robin hood complex for taking down corporations. not gonna lie, i do like seeing a corporation getting its lunch pail thrown in the mud sometimes.” me, aware they’re leaving buzzfeed: 👀
For Postmortem: Japan having such a high chance of solving crimes isn't a good thing. It's indicative of a "guilty-until-proven-innocent" justice system. They're conviction rate is also close to 99% for the same reason. I think you've talked about it in other episodes, but should have mentioned it here
and now im thinking this can be perhaps why 21 faces may be dissing the police. I'm not saying all people who hate cops but I know theres people who hate their local police so much that they'll do whatever opportunity is given.
Post Mortem: There was a death, however. The police superintendent commit suicide. Which prompted the final letter to police. While they didn't directly kill the man, it is related to the crime because he killed himself because the crime couldn't be solved by his police officers. The criminals did however seem remorseful that the guy commit suicide in their last letter.
Nobody could capture me when I’m in the shower. I’m already small but now I’m wet and soapy? Slippery as an eel. They’ll squeeze me to hold me tight and I’ll just shoot out of their arms like a bar of soap. Then I grab my comedically large can of hairspray and get them in their eyes and lungs like a roach.
Assuming Myazaki is innocent, there is still a very good reason he would publish the book until after the statute of limitations fell, being that maybe statements in the book could be misinterpreted and give police a reason to go after him after all, even small things like any of his statements in the books maybe not lining up to his testimony.
I mean considering the fact that they never took any of the money that they demanded, I feel like Ezaki was supposed to escape from the beginning. They probably just did it as a big opening scene for their "gekijo hanzai"
also i heard that in japan a lot of suspicious deaths/possible murders are listed as suicides in order to keep the solved murder statistic high? but i have no clue i just heard it online lmao
Fun fact: the author who wrote the original novel in the 30s is a renowned horror writer in Japan. His pen name is actually a play on words as well. In Japanese it’s written as 江戸川乱歩, and pronounced as Edogawa Ranpo. Now Edogawa is the name of one of the many rivers in Tokyo. While Ranpo (I assume) is a made up name but the characters mean separating, diverting or conflicting roads/steps/walk etc. Even more fun is that this pen name is a homage to Edgar Allan Poe, the horror author who Tāro Hirai (the original name of Edogawa Ranpo) adored. Edgar Allan Poe Edogawa Ranpo Pretty neat isn’t it? Awesome video as always you two.
This is one of those movie scenarios where there's one underdog policeman/detective who always has the right hunches but his coworkers don't support his theories so he has to solve it himself Except in this case there is no such person lmao
To be fair, during the 80’s the Japanese police were pretty aggressive and they’d force a confession from the “suspect” just so they could close a case.
@@selmacuprija8093 and? It doesn't matter. The sizes differ, that's just common sense. Shane is also richer and actually not just richer but indeed rich in general. It doesn't mean people who aren't as rich as him should f*ck around with him. I thought he was smart.
@@pearlkross3745 they're entertaining as hell but they don't know what they're talking about. They're your average Twitter user against the establishment while constantly contributing and working for it more than the average person. Doesnt help they actively make uninformed and blatantly incorrect statements on divisive and political issues.
I think the theory of those wanting revenge on the food industry could be true combined with the fact that Japanese police often tortures people into confessions. this entire crime just feels personal to me. I think the criminal just wanted some emotional satisfaction and closure rather than the money demanded, and when satisfied, simply stopped. I mean, if you manage to poison candy and place it in stores without being caught while you did in fact announce that you were going to do it, I'm sure you could pick up the money without being caught.
man, it's kinda sad how despite that the monster with 21 faces clearly had robin hood-esque motivations, it still ended up harming normal citizens with glico laying off 2/3 of their part-time employees. it kind of backfired in that way.
Capitalism can't be hurt in this way, it's designed to feed from us and ruin us if it falters. This is why when disaster strikes, it's socialism that is always what is called upon to help society.
Post Morten: It was most likely done to humiliate the Japanese police. They let go Ezaki since the police couldn't find him, they give constant warnings and tips, they never went to pick up the money because it wasn't about the money and they ended their spree in Japan after one of the police superintendents killed themselves due to the fact they weren't able to catch them. As mentioned Japan had a high success rate at solving crimes but this was because many people were wrongly convicted and as long as someone is convicted for it then it's classed as a success. The whole thing was a way to show how bad the Japanese police were and once it got to the point where someone killed themselves they realised they'd done enough.
Crime rate could be so low because their people are terrified. They're terrified of being shamed or bringing shame to their families also. Just 'standing out' is "shameful". That's why there are so many Hikikamori whom are afraid of their society and its unusually high standards.
Or how about there actually being 21 people involved, this would make sense with how they wouldn’t have been seen twice on cameras, they could rotate locations regularly to avoid getting caught going to the same places
I was thinking it could be this too. And plus, this would connect to Theory 2 where the survivors are in on it for revenge. And they targeted the entire industries just so that it doesnt tie back to them directly.
For post mortem, a “fox eyed” person in Japan means a person who has a narrow/thin eyes that sit a bit higher on the face. This is because foxes tend to have eyes that match those features. But some people do not like this description because it has the connotations of a person with a fox (not foxy) like personality, likes to play pranks, deceive people, etc. Hope that helps, thanks for all the years! You are both national treasures #postmortem #lovefromjapan #wheresroastmortem
For Post Mortem: I mean if it was someone who was poisoned as a baby, that would explain why the recording was of a woman and her child - perhaps to invoke the voice of those victims? #postmortem
"Solved" is a generous word. I mean you can just put someone in jail who is innocent and call it solved especially since the Japanese legal system is less of a system and more of judges not wanting to get punished for not getting a conviction.
When people say Japan has a low crime rate they forget that many crimes are unreported in Japan. TW: SA, domestic violence, Harassment, pedophilia are very rampant but we’re expected to believe “low crime rate” robberies might be very low and possibly murder overall but Japan also has one of the most horrific murder cases ever says a lot about their society
@@DaemonJerky maybe not, but they may have talk about keeping police presence away from the area, which as a known criminal, would at least be intriguing, especially if that was his territory.
Honestly not saying these kidnappers were in the rights, but the fact they made a fool of the police and called them idiots made me smile Also my theory is that these people never had it in their plans to hurt anyone, maybe they let him run away because they didn’t want to hurt him. I think plan was to make a mockery of the lazy Japenese police. It’s up to you if you think it was executed in a good way lol
For Post Mortem: A few days before the “monster” sent their last letter. It’s also worth noting that the superintendent of the police department, Yamamoto died via self-immolation. The “monster” then taunted him and his death in their last letter as well, could this all be a coincidence or was there something else involved?
Make sure to leave your questions for our Post Mortem episode down below!
Want to see your Unsolved fan art featured in an upcoming Post Mortem? Submit it here: bzfd.it/3kpb9Z7
I’m about to rewatch this episode before I go to sleep like every other episode
What are your favourite cases?
For the postmortem:what’s your favorite type of candy?
Can you all please cover Bruce and Brandon Lee please? Both deaths are too mysterious to be accidents. Love you all!!
#PostMortem Would you guys ever cover the deaths Buddy Holly/Richie Valens/Big Bopper?
i guess they never… *faced* any consequences
nice
HAHAHAHHAHA PLS
NOOOOO
OT NO
*insert clever pun*
For post mortem: Japanese police is notorious for closing cases any way possible to keep up appearances, beating the confessions out of the suspects and convicting innocent people. This was definitely done to humiliate them publicly. Maybe someone with a grudge? Someone whose friend or relative was a victim of the police brutality and incompetence? This feels personal
When I heard the percentage solved,I thought the police must be crooked. 97 percent. No way
that's such a good point. I think the woman and child voice message was a very intentional message meant for the public, to make them reconsider their views on who the real criminals were. I don't think the monster w 21 faces ever wanted the money, or to truly hurt any of the public. The wanted to make a point about the police and the companies themselves
i was about to comment this. there is police brutality and incompetence in japan too.
Hard agree.
Yeah i like this, maybe that raised their solved crimes’ rates by a considerable percentage cuz no way those cops were THAT invincible
List of things Shane is afraid of:
-Heroin
-Avocado pits
-Anyone under the age of 23
Me, 22, feeling powerful
Why does heroin scare him do you think? Also...avocado pits but not armpits?
I agree with being scared from just about everyone under age 23. Well 8-23. Kids are cool. But older kids/teens/young adults these days make for terrible human beings (for the most part...not trying to generalize or stereotype or whatever lol)
To be fair, people under the age of 23 are pretty scary
aw dang it i missed by 9 years
@@jeremygalloway1348 i dont think it was heroin exactly but the act of some random person coming at him with a needle of heroin/drugs and injecting him
For clarification: the reason the Japanese police force has such a high percentage is because they often torture suspects into confession, and they arrest people who aren’t the actual criminals.
Why is this not the top comment u.u
False. American propaganda
I was also thinking that because America is significantly bigger than Japan the statistics would be skewed if the population was similar
@@Lenin941FN ratio
@@Lenin941FN yeah America, the country with the largest prison population on the planet, is super interested in spreading anti incarceration propaganda.
i saw a comment that said “sometimes i feel like shane is a demon sent to kill ryan but just became attached” and now i cant get that out of my head
th-cam.com/video/lhD9MenTDzI/w-d-xo.html....
That's literally every comment under an unsolved supernatural video
th-cam.com/play/PLJArw3fLekfh1t0APfb4RSzY-9EnsQmOB.html
m.th-cam.com/video/qg2CoVnRH0A/w-d-xo.html
m.th-cam.com/video/qg2CoVnRH0A/w-d-xo.html
So Ryan’s solution to not getting kidnapped in the bath isn’t having his sword on him when he bathes, but instead peeing on the assailant
th-cam.com/video/lhD9MenTDzI/w-d-xo.html....
sword could get rusty in the bath
th-cam.com/video/vQ25F-ZnF5w/w-d-xo.html
so, having his *sword* on him then
Gotta switch it up on a witch
For Post Mortem: My theory is that the culprit is a victim of police incompetence. They just want to prove to the public how even though most of crimes are solved in Japan, a simple corporate terrorism with given hints can't be solved. It's not mentioned here but they also stopped after the head of police killed himself.
That’s a really good theory
This is what I was thinking, too. Or maybe someone who failed police academy? Trying to expose police incompetency.
For the record, while most crimes in Japan are “solved”, that doesn’t necessarily mean they were actually solved. The Japanese police have a pretty nasty track record of just arresting people who they feel they can pin a crime on so that it goes in the books as a successful case. It’s more important to secure an arrest and close the books than to actually catch the true culprit.
One thing is certain: they had full confidence in the incompetence of the police.
What does for post mortem mean?
The part about humiliating the police...the fact is with such a high conviction rate, there will always be innocent people and people with minor demeanors put in jail. A lot of Japanese media that involve the law are written with this in mind. To me, it's difficult to overlook the idea that perhaps they just wanted to show the police they couldn't force solve everything as a kind of revenge.
Or to show the public that the police actually can't do their jobs. If their high numbers rely on putting innocents in jail, they essentially are scapegoating all the time and aren't actually connecting the dots to find the one responsible. Not to say that all cases are handled like this, but way too many are, and that could be why this group did these acts and taunted the police this way. "If you're as good as you say you are, catch us!" and the fact they never did speaks volumes.
Yeah, that’s kind of what I was thinking. And then if they HAD made a false arrest, the actual culprit would act again, probably with some sort of message amounting to ‘wrong answer’
That's what I have been thinking through the whole video... was kinda disappointed it wasn't an actual theory.
The reason Japanese police had such a high “success” rate when it came to solving crimes is that it also had one of the highest rates of wrongful convictions, and even to this day has a 99% conviction rate; which means that if you are on trial in Japan, you are almost definitely going to be convicted.
I was actually wondering this myself.
yep
@@tamarkb6833 Measures of wrongful convictions aren't the most reliable. The US certainly has more than they should (the police are terrible there), but statistics about it are only from cases where wrongful conviction is legally determined.
In a lot of other countries like Japan, retrials may be much rarer. Not defending the US, just defending proper use of statistics.
I was gunna say this too. Super nasty justice system here
oh wow, oh my god
I'd like to think the child on the phone was actually at the center of it all and it was just a criminal ring of children that wanted free candy.
Lol
😂
oh wow
I'd like to think the child on the phone 📱 was actually at the center of it all and it was just a ctimal ring of children that wanted free candy.
@@tayloranderson7547 I’d like to think the child on the phone was actually at the center of it all and it was just a criminal ring of children that wanted free candy.
can’t believe Shane went from looking like a regular white dude to looking like a maths professor to looking like a crazy archeologist
listen man, the pandemic's been rough on all of us okay ? 😔
A....a professor, you say?
@@alanardominim is it REALLY because of that?
Don't forget the Amish period.
What does a “regular white guy” look like..? Bruh u a clown😂
ghosts don't scare shane because they're older than 23
That's a really excellent point! Lol.
Most times
They are not always older than 23.
How do you set the age of a ghost? Is it the age they died at, or the age between their birth and now? Because depending on that a ghost might be under or over 23
What about ghost babies?
Shane looks like the smart character from every 90s cartoon and 2000s DS game
THE POWER YET UNKNOWN
The world ends with you is a DS game
@@shaminabalamo525 DUNDUNDUUUUUMNNNN!!!
I think he kinda looks like jeffrey dahmer
and i wish to steal his looks
He looks like he would fit in on a game of "Guess Who?", it's wonderful and I appreciate it
Shane: nothing scares me
People under the age of 23: allow me to introduce myself
literal infant: *exists*
shane: ORHDXKJENSKDHEJS
he realises that most of us are under 23?
XD
heroin: allow me to introduce myself
@Ella Allen stfu
mҽ wɧɷ'ى 17 ɧҽɧҽ 🤪
For Post Mortem: Apparently Japan's high rate of cases solved, was attributed to them not properly investigating many cases, and labeling them solved much too quickly.
A lot of them are sadly, forced into saying they are the criminals as a way for the police to say, "We solved the case!".
th-cam.com/video/rshIItYfX9A/w-d-xo.html
The US, UK, and South Africa have the highest rates of serial killers, but likely also have the best policing. Crime stays between nations are the hardest to trust.
@@rachelhansen2417 but us actually solves cases
Thats why Detective Conan and Kindaichi exists. Because the Japanese police are incompetent and couldn't grasp the simplest clue presented in front of them.
Carlos Ghosn escape is another example for failure of Japanese police in their handling of case.
Fun fact: The writer of that kids book, Edogawa Ranpo, isn't bis real name. It is a pen name that is literally the Japanese pronunciation of Edgar Allan Poe. Edogawa was a big fan of him, and was inspired to write because of him.
Very unrelated but my BSD fan side cannot stop giggling because of this fact
Omfg that's hilarious. I had to giggle rereading edogawa ranpo
Me too😂😂🤣
My BSD loving brain loves this to no end
For postmortem: Why didnt you mention that the police captain set himself on fire because he was so ashamed that he couldn't solve the case? That event led to the monster with 21 faces to stop because they respected that so much. Such a important part of the case so I'm surprised yall left it out.
So the Monster with 21 Faces actually stopped just to respect the captain's death? I respect them even more!
TH-cam didn't like that they will demonetizate jt
@@mirilizz4389 yeah after the police captain died the monster with 21 faces sent the final letter. It said something like, "After hearing of the captain's death we wanted to give our condolences. We have decided to move on to other things. Anything else that happens is not from us but probably someone trying to copy us. After all we are the bad guys so we have bigger things to do than bully food companies."
Wow that Police Captain was a drama Queen
@@Rumsey1M that...definitely should be in the episide, when stuff like that gets left out it makes the whole thing seem biased
Missing facts: "Having entered the home of Katsuhisa Ezaki, the two masked men tied up his wife Mikieko (35 years old) and his eldest daughter Mariko (7 years old). Mikieko offered the men money and one of them responded, "Be quiet. Money is irrelevant."
they never wanted money.
Some men don't care for things like money, some people just want to watch the world burn.
i mean…. kinda badass.
@@InitialPC oh god that phrase is so overused by 14 year olds that i cringe every time i see this.
@@jackieburkhart3268 Why so serious?
@@InitialPC please. thou shalt not inflict this pain unto me.
this case givin me strong “money heist” vibes. the criminals being smart, always one step ahead, every move seemingly being calculated and in the end them not getting caught. it’s funny to see something so unbelievably fictional had actually happened irl before
an anime thing
it’s disturbing that you find innocent people being killed is “funny”
@@drzennox3690 the funny part is how unrealistic the story is and yet it happened irl. also these guys didn't kill anyone and the only moment they hazarded murder was with the cyanide incident, of which everyone took seriously and no one was injured but the company itself.
yeah they kidnapped a man and i doubt it is easy to recover from being abducted so i aint defending them, im just saying they murdered no one and their story seems as fictional as arséne lupin or aj raffles
@@drzennox3690 tell me you weren’t listening when the entire video said NO ONE DIED without telling me 🤗 as for money heist, it’s not based on a true story, so i don’t know why that stick got lodged..
@@ralph5609 its L. HAHAHAHAHHAHA death note vibes (without deaths involved just making the people see the police uselesss)
I love this one because it really just sounds like one of those riddles that are near-impossible to figure out, but if it is cracked, it's going to suddenly seem all-too obvious.
Also, I personally think that this was definitely the work of a group, rather than a individual.
Agreed. I have formulated a strangers on a train scenario for some time now, back when I actively posting on Reddit. I think it was disgruntled employees from both companies who decided to create the persona of the Monster with 21 faces in order to get back at the companies for reasons I think were personal. If I was working on this case in the 80s I would request the names of all former employees from both Glico and Morinaga and ask questions from their former co-workers about habits of said former employees like which train they took, where they liked to eat after work, the small things that could help build a profile of the members and thus finally identify the members.
The whole "the car was gray" hint made me laugh, they are making fun of the police so much 😂 almost all cars in Japan are gray 😂😂😂
This is a bruh moment.
Jsshjfjsjfjsjcj neat
Omg LMAO
@Ella Allen this is not only illegal but also probably a lie. or this is a bot account for scams
@@Blackout_Miracle scam bot.
ngl, if the monster with 21 faces were victims of arsenic poisoning.. that'd be a hell of a backstory
Tbh it kinda sounds like a tv series to me
It sure will I would like an anime or movie about this
@@thememan1387 watch terror in resonance, has A LOT of the same themes as this and after watching this I think it was probably inspired at least somewhat by this event
@@thalon8494 thanks I'll check it out
New story idea!
Shane Madej really said “eat the rich” and has stuck by it since 2016.
We stan
He is a man that knows his morals
What was the episode he said that? I can’t remember
Except in this case eating the rich means getting hard working low or middle class people fired.
@@franciscasilva8406 Yeah it's funny to see that his morals don't really succeed in this situation, because this entire spree also really just screwed over people like him
24:36 They actually did figure out who the Somerton Man was!! He wasn't a secret spy or anything, he was just a dude that was really sad and lonely who wrote a lot of poems about death and was violent with his wife :/
What a mix for a human being to have
I can't find the Somerton Man video. Has buzzfeed deleted it?
@@bizarreabstractions Apparently it was taken down for a community guideline violation? But if you go to the Season 6 Marathon it’s still there. It’s the last episode, timestamp 1:57:05 :)
@@moss_yt oh alrr thank youu
POST MORTEM: Judging by how aggressive the letters were toward the police and their inability to solve the case, do you think that maybe the whole thing was some elaborate plot done just to humiliate them? The tips given in the letters could have been false; used to lead them on a wild goose chase and make them look even more incompetent than they already looked. And if Miyazaki is involved (which would make sense given his anti-police history), he could have had some of his old buddies from his past helping him out, and they banded together to give him an alibi, thus allowing him to get away and humiliate the police even further. Granted, I don't know what his alibi was so I don't how well the last part works. The only question that remains from this theory is why would they target the candy companies as well?
Idk maybe the rebels were morbidly obese children who blamed the candy company for marketing to them as children and giving them a lifelong addiction to sweets? Idk I just feel like they are a petty group who only need any petty reason to target a large organization.
Maybe targeting the candy companies was just a means to get through to the police. Food affects everyone and candy especially, because they were targeting children indirectly, so there's an even bigger concern. We also have to look at the status the police has in Japan, it's pretty high. The Japanese people usually don't question them, they trust them, and thus, the argument of the perpetrators saying they are wasting tax money could actually be a huge deal, as it means that they are playing with their people's loyalty.
If i remember correctly they were able to get multiple leaders of the police to leave because they were so ashamed
@@SicklySeraph losing face in Japan is still a biiiig deal, so it makes sense
What if the group of 21 faces had a backup with the police. So they always knew when it was a trap. In combination with the revenge action, it mainly reminds me of the plot of "Now you see me".
I wish it would have been like rogue dentists or something. "Candy sales are down, boys! We've done our jobs!"
It’s not good for dentists by the way. If people stop eating candy totally, it means less money for dentists.
@@lecanist_GS I doubt dentists get paid per procedure instead of a wage like any other job
@@wurmturm If they have their own practice, then yes they are being paid per procedure. And if they are a junior dentists employed at a senior dentist's practice, then they would be getting a wage, but if no one comes to get dental work done then where would the money for their wages come from?
@@wurmturm what are you talking about?? Dentists get paid for procedure.
Fox.. Fox... Fox of the JDA... Fox.. Fox.. Fox of the JDA. (a la Lemming of the BDA)
For the Post-Mortem: I'm surprised you didn't mention that the group only stopped after the superintendent of the police, Yamamoto, killed himself in shame. That's when the last letter was sent, a few days after, in which said that they give their condolences and are stopping now. Love you both, #Shaniac
so they were just a bunch of trolls ?
Not sure buzzfeed could monetise the video if it had suicide themes.
BASED BASED BASED BASED BASED BASED
they seem like respectable folks (aside from their threats and poisoning candy) if that's what caused them to stop
Yea I feel like that's why they stopped. Even when they threatened to poison people they clearly labeled the tainted ones and sent a newletter, I think someone actually dying crossed a line for them. Corporate sabotage and murder are two completely different levels.
side note: 11:25 is prob one of my fav moments of this show, hearing the pure excitement in shane’s “we’re gonna talk about our favorite candy aren’t we?” to just utter disappointment in his “oh ok” when him n ryan weren’t on the same page😭😭 so cute
Any one think it could have been a disgruntled cop trying to embarrass his current or former colleagues? Would explain how they were always one step ahead of the police.
And what if the child of the cop was also affected in the milk thing. Because the letter really showed resentment, and i think parents of those children would have more resentment especially if their children weren't even 2 years old yet
@@Angel12068 exactly
@@Angel12068 being a cop and having something like that happen to your child. would seriously make you question the justice you have worked so hard to enforce.
Tbh,that's a good theory
I was honestly thinking the same way.
I'd genuinely buy a book of Shane and Ryan explaining how they would survive these murder scenarios.
A PODCAST WOULD BE AMAZING
@@somerandomperson8098 Yes this, this I would buy
@Grecia Leon signed!
@Grecia Leon signed ✌
@Grecia Leon signed 👀
For post-mortem: to me this def feels like it was done to humiliate the police force. From the letters taunting them to all the negative press the police got. I mean, the reason the rates are so high for catching murderers and thieves is because they often force evidence to fit suspects! Could this be a job to expose their incompetence and correct their reputation? Also I agree with Shane, it’s a bloody good cause, sign me up baby!!!
This is what I thought as well but it’s a shame that so many part time workers were let off but other than that I also agree with Shane that it is a good cause
I know right!? What a great cause! I love it when terrorists go and terrorize corporations that provide and employ thousands of hard working individuals! You just love to see people get stripped of their hard-earned money, by no-life retards, and who have to bring down others, instead of picking themselves up by their bootstraps and improving their own life!
That was exactly my point , since they couldn’t pin the crimes on someone (since they would continue sending letters poisoning etc) they looked incompetent since they probably pin whatever crime on some nobody with a weed charge but with these types of crimes they get stumped
Also targeting a corperation that caused direct harm to children then broadening it to include unhealthy food manufactures that target children.
I think the police were only taunted to bring attention to the case. The "thieves" wanted publicity to hurt the corporate reputation and the stock of those companies.
Yes, as people have previously mentioned, the Japanese police forces runs on a "guilty until proven innocent" mindset as opposed to the general "innocent until proven guilty". While Japan has the highest solved crime rate, it also has one of the highest wrongful conviction rates.
We don't need this comment 630 times in the same comment section
@@sergeantsupreme4395 it's one of the few things people in other countries know about the Japanese legal system. Plus, I don't know about everyone else, but I had formulated a comment while watching and needed to post it or else I wouldn't be able to focus on the rest of the video. My mind wouldn't let me. I don't think there's any harm in people expressing what they know. They're having a discussion, albeit not a linear one.
@@aynDRAWS my bad
@@sergeantsupreme4395 it's okay :) I understand that frustration of seeing the same comment over and over again with no further explanations.
Ain't gonna lie, I like them. Sounds like they just wanted to humiliate the police and never intended to harm the public. So glad no one died
I agree with you, I really liked the fact that there was mostly no violence, but the fact that many people lost their jobs because of this is undeniable. When it was time to recoup losses, the bigwigs weren't really inconvenienced, only the part-time workers: students, women with families, etc. Those people were really collateral victims. At least it was just before the Japanese Bubble so it wouldn't have been too hard finding another job I guess.
@slow mazda Yes.
@@Aleswall Sad.
@slow mazda yes, that person exposes holes in the system without actually doing damage at all
@slow mazda very much
For postmortem: I think the kidnappers allowed Ezaki to escape. They clearly weren’t interested in killing him or torturing him. Maybe they decided that starting their criminal escapades with a kidnapping would ensure they would be taken seriously from the get to. Once that was achieved, they let him to go on his merry way.
yeah I think they just wanted to mess with the companies not actually hurt anyone
Post-mortem: The reason why the rate of solved cases in Japan was so high is because the Japanese police is notorious for violently forcing confessions out of suspects. There have been multiple reports of that. This case remained unsolved isn’t because it’s impossible to solve (hence the letters calling the police “idiots”), but simply because a crime this large-scaled hindered them unable to just pin it on anyone.
I knew an ex special forces guy that claimed to keep a ceramic knife in a shower because you never know when you might have to defend your home and anything else would have rusted in the shower. I remember thinking he was crazy until these two gave their explanation of how they would defend themselves in the bath. I guess I'll be buying a ceramic knife now.
Someone made a revolver entirely from stainless steel so it was extremely rust proof but the problem is ammunition usually isn't as resistant.
You thought he was crazy until you heard "I make sure I need to pee so I can pee on the attackers" and thought "yeah that makes sense now" 💀
shane being afraid of anyone under the age of 23 has the same energy as john mulaney being afraid of middle schoolers
It does but it also makes it funny as I’m a person under the age of 23
“13 year olds are the meanest people in the WORLD”
Me feeling *p o w e r f u l*
"NOOOOO THAT'S A THING I'M SENSITIVE ABOUT"
@@joejonasfromcamprock886 HEY LOOK AT THAT HIGH-WAISTED MAN, HE'S GOT FEMININE HIPS!
it's moms/nannies, their name is from a child's book, they targeted candy companies, they warned the public so that no children were harmed, and the phone call is from a female and child. Not to mention that they could easily have an inside on either the police or with candy companies from husbands/employers
I’m curious how did you come to this conclusion it makes a lot of sense but I wouldn’t have thought it myself
I like you theory. However wouldn't the children accidentally rat them out.
@@SE_000 fair point but I would like to put in the a theory that it was a bunch of teens. Since depending on the age they Could drive, and due to them not actually owning things could learn to steal items. It isnt suspicious to have a bunch of teens hanging out. Also if they have parents working in the industry they could spy or ask questions and most would believe they are just interested in their parents jobs.
This makes a lot of sense!
i like this but you know you can just say "a woman and child", 'female' is a bit dehumanizing
You know, I once saw that Japanese court systems almost always prosecute whoever is in on trial. So maybe they have a 97% closed case percentage but there might be a lot of innocents sitting in their prisons
i was gonna say. 97% conviction is not a good thing, actually. it’s time to let go of carceral thinking.
this is a very good point
@@centali6551 actually, it's even higher today. There's about a 99.8% conviction rate in Japan. Which is... Not good at all.
And still probably less people than in American prisons.
@@darrylkinslow5613 why is everything about america, stfu
3:55 the messed up part about such a high conviction rate for murders is that in Japan if they can’t find the real killer sometimes they would pin the murder onto someone who might have been caught for a petty crime not even related to the murder to keep their stats high
Japanese culture for you man
@@marinetter.8423 for example cannabis wasnt even considered a drug, until prohibition era america after ww2 made huge laws against drugs, and what caused the shape of their anti drug culture today, along with police culture of brutality. Japanese prisons are still much more humane than american ones
juking the stats
Dang, if that's the case, then Light Yagami has been killing at least a bunch of innocents and he would have never known
This is part of the reason why Ace Attorney is like that, right? It's a satire on the JPN court system
Post Mortem: What is the size of a "Ryan sized window"?
m.th-cam.com/video/qg2CoVnRH0A/w-d-xo.html
apparently very small. like a rat hole.
"I'm five foot ten dammit!"
I imagine Ryan's bathroom has a window that is a perfect cutout of Ryan's body
its a pinhole
For post mortem: I can’t tell if the criminals have beef with the candy industry or if the crimes were intended to expose the highly accomplished police as being ineffective and bumbling. Or maybe they were just dentists sick of filling cavities… who’s to say.
Loool good point I've only had one cavity so hopefully I've not been the cause of dentist revenge on candy shops
Lol, dentists like cavites b/c they get paid to fill them.
Could be both
Theory: it was Ryan’s dad. He’s a dentist
if their main goal was to humiliate the police maybe they picked candy companies because they knew business would eventually recover? or maybe they picked an industry that wasn’t essential (not everyone eats sweets, plus if they wanted to wreak havoc on the public maybe they would pick toilet paper companies idk)
On a serious note: if you two actually wrote a survival guide together, people would buy it. Or you could each write your own and make double bank.
J,,hjh ,jj,,hhhjhhjhjhhhhjhh,hhhhhhhjjhhhhjhhjhjhh
Hhhhjhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhj
Hhhh,hhhhhhhjhhhhhhhhjjhh,hhhhjhhhhhhhhhh
Hhhhhjhjhjhhhhhhhhhhhjhhhhhhhhhhjhhjhhhhhhhh
Hjhhhhhhhhhhhhjhhjhhhhhhhhhjjjhjhhhjhhhhhhh
"Some men aren't looking for anything logical like money, some men just wanna watch the world burn" Sorry, but this entire thing seems like a comic book plot, and I am living for it.
kinda upset that ryan’s book wasn’t actually linked in the description😕
I looked as soon as he said it and I was watching this on my Roku so I had to pick up my phone and go to TH-cam to see the description
wheres my book ryan
I looked in the description. I knew it was fake but still saw
Perfect opportunity to link a rick roll
Same tho
"Do not poison the public", another valuable advice by Shane
For post mortem: The fact that this group managed to waste so much of the police's resources and man power on this case makes me wonder if the whole thing was a smoke screen for another crime being committed elsewhere...
I like the theory of the small children growing into adults and then getting revenge on corporations, would be nice if they were actually 21 different people with a single goal in mind of only chaos while... being polite enough to warn people about the poison. The letters to the police were funny though lmao
it would be truly amazing if the victims of the dry milk incident actually found each other and started such an organization
Uh huh
Especially in the days before the widespread access of the internet. Not a lot of opportunities to meet up with people who were victims of that incident during the time the Monster was active. No I actually have my own theory, one which I have posted on this very video. Basically it’s undoubtedly a strangers on a train situation and the goal was to ruin the reputations of Glico and Morinaga as payback for some reason I’m not sure yet. Maybe the people felt they were unjustly fired or demoted. Maybe they blamed those companies for the breakdown of relationships, who knows. I’m not a big supporter of the Yakuza theory because it doesn’t really seem like something the Yakuza would tap into. Mostly they focus on illegal ways to make money and also it was specified the kidnappers said they didn’t want the wife to pay when the head of Glico was taken.
Or they accidentaly found one another, and then try to find another victim, so they can be a group of the same understanding sharing their life just to chit chat maybe and then it turn south, someone with the urge to revenge start to make them feel the same hatred. Started an organization, eventually meet the manabu miyazaki as their leader, and he teach them how to infiltrate the enemy and other strategies they need for their revenge.. just my thoughts.. because the manabu also manage to make the anti police the maybe he make them to be anti police too. That explained to them embarassing the police in public.
When you have rage in your heart, you can be easily controlled. Just my thoughts folk....
@@mirandagoldstine8548 nah you forgot something. Ppl in the old times have their own way for something like this. And maybe with the some luck in their side they found each other. And from mouth to mouth they actually found each other. Who can say no to the group of same people whose have same accident like them ? Imo..
@@nekohime25 possible
I hate that this will be your last season. You guys are friggin' hilarious and I will miss the witty repartee...oh and the intriguing Unsolved cases.
what if it's the last season bc they're gonna leave buzzfeed and make their own company like the try guys 👀
They have another channel called the watcher, they have similar crime/supernatural based content and other stuff!
@@icantfindmycigarette Someone already mentioned watcher but I highly reccomend watching puppet history on their channel!!
They're on watcher! They're going to focus only on watcher! It's better, anyways!
@@katielowe7970 I just tried to sub. But was already Sub'd (noticing also I wasss without notifications...) Yet ive never seen a single video ffrom the watcher channel. Lol. Im super excited bc now I can bingeeeeeee
Post Mortem: A group of dentists angry at candy ruining kids teeth.
@Val Mc maybe children’s teeth is more important to them then work?
@@ekpeadon lol unlikely
@@gamma00crucis of course it is! It was more of a joke 😅😂😜
Dr yap 😩
That would be my worst nightmare I hate the dentist 😂😂
So, one of the things that I didn't see mentioned here was the possibility of The Monster (or their hypothetical inside man/men) shorting the companies they're targeting.
We're all familiar with the normal way stocks work. You buy then at a certain price and then sell them later, hopefully when the price increases. That's going long (there are other ways of going long, but that's the basic way). When you short a stock, you basically borrow stocks from somebody else, sell them for however much they're worth, and you do so with a promise that you'll return the same number of stocks in a month or a year or however long the contract was made for when you shorted. That's a simplification, of course, but the main thing is that if the stock price goes down, then you've made money -- you sold when it was high and bought when it was low to pay back your debt. (Of course, if the price goes up, then you lose money)
Shorting a stock is usually very risky. However, it's far less risky if you *know* that a stock is going to go down in price. That's usually because of insider trading but what if you're an enterprising criminal group? One who knows how to threaten and terrorize and make a big splash in the news and really drive down the price of a stock? If such a group were to short a stock -- and have enough people do it over a long enough period of time that it seemed like natural, everyday trading -- and then hit the company they were shorting, they could make a whole lot of money without having to ever pick up the ransom money and expose themselves to danger.
The Monster seemed to take great pleasure in making corporations and police look like fools, while playing the media like a fiddle. It seems like they had some issue with authority. So why not thumb your nose one last time at the system you hate by exploiting it's own rules to make a fortune as well? While the cops are looking for a pickup man trying to grab a bag of ransom money, you're walking out the Tokyo Stock Exchange in broad daylight with all the money you (to all outside appearances) made legally.
This also makes sense when you consider that they never actually picked up any of the money, but continued doing all of this anyways; they didn't actually need the money from the companies directly if they were making bank from stocks and it had the added bonus of hurting them over a longer term than payouts would have.
For Post Mortem: In situations where you can’t find a pattern in the data given, it can help to look at what's not there. For example, the Monster with 21 Faces targeted many companies but which companies were not targeted? Is there a company that profited off of their competitors’ lower sales? Or even outside of the industry, is there someone or some company who could’ve benefited from lower candy/food sales?
this theory really says, "the closer you look, the lesser you see"
...dentists finally snapped
@@headfirstforhalos5598 they had to
Though so too. Not to crush Shane's Robin Hood fantasy, but I would bet my left arm that this was orchestrated by some other huge corporation that would profit off their competitors' stocks plummeting.
Idk, but also look at who didn’t profit either. The police for example. Candy is a thing that almost everyone consumes, so the police would not get any hints of the kidnapper’s knowledge on things ( ex. If they would rob a medical company, maybe they’d go on a completely different route to solve the case). By attacking a so widespread industrial element as candy and candy facturies, the police would get more humiliated.
Post mortem: I don't believe the kidnapping was ever meant to be successful. "The monster" never seemed like they wanted the public to get hurt, hence why Ezaki was able to free himself. Most moves were meant to send a message to police, not to scare the public. Idk maybe this is obvious and I'm late getting the memo lol
Maybe they were unhappy with the police work on other non-related cases and used this as a method of sorta "calling them out" per-se
But tons of employees lost their jobs
But tons of employees lost their jobs
doesnt post mortem mean after death??
@@screechfrogge2597 It's a thing for BU unsolved for Shane and Ryan to possibly address this on a video for the Q and A
Here's the link: th-cam.com/video/2GK2PqLhJ0Y/w-d-xo.html
But yes Post Mortem in Latin means After death
“i do think it’s funny to have a little laugh at a big corporate entity like this. you think you’re impenetrable? HUH? look what i can do!” “you do have this robin hood complex for taking down corporations. not gonna lie, i do like seeing a corporation getting its lunch pail thrown in the mud sometimes.”
me, aware they’re leaving buzzfeed: 👀
You can tell they're Californians...
@@sweaspurdoddd5466 Shane's from Illinois?
If the ONLY good thing Buzzfeed ever did was also somehow the reason for their downfall all would be right in the world
@@chaosandbunnies8291 and where does he live right now?
th-cam.com/video/TjcEdVRVRyo/w-d-xo.html there was the time
The monster with 21 faces is actually 21 kids in a trenchcoat trying to get free candy and playing out their favourite book
New Unsolved and a new Watcher vid?! Must be my birthday 💜💜💜
Happy birthday!!
Happy birthday!!
IKR today's a good day my friend
i was like this dude looks familiar 😂🤘🏻
I'm assuming it actually is your birthday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!
"it's either a flash mob, or a corporate terrorist"
a sentence I never thought I'd hear
For Postmortem: Japan having such a high chance of solving crimes isn't a good thing. It's indicative of a "guilty-until-proven-innocent" justice system. They're conviction rate is also close to 99% for the same reason. I think you've talked about it in other episodes, but should have mentioned it here
and now im thinking this can be perhaps why 21 faces may be dissing the police. I'm not saying all people who hate cops but I know theres people who hate their local police so much that they'll do whatever opportunity is given.
As a side note, this justice system was the inspiration for Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney! The game is a parody of the Japanese justice system.
Ryan: "Sometimes when I get mad, my body shuts down and restarts..."
Shane: "Truth hurts."
Ryan: 👁️👄👁️
Post Mortem: There was a death, however. The police superintendent commit suicide. Which prompted the final letter to police. While they didn't directly kill the man, it is related to the crime because he killed himself because the crime couldn't be solved by his police officers. The criminals did however seem remorseful that the guy commit suicide in their last letter.
Nahh that's actually really sad.
I was also wondering how many people were left unemployed and the negative effect it had on those families.
That's really sad. Poor guy. I feel bad that he did that.
i think the group took risks but mightve not actually wanted to actually harm or kill someone. so maybe they stopped bc of his suicide?
Wait…what if that was the Monster with 21 faces real goal to take out the police superintendent 👀 ?
@@Mars-oz6ye YOOOOOOOOOO MAYBEE
As someone who’s 19 I feel so honored that THE Shane gets creeped out of me lmao
Me
Same
agreed
ayo same🤚🏻 we're doing the job mothman and goatman couldn't do
Hello fellow 19 year olds. This is the worst age.
Nobody could capture me when I’m in the shower. I’m already small but now I’m wet and soapy? Slippery as an eel. They’ll squeeze me to hold me tight and I’ll just shoot out of their arms like a bar of soap. Then I grab my comedically large can of hairspray and get them in their eyes and lungs like a roach.
This is so funny op omg it made my night
Dwight scrute wrote this
this is the funniest thing I've seen in months I literally cannot breathe
Thank you for the visual image
Best comment on this video
Assuming Myazaki is innocent, there is still a very good reason he would publish the book until after the statute of limitations fell, being that maybe statements in the book could be misinterpreted and give police a reason to go after him after all, even small things like any of his statements in the books maybe not lining up to his testimony.
I mean considering the fact that they never took any of the money that they demanded, I feel like Ezaki was supposed to escape from the beginning. They probably just did it as a big opening scene for their "gekijo hanzai"
To be fair, Japanese and Korean courts is notorious for convicting quickly so all that successful arrests might not be the true culprits.
also i heard that in japan a lot of suspicious deaths/possible murders are listed as suicides in order to keep the solved murder statistic high? but i have no clue i just heard it online lmao
Yeah I was about to say that too Japan doesn't have a great justice system
Yup that was my thought. Easy to get a high "solved rate" if you base it on convictions and dont care if you convict the right person.
I read somewhere that Japan has a tendency of accusing foreigners or people who ‘look the part’ of a criminal, so it’s easier to get the conviction.
Exactly. Convictions don't mean they're all guilty. The Japanese police are expected to convict everyone they arrest.
Fun fact: the author who wrote the original novel in the 30s is a renowned horror writer in Japan. His pen name is actually a play on words as well. In Japanese it’s written as 江戸川乱歩, and pronounced as Edogawa Ranpo. Now Edogawa is the name of one of the many rivers in Tokyo. While Ranpo (I assume) is a made up name but the characters mean separating, diverting or conflicting roads/steps/walk etc. Even more fun is that this pen name is a homage to Edgar Allan Poe, the horror author who Tāro Hirai (the original name of Edogawa Ranpo) adored.
Edgar Allan Poe
Edogawa Ranpo
Pretty neat isn’t it? Awesome video as always you two.
I love the fact that the group spun such an air of mystery around themselves that they live upto their name
I hate that I knew this and got excited when they mentioned him because of Bungo Stray Dogs lmao
@@esmeraldatotoro4646 same Ranpo is one of my favorite characters from the show
That's so dope.
This is one of those movie scenarios where there's one underdog policeman/detective who always has the right hunches but his coworkers don't support his theories so he has to solve it himself
Except in this case there is no such person lmao
Or maybe its like Now You See Me where the protagonist is revealed to be in on it!
To be fair, during the 80’s the Japanese police were pretty aggressive and they’d force a confession from the “suspect” just so they could close a case.
Unfortunately this is still true...
If _Persona 5_ revealed anything, it's that this still happens.
It's been known that they still do this.
They still do this zhannell. This hasn't changed.
As soon as Ryan said the stats I was wondering if that was a factor.
we love seeing ryan talk about his enjoyment of the suffering of mass corporations while filming a video for a mass corporation.
BuzzFeed isn't THAT big
@@selmacuprija8093 and? It doesn't matter. The sizes differ, that's just common sense. Shane is also richer and actually not just richer but indeed rich in general. It doesn't mean people who aren't as rich as him should f*ck around with him. I thought he was smart.
@@pearlkross3745 they're entertaining as hell but they don't know what they're talking about. They're your average Twitter user against the establishment while constantly contributing and working for it more than the average person. Doesnt help they actively make uninformed and blatantly incorrect statements on divisive and political issues.
@@charsplat1212 wdym by your last point?
@@charsplat1212 ^^^ exactly
Ryan in the bath giving a new meaning to “say hello to my little friend”
m.th-cam.com/video/qg2CoVnRH0A/w-d-xo.html
underrated comment
LMFAO
pls 💀💀💀💀💀💀
I think the theory of those wanting revenge on the food industry could be true combined with the fact that Japanese police often tortures people into confessions. this entire crime just feels personal to me. I think the criminal just wanted some emotional satisfaction and closure rather than the money demanded, and when satisfied, simply stopped. I mean, if you manage to poison candy and place it in stores without being caught while you did in fact announce that you were going to do it, I'm sure you could pick up the money without being caught.
man, it's kinda sad how despite that the monster with 21 faces clearly had robin hood-esque motivations, it still ended up harming normal citizens with glico laying off 2/3 of their part-time employees. it kind of backfired in that way.
Honestly I think they only cared about making fun of the Japanese police, so they might not believe that it backfired
Capitalism can't be hurt in this way, it's designed to feed from us and ruin us if it falters. This is why when disaster strikes, it's socialism that is always what is called upon to help society.
Post Morten: It was most likely done to humiliate the Japanese police. They let go Ezaki since the police couldn't find him, they give constant warnings and tips, they never went to pick up the money because it wasn't about the money and they ended their spree in Japan after one of the police superintendents killed themselves due to the fact they weren't able to catch them.
As mentioned Japan had a high success rate at solving crimes but this was because many people were wrongly convicted and as long as someone is convicted for it then it's classed as a success.
The whole thing was a way to show how bad the Japanese police were and once it got to the point where someone killed themselves they realised they'd done enough.
Crime rate could be so low because their people are terrified. They're terrified of being shamed or bringing shame to their families also. Just 'standing out' is "shameful". That's why there are so many Hikikamori whom are afraid of their society and its unusually high standards.
th-cam.com/video/lhD9MenTDzI/w-d-xo.html....
They literally said
"It's not about the money, it's about sending a message"
And pissing the police off and enjoying it
I’m sorry, but the way Ryan said “broke into his home and kidnapped the naked Ezaki” is just hilarious to me.
Sounds like the start of a weird hentai.
Shane is really being a savage this season and I'M HERE FOR IT
my friend: uses a slightly different tone while texting
me: The Menacing Case of the Monster with 21 Faces
LMAOOOOOOO
My dad: The menacing monster with 21 belts
HAHAHAHAHA…. 😂
„Did they hurt anyone? Just corporations? Ok I‘m a huge fan“ me too shane, me too
Also humiliated the whole police force
Indirectly they did force a man to commit suicide but ok
@@nareshujjesha5558 Fan of the anticapitalist sentiment, not the poisoning and kidnapping 2 b clear
@@scarlettschwarz1331 oh okieeees sorry for assuming the wrong thing!
But wouldn't regular ppl working for the corporation lose their jobs or receive pay cuts
Or how about there actually being 21 people involved, this would make sense with how they wouldn’t have been seen twice on cameras, they could rotate locations regularly to avoid getting caught going to the same places
I was thinking it could be this too. And plus, this would connect to Theory 2 where the survivors are in on it for revenge. And they targeted the entire industries just so that it doesnt tie back to them directly.
I thought it was already concluded or somewhat likely that they were 21 people...
Shane: no fear
People under the age of 23: exist
Shane: one fear
Avacoda pits doe
and being injected with heroin
bees
Spiders
Ricky Goldsworth
For post mortem, a “fox eyed” person in Japan means a person who has a narrow/thin eyes that sit a bit higher on the face. This is because foxes tend to have eyes that match those features. But some people do not like this description because it has the connotations of a person with a fox (not foxy) like personality, likes to play pranks, deceive people, etc. Hope that helps, thanks for all the years! You are both national treasures #postmortem #lovefromjapan #wheresroastmortem
That negative connotation with having "fox-like" personality traits exists in Korea as well. How neat!
If I'm not mistaken, that's due to the mythology of the Inari, no?
Tue
how interesting!
I grew up with a lot of 'phantom thief' stories, so hearing about the Mystery Man with 20 faces was really cool!
For Post Mortem: I mean if it was someone who was poisoned as a baby, that would explain why the recording was of a woman and her child - perhaps to invoke the voice of those victims? #postmortem
"stay with me here"
"i'm staying here. i have no choice."
Writing prompt
doof and perry the platypus
Covid family in a nutshell.
"Solved" is a generous word. I mean you can just put someone in jail who is innocent and call it solved especially since the Japanese legal system is less of a system and more of judges not wanting to get punished for not getting a conviction.
yeah that 97% solve rate is misleading cause in Japan the police have been known to falsely convict
Ah yes, you read the stats from the 20th century.
Hey what do you think about giannis winning a ring for the bucks?
When people say Japan has a low crime rate they forget that many crimes are unreported in Japan. TW: SA, domestic violence, Harassment, pedophilia are very rampant but we’re expected to believe “low crime rate” robberies might be very low and possibly murder overall but Japan also has one of the most horrific murder cases ever says a lot about their society
If Miyazaki was a known criminal with a police scanner isn't it possible he heard about the money drop and thought maybe he could just snatch it
Yess! You have more brainpower than the police force of Japan in the 80s... Probably they were not the reason why their crime rates were so low 😂😂
No way they talked about that over a radio
@@DaemonJerky maybe not, but they may have talk about keeping police presence away from the area, which as a known criminal, would at least be intriguing, especially if that was his territory.
@@it.comes.around if the criminals know cops will be in their territory, wouldnt they avoid the cops?
Honestly not saying these kidnappers were in the rights, but the fact they made a fool of the police and called them idiots made me smile
Also my theory is that these people never had it in their plans to hurt anyone, maybe they let him run away because they didn’t want to hurt him. I think plan was to make a mockery of the lazy Japenese police. It’s up to you if you think it was executed in a good way lol
right, it’s so funny i’m starting to lowkey like the criminals 💀
@@taniasotya fr 😂
why does Shane look like a frat boy and a stay at home mother simultaneously
i hate that this makes sense lmaooo
I cant unsee that now 😂
24:50 okay, hear me out...what if this was just a ridiculously elaborate plan to get people to eat healthier, like an evil LazyTown?
For Post Mortem: A few days before the “monster” sent their last letter. It’s also worth noting that the superintendent of the police department, Yamamoto died via self-immolation. The “monster” then taunted him and his death in their last letter as well, could this all be a coincidence or was there something else involved?
He was the monster
“Those shifty eyes gave you away”
Ok this is literally what a teacher would say if you tried to copy the test of someone next to you
Not even 2 minutes in and we learn that Ryan has the defensive instincts of a toad.
Come to think of it, is there any Buzzfeed Unsolved X Frog And Toad Are Friends crossover art?
This story is great. So much suspense. Glad you guys are covering cases in other countries too.
glad to know ghosts don’t scare Shane but me a 21 year old homebody creeps him out
Me, 18 😎
When you get to your late 20s 21 seems so young x.x
The closer to 30 you get, the more sus all you young-un’s seem to us.
The power we
@@anyalaASMR nice. Or should I say that about 69 year olds?
So sad the show is ending, but excited for the boy's to expand their watcher channel and grow even bigger! ♥️
They are still doing another season of unsolved supernatural!
What are they gonna do on that channel?
After this end everyone will unsub lol
Are they doing true crime or supernatural on the watcher?
@@ardadar3825 Neither. They should do something like unsolved on watcher though.
These r the best criminals till date. No deaths no crimes.. just showmanship
They got style!
In what universe did they commit no crimes?
Ryan’s face after Shane says “truth hurts” is everything