Trick (2000 TV series)

Trick comprises a comedic Japanese television drama and movie series (three seasons, four movies, and three feature-length TV specials), as well as associated comic books, novelizations and meta-fiction novels about a failed magician and an arrogant physicist who debunks fraudulent spiritualists.

Although 23-year-old Naoko Yamada (Yukie Nakama) considers herself a beautiful and talented magician, she is continuously fired and constantly hounded by her landlady for the rent being late.

Eventually Ueda develops a reputation for solving supernatural cases, but his secret weapon is Yamada, who hates the work but needs the money.

The villains include: Suzuki Yoshiko (fortune teller, time traveller), Fukami Hiroaki (clairvoyant), and Tsukamoto Emi (voice of divine punishment).

The last half of the final episode of the 3rd Season, the love-hate and unspoken relationship between Yamada and Ueda may look like it has entered a new stage.

Ueda employs Yamada to go a mysterious island in search of a girl (played by Maki Horikita) that disappeared 10 years ago.

The trade company employee Shinichi (Noriyuki Higashiyama) recommends to Naoko (Yukie Nakama) and Jiro (Hiroshi Abe) to go to a beautiful place abroad.

Ueda is asked to investigate serial killings that are likely to happen again during a festival to take place in a small village in Okayama.

The festival is marked by the return to the village of a strange woman by the name of Higashizaki Ayano, who had left 20 years ago after the death of her husband and son.

[citation needed] Songs by Chihiro Onitsuka have been used as the closing themes for all three seasons of the TV show and the first movie.

A visual novel video game based on the TV series called Trick DS-ban: Kakushi Kami no Sumu Yakata (TRICK DS版 〜隠し神の棲む館〜, lit.TRICK DS Version: Hall Where the Hidden God lives) was published by Konami for the Nintendo DS on May 13, 2010.