Dexter of the Rising Sun
Brutal: Satsujin Keisatsukan no Kokuhaku (ブルータル 殺人警察官の告白, lit. Brutal: Confessions of a Homicide Investigator) is a crime thriller manga with story by Kei Koga and art by Ryou Izawa. The manga began serialization in the josei magazine Comic Tatan in 2019. It's a spinoff manga of Trace: Kasouken Houi Kenkyuuin no Tsuisou (トレース 科捜研法医研究員の追想 lit. Trace: Recollections of a Forensic Researcher) which is also written and drawn by Kei Koga.
The manga follows Hiroki Dan, a handsome and successful young detective that is the star of the police department. Off-duty, however, he is a Serial-Killer Killer that takes it upon himself to bring bloody retribution to people that the law can't punish properly.
Due to the Author's health, however, the manga went into hiatus on 2022.
Tropes
- Affably Evil: Dan is very calm and collected when he murders criminals. Some of his victims think he's crazy, especially when he does something strange such as dancing and doing the infamous "spider-walk" from The Exorcist.
- Ambiguously Gay: There is a small hint that Dan's first love (and possibly the first time that he felt homicidal intention) was a man.Dan: We danced the Oklahoma mixer. At my school, there were a lot of boys, so there were a few dance pairs that were both male. So, with my first love... fufu.
- Asshole Victim: The draw of the manga is to watch the cruel deaths inflicted upon the absolute awful people by Dan.
- Ikewaki Teru is a man that made a pick-up artist group on college, but it is mostly a facade for his hobby of having men gang-raping intoxicated women, and even recording them to use as blackmail if they try to come forward with it.
- Character Tic: Anytime Dan finds a person that he plans to punish, his left eye twitches twice.
- Evil Teacher: Taisuke Henkouji may at first appear to be a charming teacher, but he is a degenerate who blackmails students in love with him to send him intimate photos of them. In addition, in his adolescence, he was a very mean bully who even caused the death of one of his classmates.
- First Love: Dan had a high school crush who he described as an intelligent person and made an expression that would drive him obsessed but then later lost them in unknown circumstances. Later details implied his love was a guy and he was the one to awaken Dan's homicidal tendencies to become the Serial-Killer Killer he is today.
- The Lost Lenore: As the only insight we've gotten from his Mysterious Past, Dan wistfully reminisces about his First Love back in high school to his colleagues but suddenly turns grim when he revealed said person died in an undisclosed incident. However, this is not because he misses them but rather regrets not killing them with his own two hands when they were still alive.
- Friend to All Children: Dan cares about kids and most of his victims are scumbags who committed child and domestic abuse.
- Hate Sink: All of Dan's victims are designed to be obnoxious. From a remorseless killer. A rich boy who abuses women with his group. A reporter who doesn't mind hurting others if it gives him a story, among other mean characters.
- Karmic Death:
- Souzen Yoshi was a murderer who killed two girls, cutting off their limbs and putting them in boxes. His limbs were cut off and used to make a christmas tree.
- Ikewaki Teru was a serial rapist and abuser of women. His death is a Karmic Rape by Dan's hands.
- Masaharu Onizuka was a self-righteous journalist who insisted that he was using his voice to speak for the weak and victims of injustice. He gets killed by having acid forced down his throat.
- Yuudai Oga attempted to harm a baby and his mother by undoing the hug strap he was in on a subway. He gets thrown off a bridge with a bungee-jumping cord that was poorly strapped on his back.
- Nao, The Star King became famous by recording a live car accident, subsequently harassing the driver, and even causing a man to fall in front of a train. He gets killed by having his limbs slowly run over by a car while getting recorded.
- The trio of college students attempted to hide the body of a homeless man by burying him in the woods. They get killed by being buried alive right near it.
- Rintaro Fuwa lived a public life of a family man and his love for babies while being an abusive husband, serial cheater, and having killed a woman with whom he had an affair. He gets killed by having his dick cut off for his infidelity, and then drowned in an aquarium of seawater, which emulates a fetus surrounded by amniotic fluid.
- Taisuke Henkyoji was a predatory teacher that targeted students and a bully in his childhood, in both cases, it caused people to jump off of a cliff (one in a suicide attempt, another in a dare). He gets killed by falling off of that cliff into the rocks instead of the water.
- Toshi Momiki was a parasite who mistreated his girlfriend's children and left them outside, despite the cold. He is tied up in a tree, dressed only in a diaper, and dies of hypothermia at Christmas time.
- Karmic Rape: Ikewaki is killed like this by Dan. Dan uses a spiked dildo shaped like a cross (a reverence to the cross masturbation scene in The Exorcist) to fuck him to death with 666 thrusts.
- Mysterious Past: So far, the reader has learned very little about Dan: what led him to begin killing people, how long he's been doing it, who was his first victim, etc.
- Nominal Hero: Dan is a homicide detective and yet, he kills criminals who escaped the law because he wants to see the despair in their eyes.
- Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: Onizuka says he does his job for justice. But it is clear that in reality, he only cares about getting the most lurid stories to gain fame and recognition.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: For the most part, Dan's victims are truly despicable human beings, with a healthy side of deep misogyny in their personality. Much of their crimes are committed against women, including sexual violence, domestic violence, and murder.
- Shout-Out: Many to The Exorcist, which is Dan's favorite movie, and that he uses as a reference for various tortures.
- The Sociopath: All of the people Dan murders were extremely cruel individuals with a notorious lack of empathy. Dan himself shows traits, but is more ambiguous compared to his victims.
- Vigilante Man: Dan may be a detective but he kills criminals who have thus far evaded justice. While he likes to see the despair in his victim's eyes, he believes that he's doing a good deed for society.
- Villains Want Mercy: Several of Dan's victims beg for mercy or try to convince him to let them go. It never works.
