The tornado Hotel that tore through the 1990s continues to twist and turn in the 21st century. The 2002 spring special was broadcast in the fourteenth anniversary year of the series. As an independent series, even among Ishinomori’s visual works, this became the longest-running TV program by far. Ippei, at first a new and inexperienced hotel man, has been promoted over the years and is now a full-fledged, even first-class, hotel man (although he may still think of himself as being a novice) with sufficient experience to raise subordinates, who are just like he used to be, sometimes strictly, at other times gently. The major cast has not changed in the last fourteen years. We hope that Hotel will be the longest drama ever in Japan, even exceeding a monumental drama loved by the nation, From the Northern Country, which aired for 21 years (1981 - 2002, script writer: So Kuramoto; director: Shigemichi Sugita, Fuji Television Network).
Detective Omiyasan returned in 2002! Tsunehiko Watase took over the leading role from Ken Ogata and the new series has a different ambience. Broadcast as part of Thursday Mystery series, Detective Omiyasan was very popular, with an audience rating of 12% for the first episode, and a high rating of 10.2% overall.
The Heisei Era series of Detective Omiyasan was well received, leading to the broadcast of a second season from April 2003. The audience rating of the first episode reached 14.7%, establishing it at what should be called a living room standard drama.