Murai, Inspector

Also known as 村井警部 (Murai Keibu)

Hello, My Name (in English) is…

The Japanese characters that make up Inspector Murai’s name are mura (村), meaning “village” and i (井), meaning “well”, so his name has a connotation of communal resource.

Distinguishing Features

He’s got a tall, lanky frame befitting a lawman, but without a doubt, the most distinguishing feature of Inspector Murai is his long, cat-like whiskers of a moustache. As with many of his Stars, Tezuka was inspired by real people – in this case Murai was modelled after a senior member of the brass band club that Tezuka Osamu’s eldest daughter Rumiko belonged to when she was in high school.

Status: Secondary Star (★★)

Murai is another one Osamu Tezuka’s go-to Stars for playing the long arm of the law. Unlike his more buttoned-down colleagues, such as the stoic Inspector Geta and the hot-headed Inspector Tawashi, Murai is more of a loose cannon. In many ways he’s a poster-child for the stereotypical grim and gritty cops of the 1970s – in the hard-drinking-wife-left-him-down-on-his-luck mold. Although he upholds the law, for him, the ends often justify the means, which gives him access to policeman roles that wouldn’t be a good fit for any of Tezuka’s other stars.

Notable Roles

Although he made his true stage debut came in Don Dracula (1979) – one of the latest debuts of any of Tezuka’s Stars – there is an argument to be made that he makes an earlier “amateur” appearance as one of the police inspectors working with Inspector Geta in the Vampires (1966-69) chapter “The Young Girl is Kidnapped.” His first starring role was as Inspector Futsuuno in the short-lived series, Kibando (1984), and he also appeared as Murakami in Lumpenela, the Beggar Princess (1980) – during the parody of the movie “The Thing” – when the series was almost completely revised for the Osamu Tezuka Complete Manga Works edition (MT-128) and released in 1984.