History Main / TheExoticDetective

* LordPeterWimsey, who is an English aristocrat who detects for a hobby.

* VampireDetective

* OccultDetective
* LittleOldLadyInvestigates
* DefectiveDetective

* ''Ironside'': A detective in a wheelchair.
* ''{{Life}}'': The main character, Charlie Crews, went to jail for murder, but was recently acquitted. He's also a millionaire. And he's Zen (or at least Zen-ish).

* ''Dick Spanner: Private Eye'', one of GerryAnderson's lesser-known creations which simultaneously parodies ''Film/BladeRunner'' and Creator/RaymondChandler, stars a robot.

* ''TheDragonDoctors'' has the eponymous doctors solve a few mysterious magical crimes with the help of "Inspector Blue," a detective made out of blue crystals. The investigative work is pretty sound, but it's the setting that's bizarre.

** the [[TheDCU DC Verse]] has a lot of these, eg ComicBook/TheQuestion, [[Film/{{Constantine}} John Constantine]]

** The Scooby Gang of ''ScoobyDoo'': the detectives have a talking dog/

** The Scooby Gang of ''ScoobyDoo''
** ''Inch High Private Eye''
** ''Captain Caveman''
** ''Hong Kong Phooey''
** ''Clue Club''

* Boris Akunin's ''Sister Pelagia'' one-ups all your clerical detectives by being a late 19th century Russian Orthodox ''nun'' (and a church school teacher to boot). Did I mention that she is assisted and supervised by a ''[[DaChief bishop]]''?

** The 1998 historical mystery novel ''Scherzo'' by Jim Williams features an eccentric man of letters (who may or may not be [[HistoricalDomainCharacter Voltaire]]) investigating a murder in Venice with a failed castrato singer as his impromptu sidekick.

* [[TheDresdenFiles Harry Dresden,]] wizard PI and crazy-awesome badass.

* ''ThatMitchellAndWebbSound'' has Detective Tortoise, whose quirk is that he's a tortoise, a fact he makes sure to remind the witness of constantly. Partway through it's revealed that this is not true. His real quirk is apparently that he's a human being who believes, and has somehow convinced his colleagues, that he's actually a tortoise.

** The long-running "John the Lord Chamberlain" series about a top-ranking eunuch in the Byzantine court is the original.
** The Literature/YashimSeries by Jason Goodwin about a eunuch in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire in the mid-nineteenth century.
** Tito Amato series by Beverle Graves Myers about a Venetian castrato singer in eighteenth-century Italy.

* Interestingly the Literature/YashimSeries may have spawned copycats. The John the Lord Chamberlain series is about a Byzantine Eunuch and the Tito Amato series by Beverle Graves Myers about a castrato. It may actually be that there is a niche market of frustrated singles that this is appealing to.

* Detective Professor Nathan Adler in DavidBowie's RockOpera ''1. Outside'' is a hybrid of a detective and an art critic. In the TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture setting of the story, "art-crimes" (such as "concept-muggings" and, kicking off the plot, the grisly murder of a teenaged girl whose corpse is subsequently turned into an artwork) are on the rise and the investigation of them is handed over to a specialized corporation, Art-Crime Inc. Adler not only has to figure out who's responsible for these crimes, but determine whether they are art or not. Even his line of work is seen as a form of artistic expression in and of itself.

** Others were marked as "exotic" by their ethnicity, including ''Series/{{Columbo}}'' (Italian), ''{{Kojak}}'' (Greek), and ''Series/{{Banacek}}'' (Polish).

* Spoofed on BoyMeetsWorld when Eric notices the popularity of this type of character and pitches a detective show called ''[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin "Good Looking Guy"]]'' to his father, complete with a theme song.

* ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 4}}'' has Nick Valentine, the private detective of Diamond City, who is noticeably an older model Synth in a society where Synths aren't only allowed but feared; it's a testament to how good he is that most of the residents of the town actually think well of him. He also has the memories of a real pre-war detective named Nick Valentine, which later leads to a personal quest for him finding out what happened to one of the original Valentine's old rivals.

* ''Literature/SanoIchiro'': Sano Ichiro himself, who's a Samurai Detective in the Edo era.

* ''VideoGame/{{Fallout4}} has Nick Valentine, the private detective of Diamond City, who is noticeably an older model Synth in a society where Synths aren't only allowed but feared; it's a testament to how good he is that most of the residents of the town actually think well of him. He also has the memories of a real pre-war detective named Nick Valentine, which later leads to a personal quest for him finding out what happened to one of the original Valentine's old rivals.

-> ''Coming This Fall: Some cops can read minds... Some cops can see the past... And some cops get help from angels... But there's still one cop with no special abilities whatsoever. Detective Klaus Mandela is... ''The Finder Outer!

* MarvelUniverse Exotic Detective appear to be grouped by area of expertise (i.e. powers.)

** [[ComicBook/XMen Charles Xavier]] is the psychic detective (as in one who investigates mysterious psychic attacks, not as in investigating arbitrary mysteries using pyschic powers.)

** He's even [[Pantheon/JusticeIntermediateGods the god of this trope]].

* A fair number of superheroes also like to have detectives as their alter ego, e.g. ComicBook/MartianManhunter, TheSpectre, etc.

** [[ComicBook/{{X-Men}} Charles Xavier]] is the psychic detective (as in one who investigates mysterious psychic attacks, not as in investigating arbitrary mysteries using pyschic powers.)

* ''TheMentalist'''s Patrick Jane, while technically merely a 'consultant', probably qualifies as a 'consulting detective' in real terms. And is more than a slight bit odd. At least when you consider he's a little bit sociopathic and has apparently decided that being nice to other people unnecessarily (by his standards) is a waste of his time.
* The main character of ''PushingDaisies'' is an AmateurSleuth who can [[{{Necromancy}} raise the dead]].