during a moment this topic became "is Ran important to the story"?!
i have the feeling that i already answered to that question in an other thread

so i will may repeat what some people said:
Yes Ran is important to the story,she's a major character from the begining ,even without being involved in the BO !conan want to return to his real body mostly for her(it's not the only reason,like James said,but it's one of the main reason)
But we have to admit that her role(damsel in distress a lot of times,always crying for shinichi...) have became really annoying for some people(including me

) !
ok she has a lot of qualities(i used to like her a lot in the past

) but i haven't see a deep evolution in her personality,which is required for a long serie like DC,or else people will be bored by her! that's logical that after 65 vol,some people will find her unimportant or uninteresting to the story!
i don't want her to be too involved in the BO(it would be useless for me),but i would like to see her in a different role than only the D.I.D,or the "main love interest"!
(ok now i will hide under my table in case some Ran fans would be angry XD)