Post by Jean Luc de Lemur on Jul 18, 2015 12:16:11 GMT -5
16 Operation Jewel Snatch
“Let’s go with plan number…none, I guess.”
Much like last week, I underestimated this week’s episodes too, though not to the same degree. We do not have two masterpieces here, but we do have two solidly constructed bits of filler, making these episodes seem a bit like two sides of the same coin.
The less interesting side is “Operation Jewel Snatch,” though it might be more important in terms of the development of the series. While Lupin’s old SSK never completely disappears, this marks the first appearance of a Fiat 500 in the Lupin television franchise. Sure, it’s blue rather than yellow and initially driven by Fujiko rather than Lupin, but little matter—it’s a retreat from the more playboy-esque, rich fantasy Lupin of the early episodes and a shift towards Lupin as more of an everyman thief (in keeping with Miyazaki’s own ideological preferences).
He does keep a sort of aristocratic attitude towards work, though—namely he doesn’t like doing it very much, and if he must it should be for something big. The robbery is also a surprisingly mundane jewel store robbery, hatched up by Fujiko. Lupin thinks it’s beneath him and is demonstrably disinterested, but Fujiko uses Lupin’s ego to goad him on: “When I first met you, you were more rash—it was your most charming point.” It’s putting Lupin’s ego towards his skill against his attitude towards his loot.
Ego about Lupin’s skill wins out, and we go ahead with a pretty silly—but fun—Jewel store robbery. There’s some zany reverse snobbery as Lupin and Jigen—disguised as plumbers (an guise we haven’t seen since the first episode) loudly asking what’s wrong with the toilets, and causing general mayhem as Vivaldi’s “Spring” plays on in the background. After literally sucking up the jewels, Lupin and Jigen accidentally lose Fujiko and run.
It’s more complex than this, of course—Fujiko ends up double-crossing Lupin and Jigen, taking the jewels for herself, before all three end up cornered and stuck on a cabin teetering on the edge of a precipice. Formally, this episode is a lot of fun—Lupin gets to be deranged with greed as he vacuums up jewels, there’s a lot of driving along curvy cliffside roads, and the climactic escape from the cabin features some of those great Miyazaki high-wire acts (not to mention another small airplane and a dogfight). Even though it’s “just” TV animation I ended up slightly breathless for the Lupin gang’s final escape.
But there is just not enough here. There’s enough happening, but there’s no real bottom to the story. Fujiko tricks Lupin into a heist on her behalf, things go belly-up and they have to escape. Making Fujiko lighter worked well in “The Emerald’s Secret,” but here she seems a bit foolish. There’s a bit of the moral arc—nothing’s saved except for one diamond, and Lupin aristocratically tosses it away as not good enough for his name. There are fewer ill-gotten gains in these Miyazaki-and-Takahata-directed episodes.
Stray Observations
• Fujiko’s short hair—previewed in “The Emerald’s Secret,” is now permanent.
• We get another (unintentional?) callback to “Is Lupin Burning?!” with the odd tickling claw Lupin uses on Fujiko to get her to drop the jewels. Rather it’s childish silliness or sexual harassment is up to you.
• We get another new opening, for the only time narrated by Zenigata. It’s the vaguely Latin theme from “Who’s the Last One to Laugh,” and coupled with footage from previous (post-Masaaki) episodes of the gang running, removing the last visual traces of Masaaki’s initial run of episodes and the original pilot film. Ironically, though, pilot film footage of Jigen loading his gun is used in the episode itself.
• The 500 doesn’t just fulfill Miyazaki’s more egalitarian ideology but his taste in cars, which tends towards the small and European.
Recommended?
It’s inessential and mediocre but harmless with a couple of bright spots. Beyond Lupin the characterization’s weak and diagrammatic, and the episode’s more humorous bent depends on how well the humor connects with you.
17 Lupin Caught in a Trap
As noted above, this seems to be another side of the same story, and there are indeed a lot of similarities—Lupin doesn’t want to do a robbery himself but is forced to be circumstance, there’s some high-altitude suspense, and ultimately no one who entered the story with greed on their mind gets their reward. The main difference is that “Lupin Caught in a Trap” is a much better episode.
The first reason why is because this episode has legitimate atmosphere. It opens as a nightclub owned by the episode’s antagonist, Rinko, and it lends a dose of very 1970s-esque decadence that’s an appealing change of pace for Miyazaki’s relatively run. Rinko is in the same mold as the antagonist from “When the Seventh Bridge Falls,” though, wanting to use Lupin’s skill to obtain a load of cash, and rather than threatening a new character with death she threatens the gang itself, attaching explosives to their wrists timed to go off should they not deliver a billion yen each.
Here we focus more on Lupin’s laziness than his ego, though his confidence that he’ll come up with something means the latter is a consequence of the former (I had my last day in the office a couple days ago and having to wrap up my projects in a short time period I have to admit I…um…relate especially well to this). Lupin has the idea of printing the three billion yen rather than stealing it, but they fail to come up with a good plan for the treasury and have to improvise on the spot. They might be great thieves, but even under pressure they succumb to mental blocks (something else I can relate to). Inspiration doesn’t strike until they’re outside treasury walls.
The nighttime take-over of the press is explained away by another joke about the Japanese work ethic—perhaps a bit of self-deprecation from the animation staff (Miyazaki, at least, had a reputation as a tireless worker on his films—I can only imagine how TV imagine, with its tight deadlines, must have been). But here the atmosphere works, too—you get the sense of the fluorescent lights, the repetitive work (oh no, more personal resonance) necessary to get the bills out on time.
Like the last episode there’s also a lot of aerial action, though this time from an improvised balloon set-up rather than the combination of airplanes and high-wire acts. It plays out very differently—“Operation jewel Snatch” plays out a bit more like an old serial compressed in time: this happens, then that happens. “Lupin Caught in a Trap” is more structured, and the balloon sequence is longer and wrong out for more long-term suspense as well as a bit of slapstick involving the sprouting up of industry and new apartment buildings in Tokyo (Takahata and Miyazaki’s talent for caricature, even in passing, is on display as Jigen floats over an apartment building, its inhabitants all on view in brightly-lit squares).
Despite these high points, though, “Lupin Caught in a Trap” never really raises to A-level Lupin. Part of this is the fact that so much echoes past Lupins—it’s enough of a recombination to stand on its own, but not enough to stand out. The humor also wildly varies—in one of the funniest (and most outré) sequences yet Goemon—who isn’t party to this week’s adventures—offers to free the gang of their bombs by cutting off their arms, complete with visuals. Much of the rest of the humor is still a bit on the silly side , sometimes a bit incongruously. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a car bomb played for laughs, and not remotely morbid ones, either.
Stray Observations
• Now, I'd like to play something. It’s my latest so it's nice and fresh. It's called “Hot & Heavy.”
• The first big continuity goof I’ve noticed in the show was in this episode, where Rinko’s car goes from front-engined to rear-engined.
Recommended?
Slightly more recommended than the last one, but still inessential.
Next week we will “Keep an Eye on the Beauty Contest” and figure out “Which of the Third Generation Will Win.”
“Let’s go with plan number…none, I guess.”
Much like last week, I underestimated this week’s episodes too, though not to the same degree. We do not have two masterpieces here, but we do have two solidly constructed bits of filler, making these episodes seem a bit like two sides of the same coin.
The less interesting side is “Operation Jewel Snatch,” though it might be more important in terms of the development of the series. While Lupin’s old SSK never completely disappears, this marks the first appearance of a Fiat 500 in the Lupin television franchise. Sure, it’s blue rather than yellow and initially driven by Fujiko rather than Lupin, but little matter—it’s a retreat from the more playboy-esque, rich fantasy Lupin of the early episodes and a shift towards Lupin as more of an everyman thief (in keeping with Miyazaki’s own ideological preferences).
He does keep a sort of aristocratic attitude towards work, though—namely he doesn’t like doing it very much, and if he must it should be for something big. The robbery is also a surprisingly mundane jewel store robbery, hatched up by Fujiko. Lupin thinks it’s beneath him and is demonstrably disinterested, but Fujiko uses Lupin’s ego to goad him on: “When I first met you, you were more rash—it was your most charming point.” It’s putting Lupin’s ego towards his skill against his attitude towards his loot.
Ego about Lupin’s skill wins out, and we go ahead with a pretty silly—but fun—Jewel store robbery. There’s some zany reverse snobbery as Lupin and Jigen—disguised as plumbers (an guise we haven’t seen since the first episode) loudly asking what’s wrong with the toilets, and causing general mayhem as Vivaldi’s “Spring” plays on in the background. After literally sucking up the jewels, Lupin and Jigen accidentally lose Fujiko and run.
It’s more complex than this, of course—Fujiko ends up double-crossing Lupin and Jigen, taking the jewels for herself, before all three end up cornered and stuck on a cabin teetering on the edge of a precipice. Formally, this episode is a lot of fun—Lupin gets to be deranged with greed as he vacuums up jewels, there’s a lot of driving along curvy cliffside roads, and the climactic escape from the cabin features some of those great Miyazaki high-wire acts (not to mention another small airplane and a dogfight). Even though it’s “just” TV animation I ended up slightly breathless for the Lupin gang’s final escape.
But there is just not enough here. There’s enough happening, but there’s no real bottom to the story. Fujiko tricks Lupin into a heist on her behalf, things go belly-up and they have to escape. Making Fujiko lighter worked well in “The Emerald’s Secret,” but here she seems a bit foolish. There’s a bit of the moral arc—nothing’s saved except for one diamond, and Lupin aristocratically tosses it away as not good enough for his name. There are fewer ill-gotten gains in these Miyazaki-and-Takahata-directed episodes.
Stray Observations
• Fujiko’s short hair—previewed in “The Emerald’s Secret,” is now permanent.
• We get another (unintentional?) callback to “Is Lupin Burning?!” with the odd tickling claw Lupin uses on Fujiko to get her to drop the jewels. Rather it’s childish silliness or sexual harassment is up to you.
• We get another new opening, for the only time narrated by Zenigata. It’s the vaguely Latin theme from “Who’s the Last One to Laugh,” and coupled with footage from previous (post-Masaaki) episodes of the gang running, removing the last visual traces of Masaaki’s initial run of episodes and the original pilot film. Ironically, though, pilot film footage of Jigen loading his gun is used in the episode itself.
• The 500 doesn’t just fulfill Miyazaki’s more egalitarian ideology but his taste in cars, which tends towards the small and European.
Recommended?
It’s inessential and mediocre but harmless with a couple of bright spots. Beyond Lupin the characterization’s weak and diagrammatic, and the episode’s more humorous bent depends on how well the humor connects with you.
17 Lupin Caught in a Trap
As noted above, this seems to be another side of the same story, and there are indeed a lot of similarities—Lupin doesn’t want to do a robbery himself but is forced to be circumstance, there’s some high-altitude suspense, and ultimately no one who entered the story with greed on their mind gets their reward. The main difference is that “Lupin Caught in a Trap” is a much better episode.
The first reason why is because this episode has legitimate atmosphere. It opens as a nightclub owned by the episode’s antagonist, Rinko, and it lends a dose of very 1970s-esque decadence that’s an appealing change of pace for Miyazaki’s relatively run. Rinko is in the same mold as the antagonist from “When the Seventh Bridge Falls,” though, wanting to use Lupin’s skill to obtain a load of cash, and rather than threatening a new character with death she threatens the gang itself, attaching explosives to their wrists timed to go off should they not deliver a billion yen each.
Here we focus more on Lupin’s laziness than his ego, though his confidence that he’ll come up with something means the latter is a consequence of the former (I had my last day in the office a couple days ago and having to wrap up my projects in a short time period I have to admit I…um…relate especially well to this). Lupin has the idea of printing the three billion yen rather than stealing it, but they fail to come up with a good plan for the treasury and have to improvise on the spot. They might be great thieves, but even under pressure they succumb to mental blocks (something else I can relate to). Inspiration doesn’t strike until they’re outside treasury walls.
The nighttime take-over of the press is explained away by another joke about the Japanese work ethic—perhaps a bit of self-deprecation from the animation staff (Miyazaki, at least, had a reputation as a tireless worker on his films—I can only imagine how TV imagine, with its tight deadlines, must have been). But here the atmosphere works, too—you get the sense of the fluorescent lights, the repetitive work (oh no, more personal resonance) necessary to get the bills out on time.
Like the last episode there’s also a lot of aerial action, though this time from an improvised balloon set-up rather than the combination of airplanes and high-wire acts. It plays out very differently—“Operation jewel Snatch” plays out a bit more like an old serial compressed in time: this happens, then that happens. “Lupin Caught in a Trap” is more structured, and the balloon sequence is longer and wrong out for more long-term suspense as well as a bit of slapstick involving the sprouting up of industry and new apartment buildings in Tokyo (Takahata and Miyazaki’s talent for caricature, even in passing, is on display as Jigen floats over an apartment building, its inhabitants all on view in brightly-lit squares).
Despite these high points, though, “Lupin Caught in a Trap” never really raises to A-level Lupin. Part of this is the fact that so much echoes past Lupins—it’s enough of a recombination to stand on its own, but not enough to stand out. The humor also wildly varies—in one of the funniest (and most outré) sequences yet Goemon—who isn’t party to this week’s adventures—offers to free the gang of their bombs by cutting off their arms, complete with visuals. Much of the rest of the humor is still a bit on the silly side , sometimes a bit incongruously. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a car bomb played for laughs, and not remotely morbid ones, either.
Stray Observations
• Now, I'd like to play something. It’s my latest so it's nice and fresh. It's called “Hot & Heavy.”
• The first big continuity goof I’ve noticed in the show was in this episode, where Rinko’s car goes from front-engined to rear-engined.
Recommended?
Slightly more recommended than the last one, but still inessential.
Next week we will “Keep an Eye on the Beauty Contest” and figure out “Which of the Third Generation Will Win.”
