Modern Lupin: Jigen’s Gravestone and the New Series
Jan 15, 2016 16:20:28 GMT -5
ComradePig, Lord Lucan, and 1 more like this
Post by Jean Luc de Lemur on Jan 15, 2016 16:20:28 GMT -5
Note: I’m splitting this into two reviews (in the same thread) because I had more to say about Jigen’s Gravestone than I thought I did. Consider this the final epilogue to the original series reviews—it’s sort of a prequel to the original series and thematically ties into them very well. An overview of the first half of the series will either be coming (as a reply in this thread) either later today or perhaps as late as Monday, depending on how quickly I manage to get my thoughts organized.
Jigen’s Gravestone
For much of its existence Lupin III has actually headed a nostalgic franchise. From the eighties until the early 2010s Lupin lived in television and video specials that relied on goodwill from the first two series and movies—here’s the gang, back together again in the sort of caper you’ve come to expect from them. There’s no real consensus on which of the 1989-2012 specials are the best because they’re all kind of aiming for the same, comfortable level—their quality gently fluctuates around a mean, and it’s really not all that high of one. The specials kept the setting current, though, while locking the characters (pace Fujiko’s big nineties hair) in place.
I touched in this in my eighties reviews, but beginning with Legend of the Gold of Babylon[/url] Lupin seems to be somewhat mismatched from his surroundings. Even when dipping into science fiction, Lupin’s fundamentally an analog character—his victories are typically those of wits over sophistication, improvised tinkering over fine-tuning. He exemplifies the dictum that it’s more fun to drive a slow car fast, but the problem is that through the eighties and nineties Lupin’s on a highway where his old FIAT seems more and more out of place.
A way around this mismatch is to keep Lupin in the past: this was implicitly the approach of The Woman Called Fujiko Mine[/url]: while no date was given, it implicitly took place sometime in the 1960s, serving as a prequel to the original series. There was some strangely-advanced technology, of course, but that’s par for the course with Lupin. Jigen’s Gravestone is a two-episode follow-up (with a very limited theatrical release) to The Woman Called Fujiko essentially replacing the old annual TV specials with something a bit more modern…or old-fashioned. Here the date is made explicit by the titular gravestone: 1975 (incidentally, while still a prequel this puts it after the original series, where the date is also explicitly mentioned as being 1972, but Lupin’s appeal has never been in its continuity).
Like in The Woman Called Fujiko there’s also a sort of midcentury loucheness to the story, but it’s taken further here. Fujiko’s take on the period was, by nature, idiosyncratic—unlike most similar pulpy midcentury stories (including the original Lupin comics) its protagonist was a woman, and while its feminism is pretty idiosyncratic and incomplete (despite not being the protagonist, much of the series is still from Lupin’s point-of-view) The Woman Called Fujiko flirted with the aesthetic and themes of circa-1970 Euro-exploitation, but manages to render them new because it had a sense of empathy. It brought with it a different perspective to the sort of rescue-the-girl stories that have been part of Lupin’s bread-and-butter since close to the beginning, not to mention a great take on Mine Fujiko herself.
Jigen’s Gravestone goes in the same direction both aesthetically and narratively, but also feints further towards its source material’s era. Lupin’s more selfish and less empathetic here, in keeping with the early first series and comics. With the cleverness and humor’s underscored by the grave undertone, and it is fun to see a Lupin return to his origins as a avatar of selfishness. In a lot of ways Jigen’s Gravestone is very adolescent—the final climax is ridiculous, but it’s just so damn cool—but by going all-in on that dated immaturity it ends up very entertaining.
Jigen’s Gravestone goes too far, though, in its treatment of Fujiko, who ends up captured to by antagonists of this film, stripped, and put in a transparent (lube-coated) box with some sort of giant ornate automaton equipped with, uh, a sort of blunt drill. It’s the seventies! The intent is to underscore the sadism of the special’s villain, and to ratchet up the suspense as Fujiko’s struggles are intercut with Lupin and Jigen’s car chase. It goes too far, though—from a standpoint of basic human empathy it’s just very difficult to watch, and while it does ratchet up the suspense it does to unbearable levels. Fujiko in odd, rapey S&M situations has come up before, of course, but never this vulnerable, never this explicit, and the intercutting makes the sequence go on for far too long. It’s the only big misstep of the special, but depending on the viewer it might by a fatal one.
It’s a shame, too, because the special also capitalizes on its seventies setting to do something much more interesting. In the first Lupin series we see the digital world we take for granted coming into being—computers, security systems, and telecommunications are all there, but in more primitive—and still defeatable—form. Jigen’s Gravestone hinges around the emergence of mass surveillance. Lupin’s commented on contemporary rights and security issues before, but usually from a more spy-fi standpoint: Miyazaki commented on predictive algorithms running our lives back in “First Move Wins the Computer Operation” and his pair of second series episodes deal with proliferation of nuclear arms and drones. Here Lupin takes on mass surveillance, and the strength of the seventies setting is that he can take it on for the first time. The past is used to explore a theme with contemporary relevance. It’s not as much as a comment as Miyazaki’s episodes were, but more an exploration of how the decidedly analog Lupin would respond to it (by phreaking, of course).
Lupin’s in his element, here, and it shows down to the look. Jigen’s Gravestone lightens up on the hatched shading of The Woman Called Fujiko, but a lot of the midcentury design signature remains (the special was directed by Koike Takeshi, The Woman Called Fujiko’s character designer). Lupin looks at home here—his look is roughly contemporary, not strangely out-of-step with his surroundings. There’s an Italianate style to everything, from the meticulously-dressed villain even down to Jigen, whose disheveled look almost looks artfully stylized—when Jigen says “I've got a wide range of suits, from Givenchy to Fendi” you’re not entirely sure if he’s joking or not.
Recommended?
It really hinges on the aforementioned Fujiko sequence, which is far more intense than anything else in animated Lupin (I can’t speak for the original comics). If it’s a dealbreaker, than not recommended. If you can get through it, though, it definitely garners a strong reocmmendation: it’s a well-made Lupin story that really leverages its period setting in a uniquely effective way.
Another strength is that Jigen’s Gravestone is only about fifty minutes long (as opposed to feature-length, like most of the specials). It also only features Lupin, Jigen and Fujiko, restricting Zenigata to a post-credits cameo and Goemon to a photograph. It’s this economy of storytelling that helps make Jigen’s Gravestone work.
Stray Observations
•Jigen doesn’t die. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to reveal that, and really the fun is figuring out how he faked it and how he’ll come back, not in the suspense of whether or not he was successfully assassinated.
•Lupin’s jacket color is a pretty classic case study in how color divisions can be fuzzy. To me it’s still green, just a bluer shade. I’m apparently in the minority on this, though, since most references to it are blue.
•In this instance Lupin drives an Alfa Giulia, not to come back because it was beat to hell here. This is actually kind of an ingenious choice for a gentleman-cambrioleur—it’s not proletarian like the FIAT but avoids the ostentatiousness of the Mercedes.
•This special ends essentially with a cliffhanger that either solidifies its role as a prequel to 1970s Lupin or hints at a new direction for the new series. There was some disappointment in fandom that this would apparently not be followed up on in the new series, but given the direction its taken midway through there might be a chance…
Jigen’s Gravestone
For much of its existence Lupin III has actually headed a nostalgic franchise. From the eighties until the early 2010s Lupin lived in television and video specials that relied on goodwill from the first two series and movies—here’s the gang, back together again in the sort of caper you’ve come to expect from them. There’s no real consensus on which of the 1989-2012 specials are the best because they’re all kind of aiming for the same, comfortable level—their quality gently fluctuates around a mean, and it’s really not all that high of one. The specials kept the setting current, though, while locking the characters (pace Fujiko’s big nineties hair) in place.
I touched in this in my eighties reviews, but beginning with Legend of the Gold of Babylon[/url] Lupin seems to be somewhat mismatched from his surroundings. Even when dipping into science fiction, Lupin’s fundamentally an analog character—his victories are typically those of wits over sophistication, improvised tinkering over fine-tuning. He exemplifies the dictum that it’s more fun to drive a slow car fast, but the problem is that through the eighties and nineties Lupin’s on a highway where his old FIAT seems more and more out of place.
A way around this mismatch is to keep Lupin in the past: this was implicitly the approach of The Woman Called Fujiko Mine[/url]: while no date was given, it implicitly took place sometime in the 1960s, serving as a prequel to the original series. There was some strangely-advanced technology, of course, but that’s par for the course with Lupin. Jigen’s Gravestone is a two-episode follow-up (with a very limited theatrical release) to The Woman Called Fujiko essentially replacing the old annual TV specials with something a bit more modern…or old-fashioned. Here the date is made explicit by the titular gravestone: 1975 (incidentally, while still a prequel this puts it after the original series, where the date is also explicitly mentioned as being 1972, but Lupin’s appeal has never been in its continuity).
Like in The Woman Called Fujiko there’s also a sort of midcentury loucheness to the story, but it’s taken further here. Fujiko’s take on the period was, by nature, idiosyncratic—unlike most similar pulpy midcentury stories (including the original Lupin comics) its protagonist was a woman, and while its feminism is pretty idiosyncratic and incomplete (despite not being the protagonist, much of the series is still from Lupin’s point-of-view) The Woman Called Fujiko flirted with the aesthetic and themes of circa-1970 Euro-exploitation, but manages to render them new because it had a sense of empathy. It brought with it a different perspective to the sort of rescue-the-girl stories that have been part of Lupin’s bread-and-butter since close to the beginning, not to mention a great take on Mine Fujiko herself.
Jigen’s Gravestone goes in the same direction both aesthetically and narratively, but also feints further towards its source material’s era. Lupin’s more selfish and less empathetic here, in keeping with the early first series and comics. With the cleverness and humor’s underscored by the grave undertone, and it is fun to see a Lupin return to his origins as a avatar of selfishness. In a lot of ways Jigen’s Gravestone is very adolescent—the final climax is ridiculous, but it’s just so damn cool—but by going all-in on that dated immaturity it ends up very entertaining.
Jigen’s Gravestone goes too far, though, in its treatment of Fujiko, who ends up captured to by antagonists of this film, stripped, and put in a transparent (lube-coated) box with some sort of giant ornate automaton equipped with, uh, a sort of blunt drill. It’s the seventies! The intent is to underscore the sadism of the special’s villain, and to ratchet up the suspense as Fujiko’s struggles are intercut with Lupin and Jigen’s car chase. It goes too far, though—from a standpoint of basic human empathy it’s just very difficult to watch, and while it does ratchet up the suspense it does to unbearable levels. Fujiko in odd, rapey S&M situations has come up before, of course, but never this vulnerable, never this explicit, and the intercutting makes the sequence go on for far too long. It’s the only big misstep of the special, but depending on the viewer it might by a fatal one.
It’s a shame, too, because the special also capitalizes on its seventies setting to do something much more interesting. In the first Lupin series we see the digital world we take for granted coming into being—computers, security systems, and telecommunications are all there, but in more primitive—and still defeatable—form. Jigen’s Gravestone hinges around the emergence of mass surveillance. Lupin’s commented on contemporary rights and security issues before, but usually from a more spy-fi standpoint: Miyazaki commented on predictive algorithms running our lives back in “First Move Wins the Computer Operation” and his pair of second series episodes deal with proliferation of nuclear arms and drones. Here Lupin takes on mass surveillance, and the strength of the seventies setting is that he can take it on for the first time. The past is used to explore a theme with contemporary relevance. It’s not as much as a comment as Miyazaki’s episodes were, but more an exploration of how the decidedly analog Lupin would respond to it (by phreaking, of course).
Lupin’s in his element, here, and it shows down to the look. Jigen’s Gravestone lightens up on the hatched shading of The Woman Called Fujiko, but a lot of the midcentury design signature remains (the special was directed by Koike Takeshi, The Woman Called Fujiko’s character designer). Lupin looks at home here—his look is roughly contemporary, not strangely out-of-step with his surroundings. There’s an Italianate style to everything, from the meticulously-dressed villain even down to Jigen, whose disheveled look almost looks artfully stylized—when Jigen says “I've got a wide range of suits, from Givenchy to Fendi” you’re not entirely sure if he’s joking or not.
Recommended?
It really hinges on the aforementioned Fujiko sequence, which is far more intense than anything else in animated Lupin (I can’t speak for the original comics). If it’s a dealbreaker, than not recommended. If you can get through it, though, it definitely garners a strong reocmmendation: it’s a well-made Lupin story that really leverages its period setting in a uniquely effective way.
Another strength is that Jigen’s Gravestone is only about fifty minutes long (as opposed to feature-length, like most of the specials). It also only features Lupin, Jigen and Fujiko, restricting Zenigata to a post-credits cameo and Goemon to a photograph. It’s this economy of storytelling that helps make Jigen’s Gravestone work.
Stray Observations
•Jigen doesn’t die. I don’t think it’s a spoiler to reveal that, and really the fun is figuring out how he faked it and how he’ll come back, not in the suspense of whether or not he was successfully assassinated.
•Lupin’s jacket color is a pretty classic case study in how color divisions can be fuzzy. To me it’s still green, just a bluer shade. I’m apparently in the minority on this, though, since most references to it are blue.
•In this instance Lupin drives an Alfa Giulia, not to come back because it was beat to hell here. This is actually kind of an ingenious choice for a gentleman-cambrioleur—it’s not proletarian like the FIAT but avoids the ostentatiousness of the Mercedes.
•This special ends essentially with a cliffhanger that either solidifies its role as a prequel to 1970s Lupin or hints at a new direction for the new series. There was some disappointment in fandom that this would apparently not be followed up on in the new series, but given the direction its taken midway through there might be a chance…