Post by Jean-Luc Lemur on Jun 10, 2016 0:13:37 GMT -5
58 The Border is the Face of Farewell
or, Gettin’ Jigen with It
Last week I did the freshman English thing and compared Lupin to the id and Goemon to the superego. It’s a clichéd form of analysis (Analysis!) and a bit simplistic, but it does work okay in this series, which pitches Lupin a bit more id-ish than in a lot of other media. Lupin in the first series was more-or-less a cool guy—sometimes to the point of jerkiness—all around, whereas here he’s more impulsive and at the whim of his emotions. Lupin’s decline, though, leaves an opening for Jigen: he’s cautious without being self-righteous, willing to indulge in pleasures but mostly small ones. Jigen’s the ego, and the way his character gets fleshed out is one of the best things of the second series.
“The Border of the Face of Farewell” gives us the clearest portrait of where Jigen’s character has ended up, and it is a fine picture. Jigen has taken Lupin to the Bolshoi, where they are after a gem in the prima ballerina’s tiara. They succeed, Jigen briefly grumps about how the jewel’s probably going to Fujiko, and they head to the roof to make an escape. It’s a pretty exciting escape—Lupin has to make his jump, Jigen shoots the spotlights to facilitate his escape. It feels narrower than usual, and this is confirmed when we see Jigen doesn’t make it. He’s captured not by the police though, but by Maria, the prima ballerina. She’s making an escape too, and plans to use Jigen to help her get out of the country.
Their escape takes up much of the story. It’s abbreviated for dramatic and practical effect—while they made decent progress by train much of it is spent trudging through Eastern Europe by foot, which is obvious dramatic license for a twenty-four minute long story. And, unusually, it’s not the mechanics of the flight which are the real attraction, but Jigen and Maria slowly (well, slowly for this show) getting to know and trust each other—it starts early when Jigen notes how cautious Maria is when they first enter her suburban Moscow apartment. A combination of caution, attention to detail, and determination unites the two. They make a connection, and one that lacks the improbability or gooiness of our last Jigen romance in The Rose & the Pistol.”
There is a big difference between them, though—Maria wants to defect to the US while Jigen wants nothing to do with it. There’s been a bit of a left-wing, anti-war bent to the Lupin series since at least the third episode of the first show, but this is the clearest enunciation. For Maria the US represents freedom, for Jigen it’s representative of inequality, violence (from gangs at the lowest level from gangs to assassinations at the top), and of course nuclear proliferation. It’s a bit odd to see a gunman for a thief chastising American materialism and violence, but unmentioned in the episode is that Jigen is an American. His choice was to go to the underworld, though, not the the other side of the Iron Curtain.
In the end Jigen tells Lupin, remarkably, that he’s jealous of Lupin’s blind love for Fujiko—it’s something Jigen wanted to feel for Maria, but ultimately his own caution and Maria’s own pre-citizenship Americanness get in the way of that. Of course Jigen does have such a faith, in Lupin—indeed, Jigen’s turn away from his American past and towards Lupin is explored in “Leave Revenge to Lupin”. It never goes too far, but his quiet, solid, measured ly Platonic love for Lupin is part of the core of this franchise.
Recommended?
Yes—while there are a couple of moments (such as Lupin’s big second-act scheme) that seem a bit familiar, but overall it’s a great episode and the best of the Jigen romances.
Stray Observation
• Jigen’s turn away from the mob is also explored, sans Lupin, in The Woman Called Fujiko Mine.
• I loathe, loathe, the clearly-coined-decades-after English title of this episode. Luckily I think that’s the last of these—all remaining
75 A Bridal Gown Doesn’t Suit Fujiko
or, The Bride Came D.O.A.
If the last episode dealt with love, this one deals with lust. Fujiko marries a wealthy European named Huffner, and Lupin responds in a base, criminal way: murder-suicide, shooting Fujiko dead from a rooftop and then blowing himself up. It’s an obvious ruse from the audience’s perspective, but it’s still exciting because of Jigen’s shock (not feigned, we find out—Lupin went further than he expected) and because it kind of feels like it’s been a long way coming. Lupin’s been very patient or blind to Fujiko’s betrayals and affairs over the series, and it makes some sense that he’d finally snap (plus it’s a bit of a return to his jerkier, more violent origins). It feels raw even if we know it really isn’t.
It is, of course, a similar faked death ruse in the mold of “Lupin Dies Twice”. Huffner’s known for killing his romantic conquests, so paradoxically the only safe way to access Huffner’s treasures is for Fujiko to fake her death ahead of time, allowing her access to his palace while she’s lying in state. Of course, things go awry, Lupin has to come help, you get the drift. In terms of plot mechanics it’s not the most interesting episode.
What does make it interesting is how it’s bookended by the two species of lust—Lupin’s raw frustration and Huffner’s creepy detachment. He does kill his brides (or “brides”—Fujiko’s number one hundred, so I’ll just treat the idea that each one’s a bride as a bowdlerization) but then subjects their bodies to a Lenin-esque embalming process, placing them in a “harem” that from some angles resembles history’s most morbid Ralph Lauren shoot. These women will never age, never change, never talk back, and, in a very creepy turn of phrase (at least in the subtitles), “never be violated.” Huffner’s getting off on unmolested, unchanging purity (love for Platonic forms as opposed to Platonic love, one might even say).
It’s as creepy, detached and fetishistic as Lupin is vital—the episode’s dynamics might be a bit rote but Huffner’s an awful enough villain to make the episode interesting. Huffner wants an object to lust over from a distance, Lupin wants a partner with whom he can work closely (very closely). It’s this tension between that makes the episode exciting enough to overcome its basic story. The only ingredient missing is providing a larger role for Fujiko in the finale—Lupin loves an active woman, and it would have been nice for her to play more of a role in her own rescue.
Recommended?
Yes—after a months of mere pining we finally get some real lust.
Stray Observations
• I’m kind of taking a “best-of”—or rather “most-interesting-of”—approach, so there are episodes I’m not writing up that I’ve given a look. Many of the ones I’m skipping reviewing are just dire, among them 59 Madam Prefers Them Hand-Dipped (or, The Mysterious World of Madame X), which similarly deals with a villain who wants to preserve our gang of thieves, but lacks the punch, panache, or basic storytelling competency of this episode. I’ll periodically point out episodes related to the ones I’m actually inspired to make write-ups for from now on.
• It doesn’t screencap well, but the brief flashback to before Fujiko’s wedding ceremony has some lovely animation—Lupin and Fujiko are scheeming/arguing while driving around at sunset. It”s nicely lit and the relative motion between the two cars is animated (Fujiko looks like she’s driving an MGB here, though the animation isn’t very specific).
•This, however, screencaps very well:
• Their competition for Fujiko’s a bit reminiscent of Lupin’s contest with Mamo, where the contrast was more with Mamo’s artifice than any specific creepiness.
• One device Lupin’s utilized since the beginning of the series—when his character was still fairly rough-edged (that smile is downright menacing) he’d always be put up against worse (or at least less charming) people, and that’s something that basically continues to today. It’s the same approach here, but putting him against a bigger lech instead. It’s an approach that would continue for a long time. In part n of my long series of arguments for why The Castle of Cagliostro is not, in fact, a big departure from Lupin’s canon, we see the same dynamic there, but more extreme and pushed a little under the surface.
• This is the last of the episodes I’m currently planning on covering that’s on Hulu—the rest are on Crunchyroll. The alternative English titles were made to go along with the dubbed versions of the episodes, and the dubbed episodes end soon after this one so no more horrendous punny titles, though I have to admit I actually like this one.
Next week we engage in 82 “The Old Man Rescue Operation,” take fleeting glance at 85 “ICPO Secret Directive,” and I break my old promise to avoid the more overtly silly episodes with 88 “Lupin’s Big South Pole-North Pole Adventure.” What motivates this shift? PENGUINS!
or, Gettin’ Jigen with It
Last week I did the freshman English thing and compared Lupin to the id and Goemon to the superego. It’s a clichéd form of analysis (Analysis!) and a bit simplistic, but it does work okay in this series, which pitches Lupin a bit more id-ish than in a lot of other media. Lupin in the first series was more-or-less a cool guy—sometimes to the point of jerkiness—all around, whereas here he’s more impulsive and at the whim of his emotions. Lupin’s decline, though, leaves an opening for Jigen: he’s cautious without being self-righteous, willing to indulge in pleasures but mostly small ones. Jigen’s the ego, and the way his character gets fleshed out is one of the best things of the second series.
“The Border of the Face of Farewell” gives us the clearest portrait of where Jigen’s character has ended up, and it is a fine picture. Jigen has taken Lupin to the Bolshoi, where they are after a gem in the prima ballerina’s tiara. They succeed, Jigen briefly grumps about how the jewel’s probably going to Fujiko, and they head to the roof to make an escape. It’s a pretty exciting escape—Lupin has to make his jump, Jigen shoots the spotlights to facilitate his escape. It feels narrower than usual, and this is confirmed when we see Jigen doesn’t make it. He’s captured not by the police though, but by Maria, the prima ballerina. She’s making an escape too, and plans to use Jigen to help her get out of the country.
Their escape takes up much of the story. It’s abbreviated for dramatic and practical effect—while they made decent progress by train much of it is spent trudging through Eastern Europe by foot, which is obvious dramatic license for a twenty-four minute long story. And, unusually, it’s not the mechanics of the flight which are the real attraction, but Jigen and Maria slowly (well, slowly for this show) getting to know and trust each other—it starts early when Jigen notes how cautious Maria is when they first enter her suburban Moscow apartment. A combination of caution, attention to detail, and determination unites the two. They make a connection, and one that lacks the improbability or gooiness of our last Jigen romance in The Rose & the Pistol.”
There is a big difference between them, though—Maria wants to defect to the US while Jigen wants nothing to do with it. There’s been a bit of a left-wing, anti-war bent to the Lupin series since at least the third episode of the first show, but this is the clearest enunciation. For Maria the US represents freedom, for Jigen it’s representative of inequality, violence (from gangs at the lowest level from gangs to assassinations at the top), and of course nuclear proliferation. It’s a bit odd to see a gunman for a thief chastising American materialism and violence, but unmentioned in the episode is that Jigen is an American. His choice was to go to the underworld, though, not the the other side of the Iron Curtain.
In the end Jigen tells Lupin, remarkably, that he’s jealous of Lupin’s blind love for Fujiko—it’s something Jigen wanted to feel for Maria, but ultimately his own caution and Maria’s own pre-citizenship Americanness get in the way of that. Of course Jigen does have such a faith, in Lupin—indeed, Jigen’s turn away from his American past and towards Lupin is explored in “Leave Revenge to Lupin”. It never goes too far, but his quiet, solid, measured ly Platonic love for Lupin is part of the core of this franchise.
Recommended?
Yes—while there are a couple of moments (such as Lupin’s big second-act scheme) that seem a bit familiar, but overall it’s a great episode and the best of the Jigen romances.
Stray Observation
• Jigen’s turn away from the mob is also explored, sans Lupin, in The Woman Called Fujiko Mine.
• I loathe, loathe, the clearly-coined-decades-after English title of this episode. Luckily I think that’s the last of these—all remaining
75 A Bridal Gown Doesn’t Suit Fujiko
or, The Bride Came D.O.A.
If the last episode dealt with love, this one deals with lust. Fujiko marries a wealthy European named Huffner, and Lupin responds in a base, criminal way: murder-suicide, shooting Fujiko dead from a rooftop and then blowing himself up. It’s an obvious ruse from the audience’s perspective, but it’s still exciting because of Jigen’s shock (not feigned, we find out—Lupin went further than he expected) and because it kind of feels like it’s been a long way coming. Lupin’s been very patient or blind to Fujiko’s betrayals and affairs over the series, and it makes some sense that he’d finally snap (plus it’s a bit of a return to his jerkier, more violent origins). It feels raw even if we know it really isn’t.
It is, of course, a similar faked death ruse in the mold of “Lupin Dies Twice”. Huffner’s known for killing his romantic conquests, so paradoxically the only safe way to access Huffner’s treasures is for Fujiko to fake her death ahead of time, allowing her access to his palace while she’s lying in state. Of course, things go awry, Lupin has to come help, you get the drift. In terms of plot mechanics it’s not the most interesting episode.
What does make it interesting is how it’s bookended by the two species of lust—Lupin’s raw frustration and Huffner’s creepy detachment. He does kill his brides (or “brides”—Fujiko’s number one hundred, so I’ll just treat the idea that each one’s a bride as a bowdlerization) but then subjects their bodies to a Lenin-esque embalming process, placing them in a “harem” that from some angles resembles history’s most morbid Ralph Lauren shoot. These women will never age, never change, never talk back, and, in a very creepy turn of phrase (at least in the subtitles), “never be violated.” Huffner’s getting off on unmolested, unchanging purity (love for Platonic forms as opposed to Platonic love, one might even say).
It’s as creepy, detached and fetishistic as Lupin is vital—the episode’s dynamics might be a bit rote but Huffner’s an awful enough villain to make the episode interesting. Huffner wants an object to lust over from a distance, Lupin wants a partner with whom he can work closely (very closely). It’s this tension between that makes the episode exciting enough to overcome its basic story. The only ingredient missing is providing a larger role for Fujiko in the finale—Lupin loves an active woman, and it would have been nice for her to play more of a role in her own rescue.
Recommended?
Yes—after a months of mere pining we finally get some real lust.
Stray Observations
• I’m kind of taking a “best-of”—or rather “most-interesting-of”—approach, so there are episodes I’m not writing up that I’ve given a look. Many of the ones I’m skipping reviewing are just dire, among them 59 Madam Prefers Them Hand-Dipped (or, The Mysterious World of Madame X), which similarly deals with a villain who wants to preserve our gang of thieves, but lacks the punch, panache, or basic storytelling competency of this episode. I’ll periodically point out episodes related to the ones I’m actually inspired to make write-ups for from now on.
• It doesn’t screencap well, but the brief flashback to before Fujiko’s wedding ceremony has some lovely animation—Lupin and Fujiko are scheeming/arguing while driving around at sunset. It”s nicely lit and the relative motion between the two cars is animated (Fujiko looks like she’s driving an MGB here, though the animation isn’t very specific).
•This, however, screencaps very well:
• Their competition for Fujiko’s a bit reminiscent of Lupin’s contest with Mamo, where the contrast was more with Mamo’s artifice than any specific creepiness.
• One device Lupin’s utilized since the beginning of the series—when his character was still fairly rough-edged (that smile is downright menacing) he’d always be put up against worse (or at least less charming) people, and that’s something that basically continues to today. It’s the same approach here, but putting him against a bigger lech instead. It’s an approach that would continue for a long time. In part n of my long series of arguments for why The Castle of Cagliostro is not, in fact, a big departure from Lupin’s canon, we see the same dynamic there, but more extreme and pushed a little under the surface.
• This is the last of the episodes I’m currently planning on covering that’s on Hulu—the rest are on Crunchyroll. The alternative English titles were made to go along with the dubbed versions of the episodes, and the dubbed episodes end soon after this one so no more horrendous punny titles, though I have to admit I actually like this one.
Next week we engage in 82 “The Old Man Rescue Operation,” take fleeting glance at 85 “ICPO Secret Directive,” and I break my old promise to avoid the more overtly silly episodes with 88 “Lupin’s Big South Pole-North Pole Adventure.” What motivates this shift? PENGUINS!