After pleasing a whole lot of fans with their rescues of Fist of the Northstar TV and the two Galaxy Express 999 movies as well as a few other classic pickups, Discotek Media has made an announcement on their Facebook page that they’ve acquired the first season of Lupin the 3rd for release in North America. The series will start being released in 2012 on DVD.
Lupin the 3rd has had a pretty varied publishing history in the US both in anime and manga form and it has met with a lot of ardent fans but not enough to really make it a breakout hit, which isn’t a surprise considering it’s from the 70’s for a lot of it. TOKYOPOP released the manga series that ran from 1976 to 1981 through both incarnations and Geneon Entertainment procured a large chunk of the TV series that was eventually aired on Cartoon Network, with plenty of modernized gags for the dub, but a good bilingual DVD presentation that did the best it could with the interference caused by TMS of Japan. AnimEigo has released some of the movies and FUNimation released several of them and the TV specials as well on DVD, but none of them met with huge successes.
Plot concept: Arsène Lupin III, the grandson of the fictional gentleman thief, Arsène Lupin, is considered the world’s greatest thief, known for announcing his intentions to steal valuable objects by sending a calling card to the owners of his desired items. His right-hand man and closest ally is Daisuke Jigen, an expert marksman who can accurately shoot a target in 0.3 seconds. Although Lupin and Jigen frequently work as a two-man team, they are often joined by Goemon Ishikawa XIII, a master swordsman whose sword can cut anything, or Fujiko Mine, a femme fatale and Lupin’s love interest. Although Fujiko usually works together with the others, she occasionally exploits Lupin’s interest in her to steal a treasure for herself. Lupin and his gang are constantly chased by Inspector Koichi Zenigata (Pops) of the ICPO, who has made it his life’s work to arrest them, chasing Lupin across the globe. On the rare occasions he catches Lupin, Zenigata secretly hopes Lupin will escape so he can continue to chase him. Regardless of whether Lupin and his followers succeed or fail, they are always looking for the next heist.
