Lupin the Third: Mine Fujiko to iu onna

This series kept me off balance. While the first episode introduced a seemingly straightforward though bizarre story about a competition/flirtation between thieves Lupin and Fujiko, subsequent episodes got increasingly perplexing and surreal, motives and characters darkened, and my understanding of what the series intended kept shifting. A few episodes in I thought it was a sort of nonsensical thing most notable for its striking animation, but as the end approached the pieces came together like the threads of David Lynch's Mulholland Drive, and I realized the series' meta nature.

Here I should mention that I am not that familiar with the Lupin series. I saw the Miyazaki movie, and I think that might be it. So I have no issues with a revisionist reboot. I do find Lupin's character doesn't entirely fit in this world. He is inherently so goofy in looks and movement that he doesn't quite mesh with a story with his name in the title. But that slight objection didn't keep me from finding the series as a whole utterly fascinating.

I had other objections as I watched the series. Fujiko's mix of psychopathy and what seemed like exploitative nudity bothered me at times, but in the context of the series this all makes sense. Oskar's character also seemed problematic, but I read a fascinating analysis that put him in an entirely new light.

And that's the thing about this series; you can't just watch it, or just watch some of it. You have to watch all of it and then think about what it's all about. And now I need to re-watch it to see if the most perplexing parts make sense with my new understanding of what was happening. Although I suspect that, as with Mulholland Drive, it's never going to totally make sense.