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Lupin III Coming to Hollywood
Secret anime ninja writes "A story in today's Toronto Star says, "Master thief Lupin the Third, a comic book hero in Japan for more than 30 years, will soon make his Hollywood debut." The story goes on to say that it's been optioned by the producer of Minority Report, Schindler's List and Jurassic Park." Lupin III is currently airing on Cartoon Network and several Lupin movies are available on DVD. Castle of Cagliostro, directed by Miyazaki is a great movie.
If you want to know more about the original Arsène Lupin, gentleman-burglar, and the author, Maurice Leblanc: here and there
Lupin the 3rd is basically a story about the exploits of four legendary thieves and an Interpol investigator who's constantly on their trail. They seem to try to rob and rip people off more for the challenge of it then for the actual money (though, they do seem to enjoy the money as well). Central to Lupin's character is that he doesn't seem to be a killer, just an unorthodox thief.
Lupin (pronounced Loop-ON, I believe) is the grandson of a legendary criminal, and has taken on his legacy of performing impossible crimes under the very nose of authorities many times. His main ability seems to be his quick wit and extreme intelligence when it comes to stealing things. He (as well as the rest of the crew) is a fairly good master of disguise.
Jigan is a guy who tends to wear a suit and a dark hat, drinks an awful lot, and is a damn good shot with a revolver. He's generally a rather pragmatic figure who tends to just like hanging out with Lupin, because Lupin's an interesting guy.
Goemon is a legendary swordsman (a kind of stereotypical samurai), who also enjoys just hanging out with Lupin and Jigan. Of all the characters, he is probably the most outlandish, performing rather impossible feats with his sword. However, it would not be difficult to mute this down to reality's level.
Fujiko (not positive on the spelling of these names by the way) is who Lupin is particularly smitten with. She has rather um...large breasts (sorry, there's really little else to say, since they're kind of central to her character). Of the 4 criminal characters, she is probably the most in it for money. She is probably the best at disgusing herself, and will often backstab multiple people just to get more money for herself. She often attempts to pull one over on the other main characters to enrich herself. Jigan and Goemon aren't too fond of her, but put up with her because of Lupin.
Zenigata is the Interpol inspector who has gotten pretty good at figuring out where and how Lupin works, but he has some behavioral problems so the local authorities tend to not believe him or comply with him fully when he makes requests. As such, he's usually there to witness Lupin's hijinks, but he never seems to catch him. Also referred to as "Pops."
That's the basics of it. Its a pretty fun, though simple show.