Lupin the 3rd: Part III 42 (Nonsense Scheme #LupinIII)

September 13th, 2024

AstroNerdBoy

Lupin the 3rd: Part III 42
Lupin III Part 3 42
ルパン三世 – Part III Ep. 42

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis

Lupin disguises himself as Hassan, the Director of Egypt’s Ministry of Culture. He takes Fujiko to a polo match in England where Count Bone and Lord Wave (Waib) are playing. Lupin explains how these two run a massive insurance company, but get wealthy by sinking oil tankers, passenger jets, and even shooting down a U.S. space shuttle. Lupin’s gang travel to Egypt, where he reveals he paid for a a pyramid to be built.

Fujiko takes on the role of a professor of archeology from Tokyo University, who makes the discovery of King Gigglah’s pyramid. After a press conference where Fujiko announces the find, with Lupin there as Hassan, Count Bone and Lord Wave show up. “Hassan” buys a £10B policy on the fake pyramid. He claims it is because Lupin will steal it. Zenigata shows up, helping to back that claim.

With Zenigata’s assistance, Bone and Wave have a small army to defend the pyramid. Lupin brings in an airship, but it gets shot down. The incident causes Wave and Bone to get greedy, thinking they can sell a £100B policy. Meanwhile, Fujiko is with Hassan and Zenigata, who expresses doubts about the authenticity of the pyramid. Wave, Bone, and “Hassan” arrive by helicopter. Zenigata is about to arrest “Hassan” when Fujiko screams.

Zenigata finds “Lupin” and “Jigen” bound up, so he arrests them, despite the “Lupin” claiming to be Hassan. Meanwhile, “Hassan” pays £100B in cash for the policy worth £500B, backed in cash. That night, Jigen shoots the ceramic top off the pyramid, allowing its ice core to melt and the pyramid “vanish”. Lupin then makes off with the £500B cash as the policy now has his name on it.

Thoughts/Review

Yikes. Lupin the 3rd: Part III 42 requires the viewer to just accept complete and utter nonsense could easily happen. For a start, there’s the fake pyramid Lupin built. I can believe Lupin would have the cash to do this. However, he’d require the cooperation of the Egyptian government to do so. Indeed, he’d need their support for all aspects of the scheme. After all, Lupin disguises himself as Director Hassan, who’s an actual person. And the real Hassan states his belief that this fake pyramid is in fact real.

The next piece of utter story rubbish are the British nobility and their insurance schemes. I don’t understand how they get rich after personally destroying things like an oil tanker, a jumbo jet, and a space shuttle. In fact, their scheme should have put them in the poor house, as they’d have to pay the policy holders a ton of money to cover their losses. Clearly, the writers of this episode are utterly clueless about insurance.

Then there’s the cash aspect of Lupin’s scheme. Since Lupin previously scored $500M, I could believe that he paid for the pyramid to be built. But where does Lupin come up with £100B, in cash to pay the premium? Even more idiotic is Count Bone and Lord Wave backing in £500B in cash and dumping it out. How does that make any sense? In fact, nothing in this episode made sense, and I feel stupider for having watched it.

Finally, how the heck did Zenigata not recognize Fujiko? Heck, she didn’t even bother to change her name, so Zenigata should have immediately known and busted her. Not only that, but the writers seemed to understand how hideously stupid their plot was. After all, they had Zenigata start to question things, but still act dumb.

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

Let me wrap up my review of Lupin the 3rd: Part III 42 with some final thoughts.

The kid in me did find some mild amusement in Lupin dropping a silent but deadly fart while in disguise.
Things like the sinking of a tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, or the jetliner getting shot down were things that actually had happened when this episode aired. The explosion of the space shuttle had not yet occurred. But it is freaky that a year later, the space shuttle Challenger would explode.