Lupin series is about a skilful thief Assane Diop who is an immigrant form Senegal. His father was found guilty of stealing a necklace 25 years ago. Assane through his clever planning decides to unravel the mystery behind the missing necklace and prove his father’s innocence. The show has been inspired from the fictional character, Arsène Lupin, created in 1900s who is known as the master of disguise and a gentleman burglar. Assane follows strategies which Arsène Lupin used to use for the burglary.
Lupin offers us everything which it promises in the trailer. We witness a heist, police chasing sequences, clever escape tricks and picturesque views of Paris. However, when we look at the details, we find bigger problems.
While majority of people are complimenting this series, I would like bring to you 10 reasons why you should not add Lupin to your watch list.
1) Aversion towards Assane Diop
Assane is shown as a smart person who cleverly plans his actions. The first episode and initial parts of second episode, Assane seems really talented. But as we progress, he starts making foolish decisions.
In one scenario, he urgently needs to talk to a person who is imprisoned. The best solution he comes up with is, he exchanges his identity with another prisoner and replaces him in the prison. The question is why not come up with another ‘smart’ idea given the fact he is exceptionally brilliant. The answer to this question is that the creators want to show his skills. Thus, they deliberately put him in scenarios which increases the chances of action and escape sequences.
Further, he is made a ‘saviour’ who brings people justice and makes people realize of their worthiness. This reminds me of a typical Bollywood blockbuster movie hero who is shown as an invincible person. Assane is the main character and it becomes hard to connect to him, so how will we connect to his story?
2) Unconvincing detective Youssef
Detective Youssef in the first episode, out of the blue compares Assane, our hero, with Arsène Lupin. While the people who have read the books may be able to draw parallels, the director doesn’t cares to explain how the detective came to this realisation. With dramatic song in background the detective says, ”His style is similar to that of Arsène Lupin”. Nobody in this department believes him. In the later episodes he is seen connecting the dots about the disappearance of the necklace and Assane, which as an audience we already know. We aren’t explained his approach and strategy towards the case. The only thing he does is compare Assane with Lupin, without us telling the reason behind his observation. Its distressing.
3) Other characters are bland
There are a whole bunch of side characters which are equally annoying and dumb. In every episode we encounter a new character testing our patience. Among them, we meet a journalist whose career has been destroyed by Mr Pellegrini. She is reluctant to go back to her practice after 10 years but Assane convinces her effortlessly, as if it is a piece of cake. Another character, Dumont, is a powerful official and is involved with Assane’s past. Despite having so much power, he is terrified of Assane. It is immensely unconvincing.
4) Brainless police
If the thief is genius, the police needs to be more vigilant and proactive. This police is not even near. There are 101 reasons why the police is idiotic, but we’ll talk about just a few.
Assane is seen in different get-ups at various crime scenes. The police makes a sketch guided by the witnesses. This sketch turns out to be somewhere near to that of Assane. Fast-forward when they go to catch him, they bring with them an entirely different person despite having Assane’s sketches. Isn’t it comical?
In another scene, when the police finds out the location of Assane, the whole department(consisting of around 12 people) just runs out of the room in a dramatic way. I couldn’t stop my laughter.
5) Monotonous screenplay
The screenplay is majorly dependent on the protagonist travelling from one place to another. He covers places including Louvre Museum, Paris prison, parks, cafes, hotels, Pellegrini estate and many more. Moreover, every time he meets a person to get information about his father, that person redirects him to another person. This chain keeps going on for the entirety.
6) Irrelevant flashbacks
In the beginning the flashbacks where we see young Assane, are interesting. These provide a direction and build-up for the story. At first they tell his father’s story but eventually turn towards explaining his love life. The part which shows his love life is highly irrelevant and it decreases the pace of the show.
7) Questionable action and escape sequences
Even if the script is poorly written, the audience still desires to watch exhilarating action scenes. Here, the action scenes seem novice. In the Louvre, the heist plan goes wrong and one of the thieves is pushed on the floor by the police. Still he tries to reach for the necklace which is a few inches away. The whole scene is hilarious, though it is not meant to be.
The director doesn’t give much details, ‘scientific’ explainations about how Assane escaped the prison. Moreover, everything is set up for his convenience. When the security is after him, he fights them back and runs out of the media room. Later we see not a single soul following the most wanted person out of the media room. Why? For his convenience.
8) Illogical throughout
I just want to discuss a particular scenario to prove this show lacking any sense of logic. Assane needs to spy on Mr. Pellegrini in the middle of the night. He uses a noisy drone with a flash light to do this task. Here Assane doesn’t even use his common sense that the drone might wake up the residents. Certainly this strategy degrades Assane’s clever-person image.
9) Focus on insignificant details
The director focuses on unnecessary details. In one scene a boy saves young Assane and introduces himself. Afterwards we never get to see this boy ever. So why introduce? To list another incident, Assane gets into tussle with the some bullies in the prison. These bullies don’t contribute anything to the story and are used as gimmicks to make the screenplay eventful!
10) The cliff hanger
Though the screenplay starts to pick up in the last 15 minutes, the end doesn’t shocks us. The cliff hanger is highly unmoving.
In conclusion, the show doesn’t have interesting characters and the screenplay is monotonous. Complimenting it are the illogical and predictable action sequences.
Also read:
Run Review: A slow burn mystery which leaves us with a contented climax.
The Platform Review: Extreme violence diminishes the effectiveness of the message conveyed.
What Keeps You Alive Review: The movie is devoid of tragedy, and a convincing story.
The Silence Review : A tolerable apocalyptic movie with great visuals but less thrills.
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An Indian reviewer who writes about horror and thriller movies/series. If not movies, he likes to pick up a mystery book to read. Some of his favourite movies/series include Stranger Things, Elite (S1-3), Train to Busan, Andhadhun, Strangers: Prey at Night.