Lupin the Third vs. Detective Conan: The Movie

The leads of two separate franchises in one film: Lupin III the thief is after a jewel, Conan the detective is after a murderer. The two stories intersect over a question of succession in a small kingdom. The film is not interested in solving the crime. It is interested in the mismatch between two genres, one belonging to a thief trying to escape and the other to a detective who catches whoever runs. Placing them side by side turns the question of who wins into a question of whose story we are in. The form has to bring both series onto a single rhythm, and it does so by trimming Conan's deduction scenes and giving more room to Lupin's heist staging. This is the second meeting of the two. The first was a television special broadcast on Nippon TV and Yomiuri TV on 27 March 2009; the theatrical film opened on 7 December 2013 and within a month had passed ¥3.6 billion and sold more than three million tickets. Hajime Kamegaki directed. Kanichi Kurita voices Lupin, Minami Takayama voices Conan. Who it is for: viewers who know both series and enjoy versus films. Who it is not for: viewers who know neither. The film spends no time introducing anyone, and a crowded cast is hard to follow if you do not already know who is who.