Lupin III/Recap/The Columbus Files

The Columbus Files, released in Japan in 1999 as Ai no da capo ~Fujiko's Unlucky Days~, is the eleventh entry in the annual Lupin III Made for TV Movie series. FUNimation released it with an English language dub in 2005 as the ninth of the ten Lupin films/TV movies they acquired for distribution, and it was also included in the 2006 "Final Haul" boxset.

The director of Columbus Files is none other than Shinichi Watanabe, a.k.a Nabeshin of Excel Saga fame, a director noted not only for being a Lupin III fan, but often dressing in a similar fashion. Carrying forward his tradition of placing Author Avatars into his works is the henchmen Nazarov, who bears his trademark afro and brightly colored Lupin-esque jackets. The special also bears many signs of Nabeshin's much more light-hearted touch; in spite of how seriously Fujiko's condition is treated, this is definitely one of the more comedic and slapstick entries in the entire Lupin canon.

Fujiko is unveiling her latest scheme to Lupin over a romantic dinner: she has found and memorized the "Columbus Files", a set of documents that reveal the location of a mysterious lost treasure, the Columbus Egg. Before she can tell him more, their evening is interrupted by the rascally Nazarov, sent to retrieve the information Fujiko has. As she and Lupin flee, however, they end up falling over a cliff. Lupin loses his grip, and Fujiko slips away...

Later, treasure hunter Rosaria returns to her home to find a frightened young woman hiding there; it turns out to be Fujiko, stricken with amnesia from her fall and traumatized by flashes of the attack. Even when Fujiko eventually reunites with Lupin and the gang, she can remember nothing. To make things worse, Nazarov and his boss wants the information from the Columbus Files locked away in Fujiko's missing memory. It's up to her friends and Rosaria, also tied into the mysterious documents somehow, to keep Fujiko out of the hands of the enemy, restore her to her normal self, and find out what the secret of the Columbus Egg really is.

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This TV movie features examples of:

• Absurdly Sharp Blade: Buildings, boats, and so on and so forth. Typical day for Zantetsuken.
• Aluminum Christmas Trees: Orgone energy was at one point studied as legitimate by some scientists; eventually, it was exposed as quackery and became forgotten. One of its theoretical uses was controlling the weather.
• Ammunition Backpack: Jigen takes one on the final assault on the temple.
• Amnesiacs Are Innocent: Fujiko is not her normal Femme Fatale self during her bout of memory loss.
• Chivalrous Pervert: Lupin, as always. However, after he realizes how severe Fujiko's amnesia is, he backs way off on the "pervert" part.
• Do Not Touch the Funnel Cloud: As long as you don't touch it, you can even fly an airplane past it!
• Easy Amnesia: Fujiko has a textbook example for the entire film.
• Gag Dub: A brilliant running gag for those familiar with both FUNimation and Geneon's concurrently running dubs, where Lupin, Jigen, and Goemon constantly bicker about the correct pronunciations of their names with each other, much as fans of each dub did back when they were originally released.
• Homoerotic Subtext: The beach scene with Jigen and Goemon. And yes, while the mouth-to-mouth is explained, why Goemon had to take most of his clothes off to do it is not.
• Identity Amnesia: Fujiko, to the point that she completely loses her normal Femme Fatale personality and becomes a simple Distressed Damsel.
• Implausible Fencing Powers: Goemon saves the day by cutting through a tornado.
• Kiss of Life: Goemon on Jigen. To be specific, Goemon on Jigen twenty-seven times. Jigen is not happy at all.
• Mismatched Eyes: Rosaria, hinting at her relation to Barton.
  • Barton's Right-Hand-Cat also has them.
• My Name Is Not Durwood: In the English Dub, Lupin almost constantly refers to Nazalov as "Nasal Cough".
• Split Personality Makeover: Fujiko sort of gets a very subtle one: As soon as she has lost her memories, she loses the color on her lips. It reappears when she's back to normal.
• Super Strength: Bestowed on Barton once he harnesses the power of the Columbus Egg. Unfortunately, it also comes with the side effect of Unstoppable Rage.
• Take My Hand: Lupin to Fujiko. However, she slips out of his grasp.