Lupin Continues to Steal Hearts in a Thrilling Part 3

There’s something about the larger-than-life characters from a specific era of European crime novels that keeps resonating with audiences, as is evidenced by the persistent influence of figures like Sherlock Holmes more than a century after his debut. Fitting into this trend, Netflix’s take on Maurice Leblanc’s gentleman thief Arsène Lupin shot to the top of the streamer’s charts when it came out in 2021, becoming the most-watched non-English series on the platform at the time (although Squid Game would shatter this record later that year). 

At the heart of this new Lupin’s success was that it modernized the slickness of old-school caper stories to deliver fun narrative sleights of hand alongside compelling familial drama, all anchored by Omar Sy’s deeply charismatic performance. Thankfully, Part 3 picks up right where its predecessor left off. Between its smartly crafted intrigue and well-portrayed exploration of our hero’s fractured relationships, each of its seven episodes are packed with excitement. 

This season takes place a year from where we left off: after narrowly escaping Paris and successfully entrapping Pellegrini, the man who framed his father for theft, the Lupin-inspired master thief Assane Diop (Omar Sy) is in hiding. However, as the news cycle obsesses over his exploits, he realizes his fame is negatively affecting the family he was forced to leave behind, including his wife Claire (Ludivine Sagnier) and his son Raoul (Etan Simon). Compelled to do right by them, he returns to Paris for what he hopes will be his last job. Reuniting with his best friend Benjamin (Antoine Gouy), the two concoct a scheme that should fix Diop’s personal problems and let him right a previous botched assignment, the theft of France’s Black Pearl, in one fell swoop. But things don’t exactly go as planned, and our modern-day master of disguise is visited by a ghost of his past who threatens to unravel everything.

First and foremost, Part 3 pulls off a non-stop barrage of exciting heists that are even more cleverly constructed and frequent than in the previous installments. Due to circumstances which I’ll avoid spoiling, our gentleman thief is forced to carry out a string of daring schemes, each defined by layers of misdirection. These play out similarly to what came before: going in, usually only clued-in on part of the trick, leaving room for sudden gratifying reveals that recontextualize what’s unfolding. However, even though I expected this structure, I still found myself fooled by ingenious twists as I was caught up in the tension of each gig. These ruses are further amplified by snappy editing and sleek camera work that captures their intricacies with style, emphasizing the guile and skill employed by our protagonist and his co-conspirators.

Part of what made this show so popular is how it melds its source material’s complex “aha” moments with the grounded specifics of a modern setting, letting contemporary audiences more readily buy into its many turns. Although there is some fudging (particularly around its depictions of technology), these heists rely on strategy and misdirection that often seem like they could actually work. Additionally, flashbacks clue us into the moments where the seeds for these duplicities were planted, creating a clear chain of cause and effect.

Another crucial element of the series’ success is that, despite the many qualities that make Assane an unrivaled thief, such as his quick wit, understanding of psychology, and sleight of hand, he can’t outsmart the ways his line of work causes tensions in his personal life. While the last season was largely based around him trying to find justice for his wrongfully imprisoned father, this one focuses on his unresolved relationship with his mother. We jump between the ‘90s and the present, learning more about how the absence of his parental figures led to him falling in with an exploitative boxing club owner who manipulated teenagers with nowhere else to go. These flashback scenes are frequently brutal, whether it be seeing Assane lose contact with his estranged mom or when he and his buddy Bruno (Noé Wodecki) are pitted against each other by their warped “fatherly” figure.