Night Hood

"My grandson ^[1] only wishes he was THIS classy."

Night Hood was an animated series inspired by the Arsène Lupin novels by Maurice Le Blanc. Set in the 1930s, Lupin is aided by his assistant Grognard. Getting involved in his exploits are two reporters, Kelly Kincaid and Max Leblanc. Inspector Ganimard and Sgt. Folenfant seek to capture him. Lupin himself opposes the schemes of billionaire arms industrialist H.R. Karst, the devious May Hem and a tough as nails thug known only as Steel.

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Tropes used in Night Hood include:

• The Ace: Lupin, naturally, for the majority of the series. And it works.
• All Plucky Female Reporters Want Gentlemen Thieves: Kelly and Lupin have a bit of UST going on... well, as much as a YTV show can have, at any rate.
• Animation Bump: As good as the animation for the actual show is, the intro is phenomenal.
  • The Medium Blending doesn't hurt, either...
• Animesque: Mostly the opening, which is gorgeous, I might add.
• Arms Dealer: Karst.
• Badass Cape: Lupin
• Badass Driver: Grognard
• The Baroness: May Hem.
• Bifauxnen: Kelly never wears women's clothing. The girliest thing she sports is a set of pink pajamas.
• Blondes Are Evil: May Hem
• Cane Fu: Lupin's cane isn't just for show...
• Calling Card: Lupin's left these so many times, Karst just has to leave a fake card at a crime he planned, and Ganimard and Folenfant are on Lupin's trail - or so they think... Several times Lupin complains that his habit of leaving a calling card just makes him easy to frame.
• Concealing Canvas: In one episode, Lupin and Grognard are baffled as to where some hidden documents could be in the room, because there are no paintings for a safe to be hidden behind, and as Grognard points out, "All safes are behind paintings!". Turns out it was behind a tribal mask.
  • Later on in the same episode, Karst fulfils the exact same trope... and Lupin goes straight for the painting.
• Cool Car: Lupin's car can even turn into an airplane and a boat
• Corrupt Corporate Executive: H.R. Karst.
• Cultural Translation: The English dub gives pretty much everyone an American accent. Fortunately all names have their proper French pronunciations
  • Lupin himself however has a very slight accent that sounds like it might be French. Maybe.
• Deadpan Snarker: Lupin is often this
• Evil Counterpart: Karst to Lupin, Steel to Grognard and May Hem to Kelly.
• Fake-Out Make-Out: Lupin and Kelly pull one of these when planning to rob Fort Knox.
• Femme Fatale: May Hem again.
• Five-Bad Band
  • Big Bad: H.R. Karst
  • The Dragon: Steel
  • Evil Genius: H.R. Karst again
  • The Brute: Gila and Diesel serve as Co-Brutes.
  • The Dark Chick: May Hem
• Gay Paree: Most of the buildings and clothes are Art Deco. Not that much of an Adaptation Decay, given that about a third of the books were written in that time.
• Gentleman Thief: Lupin himself, naturally.
• Getting Crap Past the Radar: On episode seven, May Hem did an interesting way to calm down the enraged Karst who was once again foiled by Lupin. The scene ended with May Hem stroking the back of Karst's neck and a newspaper was thrown away. Does This Remind You of Anything??
• The Gentleman Thief Who Doesn't Do Anything: Lupin seems to spend more time foiling Karst than actually stealing anything.
  • Well, Karst does seem to spend most of his time making Lupin Wrongly Accused of a crime Karst himself had committed, or just inferring that he's more thief than gentleman, or making it personal in some other fashion. Thus, Lupin has to write a wrong to either clear his name, avenge his honour, or both.
• Heroes Want Redheads: Lupin towards Kelly. The same can be said for Folenfant as well, though his chances there are even less than catching Lupin.
• High-Class Glass: Lupin always wears a monocle and Badass Cape when going into action.
  • In one episode, he allows himself to be caught, but he doesn't have his monocle on. It turns out to be Grognard wearing a Lupin mask.
  • There's also this one episode when Lupin reveals himself to May Hem by removing his mask and putting on his monocle. Then, May Hem slaps him and his monocle falls out.
• Hopeless Suitor: Folefant is this to Kelly. There's an interesting variation to this in that Kelly knows he has a crush on her, and is more than willing to exploit this by taking him out to lunch for a scoop... but nothing more.
• Intrepid Reporter: Kelly.
• Karma Houdini: Karst and all his allies. While Lupin does ruin their plans, he is never stopped from trying again or caught for everything he's behind.
  • The general implication is that even if Karst or his cronies was charged, he'd just buy his way out of it.
  • Also, Lupin does seem to hurt Karst in his wallet most of the time. After all, he had a lot of money invested in these schemes...
• Legacy Character: Fans suggest that the Lupin of Night Hood may in fact be the son of the original Arsène Lupin, which would make him the father of Lupin III, but THAT would fall under Epileptic Trees.
• The Mafia: They show up in Episode 13.
• Male Gaze: A couple of times featuring May Hem.
• Master of Disguise: Lupin, of course... even when it's just a fake moustache May Hem also gets in on the act from time to time.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: H.R. Karst is pretty much a villainous Howard Hughes.
  • And of course there's Herlock Sholmes.
• Orient Express: A large part of A Prince on The Orient Express.
• Papa Wolf: Just try messing with any one of Lupin's friends...
• Personal Mook: While not at all villainous, Grognard is this to Lupin, acting as his driver, cook, and general ally.
  • Steel plays this straight.
• Plucky Girl: Kelly.
• Police Are Useless: Well, Folenfant certainly is.
• Punny Name: Not just May Hem (d'you get it?) but Folefant, translated into English, means "child's toy"
  • In Episode 13, there's a Mafioso whose surname is Marscapone.
• Scarf of Asskicking: Lupin
• Schizo-Tech: The show is set post World War I and yet, there's the existence of surveillance cameras and automatic doors.
• Shout-Out: This version of Lupin has several Shout Outs to various anime series, least obvious is Lupin himself takes several visual and stylistic cues from Tuxedo Mask and there are even a few to Lupin III (the dynamic between Lupin and Grognard owes a lot to that between Lupin and Jigen).
• Skunk Stripe: Wilson.
• Something About a Rose: Aside from symbolizing how Lupin really is, rose becomes a communication item for Lupin and Kelly whenever there's crucial info.
• Spy Catsuit: May Hem has one.
• Sweet Tooth: Max.
• Sympathetic Inspector Antagonist: Ganimard.
• Those Two Bad Guys: Gila and Diesel, Karst's rather incompetent henchmen.
• Timm Style: The art style is very obviously inspired by Batman: The Animated Series.
• Tranquilizer Dart: Complete with Instant Sedation.
• Unresolved Sexual Tension: Lupin and Kelly if they aren't an Official Couple.
• Worthy Opponent: Lupin muses that Inspector Ganimard would be this if he wasn't saddled with the utterly incompetent Folenfant.
• Writing Around Trademarks: The name change for the English dub was due to some legal buffoonery surrounding the name Lupin.
• Gentleman Thief Exit Stage Left: Lupin always does this... and not just Once an Episode.
• Villainous Breakdown: Karst usually gets this whenever he found out that Lupin thwarted his plans again.

1. ↑ or is it my son?