Daisuke Jigen, partner-in-crime to Lupin the Third, subject of last year’s Daisuke Jigen’s Gravestone and recent winner of a poll ranking anime’s coolest old guys, has been spotted around Italy lately, according to Japanese news source Culture Lab.
To be more specific, Jigen’s visage has appeared on the shutters of cigarette shops throughout the country.
According to the original article, Jigen is quite popular in Italy, and owners of cigarette and other small shops specifically request street artists to scrawl the character on their shutters.
No wonder the new Lupin series is set in and set to air in Italy.
Indeed, it’s not clear when exactly these images appeared, but they seem to predate the announcement of the new show. Culture Lab speculates the new series might set off a whole new Jigen boom at home and abroad, to which we respond: yes please.
イタリアのタバコ屋はシャッターに次元を描くのが流行ってるのだろうか。よく見かける。 pic.twitter.com/gbLnZG206k
— Iwasaki Keiichi (@bikeandmagic) June 25, 2015
Source: Culture Lab