YMMV / Lupin III: Part 1

• Animation Age Ghetto: This series is notable for being the first anime series ever to break out of this and target an adult audience. Even after the Tone Shift, it's still clearly not meant to be for kids.
• Complete Monster: See here
• Magnificent Bastard:
  • "The All-Together Playing-Card Operation": Joker is the Anthropomorphic Personification of the "Napoleon cards", a special deck of cards believed to bring good luck to its holder. Having previously been in the possession of Napoléon Bonaparte, Joker eventually made his way Mr. Gold, who used the cards to enrich himself. Desiring escape, Joker manifests himself to Fujiko to entice her into stealing the deck, which she persuades Lupin to do. After providing the crew the good luck they need to escape Zenigata, Joker thanks her for her help in his escape before leaving in the wind, continuing to spread his good luck elsewhere.
  • "Killer Sings the Blues": Poon is Fujiko's former partner who wants to recreate their glory days together. In the past, the two were known as the "Golden Pair", with no one able to stop them from stealing anything they wanted or stand in their way, but when Fujiko made a mistake and their organization outed them, Poon helped fake her death before going underground. Disappointed that she never tried to contact him for three years, Poon tracks her down and kidnaps her in front of Lupin, refusing to let him help save her life only because he knows Lupin's reputation and will never trust him. When Lupin rescues her anyway, Poon simply tries to shoot him in the back, and when Fujiko kills him first, he quietly realizes that she's in love with Lupin and reflects that he just wanted his partner back.
  • "Who Had The Last Laugh?": The Elder of the village is a surprisingly crafty man taken hostage by Hayate before the episode begins. During his time as a captive, the Elder refuses to be cowed, openly laughing at his captors' incompetence when Fujiko escapes his grasp. When released on a deal with Hayate, the Elder proves himself a capable Con Man, scamming Lupin out of all of his possessions, including his money and the clothes off of his back. He then helps betray and attempt to kill Lupin, acknowledging that the plan most likely didn't work out because Hayate began to smugly gloat. After being betrayed and freed by Fujiko, the Elder then swaps out her treasure maps for a set of fakes, taking off with his money and maps as a newly rich man.
• Values Dissonance: The aforementioned sexualized torture Fujiko goes through at the hands of Mister X is played at least partially for fanservice. Also, she and Lupin make cracks about it after the fact, with Lupin joking that he should have gotten there later after seeing her torn up clothes. While such types of prevserice can still be found in anime today, it's much less acceptable in the 2020s than the 70s. Nowadays, sexual violence of any kind is a fair bit less likely to be portrayed in such a way, and it would likely be treated with a heavier gravity by characters in universe than it was here.
  • That being said, the torture machine was brought back in the "Is Lupin Still Burning?" OVA as a celebration of the franchise, so this particular instance may invoke a Grandfather Clause.
• Vindicated by Reruns: Bombed in its inital airings due to its (at the time) unusually dark, mature tone. After it proved popular in reruns, it got a revival in the form of the Red Jacket series - and quickly became one of Japan's most popular and beloved media franchises.