The only question I would like answered is, if it did appear in The Anime Encyclopedia, what the source of the information is. Regardless about if The Viper is real or not, I want to see the mention of it in the book and know why it was written.
I looked into the authors and they're veterans in the industry. They've written a lot of books about anime and manga, lead writer Johnathan Clements even worked on the English script for a couple 80s Lupin films as well as helped in localizing dozens of other movies. It would be pretty shocking to learn they included a detail that he had only heard in rumor and never looked to verify it.
I don't know when The Viper rumor first popped up but the second edition of the encyclopedia is from 2006 which predates even the oldest threads on the Lupin website. But if it's not in the second edition then that means we have no credible source.
Last Edit: Nov 10, 2022 2:25:18 GMT by LSuperSonicQ
This is really funny to watch, because the beginning of this thread basically debunks this entire dub as being legit. Bilby wrote down bullet points and everything. There's no reason to continue searching for it.
Agreed. Certainly not an anime dub of some kind, more than likely some Australia-exclusive cartoon from that country's early years of animation that had a similar concept of Lupin III, but with a very different execution. Could be wrong on that, but definitely something I'd see being the case.
Post by extremewreck2000 on Nov 18, 2022 0:36:55 GMT
Now I have an interesting theory:
What if it is a dub of something, but it's not an anime, but rather some like, Western European cartoon that is similar to that of Lupin III in concept? Like, I can definitely see there being more cartoons starring thieves around the time than just Lupin III since thieves have been a concept for CENTURIES at this point. I mean, Robin Hood is a very popular thief, you know, the one who steals from the rich & gives it to the poor?
Judging by the name, it'd probably be about a thief who rides a car with fang-like things on the front to cut through material(like say, wood) & is likely on the run from someone trying to stop him(perhaps a wizard, witch, or warlock of sorts). Chaos & hilarity ensues!
If it is a cartoon from another country with a similar style to Lupin, it would be almost impossible to prove unless we found a show from the early 70s called The Viper. Just as there is no proof that The Viper exists at all, I feel like there's equally no proof of it being something else.
As for contacting TMS, I'm sure Discotek could technically do it but I know they've had a history of ignoring fan requests (F-Zero). Asking TMS themselves is probably not an option either since Japanese companies are hard to reach, even in really popular searches like Phantom Blood and Frontier Enterprises Dragon Ball dubs those rights holders have never helped us with the searches.
I still think our answer remains with the old anime community and it's going to take some researching to get us there. Recently I talked with the owner of the Lupin Encyclopedia site after having searched the entire forums looking for any mention of The Viper and coming up empty handed. He stated he had never heard about the topic before but wouldn't be surprised if it did exist as a local production in some kind of small test market.
If his words as a community member and site owner mean anything, then it's possible the entire claim isn't some made up hoax. Even though I never found the origin of the 3 Men Rumor (fake pilot episode of Ed, Edd N' Eddy), one of the oldest community members dismissed it as being fake during my conversation with him. This response is much different than that.
Even if The Anime Encyclopedia doesn't make any mention of it and nobody in the Lupin community has heard of it, the rumor still started from somewhere and that's what I'm most curious about. I still have to find a copy of the 2nd edition of The Anime Encyclopedia as well as get in touch with the lead author. I asked the co-author on Twitter about it but never got a response, I might try and email for them now.
Though like I said before, the likelihood of it being fake is considerably higher if the only sources in this thread are found out to not have mentioned the topic at all.
If it is a cartoon from another country with a similar style to Lupin, it would be almost impossible to prove unless we found a show from the early 70s called The Viper. Just as there is no proof that The Viper exists at all, I feel like there's equally no proof of it being something else.
As for contacting TMS, I'm sure Discotek could technically do it but I know they've had a history of ignoring fan requests (F-Zero). Asking TMS themselves is probably not an option either since Japanese companies are hard to reach, even in really popular searches like Phantom Blood and Frontier Enterprises Dragon Ball dubs those rights holders have never helped us with the searches.
I still think our answer remains with the old anime community and it's going to take some researching to get us there. Recently I talked with the owner of the Lupin Encyclopedia site after having searched the entire forums looking for any mention of The Viper and coming up empty handed. He stated he had never heard about the topic before but wouldn't be surprised if it did exist as a local production in some kind of small test market.
If his words as a community member and site owner mean anything, then it's possible the entire claim isn't some made up hoax. Even though I never found the origin of the 3 Men Rumor (fake pilot episode of Ed, Edd N' Eddy), one of the oldest community members dismissed it as being fake during my conversation with him. This response is much different than that.
Even if The Anime Encyclopedia doesn't make any mention of it and nobody in the Lupin community has heard of it, the rumor still started from somewhere and that's what I'm most curious about. I still have to find a copy of the 2nd edition of The Anime Encyclopedia as well as get in touch with the lead author. I asked the co-author on Twitter about it but never got a response, I might try and email for them now.
Though like I said before, the likelihood of it being fake is considerably higher if the only sources in this thread are found out to not have mentioned the topic at all.
Well I mean, just because it will be very hard to prove doesn't mean it will be impossible & in my eyes, seems more likely considering, well, would you really think Lupin III would have a nickname like The Viper? It sounds cool, but does his car have awesome fang-like things in the front to rip & tear down material in the way? From what I've seen, NOPE!!!
It being a local production would be possible, but it was said to have been done in 1972, which was way before dubbing anime became more common in the US. 1972 was over a decade away from Robotech you know! So, presumably it is a dub, but it's likely a Western European cartoon & was most likely dubbed in English sometime in the 80s or 90s, 1979 being the earliest year I could think of.
Last Edit: Nov 20, 2022 22:56:48 GMT by extremewreck2000: EDIT: Sentence issue
If it is a cartoon from another country with a similar style to Lupin, it would be almost impossible to prove unless we found a show from the early 70s called The Viper. Just as there is no proof that The Viper exists at all, I feel like there's equally no proof of it being something else.
As for contacting TMS, I'm sure Discotek could technically do it but I know they've had a history of ignoring fan requests (F-Zero). Asking TMS themselves is probably not an option either since Japanese companies are hard to reach, even in really popular searches like Phantom Blood and Frontier Enterprises Dragon Ball dubs those rights holders have never helped us with the searches.
I still think our answer remains with the old anime community and it's going to take some researching to get us there. Recently I talked with the owner of the Lupin Encyclopedia site after having searched the entire forums looking for any mention of The Viper and coming up empty handed. He stated he had never heard about the topic before but wouldn't be surprised if it did exist as a local production in some kind of small test market.
If his words as a community member and site owner mean anything, then it's possible the entire claim isn't some made up hoax. Even though I never found the origin of the 3 Men Rumor (fake pilot episode of Ed, Edd N' Eddy), one of the oldest community members dismissed it as being fake during my conversation with him. This response is much different than that.
Even if The Anime Encyclopedia doesn't make any mention of it and nobody in the Lupin community has heard of it, the rumor still started from somewhere and that's what I'm most curious about. I still have to find a copy of the 2nd edition of The Anime Encyclopedia as well as get in touch with the lead author. I asked the co-author on Twitter about it but never got a response, I might try and email for them now.
Though like I said before, the likelihood of it being fake is considerably higher if the only sources in this thread are found out to not have mentioned the topic at all.
Well I mean, just because it will be very hard to prove doesn't mean it will be impossible & in my eyes, seems more likely considering, well, would you really think Lupin III would have a nickname like The Viper? It sounds cool, but does his car have awesome fang-like things in the front to rip & tear down material in the way? From what I've seen, NOPE!!!
It being a local production would be possible, but it was said to have been done in 1972, which was way before dubbing anime became more common in the US. 1972 was over a decade away from Robotech you know! So, presumably it is a dub, but it's likely a Western European cartoon & was most likely dubbed in English sometime in the 80s or 90s, 1979 being the earliest year I could think of.
It didn't make sense to call him Cliff Hanger either, but someone did that when he appeared here in a laserdisc game in the early 80s.
"oooh, you're a- a freaked out child in the woods..."
Well I mean, just because it will be very hard to prove doesn't mean it will be impossible & in my eyes, seems more likely considering, well, would you really think Lupin III would have a nickname like The Viper? It sounds cool, but does his car have awesome fang-like things in the front to rip & tear down material in the way? From what I've seen, NOPE!!!
It being a local production would be possible, but it was said to have been done in 1972, which was way before dubbing anime became more common in the US. 1972 was over a decade away from Robotech you know! So, presumably it is a dub, but it's likely a Western European cartoon & was most likely dubbed in English sometime in the 80s or 90s, 1979 being the earliest year I could think of.
It didn't make sense to call him Cliff Hanger either, but someone did that when he appeared here in a laserdisc game in the early 80s.
Well yeah, that. I think that was around the time anime dubbing was slowly getting more common before Robotech & Voltron led to anime dubbing becoming more common than ever at that time period.
I have just found out about this from LSuperSonicQ and managed to track down a epub of the 2nd edition of the encyclopaedia and can confirm no mention of the viper in either the Lupin section of any references to Lupin with any of the mentions of Viper elsewhere in the book. All mentions of Viper in the book refer to Viper GTS except for one alternative name in the Kimba the white lion section.
However it is interesting that in the Lupin section mention is made that the name copyright dispute was started after the original Lupin creator’s estate found about the anime from an Australian broadcast of the dub of the Miyazaki written eps. As an Australian I am shocked at how often my homeland seems to be a part of the weird anime dub stories.
I have just found out about this from LSuperSonicQ and managed to track down a epub of the 2nd edition of the encyclopaedia and can confirm no mention of the viper in either the Lupin section of any references to Lupin with any of the mentions of Viper elsewhere in the book. All mentions of Viper in the book refer to Viper GTS except for one alternative name in the Kimba the white lion section.
However it is interesting that in the Lupin section mention is made that the name copyright dispute was started after the original Lupin creator’s estate found about the anime from an Australian broadcast of the dub of the Miyazaki written eps. As an Australian I am shocked at how often my homeland seems to be a part of the weird anime dub stories.
Moreso than Norway(aside from that "Norwegian Sailor Moon dub" bullcrap), that's for sure lmao.
If the only "source" for this is supposedly in a book that doesn't have it in it, could this just be an Internet rumor?f
Again, it's probably either confusion with some very obscure cartoon from another country or it's one of those oddball rumors from the days before the internet was mainstream(I'm talking before 1995), possibly before even BBS servers became popular.
Well I mean, just because it will be very hard to prove doesn't mean it will be impossible & in my eyes, seems more likely considering, well, would you really think Lupin III would have a nickname like The Viper? It sounds cool, but does his car have awesome fang-like things in the front to rip & tear down material in the way? From what I've seen, NOPE!!!
It being a local production would be possible, but it was said to have been done in 1972, which was way before dubbing anime became more common in the US. 1972 was over a decade away from Robotech you know! So, presumably it is a dub, but it's likely a Western European cartoon & was most likely dubbed in English sometime in the 80s or 90s, 1979 being the earliest year I could think of.
It didn't make sense to call him Cliff Hanger either, but someone did that when he appeared here in a laserdisc game in the early 80s.
The Cliff Hanger title wasn't made by Stern, but rather TMS. There were legal issues with the Arsène Lupin estate that prevented Lupin III from being released in Europe with its original title (this also resulted in the cancellation of Lupin VIII and its retool into Inspector Gadget, and Lupin being renamed to "Wolf" in the Streamline Pictures dub). In 1997, there was a Latin Spanish dub of Lupin III Part 1; this dub also used the Cliff Hanger title.
I have just found out about this from LSuperSonicQ and managed to track down a epub of the 2nd edition of the encyclopaedia and can confirm no mention of the viper in either the Lupin section of any references to Lupin with any of the mentions of Viper elsewhere in the book. All mentions of Viper in the book refer to Viper GTS except for one alternative name in the Kimba the white lion section.
However it is interesting that in the Lupin section mention is made that the name copyright dispute was started after the original Lupin creator’s estate found about the anime from an Australian broadcast of the dub of the Miyazaki written eps. As an Australian I am shocked at how often my homeland seems to be a part of the weird anime dub stories.
Whoa thanks for doing that! In that case it pretty much closes the mystery, we have no living sources of The Viper which highly suggests it's nothing more than a rumor.
It's possible OP was misremembering and there really was a mention of it in another encyclopedia or website, but without knowing that information it would be impossible to follow up on. And even if we did find another source, there's no guarantee it would contain anything useful we could use to do more research.