The hits just keep on coming for Netflix‘s lineup of original TV shows, with French mystery caper Lupin on track to become one of the platform’s biggest small screen exclusives ever, as 70 million households are projected to watch the five-episode miniseries in the first four weeks the glossy crime story is available to stream.
To put the company’s recent hot streak into perspective, three of Netflix’s seven most-watched shows ever will have been released since last October, with Lupin performing even better than monster hits The Queen’s Gambit and Bridgerton. In fact, the thriller is set to score the second biggest TV debut for the platform behind the 76 million viewers who binged the first season of The Witcher.
Those are incredible numbers for any project never mind a foreign language venture, with Lupin also becoming the first French production to ever crack the Top 10 most-watched list in the United States to announce itself as a global phenomenon. The meta narrative sees X-Men: Days of Future Past‘s Omar Sy star as Assane Diop, a career criminal who finds himself inspired by fictional thief Arsene Lupin, a character that’s endured as one of France’s most famous literary creations for well over 100 years.
Two of the five installments were directed by The Incredible Hulk and Now You See Me‘s Louis Letterier, and Lupin has also been receiving widespread critical acclaim, currently holding a 93% score on Rotten Tomatoes. Based on the early projections, a second run of episodes is no doubt going to be announced in the very near future, as the series looks to emulate the worldwide success of fellow European crime series Money Heist, which has long since been established as one of Netflix‘s most-watched shows.