Live-Action TV
Description
Albert Johnson is a character who appears in episode 33 of the 2008 Golgo 13 television anime series, titled Wine of Renown. He comes from a proud and established family of French wine producers, and his personal and professional identity is deeply tied to this heritage and the reputation of his family's wines.
The narrative presents Albert as a man driven by a desperate need to protect his family's honor and his own pride. He finds himself in a precarious situation where a Japanese businessman named Yanagida has been purchasing his wines. Yanagida, who cannot genuinely distinguish between different vintages, holds significant financial power over Albert's products. To make matters worse, Albert commits a fraudulent act at an auction, selling a bottle from the 1900 vintage while claiming it is a far more valuable and rare bottle from the 1800 vintage.
Yanagida then hosts a grand party to showcase his wine collection, inviting several renowned sommeliers who would possess the expertise to detect Albert's deception. Facing the imminent and public exposure of his fraud, which would bring ruin to his name and his family's legacy, Albert decides to hire the assassin Golgo 13. His goal is not to kill a person but to shoot the specific fraudulent bottle of wine at the moment it is uncorked, thereby destroying the evidence of his crime. This motivation reveals a man who, while willing to commit a dishonest act, is ultimately terrified of the consequences of that act being revealed. His pride is his most valuable possession, and he will go to extraordinary, even criminal, lengths to preserve it.
In the story, Albert's role is that of a client for Golgo 13. Unlike many of the assassin's clients who seek the death of a rival or enemy, Albert's request is unique: the target is an inanimate object. His desperation highlights a central theme of the series, where individuals from all walks of life are driven to contract Golgo 13 when they see no other way out of an impossible situation. A key twist in the episode occurs when Yanagida, at the party, invites Albert himself, as the guest of honor, to perform the uncorking. This development places Albert directly in the line of fire and escalates the personal risk he must take to save his reputation.
Regarding his relationships, the most significant one in the episode is with his antagonist, Yanagida. This relationship is built on an imbalance of power, with Yanagida as the wealthy buyer who unwittingly threatens Albert's entire world. The story also establishes a brief but crucial professional relationship with Golgo 13, based on a contract. There is no character development for Albert beyond this single episode, as he is a client of the week, a format typical for the series. His portrayal is that of a man facing a moral crisis brought on by his own previous dishonesty, and the audience witnesses his desperate plan unfold and conclude.
Albert Johnson does not possess any physical or combat abilities. His notable traits are his knowledge of wine and his deep-seated pride in his family's winemaking legacy. It is this expertise and pride that ironically lead him to commit fraud and subsequently to hire an assassin to cover it up. There is no information about any other version of a character named Albert Johnson in the Golgo 13 anime series. A character named Albert appears in the 1983 animated film Golgo 13: The Professional, but that character is an elderly butler and manservant to the villain Leonard Dawson, and is distinct from the French winemaker in the television episode.
The narrative presents Albert as a man driven by a desperate need to protect his family's honor and his own pride. He finds himself in a precarious situation where a Japanese businessman named Yanagida has been purchasing his wines. Yanagida, who cannot genuinely distinguish between different vintages, holds significant financial power over Albert's products. To make matters worse, Albert commits a fraudulent act at an auction, selling a bottle from the 1900 vintage while claiming it is a far more valuable and rare bottle from the 1800 vintage.
Yanagida then hosts a grand party to showcase his wine collection, inviting several renowned sommeliers who would possess the expertise to detect Albert's deception. Facing the imminent and public exposure of his fraud, which would bring ruin to his name and his family's legacy, Albert decides to hire the assassin Golgo 13. His goal is not to kill a person but to shoot the specific fraudulent bottle of wine at the moment it is uncorked, thereby destroying the evidence of his crime. This motivation reveals a man who, while willing to commit a dishonest act, is ultimately terrified of the consequences of that act being revealed. His pride is his most valuable possession, and he will go to extraordinary, even criminal, lengths to preserve it.
In the story, Albert's role is that of a client for Golgo 13. Unlike many of the assassin's clients who seek the death of a rival or enemy, Albert's request is unique: the target is an inanimate object. His desperation highlights a central theme of the series, where individuals from all walks of life are driven to contract Golgo 13 when they see no other way out of an impossible situation. A key twist in the episode occurs when Yanagida, at the party, invites Albert himself, as the guest of honor, to perform the uncorking. This development places Albert directly in the line of fire and escalates the personal risk he must take to save his reputation.
Regarding his relationships, the most significant one in the episode is with his antagonist, Yanagida. This relationship is built on an imbalance of power, with Yanagida as the wealthy buyer who unwittingly threatens Albert's entire world. The story also establishes a brief but crucial professional relationship with Golgo 13, based on a contract. There is no character development for Albert beyond this single episode, as he is a client of the week, a format typical for the series. His portrayal is that of a man facing a moral crisis brought on by his own previous dishonesty, and the audience witnesses his desperate plan unfold and conclude.
Albert Johnson does not possess any physical or combat abilities. His notable traits are his knowledge of wine and his deep-seated pride in his family's winemaking legacy. It is this expertise and pride that ironically lead him to commit fraud and subsequently to hire an assassin to cover it up. There is no information about any other version of a character named Albert Johnson in the Golgo 13 anime series. A character named Albert appears in the 1983 animated film Golgo 13: The Professional, but that character is an elderly butler and manservant to the villain Leonard Dawson, and is distinct from the French winemaker in the television episode.