see you later, space cowboy
Just two newsletters ago I said I probably wouldn’t watch the Netflix adaptation of Cowboy Bebop. It turns out that I lied - I totally watched it, and I even started the day it was released. And… it wasn’t terrible?
STUFF I LIKED
The music
The reason I broke down and decided to watch it was because I saw a video about the music, and Yoko Kanno mentioned writing new music for the live adaptation. I’m a Yoko Kanno fan, so I decided to try the first episode for the music. Plus, I figured if nothing else most of the scenes would look cool. And it did. And the music is superb. I will never tire of “Tank!”, the opening theme, although I missed “The Real Folk Blues” as the ending theme - I wonder why they didn’t use it for every episode?
Big Shot / Punch & Judy
There wasn’t as much Big Shot in this adaptation, but I like that they were included, because they would be so easy to cut. They’re fun to watch, and I wish they’re utilised more, but what little we got was fun anyway.
John Cho
I like John Cho, but really his performance took me by surprise. I couldn’t really imagine him as Spike Spiegel, but he totally embodied Spike. It was like watching the anime version come to life, for me.
Side notes: Mustafa Shakir was a pretty good Jet (even though I’m not so keen on the changing him from a cool more mature partner to some anxious dad), and despite my reservations, Danielle Pineda’s Faye is a scene stealer. I still wish her character would remain Southeast Asian (regardless of the actress), but I guess this isn’t something that bother a majority of the fans.
Faye’s backstory
First of all, THEY MADE FAYE QUEER. I will never not love this decision. It does feel like one of those trade-off things - like how they made the character of the Ancient One white in Doctor Strange, but genderbent her so that fans would be appeased by a woman playing the Ancient One. So they took away Faye’s Asianness, but they gave us a queer Faye. I guess I’ll take it shrug emoji
The episode where Faye deals with her past, Galileo Hustle, is easily my favourite episode. It felt more like Bebop than most of the others - it had humor and showed the camaraderie between the Bebop family, and the odd relationship between Faye and her fake mother (her backstory changed from the anime version) really worked for me. And the fact that it seemed like Faye was going through a second adolescence, because she was missing the memories of her early years.
This one scene where Jet watches Kimmie’s recital
I’m not going to elaborate, but this scene was funny af.
The very few moments where the Bebop crew got to relax
When they were hanging out in their ship, or going bowling, and all the other little scenes like that - that’s when they felt real, to me.
Ana and Gren
Gren is a bit different from the anime, but both Grens are cool in my book. And I really like Ana, and I want more of her in season two.
STUFF I DID NOT LIKE
Julia and Vicious
Unfortunately, despite the fact that they only really come up towards the end of the anime, they took up so much of this first season that if I were to give up on this adaptation, it would be them.
Julia and Vicious were never favourites, or even intriguing characters to me in the anime - although I could see their purpose in the overall narrative. It’s just that I would’ve been fine with a slice-of-life style story of the Bebop crew’s exploits, so I didn’t need the story of Spike’s mysterious first love, and the creepy, scary Vicious haunting Spike. But, you know what? Julia was mysterious til the end, and Vicious was scary and creepy in the few scenes he showed up in.
In the Netflix adaptation, we get so many flashbacks of Julia and Vicious, and Julia began to feel more like a damsel in distress rather than a mysterious noir figure, and Vicious… felt like your average deranged gangster that the Capo should’ve put down years earlier. There is no mystique when I think of Julia, no dread when I think of Vicious. They were just, meh. And so, so very boring.
Not Enough Ein and Ed
Ed was missing for all of this season, except for the last five minutes or so. And Ein was so underutilised. These two are the heart of the Bebop crew, and I think their absence was part of why most of these episodes felt more dreary than fun. (Fortunately, the good episodes were enough to get me watching til the end!)
I’m still not sure on whether I like the casting/portrayal of Ed, as they appeared so late in the series. I read on twitter that Ed is such a cartoonish, over-the-top character that they might be a bit to jarring an addition to a gritty, realistic live action adaptation. However, because this series has been very dark and gritty for the most part, the brief moment we get Ed at the end felt like a bright reprieve to me. What I’m not sure about is whether I will continue feeling this way when we get them for a full second season… or will we?
the pacing
I’ve mentioned this to some friends several times while watching this, but Netflix’s pacing when it comes to reveals is all over the place. Every major character in Bebop have interesting pasts and an air of mystery about them when we first encounter them. In the anime, we learn about their pasts in bits and pieces, and it’s very subtle for the most part. Netflix’s version? Not so much. It’s more like, “here, have this episode which will info-dump you everything you need to know about Jet so you can understand this other bit at the end”, and so on.
The ending
This may be a bit too much of a spoiler to talk about in detail, but basically the anime’s ending is both more finite and more open-ended than this Netflix version, and with the exception of my looking forward to more Ed in the future, I honestly didn’t like how/where this season ended.
TL;DR
I find this Netflix adaptation… watchable. Occasionally, even enjoyable. Sure, that may not be a ringing endorsement, exactly, but you know what? Compared to the US adaptations of Dragon Ball, Death Note, Ghost in the Shell, and Avatar: the Last Airbender… Cowboy Bebop is definitely way better than the rest. I actually managed to get finish it, whereas I could barely tolerate the trailers of the others.
So - yes, I recommend this, with some reservations :)
I was going to link my post on the first time I went for Arashi’s 5x20 concert in the last email, but forgot. Also, I realised that I forgot to crosspost it to LJ, so I only just did that.
Anyway, here it is!
STAY SAFE!