Netflix's Live-Action Cowboy Bebop to Release This November

crashb648 said:
Thanks for the analysis! My brother will be pleased :)

How is the bad language? I don't like watching shows with lots of swearing (especially F-words), so I'm wondering how it is in this show? The original was quite tame, so I hope it's similar...
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It has quite a bit of bad language tbh. All sorts of swearing. F bombs but also a linguistic cauldron of swearing to be fair. Faye is he main culprit on that front. I love it (I swear far to much in real life so I find it a very relatable way of speaking) but appreciate it may not be for everyone.
 
From the first ten minutes it feels right. The original is pretty camp, and silly. Cho clearly can’t do martial arts and seems a little slow but otherwise I’m down,
 
Watched a couple of episodes, it's both better than I expected and worse. They got the atmosphere down well & the casting isn't quite as bad as I thought (the only Jet for me will always be Michael Jai White though :p).
Milf man does a passable Spike but he doesn't look quite right. Given Spike's history it does make sense that he's older, he has the swagger but he doesn't have that ice cool factor so it comes off more like a Ryan Reynolds performance.
A minor gripe as well is the hair, It just doesn't look right, it lacks... Spike.

I reserve judgement on Faye for now as she's not had a huge presence yet.

The action though... It's not shaky cam which is a plus but instead employs lots and lots of jarring cuts that mess up the flow. The rare time they don't actually cut a move in a fight you can tell how AWKWARD Milf man is & the choreography stands out like a sore thumb because he struggles to hit his marks in a timely manner and you can see that the stuntman is clearly waiting.
It's a real shame because the scenes would be engaging if they were actually smoother.

Edit: As an aside, my ideal Spike would have been Mark Dacascos, he's been criminally neglected over the years. I think he has the appearance, the charisma & the martial arts ability (just watch Drive, the greatest American martial arts movie :p)
 
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serpantino said:
my ideal Spike would have been Mark Dacascos
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Not sure what age he must be by now, but that's not a bad shout - if they'd done it around the early 2000s maybe, I could absolutely see that. He's also good in the Canadian Crying Freeman movie, which is a surprisingly successful live-action anime/manga adaptation.
 
Professor Irony said:
Not sure what age he must be by now, but that's not a bad shout - if they'd done it around the early 2000s maybe, I could absolutely see that. He's also good in the Canadian Crying Freeman movie, which is a surprisingly successful live-action anime/manga adaptation.
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I think he's late 50s but he looks younger than Cho :p. If they kept Spike like the series where he's still young & was a naughty boy in his teen years then I'd agree but they seem to have made him older & more baggage ridden in the live action, plus they're focusing a lot more on vicious.
 
Magillanica Lou Mayvin said:
That said, a guy with a Judge Dread(?) lookalike avatar and debates over size can never end well, honestly.
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Oddly enough, similar ideas permeate in other areas of the internet about users with anime avatars. Crazy world we live in, eh?

I'd not actually seen that there'd been a discussion along those lines on the forum. Thanks for phrasing your reply in such a way as it looks like I was somehow involved in it. 😕 But yeah, racial stereotyping is bad. That's out of order. Sadly, so is a needlessly aggressive / hostile method of moderation when discussion could be a better solution. Which is why I don't frequent this board much anymore.

Anyway, more on topic: Since I've started seeing clips of Netflix Bebop, everything's felt really... off. Like the makers don't understand the tonality or the characters. Why is there so much casual swearing? Why is Faye suddenly obnoxiously mouthy? Why did anyone think that joke about the bidets was in keeping with Cowboy Bebop?

Nup. It ain't for me. I do hope folks who are having fun with it continue to enjoy it, though.
 
Watched the first episode, when it was added to Netflix. Almost stopped within the very same first 10mins that pleased Burt above. The comical overacting of the throwaway intro goons made me long for high budget animation. Went from anime goofy to live-action cringey, right there. They copied the movie intro with Spike walking into a hostage situation with his earphones on, but instead after getting off an elevator. This worked in the movie because he walked into a convenience store, feigning oblivious ignorance trying to buy something, and was short and sweet. The Netflix version wasn't.

I wasn't immediately down on it, though, as the SpikexJet banter, and Jet in particular as others have said, isn't terrible. He even sounds like the dub voice actor. Iffy with Jet randomly trying to emotionally blackmail Spike so he can give his new DAUGHTER a birthday gift, but okay. Bantz. Then however was more b-tier actors acting out episodic anime roles... and Faye. Since womens in 2021 need to not be sexualised and be equal to men, she first matched Spike in a fistfight, then started swearing/calling them ****ing idiots. A far cry from the anime version that happily uses her feminine wiles to seduce/trick. She was better without clothes tbh.

The real issue with this adaptation seems to be Vicious/Spike=Fearless. Unlike every other anime that lack any form of subtlety ("HE'S FAST, WHAT DO I DO" etcetc), Bebop stands out in a hugely positive way by only showing Spike's backstory in brief glimpses. Vicious only appeared when important. Julia wasn't introduced until near the end. Spike barely talked about himself, and the most backstory we got was Spike talking to Jet... about cats. The Netflix version totally misunderstands the anime and has Spike on the run from the dastardly organization and apparently codenamed FEARLESS as a plot point from ep1. Vicious is also a miscast cartoon quoting the character randomly. And Julia's riding his d still in this version, apparently.

I was bored by the 50min padding by ep2. There was a strong black woman and bald S&M person. All I recall. Oh, and yeah: Spike actor too old. He tries his best with the role.

HdE said:
Oddly enough, similar ideas permeate in other areas of the internet about users with anime avatars. Crazy world we live in, eh?

I'd not actually seen that there'd been a discussion along those lines on the forum. Thanks for phrasing your reply in such a way as it looks like I was somehow involved in it. 😕 But yeah, racial stereotyping is bad. That's out of order. Sadly, so is a needlessly aggressive / hostile method of moderation when discussion could be a better solution. Which is why I don't frequent this board much anymore.
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Antagonise at your own risk. My bite is VERY much worse than my bark. Not here to argue with fools.
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Apologies for not being punctual, Hi-di-ei. I was banned for a post in this very thread, ironically after saying our freedom of speech ilk 👌 are safe. And please do forgive me for assuming you were posting in support of Spike being too small, and had fiercely debated this very point, before being moderated previously. A simple misunderstanding, I assure you.

I do try not to judge a book by its cover unless critiquing forum avatars, which I don't think is crazy at all. Well, the world certainly is, but not the world of anime forum avatars. Pseudo internet psychology is an entertaining hobby of mine. For example, a male with the image of a 2D woman is unlikely to have ever conversed with a real one. 'Tis why I'm glad Magiloulou is a 3D video game character. Someone with a loli avatar is waaaaaaay more into children than is good; no doubt desiring a DAUGHTER. As for Judge X Dread, paired with a VERY intimidating signature I'd actually only just read - which may have scared me if not for my rabid Westie having bitten me yesterday - and a passive aggressive posting style... clearly, you're a tsundere that tries to be tsuntsun but, deep down, is deredere. Would you say that or being a very angry man best describes you, overall?
 
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Right time for final thoughts having watched the whole show.
There's only really one way to judge it or to be more accurate two ways; If you've seen & love the anime or if you've never seen the anime or have and don't love it.

New & meh - 6/10
As I said previously the dynamic between Jet & Spike is the best part and the story of Vicious & Julia is the weakest.
Taking it at face value and looking at it as a separate entity it's an good entertaining series with some good CGI but pretty shocking writing. The actors are mostly well cast but aren't given enough to work with.
IF and at this point I'd say its a pretty big IF it gets a second season they really need to tighten up their writing staff and maybe just get rid of the person who thought a bukkake joke in Bebop was a good idea 🤦‍♂️
There is very little world building. I noticed this after speaking to my brother and realising that most of what I knew about the show came from what I'd learned from the anime. The whole situation with earth and the whole concept of what the Cowboys ie. Bounty Hunters are and why they're a thing. The galaxy is a big place and there aren't enough police officers to catch criminals so they have Cowboys. Apart from the fact they only go after like 2? 3? Bounties on the show and the cops show up and kill one of them.


Seen & loved - 3/10 (warning NSFW)
Vicious!?!? What the actual ****!!! You took the galaxy's biggest boogeyman and made him a daddy's boy whimpering little bitch!
I've nothing against the actor he did the best with what he was given. It just so happens what he was given was absolute ****.

Next, Jet. I didn't mind them giving him a daughter in fact I quite liked it and thought it showed a different side of him... then they tainted it by making him the biggest cuck in the galaxy!
They have another cop banging his ex wife, raising his kid, throwing him jobs and saving him when he gets in trouble, then his daughter calls the new guy daddy at the end in front of Jet🤦‍♂
(he does have the best moustache in the galaxy though)

Faye. Is an entirely different character to the point where I don't think the writers actually watched the anime or understood her.
Case in point the whole Whitney episode and the way it ended with her smiling and flying off while Whitney looks on going that's my girl.

Ed..... not terrible but damn tone it down a bit, drop the wig for something that doesn't look so cheap and comic and could be OK.
Didn't really have much to go on so not gonna judge her too hard.

Fearless...... hahahahahaha


I kinda lost my way there and went rambling a bit. Sorry.
Short answer. If you ignore the original anime it's OK. If you loved the original and hold it in the highest regard its a sin against God.
 
CommanderZx2 said:
This certainly surprising, Netflix has never killed a show due to people disliking it otherwise they wouldn't have signed up Adam Sandler to make them 6 movies. I guess just it didn't attract many viewers.
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I can totally understand why given the reception.
Part of me wishes they got a second season but just replaced the entire writing team it had some good points.
At the same time the state in which the first season ended would've meant and almost entirely original story going forward and that would've been a bigger challenge for them than adapting the anime.
 
It crashed and burned, huh? I'm not surprised-I tried to watch the 1st episode and stopped 7 minutes in and said that's enough of this ****. As far as I'm concerned the series was DOA.
 
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