A Shirt on Sunday: Cowboy Bebop
I know there's a lot of anime fans on Steem - far better informed and widely watched than I am, but here's the show that I consider the peak of the genre...
Kaubōi Bibappu, according to WkipediaIf you only ever watch one anime series, it should be this one. Released in the late 90’s, Cowboy Bebop was a minor hit and opened up the English language market for anime serials.
If memory serves, I picked up a 2-VCD (Video CDs, kids! They’re the future!) of the film, subtitled ‘Knocking on Heaven’s Door’, in Singapore, around about 2002. There was a shop with all sorts of stuff you couldn’t get in the UK and this was on display, presumably as a new release. Luckily it was subtitled in English. Establishing that fact could itself be a challenge as the disc packaging sold in Singapore would be in Chinese, necessitating a complex discussion with a shop assistant, to define what subtitles were, what language was needed, and then if the particular disc under discussion had them. The guy sold me ‘Ju-On as well – the original Japanese made-for-TV trilogy known in English as ‘The Grudge’. Even with subtitles they made no sense at all, which saved me from becoming obsessed with dodgy Japanese horror films.
I didn’t even know if our DVD player could play VCDs.
It did, and I was entranced. Spike Siegal, a one-time member of a crime syndicate and Jet Black, ex-policeman and owner and pilot of the spaceship Cowboy Bebop are bounty hunters. They are unfortunately not very good at being paid and are perpetually broke. The film opens with a criminal being capture at a 7-11 in a set-piece Tarantino would love. From there we head into space and meet Faye Valentine – a failed gambler avoiding her creditors, Radical Edward – a hyperactive female hacker, and Ein – a genetically modified corgi who is smarter than the rest put together. It is a future where bounty hunters have their own TV show on the latest cases and mankind is expanding through the galaxy, taking with it all the crime and craziness it devised back on Earth.
Jet, Spike, Faye, Ed & Ein SourceSpike and Faye are two of the sexiest characters ever drawn while the scripts and artwork are a nod to the classic noir of The Maltese Falcon and it’s like. There are space battles, fisticuffs, heartbreak, passion, gunfights, rooftop chases and a lot of bad cooking. On top of that there is an incredible soundtrack. The Cowboy Bebop theme tune is a cool jazz masterpiece while the series music covers every 20th Century genre.
The 26 episodes of the series introduce the characters, hunt down many criminals and slowly tease out the history of the future and Spike’s complex back story, which eventually leads to his undoing. The final episodes are nail-biting stuff and the ending a shock. This is NOT Scooby Doo.
Seeing Cowboy Bebop re-invigorated my interest in anime and manga, which hasn’t abated to this day. The t-shirt is a one-off, produced by Janet for my birthday using a still from the DVD.
Anime is life, and Cowboy Bebop started it all for me.