Cowboy Bebop Genre: Action Asuka-chan's Overall Score: 10

Reviewer: Asuka-chan
Type of Review: General

Cowboy Bebop, directed by Shinichiro Watanabe and Character Designer, Toshihiro Kawamoto. Both who did an excellent job with this series. This series was not based on a manga, but rather the manga that is out there came second. Which allowed quite a bit of freedom. In addition the manga does not seem able to do it justice, and has had only a very limited run in that they are not doing a manga version of the entire series.

This is a series that I would recommend to most people, there is only one minor questionable moment for the younger audiences, at which point a transgender character is shown to be both male and female (nothing too graphic, and not for a large amount of time). There is a fair amount of guns and shooting and one episode deals with drug use, but not by our heroes of the series. It is a series that could be called gritty, and far from idealizes the lifestyles of the characters within the series.

This Action/Sci-fi series is both a comedy and a drama, however it is not the type of drama that is a "in your face" drama either. The series starts off with the adventures of two bounty hunters: Spike and Jet who is a former cop, and within a few episodes add the remaining main characters of Faye, a fellow bounty hunter, A young child, Ed and last but not least Ein who is a scientifically created dog who is probably the brightest of all the characters. Who all come to live upon the spaceship "Bebop".

The series follows the mismatched group as they go around trying to collect bounties so that they can get some money. Despite their attempts not to work together, they usually end up doing so out of desperation to get some money so they can at least get some money for their next meal.

The drama comes in when we learn more about each character and see that despite their carefree lifestyles and attitudes that each has some sort of dark element in their past, that they have each tried to get away from. With the exception being Ed and Ein where the choice of leaving their pasts behind was not theirs. A past, in which they learn through the course of the series that they cannot actually avoid completely and that each must come to terms with.

One of the key parts of this series is not the characters or the artwork, but rather the music that is done by Yoko Kanno. One could argue that it is just as important as the characters at the same time however it is not involved in the way most series use music, you never see a character singing any of it. But rather the music is a character in the series, much like the three old men who are continually popping up in most if not all the episodes. This is one of the aspects that goes to make Cowboy Bebop such a new and exciting. It helps clue you into the mood of the series and of the characters and gives us an additional method to get "into the character's heads".

This series could probably be considered one of Bandai's bigger successes to date. It has become widely popular in the United States and is aired on a regular basis (as of 5/2003) on the American cable network channel Cartoon Network.