Keepin' On Bebopin'

I'm four episodes in now on the live action Cowboy Bebop and I've just started to realise how much I wanted it to be a good show. I still want it to be good, I fully intend to finish it. I keep focusing on the things that work--the sets, the ships, most of the costumes. Daniella Pineda is actually really good despite her ill-advised video mocking the fans. She has excellent comedic timing. And, you know what, she does show a lot of skin.

I think the awkward truth that no-one can say out loud is that she can't wear Faye's original costume because she's an endomorph. Faye's original costume would simply look really bad on her. If she were Uma Thurman or Bai Ling, it would've looked great. If I were casting the show, I would've looked for an ectomorphic comedienne from Singapore, then it would also match the anime Faye's ethnicity. But, on the other hand, Pineda's sense of timing is great so maybe it's worth changing the costume and her character.

Adrienne Barbeau as the eco-terrorist leader Maria Murdock was perfect casting. And I applaud her for taking such an unflattering role. I didn't like how the poison gas turns people into trees instead of monkeys, though. The monkey thing wasn't just hazardous for your health, it was embarrassing. I suspect that the idea of any physical attribute being embarrassing is too politically incorrect now, though.

This show is definitely diminished by some ideological leanings. The cops, the ISSP, who were corrupt in the original anime, are now ridiculous caricatures, right out of a "defund the police" wet dream. But the worst flaws in the show's writing aren't necessarily political.

The writers don't understand cool. Or they suspect cool is fascist. Spike in the anime was cool. Like Steve McQueen or Kowalski in Vanishing Point or Cary Grant in Notorious. A man of few words, seemingly relaxed, often when things around him are in turmoil. Live action Spike cracks stupid Revenge of the Nerds jokes, cackling with Jet about some Cosmonaut that Faye reminds them of. He makes you want to beat him up and take his lunch money.

My suspicion that they've simply removed his expertise in martial arts seems to have been accurate so far. It's kind of sad. It's like, the writers couldn't bring themselves to include it because they just couldn't muster that much faith in their own fantasy. Vicious (Alex Hassell) suffers from a similar problem. The cold badass from the anime is now a man who pathetically whines to Julia about how he is a real man. And Julia (Elena Satine) is petty and manipulative. Which is especially disappointing because Elena Satine is really beautiful in the role.

Spike has a scene with Ana--who's so different from the anime she's basically a whole new character--where he explains to her he can't tell Jet about his syndicate past because he's afraid Jet won't understand. And, he tells Ana, that would break the both of them. Ugh. This is like Chris Chibnall territory--a character actually explaining his motivation. It's also a shit motivation--and definitely not cool. Spike didn't tell Jet about it in the anime because he didn't need to and dredging up the past was a painful prospect in itself. That was clear without Spike ever once having to say it.

The head writer on this live action Cowboy Bebop is Christopher Yost. The good press for Yost touts him as the writer of Thor: Ragnarok and The Mandalorian. He was a writer, of three writers, on Thor: Ragnarok, and he also worked on the infamous Thor: Dark World with two other writers. He co-wrote one episode of The Mandalorian, a teleplay I hated, for an episode I only liked because of the presence of Bill Burr. So I guess I shouldn't be surprised his Cowboy Bebop would turn out this way.

Even so, like a sucker, I'm going to keep watching. The idea that Cowboy Bebop could ever be resurrected has always seemed impossible but that very impossibility has always made it the more tantalising.

This live action version is available on Netflix.