Cowboy Bebop
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Cowboy Bebop is a multi-genre anime series directed by Shinichiro Watanabe and featuring a stellar soundtrack from composer Yoko Kanno (Escaflowne, Macross Plus).
The series is licensed by Bandai Entertainment. It premiered on [adult swim] on its inaugural night in September 2001.
Contents |
Plot
In the year 2071, scientific barriers have been broken, space travel has become a reality, and most of the solar system has now been colonized and linked by hyperspace gates, but at the same time a new breed of criminal has emerged. Cowboy Bebop follows the trail of a team of intergalactic bounty hunters aboard the fishing ship Bebop whose only mission is to survive in the new frontier of space and the Wild-West-like times in which they live. Although bounty hunting is a high-paying game for these space cowboys, they always end up losing the cash largely because of damage expenses or circumstances beyond their control.
The series is unique for its plot which fuses together multiple genres of movies and television (film noir, science fiction, Western, etc.) and its influences from American music, particularly blues and jazz, which is reflected in its story structure as well as its soundtrack.
History
Cowboy Bebop has proven itself to be among the most popular of the action programming on [adult swim]. It has stayed on the block since its inception in September 2001 and is still one of its widest-received anime shows.
Characters
Spike Spiegel
A man with a complicated past, Spike, during the series, is a bounty hunter who gets by on his martial arts skills along with help from his partners on the Bebop. He often runs into bad luck when trying to catch his bounty. He uses the Swordfish II, a ship that is considered an antique of sorts, but packs a punch.
Jet Black
The straight man in a crew comprising of a dog, a kid, and a maniac, Jet worked for the ISSP before joining up with Spike to become bounty hunters. He often acts as a fatherly figure, and was known as the "black dog" when he was in the ISSP.
Faye Valentine
A gambler whose past is as much a mystery to her as it is to us. She has a massive debt hanging above her that seems impossible to ever pay off, and often follows around Spike and Jet in their quest to get money from big bounties.
Edward Wong Hau Pepelu Tivrusky IV
A child hacker from Earth, Ed is a mysterious girl (though that also remains a mystery) who joins the Bebop crew in episode nine, and there on becomes a crucial helper.
Ein
Ein is a dog, but not your ordinary canine. He was supposedly a data dog developed for reasons that remain unknown throughout the series.
Vicious
A member of the red dragon, and Spike's former apprentice in the syndicate, Vicious is someone who continues to haunt Spike in the present and the past.
Julia
The woman from Spike's past, and the only woman he has loved. She makes the connection between Spike and Vicious.
Credits
| Original Concept | Hajime Yatate | U.S. Licensor | Bandai Entertainment |
| Director | Shinichiro Watanabe | ADR Production | Animaze |
| Planning | Sunrise | ADR Director | Melissa Williamson |
| Character Design | Toshihiro Kawamoto | ADR Script | Marc Handler |
| Color Key | Tomoni Hashimoto | ||
| Art Direction | Yoshiyuki Ito | English Vocal Cast | |
| Color Setting | Yukari Goto | Stephen Jay Blum | Spike Spiegel |
| Art Direction | Junichi Higashi | John Billingslea | Jet Black |
| Director of Photography | Yoichi Ogami | Wendee Lee | Faye Valentine |
| Music | Yoko Kanno | Melissa Fahn | Edward Won Hau Pepelu Tivrusky IV |
| Music Producer | Toshiaki Ohta | ||
| Animation Production | Sunrise | ||
| Production | Bandai Visual Sunrise |
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Sessions
| 1 | Asteroid Blues (9/2/2001) Spike and Jet are on the trail of Asimov Solensan, a man who ran away from his syndicate with a shipment of "Bloody Eye", an addictive and highly dangerous drug. While Jet hits up for some clues, Spike befriends an expectant mother. |
| 2 | Stray Dog Strut (9/2/2001) Abdul Hakim has stolen a valuable item from a research laboratory, and Spike and Jet are on his tail. But they're not the only ones chasing after him...nor is the item the only thing they're chasing after! |
| 3 | Honky Tonk Women (9/9/2001) Faye Valentine, a hard-luck gambling woman on the run from the authorities, crosses paths with Spike and Jet in a Mars casino where she is involved in a shady microchip deal. |
| 4 | Gateway Shuffle (9/9/2001) Spike and Jet capture Twinkle Maria Murdock, leader of a band of eco-terrorists, but run into a problem cashing the bounty. Meanwhile, stranded in space, Faye receives a mysterious briefcase from a dying man. |
| 5 | Ballad of Fallen Angels (9/23/3001) Spike's past comes back to haunt him when he goes after his old mentor Mao Yenrai, leader of the Red Dragon Syndicate, and discovers that an old friend and comrade Vicious has set a trap for him. |
| 6 | Sympathy for the Devil (12/16/2001*) When Spike's next bounty hands him a ring with his last breath, the Bebop crew finds a connection between it and a young musician named Gwen. |
| 7 | Heavy Metal Queen (9/23/2001) The Bebop is on the trail of an illegal explosives dealer when Spike meets V.T., a space trucker with no love for bounty hunters. |
| 8 | Waltz for Venus (12/23/2001*) While cashing in a bounty on Venus, Spike meets a man named Roco who wants to learn his Jeet Kun Do skills. After he leaves him a rare Venusian plant, Spike later learns his pupil is one of the gang they are now looking for. |
| 9 | Jamming with Edward (9/30/2001) An orbital satellite makes strange markings on the Earth's surface. The Bebop crew investigates, and along the way meets the brilliant kid hacker "Radical Edward", who is believed to be responsible. |
| 10 | Ganymede Elegy (9/30/2001) The Bebop is delivering a captured criminal to the Ganymede police when Jet pays his ex-girlfriend a visit, unaware that her new beau has a bounty on his head. |
| 11 | Toys in the Attic (10/7/2001) It's a lazy day on the Bebop when an unknown creature roams about the ship attacking the crew. |
| 12 | Jupiter Jazz, Part I (10/7/2001) Faye has deserted the Bebop, but not without cleaning out the safe first! Spike and Jet ask Ed to track her down, but she comes up with another woman's name--Julia--which sends Spike to a town on Calisto with no women. |
| 13 | Jupiter Jazz, Part II (10/14/2001) While on Calisto, Faye has met a friendly jazz musician named Gren who is more than meets the eye. Meanwhile, Jet's still looking for Faye, while Spike, still looking for Julia, confronts Vicious once more. |
| 14 | Bohemian Rhapsody (10/14/2001) A string of robberies at hyperspace gate tollbooths has the Bebop crew searching for the mastermind. Their search leads them to a senile old chess player who plays a game with Ed. |
| 15 | My Funny Valentine (10/21/2001) Who is Faye Valentine? Even she doesn't know. The first thing she can remember is waking up in a cryogenic sleep chamber about three years ago... |
| 16 | Black Dog Serenade (10/21/2001) A group of convicts hijack a prison transport ship bound for Pluto, and Jet's old ISSP partner calls him for help. It seems the ringleader was a man Jet attempted to take down on that one fateful day... |
| 17 | Mushroom Samba (10/28/2001) Out of fuel and out of food, the Bebop is struck by a hit-and-run driver and forced to crash land on Io. Ed and Ein are sent out to get some food, but instead join in a hunt for a dealer of illegal mushrooms. |
| 18 | Speak Like a Child (10/28/2001) Jet is stuck paying C.O.D. charges when a package arrives for Faye and she's not around to receive it. The videotape inside leads them on a trip to old Earth to pick up a VCR that will play it. |
| 19 | Wild Horses (11/4/2001) The Bebop is tailing a trio of pirate hackers while Spike takes his ship in for repairs. |
| 20 | Pierrot le Fou (11/4/2001) Spike runs afoul of Mad Pierrot, a superhuman killing machine with the mind of a child. |
| 21 | Boogie Woogie Feng Shui (11/11/2001) A mysterious e-mail sees Jet meet up with the daughter of an old feng shui expert who is on the run from syndicate hit men. She is searching for her missing father, and a strange stone which will hopefully reunite her with him. |
| 22 | Cowboy Funk (2/15/2002*) Spike is on the trail of an oft-ignored serial bomber when he meets Andy, a rival bounty hunter who takes the term "cowboy" quite literally. |
| 23 | Brain Scratch (11/11/2001) SCRATCH is a cult that believes one can transcend his physical body by uploading his soul to the Internet. The Bebop crew is on the case when its leader, Londes, has a bounty on his head for his cult's high suicide rate. |
| 24 | Hard Luck Woman (11/18/2001) Faye discovers a vital clue to her past, while Ed revisits her old home and is reunited with her father. |
| 25 | The Real Folk Blues, Part I (11/18/2001) Vicious' attempted coup on the Red Dragon Syndicate fails, and the elders sentence him to death. Anyone associated with him is to be hunted down, including Spike and Julia. Faye, meanwhile, has a run-in with Julia, who asks her to relay a message to Spike. |
| 26 | The Real Folk Blues, Part II (11/25/2001) Spike and Julia are reunited at last, but with Vicious and his new syndicate hot on their trail, can they really escape together? |
*Episodes 6, 8 and 22 were omitted from the series' initial broadcast for content parallel to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Movie
Cowboy Bebop: Knockin' on Heaven's Door (IMDb entry) (US title: Cowboy Bebop: The Movie) premiered in theaters in Japan on September 1, 2001. It was released on DVD in the US in 2003 after a two-year delay due to the film's subject matter parallel to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
The story takes place between episodes 22 and 23 of the series. When a tanker truck explodes on a busy city street on Mars releasing a deadly viral infection in the air, a bounty of 300 million woolongs is offered for the capture of the man responsible, which instantly attracts the Bebop crew. But the case takes a turn for the strange when the mastermind behind it, a man by the name of Vincent Volaju, was reported dead ten years ago, while Spike meets a mysterious woman named Electra who is after him as well. And it seems Vincent has something bigger planned for the city's upcoming Halloween parade...
The film aired on [adult swim] on September 3, 2005.
