Cowboy Bebop

More casting news over the wire -

https://twitter.com/NXOnNetflix/status/1329424217171890177

No word on Ed.

Radical Edward will now be a CGI character

So, looks like they are changing Shin & Lin to fraternal twins.

And genderflipping Mao.

Also Gren is described as a "right-hand person", in a gender neutral sense.

Ed and Ein will both be played by Andy Serkis.

News is news. As long as something's happening with this. Interesting that Mao, Shin, and Lin are important enough that they've already been cast. Wonder if that'll be in the present or in flashbacks. Wonder if this means Mao won't be killed off less than a minute after being introduced. I mean, if Ana is Anastasia and she has a right-hand person, that seems like her role has been expanded, too. And I wonder if Chalmers is Fad, or if this is a different partner.

Casting is fine but I hope they don't go overboard trying to flesh out Spike's backstory.

Not having a surplus of details about the people from his past enhanced the narrative flow.

If they feel like they have to give it a consistent narrative, I kinda hope they do it in the way that Blood Blockade Battlefront handled it in the anime adaptation for that. Most of the show was standalone episodes, but there's a bit near the end of each episode tied to the main plot, with a couple episodes about that main plot. The pacing turned out a little wonky, but with an hour to work with, it would be a bit easier to balance it. Like, little hints and nods towards the central plot...I guess sort of like a less inept version of a 2005-2008 Doctor Who story arc, where you can take most of the episodes separately, but there is something building in the background.

The thing I hate, HATE about reboots or adaptations? When the backstory or origin story of a character is changed to be more complex or just changed for the hell of it.

The midiclorians in Star Wars is a good example of a Voodoo Shark added for no good reason.

Pragmatic Adaptation gets a free pass - sometimes it's just easy to cut stuff out or change things. The Dark Knight has a good take on the Joker that is iconic even if it drops many elements from the comics.

Faye Valentine getting Adaptational Modesty doesn't really bother me.

What does is adding a story that doesn't make sense or larding up scenes with "backstory".

Spike & the rest of the Bebop crew were interesting because the show doled out their backstory over the course of the series.

I don't need the backstory of the characters to be 100% true to the source - I don't want it to slow down the pacing and I do want it to make sense.

Daniella Pineda confirmed in an Instagram post that production on season 1 is finally finished.

Goddamn, was John Cho's accident all the way back in 2019? I'm glad he recovered, but that's just another thing that feels like it was just a few months ago, even though this past year feels like the past four years.

Anyway. Very nice. Tensely awaiting our first glimpse of the show in action.

Ohhhh no. I was very much aware of this show's production being on halt. Good he's recovered at least.

Netflix is doing a virtual convention June 7-11 and with it are promising the first look at Bebop.

Dammit Netflix, just drop a trailer already.

Zendervai: Im guessing that how exactly gonna happen since for most of the time, cowboy bepop dosent have a central arc like other series, not even a "this happen in background while episode are happing", there is a sort of mystery arc with spike about julia, vicious and all that but that it, it play a little a episode 5 and 8, them episode 13 and them in the last episodes.

I guess they will make that more prominent to give a stronger sense of continuity.

Anime fans are used to things like Gainax Ending and some of the ...odd..pacing choices in Anime scripting.

Joe and Jane Sixpack, clicking on that "Bebop show" in their Netflix cue would need a more conventional A and B plot. Sure the Myth Arc had been around since the 90's (thank you Babylon 5) but it's only after the mid-2000's that general audiences got used to it.

So Imma guess that the live action show will have an A and B plot and some episodes that drop the Myth Arc for the show to keep audiences interested.

I'd much prefer that. One of the biggest problem with let's the say the Marvel Netflix shows is they didn't really have those case-of-the-week episodes. They insisted that everything be devoted to they myth arc, which would often lead to extremely slow plotting or What An Idiot moments. Cowboy Bebop I feel was much better for having varied 'filler' episodes so to speak (I know they aren't actually filler, I couldn't think of a better name).

The binge-watch model has lead to some bad storytelling approaches. A lot of people approach shows they know will be released all at once like a 6-10 part movie, which really, really hurts a lot of stories because they aren't supposed to be handled that way. This is part of the reason for the Netflix bloat issue. You can't have a one-off breather episode when you approach the whole thing as one story with no breaks, but if you only have enough material for 6 or 7 out of 8 episodes, you get stuck with an episode or two where nothing happens but it's trying to convince you that it's really important.

Edited by Zendervai on Jun 6th 2021 at 10:54:39 AM

The binge approach has led to what's called "Netflix Bloat" as well, in which a season is padded out to provide a full complement of episodes when the overarching story could probably have been told much faster.

Thing is that Cowboy Bebop doesn't really have a story arc, what Myth Arc they do have is not one ongoing story, but they do have immensely detailed lore surrounding every location and event. I don't think there is anything wrong with adding a some degree of serial storytelling, but I don't want that to come at the cost of the dense world building atmosphere that defines the show.

I never really got into the MCU Netflix shows because I felt they leaned a little too heavily on the dramatic conversations in dark rooms or nighttime alleyways, which was a necessity for budget but the setting never came alive for me with the level of detail that Cowboy Bebop would.

Well, the setting will help there. MCU Netflix takes place in New York. Everyone knows what New York looks like, so focusing on that would feel relatively pointless.

A sci-fi space travel series, on the other hand, is naturally inclined towards showing off the locations (budget permitting. I love Killjoys, but the tiny budget meant most of the locations had like, a five second establishing shot and everything else was shot inside like, a school or whatever). Netflix won't give this show a Killjoys budget.

I mean I do feel there were two Myth Arcs but it was tied more to Spike and Faye specifically and while they were seperate they both detailed their pasts respectively. Jet and Edward you explored their pasts but there wasn't a narrative that flowed from that. The Myth Arcs also took up a small chunk of the series percentage wise.

Not myth arcs, really, but definitely character arcs. Spike's does result in a story arc, and Faye's does too, to a lesser extent. Ed and Jett's just result in some character development.

But there is an overarching theme of dealing with the past, or having one's past catch up to them, throughout the series as a whole, and touches on all the central characters.

Edited by Robbery on Jun 6th 2021 at 4:14:02 AM

Spike and Faye's character arcs are especially non-linear, both have something of a conclusion but is not a dramatic beginning, middle and end.

And when I bring up the setting it's not about the budget to represent a sci-fi city but about populating the locations with a sense of history and colorful characters. While that is also tied to budget (extras, bit players and complex set design does take a little bit more money), its more about making that a priority. Despite the future setting, Cowboy Bebop is not so futuristic that you can't dress up existing locations just a little to make it work.

No trailer apparently, just an announcement that it's coming this fall.

And Yoko Kanno is coming in as composer.

Hell to the yeah!