Honestly I just don't understsnd why some people insist of believing you can take an outstanding animated series and "improve" it by doing it live action...
When is someone going to remake heavy metal live action?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Wasn't cowboy bebop good enough as it was? Will live action just be an excuse to stick in some bare breasts?
Yeesh. At least Shinichiro Watanabe and some of the people from the original studio are producing/consulting. But yeah, doing a live-action recreation of an anime series is a pretty fruitless endeavor, and is surely going to attract the ire of fans no matter how they handle it.
There’s not that much ground to cover. Bebop wasn’t a really long running series, and the vast majority of it is slice of life, with only a handful of episodes really dealing with the overarching plot.
LordofHats wrote: Because after ruining 80s merchandising empires, Hollywood has moved on to murdering the 90s anime boom.
This.
Netflix has produced some outstanding shows of late though, hopefully this will be another.
The only positive about this is that these live action adaptations have a much broader audience than anime so I will be able to discuss the plot of Cowboy Bebop with my Dad for example who will not watch an anime. The same happened with Death Note and the FMA movie, both of which are garbage imo but at least Dad enjoyed them lol
In Japan it's very common for that kind of thing to start in one medium, then move to others.
For example there's a live action film of Gantz, and a live action film of Deadnote, both of which started as manga. Haruhi Suzumiya started as a light novel, then moved to manga, then anime.
Nearly anything popular gets exploited in several different formats.
How often do they remake anything that was popular? (and the destroy it, but if get money, all the time now is what matters):
Conan the Barbarian
Total recall
The Mummy
Arthur
etc etc etc
Awesome anime or cartoon, destroyed:
DBZ is number one, how bad was dragonball... (I mean I liked Spike in Buffy, but as Piccolo, this short ass and was (ironically) the smallest forepart, that destroyed this film)
Think they did a live action Fist of the North Star as well which was atrocious.
Many bad video game adaptations as well (a few good ones, like the first Mortal Kombat was awesome for when it came out, I loved it and I loved the first Resident Evil when it first came out etc).
I'll need to report you for that thoughtcrime, RiTides. You're supposed to complain that it's "raped your childhood", "destroyed the original" and other such hyperbole.
It could be good, but good luck to the writers and the producers. Cowboy Bebop is an anime in which you find Miles Davis, Hong Kong movies, Wim Wenders, Blade Runner, and Georges Dumézil. With fantastic atmosphere a and memorable universe and characters, whose interactions and motivations are sometimes just hinted and reward a re-watch. References to older anime like Lupin III and Captain Harlock. Plus a killer Soundtrack, of course. Good luck re-making THAT.
Really Cowboy Bebop was a decent and cool story with good characters. But the thing that really made it stand out to me was the animation. You can't duplicate that in live action so I suppose it will fail. Honestly Ghost in the shell was the same thing - but that failed for other reasons. Mainly - Scarlet Johansen.
slave.entity wrote: Wasn't Masamune Shirow also consulted for the live action Ghost in the Shell? Didn't save it.
To date, there are no examples of good live action anime adaptions.
Better question was why did gits"fail". if i recall its mostly due to the whole white washing nonsense that it got wrapped up in.
the movie was stunning visually and the story wasnt bad. if anything my only gripe with the movie was the under utilization of the secondary characters.
Bebop could actually fit into a single film fairly well. Yes the story would have to change to accomplish this, but it could be done.
They could even speed it up if they start half way through a bit like the Firefly film. Ergo don't go through finding the crew, but have them established and on a job and use that to introduce them all. Feys story doesn't "really" matter if you focus purely on Spikes story as the core storyline; whilst Eine and Edward can be glossed over as well somewhat.
Again its not that their stories are not important, but that if you are going for a film they could easily just focus on Spike, the breakup of the crew and the final ending. It would lack the impact of the series, but it could be done.
Then again they could do what they diid for the animated film, a one off adventure. The crew certainly went on more than we saw in the series so there's loads of room to fit in loads of stuff and a few choice locations without impacting anything already established.
Well it sounds like its going to be a series. So no need to cram or streamline the overaching plot. Hopefully they leave room for some of the stand alone bounty hunter slice of life stories.
Didn't Cowboy Bebop already have a live-action adaptation? I seem to remember it getting quite the cult following after being canceled too soon. Seem to remember it going by the title "Firefly"
Galef wrote: Didn't Cowboy Bebop already have a live-action adaptation?
I seem to remember it getting quite the cult following after being canceled too soon. Seem to remember it going by the title "Firefly"
slave.entity wrote: Wasn't Masamune Shirow also consulted for the live action Ghost in the Shell? Didn't save it.
To date, there are no examples of good live action anime adaptions.
Better question was why did gits"fail". if i recall its mostly due to the whole white washing nonsense that it got wrapped up in.
the movie was stunning visually and the story wasnt bad. if anything my only gripe with the movie was the under utilization of the secondary characters.
IMO the idiotic whitewash was part of it.
The seconf part is that the original gits was a deeply thoughtful and intelligent story that dealt with fundamental issues of what is humanity and can a thinking, sentient being be equal to human?
The live action movie was "Hot badass babe gets screwed by evil guys and goes after them". Yawn.
slave.entity wrote: Wasn't Masamune Shirow also consulted for the live action Ghost in the Shell? Didn't save it.
To date, there are no examples of good live action anime adaptions.
Better question was why did gits"fail". if i recall its mostly due to the whole white washing nonsense that it got wrapped up in.
the movie was stunning visually and the story wasnt bad. if anything my only gripe with the movie was the under utilization of the secondary characters.
IMO the idiotic whitewash was part of it.
The seconf part is that the original gits was a deeply thoughtful and intelligent story that dealt with fundamental issues of what is humanity and can a thinking, sentient being be equal to human?
The live action movie was "Hot badass babe gets screwed by evil guys and goes after them". Yawn.
Wait really its been a while but i recall a lot of the plot involving around consent and the rights of corporations over "property" which is a pretty relevant nowadays.
Both the original series and live action had hot badass babe action going after perceived evil guys which end up being a "good or neutral" guy type thing so thats pretty moot.
as well the white washing in the sense of the setting also makes sense considering it is a western corporation with western doctors whom probably have a bias towards white bods which is another interesting aspect of the rights and consent. and identity politics (whether it was touched upon honestly i need to go watch it again but these were the aspects i recall and or could be touched upon from the story)
Honestly I just don't understsnd why some people insist of believing you can take an outstanding animated series and "improve" it by doing it live action...
Why? Because something has some recognition, so therefore it's more likely to make money. And you get to re-sell the old stuff to new people and sell new merchandise too!
The actors still look like they're cosplaying the characters, rather than playing them (Faye especially), and there's no Ed. Still, the three fighter craft are there, there's a lot of direct references to many episodes in there. Could be good.
The actors still look like they're cosplaying the characters, rather than playing them (Faye especially)
The few glimpses of set and costumes we get look like it leans hard into Doctor Who sort of visual camp, which I think isn't quite right for the series.
So they made Ein a corgie again - good - but then no Ed?
Considering the very hammy style they've done for the intro, at least, Ed would at least fit that theme of acting and production style perfectly.
I do agree there is something "off" and in the Dr Who or "Cosplay" kinda style they've gone for. It might just be what they've done for the theme for the intro and the actual show will appear different.
edit - unless finding Ed is part of the storyline for the film and therefore she doesn't appear in the opening trailer.
That trailer does some weird uncanny valley thing to me, just in the opposite direction!
You know, trying to get animation to look like real people, but the end result being rather disturbing. In this case, trying to to look like the Cowboy Beebop intro, but the end result being rather disturbing...
If someone had said "look at what these enthusiastic and talented YouTubers have managed to do!", I'd have been impressed; but coming from a professional show with Shinichiro Watanabe's name on it (not that he had any say in any of it...), just... urgh.
slave.entity wrote: Wasn't Masamune Shirow also consulted for the live action Ghost in the Shell? Didn't save it.
To date, there are no examples of good live action anime adaptions.
Better question was why did gits"fail". if i recall its mostly due to the whole white washing nonsense that it got wrapped up in.
the movie was stunning visually and the story wasnt bad. if anything my only gripe with the movie was the under utilization of the secondary characters.
IMO the idiotic whitewash was part of it.
The seconf part is that the original gits was a deeply thoughtful and intelligent story that dealt with fundamental issues of what is humanity and can a thinking, sentient being be equal to human?
The live action movie was "Hot badass babe gets screwed by evil guys and goes after them". Yawn.
IMHO, Ghost In The Shell (the manga) has mostly been misunderstood in the spinoffs & movies etc. Most of them somehow make the story about the action, whereas to me the OG GITS was always a "detective story". I think I've seen most of the spinoff content, and AFAIK only the series "Ghost In The Shell: ARISE" has that OG detective story vibe going on.
If anyone wants to make more GITS, it has to be more Blade Runner (detectives.. in SPACE) and less Micael Bay blockbuster gun/mecha pron. This is what I hated about the most recent movie, it totally failed in the detective story department.
Has there ever been a good live action rendition of an anime that has got the styling spot on?
I find that is always the thing that doesn't work for me, the styling and mood of the setting never translates. I think some of it comes down to the sound design as well.
In the ghost in the shell, there were one or two outstanding elements (the assassin cyborgs at the start and the spider tank at the ending off the top of my head) but obviously the rest was terrible.
If they want to make some money off the IP, do an anime spin off in universe.
When really, its the long bit of actionless dialogue that follows shortly after the fight that was in fact the point.
The spider tank was Too iconic, to the point they keep imitating it in other iterations. I mean how many times has she ripped her own arms off trying to bare hand the hatch of a tank?
You're having troubling coming to grips with the fact you are no longer the target audience and your participation is nice not the primary goal. Medias prime target is is in the 16-24 range, even when playing on nostalgia. Sure there are outliers but generally speaking that is why a lot of this is done. The original came out in 1998 so even assuming you didn't see it until 2000 that still means if you were 16 then you are 37 now. You watching it is icing on the cake but your kids are who they want.
A lot of reboots are aimed primarily at the nostalgia money of the original audience. Its one of the reasons they fail so often- they don't attract a new audience and/or the 30-somethings (or 40-somethings) don't like the changes. See the Dragonball movie, which AFAIK, appealed to nobody.
The worst performances are usually reserved for the properties where it turns out no one cares about it, not new audiences nor the nostalgia crowd.
As popular as it was with many people, I don't think I know anyone that has watched it other than myself.
It's still very niche.
...It's literally responsible for bringing Anime to the west. I don't think in over 20 years of being a fan I've ever met a person who didn't know the show. Maybe different generations?
I've never seen Cowboy Bebop. I only know the name from the Official Soundtrack I DLed back in the day from Napster LOL
Manga video (was it a UK thing?) was my first exposure to anime stuff. Akira was the thing everyone was watching in my youth. Admittedly, I haven't been keeping up with anime stuff in two almost two decades, don't think I've seen anything really interesting after watching Serial Experiments: Lain. It's a genre with quite a lot of chaff innit
Chillreaper wrote: That trailer does some weird uncanny valley thing to me, just in the opposite direction!
You know, trying to get animation to look like real people, but the end result being rather disturbing. In this case, trying to to look like the Cowboy Beebop intro, but the end result being rather disturbing...
If someone had said "look at what these enthusiastic and talented YouTubers have managed to do!", I'd have been impressed; but coming from a professional show with Shinichiro Watanabe's name on it (not that he had any say in any of it...), just... urgh.
Beyond just kind of being incredible, I'd say its most important accomplishment was the sheer quality of the dub. It was one of the first that took voice acting really seriously with a seasoned cast and opened the door for not abysmal dubs that made it MUCH easier to air anime on US television. It was a big part of what shifted the perception of "cartoons" to something that could be treated with care. It's also just... really, really good.
As for the Netflix version.... yeah, being a direct copy seems awful. Just... why? The original hasn't aged a day. The opening here feels particularly weird because it fits in a lot of clips of scenes that distract from the silhouette aesthetic of the original. Watch them side by side and its pretty obvious what's off is the push of 70's era character clips. And yes, the whole thing has their weird YouTube cosplay feel.
AduroT wrote: I’d wager Toonami Dragonball brought anime to the west, but that was so long ago I don’t remember clearly.
Yeah, I still distinctly recall middle school me making fun of some of my friends for liking that DBZ stuff, and that was 96-98. Per Wikipedia, CB came out in 1998 (though I doubt it hit The West/English speaking regions that quickly), so it would've been after at least some of the DBZ stuff.
As for the live action show, well, I am in the middle of watching the original anime for the first time. I don't hate live action Faye's outfit, but I dont love it either. . . .Like, its a combination of "why couldn't they be more true to source?" and "well, Faye's animated outfits are just ludicrously skimpy/impossible to pull off in today's environment". And from a few interviews I've seen, it looks like the show isn't supposed to be a carbon copy of the anime, even if in the opening sequence we see a few scenes directly copied. It seems they are going to use some of those seminal moments of the anime and explore other facets of those situations? I dunno, I think its all a bit wait and see for me and the wife (who introduced me to the series), and I'll approach the netflix series with an open mind, and try to judge it on its own merits
endlesswaltz123 wrote: Has there ever been a good live action rendition of an anime that has got the styling spot on?
I find that is always the thing that doesn't work for me, the styling and mood of the setting never translates. I think some of it comes down to the sound design as well.
In the ghost in the shell, there were one or two outstanding elements (the assassin cyborgs at the start and the spider tank at the ending off the top of my head) but obviously the rest was terrible.
If they want to make some money off the IP, do an anime spin off in universe.
Black butler's live action movie got it down perfectly.
AduroT wrote: I’d wager Toonami Dragonball brought anime to the west, but that was so long ago I don’t remember clearly.
LOTS of anime predates Bebop. Or Dragon Ball. I mean, I was watching Voltron in the early 80's. Even Dragonball had early morning runs on various networks before Toonami brought it to prime time. The important thing to remember about Bebop is really how well it was translated. DBZ came across HEAVILY censored with a handful of voice actors doing goofy voices for the different characters. That was pretty much the norm in the US. Cartoons were for kids and kind of one man performances from the days of Mel Blanc. The few exceptions were stuff sold to the edgy MTV crowd, but even the likes of Ninja Scroll had terrible performances. The few attempts at high profile dubs (Princess Mononoke) often brought in professional actors but didn't really result in great translations.
Bebop REALLY changed the game on dub quality. Steve Blum is so prolific now its almost a running gag, but that's just because he set a new standard for what could be expected from western voice acting. It had been a change that brewed throughout the 90's on the back of Batman TAS, but it really took off with Bebop. Not just a huge leap in the quality of anime dubs, but western animation in general. There was really no defending dubs prior to Bebop, but Bebop was a point where anime culture could connect with a more mainstream audience. It wasn't the first by any means, nor the most influential, but it just kind of landed as this common ground where so many overlapping groups of fans of entertainment could find something to bond over.
AduroT wrote: I’d wager Toonami Dragonball brought anime to the west, but that was so long ago I don’t remember clearly.
That's a decade late. Macross/robotech, gatchaman/defenders of the planet(?)/g-force, transzor z, voltron were around (if spotty) in the early to mid 80s. Bits and pieces in the late 70s, iirc.
As popular as it was with many people, I don't think I know anyone that has watched it other than myself.
It's still very niche.
...It's literally responsible for bringing Anime to the west. I don't think in over 20 years of being a fan I've ever met a person who didn't know the show. Maybe different generations?
Edit: I’ve been thoroughly ninja’d. Ironic, considering the subject matter.
AduroT wrote: I’d wager Toonami Dragonball brought anime to the west, but that was so long ago I don’t remember clearly.
That's a decade late. Macross/robotech, gatchaman/defenders of the planet(?)/g-force, transzor z, voltron were around (if spotty) in the early to mid 80s. Bits and pieces in the late 70s, iirc.
Yeah, but I’d say DBZ is where it got more mainstream I mean.
I just remembered that Channel 4 in the UK used to show Manga branded films at about 11pm for a while. I think I caught one or two and felt very grown up (being about 14 at the time) and got hooked
Sadly that's why the whole anime thing passed me by for decades. Channel 4 was very spotty for reception where we were (it was also why Babalon 5 was something that I also missed most episodes of). That and my parents were not ones for letting us watch films super super late in the night.
As for which anime "brought it to the west" I suspect there isn't one. There's a cumulative effect of multiple small steps being taken and whichever one you feel "brought it to the west" is likely just the one of many that you spotted/connected too/remember first.
Heck you could argue that Pokemon brought anime to the west in a massive way, even though at the time most kids would have called it a cartoon not anime.
The only anime I'd ever seen in my teens (mid 90s) was basically Akira. That seemed to be just about the only anime that ever appeared on UK terrestrial TV. Saw some more at University, but never enough to get really hooked on it. (As in, I liked it, but not particularly more than I liked most other animation). And DBZ always seemed like nonsense.
Actually only got around to watching Cowboy Bebop a few months ago when I ran across it on All 4 while looking for Harley Quinn. And I have to say that it's absolutely excellent, I should have watched it decades ago, and this live action version is going to have to work HARD.
I suspect the "opening credits" we've seen aren't the final version. I think some of them will be replaced with Ed after they turn up a few episodes in.
The only anime I would even consider adapting for the western market is Gunsmith Cats.
The show is already set in Chicago and riding off the coat tails of Dirty Harry and Bullitt. The only challenge would be May's age and cherry picking the more suitable parts from Sonoda's manga series, which are easy fixes( just don't go there! ). Theres some very cool bits and pieces they could use from Riding Bean too...
Trying to adapt shows and films like Cowboy Bebop and Ghost In The Shell, on the other hand, is really making hardwork for themselves but for little gain.
Not enough for me to start paying for Netflix again. Faye Valentine might have done it with Squid games on the to do list (wife is Korean and patiently waiting for us to settle somewhere so we can view properly I.e. not on an iPad) and I like John Cho but… mildly pessimistic here. The anime was the best imho… this, likely going to be forgettable.
I don't know how I feel about there being no Ed. Especially considering the style of acting they've gone for Ed would have played into that as a character probably better than the others.
I'm not 100% sold on the "hammy" acting. I think part of the charm of the original was that the main characters were "serious" when it needed to be. I think its also because they come off as acting in the clips. Each bit feels like "and now I'm acting" rather than being fluid natural moments.
It's very guardians of the galaxy in style at times, then very drab at others... Which makes sense if they are travelling around a star system, worlds will be different.
The minor glimpses of the martial arts are hilariously bad though, super slow motion and looks forced, either they don't have stunt doubles, or the stunt doubles are terrible in that aspect.
Il give it a go, but it appears to just be live action the show. At which point... whats the point? If your not going to do something a little different, enhanced, fleshed out, more... Or continue the story. Why make it? The original already exists. Whats the point of a shot for shot remake of the thing that is already available?
I could be wrong. Kind of hope I am. If i'm not, the original is right there.
I've already got a Netflix subscription so I'll give it a watch. I'm... cautiously optimistic. Nothing really blew me away with the trailer but then again, while I've always really liked Cowboy Beebop, it was never one of my all time favorites.
It's not often there's a live action anime movie that I enjoy, I actually think Alita was the only one (and I'm told I only like it because I haven't read the source material) so odds are against it, but who knows. Monkeys and Typewriters right?
Lance845 wrote: Il give it a go, but it appears to just be live action the show. At which point... whats the point? If your not going to do something a little different, enhanced, fleshed out, more... Or continue the story. Why make it? The original already exists. Whats the point of a shot for shot remake of the thing that is already available?
I could be wrong. Kind of hope I am. If i'm not, the original is right there.
not everyone likes anime, hell getting my dad to watch ANY animation is a challange, he declared into the spiderverse was "boring and intreasting" by the end of the credit rolls (he clearly wasn't willing to give it a shot cause "cartoon")
For me the biggest disappointment is in the casting of Spike. Don't get me wrong, I like the actor, just not for this particular role. Something just seems not quite right with him. I don't know who I'd want to play that character though.
I am happy that they kept Tank as the theme song. If they had changed it I think there would have been riots.
cuda1179 wrote: For me the biggest disappointment is in the casting of Spike. Don't get me wrong, I like the actor, just not for this particular role. Something just seems not quite right with him. I don't know who I'd want to play that character though.
I am happy that they kept Tank as the theme song. If they had changed it I think there would have been riots.
Yeah, considering how much spike conveys without speaking, an actor would have to be all about nailing the presence and suave, relaxed, laid back but supremely confident nature of Spike... Nothing about the actors past roles suggest this, and this really isn't that big of a deal, but he doesn't seem tall enough..
cuda1179 wrote: For me the biggest disappointment is in the casting of Spike. Don't get me wrong, I like the actor, just not for this particular role. Something just seems not quite right with him. I don't know who I'd want to play that character though.
I am happy that they kept Tank as the theme song. If they had changed it I think there would have been riots.
Yeah, considering how much spike conveys without speaking, an actor would have to be all about nailing the presence and suave, relaxed, laid back but supremely confident nature of Spike... Nothing about the actors past roles suggest this, and this really isn't that big of a deal, but he doesn't seem tall enough..
The type of "mood" needed for Spike is a bit of a mix of late 80's Clint Eastwood, Keanu Reeves, and Lawrence Fishbourne, but Asian of course. Kind of a smooth (but not 007 smooth) feeling while still portraying a "I don't give a Feth" attitude, and looking somewhat hungover 24/7.
We need to make a clone that is 50% Jet Li and 50% Kurt Cobain.
Grunge did have the dirty, mussed hair and perpetually drunk look going on though. Good call on the Miami Vice suit style, although lose the pastel color palette.
Granted, I've only seen the first disc of the blu ray of the original (so. . . first 6 episodes of the original anime), but the wife and I watched the first episode last night and were rather entertained by it.
Seems like the dude playing Spike may genuinely be a fan of the series, as he seems to have Spike's fighting style down pretty good. And, maybe its just me, but I personally feel like the campyness so far seems to work slightly better in live action than it did in anime? I dunno, the jury may still be out on that bit
Started watching it. 3 or 4 episodes in. It is NOT a flat out remake of the cartoon. Which is a good thing. Glad they are using this opportunity to do some stuff with it. Will keep watching.
I rewatched all the animated episodes over the last few weeks on netflix, and considering I first watched it when I was still a young teenager, the amount of satire I missed out on at the time gave me quite a nice refreshed viewing experience.
I've watched the first episode and the satire is heavy, which is great... I still think the martial arts standard in the live action, and well the combat in general is poor in terms of execution, but I think that is part of the satire of it.
Just starting episode two, I was wondering if they would do a version of Big Shot in it, straight in at the start.
Just finished the live actions. I think the acting for the most part is good to great with the clear stand out being Jet. God damn does he nail that character. Jet is leagues above the rest of the cast.
There are a couple actors I liked less, and in particular I think the final character to show up in the series is just... awful. Granted they have like... less than a minute of screen time. But feth that was bad.
The clip I saw of Jet was impressive. He really did nail it. Faye is a big nope. The costume change is good however. The anime costume for her is the worst part of the series IMO.
So they change some things and add to some things with the backgrounds of every character.
By the end of the series you see quite a bit of spike, julia, and vicious's background together.
Julia is turned into a whole character instead of spike's girlfriend in the fridge.
Faye's acting is really good for the version of Faye that we get. She isn't the insurmountable debt version of the character (which is pretty flat. One dimensional except for a couple episodes of the anime where they actually get into her past). In a lot of ways what we get is way more personal for her. And it works in the show. She has more stakes in the now and they do more with it.
Faye always felt like a late bloomer in the original series. Her story only really gets going just as the series starts to come to an end. I think if they'd had more time to do a bit more with her. She certainly had an interesting past once they took a look inside it. It's just it kind of got overshadowed by Spike's past and events at the end.
Then again we learned almost nothing of Ed's background either.
I watched it and had previously watched the original. Ironic snake will bite me but I was just relieved that Boba Fett and Luke didn’t swoop in to save the main characters.
It got cancelled fast. I can't believe they didn't even do a follow up season. They dragged out that awful Sabrina series for 3 seasons before it got cancelled.
A lot of anime reviewers were not kind, so that might have played a part. With Crunchy and Funimation merging, Netflix needs the anime fans on side to help fight the near monopoly that merger will create.
AduroT wrote: I’d wager Toonami Dragonball brought anime to the west, but that was so long ago I don’t remember clearly.
LOTS of anime predates Bebop. Or Dragon Ball. I mean, I was watching Voltron in the early 80's. Even Dragonball had early morning runs on various networks before Toonami brought it to prime time. The important thing to remember about Bebop is really how well it was translated. DBZ came across HEAVILY censored with a handful of voice actors doing goofy voices for the different characters. That was pretty much the norm in the US. Cartoons were for kids and kind of one man performances from the days of Mel Blanc. The few exceptions were stuff sold to the edgy MTV crowd, but even the likes of Ninja Scroll had terrible performances. The few attempts at high profile dubs (Princess Mononoke) often brought in professional actors but didn't really result in great translations.
Bebop REALLY changed the game on dub quality. Steve Blum is so prolific now its almost a running gag, but that's just because he set a new standard for what could be expected from western voice acting. It had been a change that brewed throughout the 90's on the back of Batman TAS, but it really took off with Bebop. Not just a huge leap in the quality of anime dubs, but western animation in general. There was really no defending dubs prior to Bebop, but Bebop was a point where anime culture could connect with a more mainstream audience. It wasn't the first by any means, nor the most influential, but it just kind of landed as this common ground where so many overlapping groups of fans of entertainment could find something to bond over.
Bebop's voice acting is wonderful, no doubt about it, but Manga Entertainment got a couple of things right as well. Check out absolutely brilliant dub of Cyber City Oedo, for example.
As for the rest, wife and I only watched the first episode of Cowboy Bebop (the live action version) before she contracted Corona and went into quarantine, and we liked it, and we're big fans of the original, so we're looking forward to watching the rest of it. John Cho was surprisingly good as Spike, not so sure yet about the rest of the casting.
No season 2??!! ...run scene from BASEketball where Trey is watching the disturbing trailer and going, Awwww, aww, awwww, awwwwwwww, aww, awwwwwwwwwww...
I am about 6 episodes in and rather enjoying it. I really like the actors with the main characters, but I am least fond of Viscious - sure, he looks the part, but not fond of his portrayal. I never watched the anime, but do recall flipping past it and stopping for a bit, but never staying long enough to have an impression. So, I will have to put the anime series on my 'watch' list.
So frustrating that Netflix is willing to pull the plug so quick on so many shows. Sure, they can't all be Squid Games successful (create for cheap and then go through the roof), as this show along with Jupiter's Legacy seemed to just be getting their feet under them when yanked.
Does Netflix really have that deep of a bench where they can yank out their players and replace so quickly? Obviously so. I am sure it has to do with production costs (its always about money), as both CB and JL had fairly high CGI/production costs.
This show is hot garbage.. watched the first episode and decide to stop there haha
I don't think this particular anime can make the transfer to live action. Some things should jut be left alone.
Think its a big shame because it will undoubtedly put people off from watching the anime which is all time great anime IMO.
Just when I thought "so it has got both Ein AND Ed in it...okay, lets sign up to Netflix...three, two, one lets - ", they pull a Disney+ and cancel it, just like they did with The Owl House.
Seriously, what is wrong with these subscription services? When they finally get me all buttered up, they drop me on the floor buttered side down. Next it'll be a Necromunda live action show on WH+, and then they'll cancel that after five episodes...
trexmeyer wrote: It got cancelled fast. I can't believe they didn't even do a follow up season. They dragged out that awful Sabrina series for 3 seasons before it got cancelled.
Maybe the cashflow at the Flix is getting bumpy as even terrible shows like the aforementioned Sabrina as it, besides the lovely Ms Shipka, got worse every season but still got the 3 and out standard Netflix run
Well, the last episode with Ed showed me a character that I am not sure I could watch for an extended length of time. Might work in Anime (the whiney blond demon slayer kid from Demon Slayer comes to mind - so great), but would not want to watch a live action person to this extreme.
Sabrina? Watched about one season... I just could no longer get past the show's obvious and and perpetual push for demon worship and constantly saying how great it is. I could just see goth kids by the boatload jumping on that band wagon.
Mrs. GG and I were a couple of the folks that only recently came at the live action version without having seen the anime and we really enjoyed it. Well Mrs. GG really enjoyed it… I loved it! This was one broken hearted Gnome when we found out it was cancelled… like Firefly… the trauma continues… the wounds just will not heal….
Never having seen the original, I watched the whole season. Kind of liked it. Not sure I'll ever watch the original because I find watching Anime very hard these days. Most anime is just so.. loud yknow
tauist wrote: Never having seen the original, I watched the whole season. Kind of liked it. Not sure I'll ever watch the original because I find watching Anime very hard these days. Most anime is just so.. loud yknow
Bebop is classic anime so its really nothing like modern anime.
Also as its been mentioned Alita was ok, but I had to stop watching it part way through as they seem dead set on telling the entire story in one film and I'm only part way through the manga. It's a film which, to me, just feels like they tried to cover way too much in one go. There's no pause to dwell on events and the need to cover so much ground rushes ever so much of the actual story and developments. It's not bad in of itself, but its just very rushed if you know the original source material.
Bebop is classic anime so its really nothing like modern anime.
Even as a classic anime it was really nothing like other classic anime. Bebop pushed the boundaries of the genre and did a lot of things nobody else was doing at the time (nor are doing today). Thats part of what makes the series so iconic and monolithic - because its so singular in its approach to art/animation, storytelling, narrative structure, etc.
Personally Bebop has basically ruined all other anime for me, like tauist I struggle watching most other anime (aside from The Big O and older UC era Gundam stuff) and generally just find modern anime to be extremely cringe. I constantly find myself trying to find new anime to watch that are similar to Bebop, and then I just end up watching Bebop instead because nothing out there comes anywhere close to it.
I will still maintain the live Cowboy wasn’t bad, but nearly everything they changed from the anime was a downgrade, so if you haven’t seen the anime the live version is pretty good. It’s kind of like a reverse of OG Fullmetal vs Brotherhood. The OG isnt bad, but everything Brotherhood changed was better.
Personally Bebop has basically ruined all other anime for me, like tauist I struggle watching most other anime (aside from The Big O and older UC era Gundam stuff) and generally just find modern anime to be extremely cringe. I constantly find myself trying to find new anime to watch that are similar to Bebop, and then I just end up watching Bebop instead because nothing out there comes anywhere close to it.
Ah ha! That must be it!
I wondered why I have a hard time getting into anime these days, despite having watched so much of it 20 years ago. Maybe it's not necessarily bad, it's just not as good as Bebop.
The only exception to this seems to be GiTS: SAC... apart from the final episode of the latest installment... what a mess.
The problem is anime has changed. I the 80s or so it was generally quite serious and very heavily story driven
Today its gone the cutsey, childish, big boobies angle and its infected a LOT of anime. Plus you've a lot of "kid at school" type setups coupled to "this is an MMO" from the perspective of players (eg Overlord) as opposed to the 80s where it was closer to "this is a DnD adventure" from the perspective of the characters
I think part of it is that you've generations who have grown up with MMO pc games and they are recreating that; another part is it means they can do a slow side scroll of a single drawn image whilst the character monologues about his DPS abilities or something (Overlord is rife with that in the clips I've seen).
IT makes finding serious story driven anime tricky - its out there just harder to find.
eg:
Wolf's Rain, Ergo Proxy, Akira, Bebop, Ghibli films, Ghost in the Shell (films and Stand Alone Complex series*, Full Metal Alchemist, Attack on Titan, Alita (the animation which is far superior to the live action, in my opinion)
Then you've what I consider the halfway which are, to me, annoying. They are predominantly "serious" but then interject supremely childish elements of story and animation: eg
Trigun, the new Hellsing**
*Although Ghost keeps getting soft reboots. The original films; the SAC series and the newer series that I forget the name of are each technically their own timelines. You can draw parallels and spot patterns, but they don't really link up well. EG SAC actually sets up a lot of elements for the original 2 films really well - with the exception that Togusa is a rookie in the films and yet in SAC season 2 he's running the team.
**Which is better animated and covers more story, but at the cost of character development and pacing
Overread wrote: The problem is anime has changed. I the 80s or so it was generally quite serious and very heavily story driven
Don’t make me break out the Bender “Oh wait you’re serious” gif. The 80s had its fair share of schlocky stuff, it just doesn’t become as immediately memorable. The perfect example is Bastard, which is actually got a remake here recently. It is Very not serious and full of boobs. Fullmetal Alchemist, 2003, is really good. Good enough they redid it with Brotherhood in 2009 after the manga finished and it’s even better. There’s always tons of schlock with buried gems, you just only remember the buried gems from ages past while the current schlock fresh on your mind can drown out the good stuff.
Yeah "kids at school" anime trope is a bit of a dealbreaker for me. Its easier for me to ignore the completely unrealistic overly mature 16 year old child-soldier protagonists in a lot of anime when I'm not constantly reminded of their age by their presence in a school.
"world is a video game" is also something I have a hard time getting into, it was cool and innovative the first time I watched it, okayish the second time I watched it, but now its just sadly repetitious.
And yes, Ghibli works and Akira are great. I need to give Ghost in the Shell another watch - I've seen it several times but never really paid very much attention to it, but I did enjoy it. I never really "got" Wolfs Rain, it was just kinda there. I've bene intrigued by Attack on Titan, but haven't got around to it yet.
Currently trying to power my way through JoJos Bizarre Adventure, I'm currently about halfway through the Japanese JoJos arc - I feel more like I'm watching an animated manga than I am an actual anime, but I don't hate the series. I don't really like it either, but its nice background noise while I paint minis or whatever and as much as I pretend to roll my eyes at the awful pop-culture puns/references, I do get a kick out of them.
If it’s not Brotherhood, my favorite anime would have to be Gurren Lagann. Yes it’s loud, but it also tells a good story in there. Not sure which of the two would be my absolute favorite, but it’s one of those.
1) The plot moves at the speed of a glacier. Even though I like slower stories, AoT seems to take forever
2) A lot of the not-lead characters appear kinda similar visually and a lot of them come and die fairly quickly. So I find I, more than normal, get confused who is who in the sub-characters.
Wolf's Rain is great, but for some reason mid season they do something like 4 recap episodes which is rather strange because they only recap the story that you've seen and don't go any deeper into the history of the characters they follow. Which I felt was a bit too much even for a catch up period and kinda a waste of so much screen time and a shame that we didn't really learn more about the backstory of characters
Anime covers a huge range of styles and genres. Trying to bundle it under one banner is like trying to Breaking Bad and, IDK the Bachelor are the same because they're both live action. There's definitely hot genres that you might not like (I'll not shed a tear when we're done with Isekai) but they can be worth checking out the best in class for to see if you like.
Bebop is definitely a tough act to follow, having been a classic in its day that's stood the test of time. There are definitely shows worth checking out in its vein though. Monster, season 1 of Psycho Pass, Megalobox all seem like the kind of shows worth giving a shot.
Haven't heard of any of those three, I'll look into them.
Agreed that anime is (theoretically) very broad and that it *should* be inappropriate to lump them under one banner just as it would be to lump live-action together, but I think for many of us who struggle with modern anime the problem is that the prevalance of certain conventions/tropes/structure/styles across a very broad spectrum (I'd go so far as to say an overwhelming majority) of it which makes much of it unapproachable to us or difficult for us to enjoy. Not unlike musical theater, for example - there are many genres within it (horror, comedy, drama, romance, etc.) but some people just don't like musical theater because there are central defining characteristic of the art-form that, well, people just don't like. In much the same way, there are certain characteristics of the art-form of anime, at least as far as the current predominant style is concerned, which some people just don't care for.
chaos0xomega wrote: Haven't heard of any of those three, I'll look into them.
Agreed that anime is (theoretically) very broad and that it *should* be inappropriate to lump them under one banner just as it would be to lump live-action together, but I think for many of us who struggle with modern anime the problem is that the prevalance of certain conventions/tropes/structure/styles across a very broad spectrum (I'd go so far as to say an overwhelming majority) of it which makes much of it unapproachable to us or difficult for us to enjoy. Not unlike musical theater, for example - there are many genres within it (horror, comedy, drama, romance, etc.) but some people just don't like musical theater because there are central defining characteristic of the art-form that, well, people just don't like. In much the same way, there are certain characteristics of the art-form of anime, at least as far as the current predominant style is concerned, which some people just don't care for.
I totally agree. I took a near decade hiatus starting in the mid-2000s just because I was having trouble parsing the good stuff from the popular but kind of trash stuff that came with the surge of kids who grew up with reliable access to anime. One of the things that gave the genre a reputation for quality is just that for the most part you didn't get to see it unless it was the best of the best at one point and when that filter was removed it took a bit for the tools to get in place to help us do the sorting ourselves. Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled that I don't have to deal with fansubs and the like anymore, just that you can't assume anime has any consistent quality anymore. Definitely worth putting in the effort though. Like any medium high production values and sharp writing can go a long way and I still find it the single best place to find succinct stories told in a reasonable number of episodes that have satisfying conclusions.
Oh, and check out The Great Pretender if you haven't. I think it kind of peaks in its opening arc and the final arc is definitely a huge letdown, but the first arc probably comes as close to capturing the heights of Bebop as anything in the last 20 years and each arc is pretty self contained with its own satisfying conclusion.
AduroT wrote: I will still maintain the live Cowboy wasn’t bad, but nearly everything they changed from the anime was a downgrade, so if you haven’t seen the anime the live version is pretty good. It’s kind of like a reverse of OG Fullmetal vs Brotherhood. The OG isnt bad, but everything Brotherhood changed was better.
I do wonder what the live action show would have been like if all the Julia/Vicious crap had been cut out (especially that ending...).
The thing is Ed was a very accurate Ed. More so than Spike or Vicious in the the show even. Ed’s just a very cringe character and that doesn’t look good when it’s done accurate and not cartoon stylistic.
H.B.M.C. wrote: Ed was in 3 seconds of the final end credits scene. She was a non-issue.
Julia wasn't a girlfriend in a fridge either.
In the cartoon Julia was 100% fridge. She existed just to be Spikes past trauma then show up for the last episodes. She has 0 personality. She has no motivations to speak of. She has no background anyone can point towards. She's Uncle Ben, Thomas and Martha Wayne. She exists solely to motivate Spike.
Giving her something to do besides exist and die in the live action show wasn't a bad change.
Yes, Ed was only in it for 3 seconds. It's the worst 3 seconds of the live action series.
Yeah but the story focuses on Spike and the Bebop crew alone, we don't need to know Julia's history. We just need to know how important she was and is to Spike. That relation is what's key and we only see her for a brief moment in a rather forced situation. Plus by that point we know that Spike's past was far from good even with rose tinted glasses.
I can get on board with developing her more ,but at the same time I feel like developing her more is more eating away at the mystery of Spike's past. Bebop was great in that we got little snippets of the past of each character and from that we have to puzzle together the person who we see in the current times.
Also I just watched that Ed scene on youtube. It's - gods its cringe.
I realise what the problem is though. Ed doesn't move. She's in 1 spot the entire scene and trying to be bouncy and overenergetic, whilst not actually moving off the spot. Then, for some reason, they decided to do a point of view camera that makes the whole scene feel like its someone doing it as a webcast on their webcam at home pretending to act like Ed.
Honestly kinda feels like you need a really good actress to pull off Ed and they just didn't get that.
Lance845 wrote: In the cartoon Julia was 100% fridge. She existed just to be Spikes past trauma then show up for the last episodes. She has 0 personality. She has no motivations to speak of. She has no background anyone can point towards. She's Uncle Ben, Thomas and Martha Wayne. She exists solely to motivate Spike.
She's a cipher, at best, until she suddenly comes into focus. She's not motivation, because Spike ran away from that world. It keeps chasing after him.
Lance845 wrote: Giving her something to do besides exist and die in the live action show wasn't a bad change.
It was an awful change. Every scene with her and Vicious was torture.
Lance845 wrote: Yes, Ed was only in it for 3 seconds. It's the worst 3 seconds of the live action series.
You could have stopped watching as the credits came on and never known it was there. It was a non-issue.
Overread wrote: I can get on board with developing her more ,but at the same time I feel like developing her more is more eating away at the mystery of Spike's past.
Exactly! The whole point is that we don't know all of Spike's backstory until the end. We don't know the importance of the relationships until they're basically over (usually fatally). It's a mystery that sits at the fringes of the story, crossing over with the lives of the protagonists in very specific and poignant times. But other than that it is designed to sit in your peripheral vision. You're always aware of it, but it doesn't drown out what's going on.
AduroT wrote: I will still maintain the live Cowboy wasn’t bad, but nearly everything they changed from the anime was a downgrade, so if you haven’t seen the anime the live version is pretty good. It’s kind of like a reverse of OG Fullmetal vs Brotherhood. The OG isnt bad, but everything Brotherhood changed was better.
I do wonder what the live action show would have been like if all the Julia/Vicious crap had been cut out (especially that ending...).
Personally Bebop has basically ruined all other anime for me, like tauist I struggle watching most other anime (aside from The Big O and older UC era Gundam stuff) and generally just find modern anime to be extremely cringe. I constantly find myself trying to find new anime to watch that are similar to Bebop, and then I just end up watching Bebop instead because nothing out there comes anywhere close to it.
Ah ha! That must be it!
I wondered why I have a hard time getting into anime these days, despite having watched so much of it 20 years ago. Maybe it's not necessarily bad, it's just not as good as Bebop.
The only exception to this seems to be GiTS: SAC... apart from the final episode of the latest installment... what a mess.
I've had the opposite reaction. I watched Bebop a long time ago, but now I've started feeling that if I were to start it today I wouldn't be into it.
Mostly this is because I've come to prefer the long continuing stories rather than the episodic stuff Bebop did that ultimately didn't really come together all that much.
But it is hard to find a cast of characters that I like as much as Bebop.
I dunno, personally I think Bebop found a way to tell what is in effect a long continuing story through episodic stortylling. Almost every episode moves the main central narrative forward in some small way or provides some sort of exposition, backstory, or character development that becomes relevant to the central narrative in the end. The only real exception to that might be "Toys in the Attic" (which is absolute 100% filler but still probably my favorite episode of the series).
(seriously, not having a pop at anyone)
. Was just thinking of rewatching the series. Worst case, it's not that good and all we pretend it never happened, right? 
