The anime “Trigun” also came out about the same time and had a very “Western in space” theme. A decade prior to that you had the American animated show “The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers”.
I think that by the time you get to Firefly, there is such a mishmash of genres it’s hard to pinpoint who borrowed from what.
The original Star Wars borrowed heavily from Westerns and the works of Akira Kurosawa (which already borrowed heavily from each other - i.e. Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven). Not to mention a well-known body of work that revolved around another desert planet.
In the 80s, add the influence of cyberpunk author William Gibson to the “working class astronaut/cowboy in space” and you get films like Alien, Akira, and Ghost in the Shell (which later inspired The Matrix).
Ridley Scott added a “sci-fi noir” vibe to create Blade Runner, largely one of the biggest influences on the Cowboy Bebop aesthetic. So much so that in one of the new episodes, characters are quoting lines from Roy Batty’s “Tears in The Rain on the Shoulder of Orion just off Tanhauser Gate” speech.
It’s also hard to imagine that the creators of Cowboy Bebop didn’t derive some influence from Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, and Jackie Brown, given that Tarantino derives most of his inspiration from film noir, Hong Kong action films, anime, Westerns, cool 70s Blaxploitation films, etc.
I’m just saying by the time Firefly came out in 2002, they had been mixing that big pot of random genres for a long time.
Watched the first episode and can’t say I care for it much. Jet and Faye are fine but Spike just doesn’t cut it and that is a pretty fatal problem.
Beyond that, the episode seems to replicate individual scenes from the anime quite often but with a fraction of the visual craftsmanship. For example the red-eye fight scene and the climactic space shoot-out which has a tragic beauty in the original which is completely lost.
I also think the episode packs too much of the bigger story especially Vicious and Julia whereas the original is much better at slowly introducing the characters and universe. Given there are only 10 episodes it was OK to introduce Faye in Episode 1 but Vicious and Julia should have come in later.
It’s actually been many years since I have watched the original and I have really enjoyed re-watching the first few episodes. It’s an amazing show and I think I will just continue with that.
I felt the other way; I liked that there seemed to be some overall plot to the live action series from the beginning and I felt that the few episodes of the animated series seemed pretty plotless.
I agree that the live-action red-eye fight scene was pretty lame.
Actually I agree a bit. I remember when I first saw the original thinking that the first few episodes were a bit slow. They probably work better now when re-watching since I already know the larger arc.
However I still wouldn’t have put Vicious and Julia in the very first episode. I think introducing the syndicate and alluding to Spike’s history with it is enough to spark the viewer’s curiosity about the larger story. Then in a later episode I would have introduced Vicious and in a still later episode Julia. Dumping them all in the first episode doesn’t work and in particular the flashback scene with Julia right before the final shootout was poor.
My husband said exactly that. Well, pretty darn close. When I mentioned to him that it reminded me of the Tick, he said it was if they had crossed it with Firefly.
There was one shot in Cowboy Bebop that strongly reminded me of the scene in the movie of Firefly crew going into the bar. It’s interesting to read the “what came first” analysis, as I hadn’t quite realized that Bebop is older.
My husband’s been commenting a lot on the camera angles, which seems to be a big part of the feel of the show. We’ll keep watching.
God no. This was an utter disaster from the start with a few decent points. General audiences rated it slightly higher than critics, and both suggested it was dreck. This is a show where somebody seriously screams “Welcome to the ouch!” Key factors in its cancellation are that (A) the show simply wasn’t that great quality-wise, (B) it just didn’t sell, and (C) several castmembers and creators cultivated hostile relationships with the fans of the anime. The latter is a particularly problem because Netflix has a questionable record of trying to adapt anime.
Also, to clarify, the one thing the fans of the original anime series can’t do is Gatekeep. They have no power over Netflix and could not even slightly affect the recommendations. If it sold, it would have been kept.
Gatekeeping does not mean those who do it have power over the production or even are successful at changing how a show is made. They are just people who have decided they know how things ought to be and complain loudly when something does not conform to their very particular standards.
Netflix Cowboy Bebop was well casted, well directed, well filmed, well choreographed and, I would say, well written. It is a live action anime, the cringey parts are a part of it. Again, think Tarantino films. You have over-the-top exposition. All of a sudden this is bad in a live anime adaptation? Can you name a live anime adaptation that was good in your view?
I’m not saying this show was the best thing ever but it was better than the brigade of self-styled anime fans who dumped on it would have it to be.
I’m not here to tell you what to like and dislike, but it critics don’t agree with you - and neither did general audiences.
Second, Tarantino-esque stylistic suck is really not going to translate the original to a new medium. It’s just not part of the concept. So you’ve got something which has a different tone, different story, different characters, different visual aesthetic, and different emotional heft to it - well, what’s actually been brought over? Because layering deliberate cringe on that is just a middle-finger to the audience. If it happens to be your specific joy in life, that’s great - but it doesn’t mean the show was any good.
Secondly, I owe you no examination of my personal tastes whatsoever. However, Detective Pikachu is an interesting take on the Pokemon franchise, which involves quality filmmaking to achieve a fairly interesting result. it’s not deep by any measure, but it’s enjoyable and fun. I wasn’t a huge fan of Alita: Battle Angel, but that’s only because it’s so stuffed with plot and characters that it never has time to breathe.
Hell, I even laughed at Dragonball: Evolution. It’s an utterly terrible movie, and a worse adaptation, but in that specific case it hit the “So Bad it’s Good” territory just from the sheer effort put into the failure. But the thing is, it’s still a failure regardless, just one where the flaming trainwreck left in its wake is rather entertaining. Cowboy Bebop isn’t even that.
This is a pretty good description. Those Metacritic scores are godawful. I wonder what kind of numbers Firefly had when it aired?
Doesn’t everyone have that problem with adapting anime? I read an article just a couple days ago that said Alita: Battle Angel was the only movie adaptation that made any real money back in US sales. And that was $85 million on a $175 million budget. I can’t recall if they talked about tv shows.
Looks like you are in the minority on that. Like I said above, bad writing and paper thin characters make for a bad show. And the wooden acting by almost everyone in it made it impossible for me to finish watching.
I don’t watch anime at all, but that’s just because I dislike the art and animation. It always looks like everything is done on the cheap. I have nothing against the writing and I believe I said upthread I was really looking forward to this. It just didn’t click with me at all.
I will say again that I wonder if a lot of the problems came down to the director. That many people turning in such wooden acting in one project can’t be a coincidence.
That’s not what I said. I said I did not like the art or animation. I said I was fine with the writing, it’s right there in my post. The least you could do is read the whole post, it wasn’t that long. Please do not rephrase what I posted so you can slip in what you think is a clever dig.
Art/animation has nothing to do with a live action show. No crappy art or animation involved there at all. So yes, I did expect to like the show and I explained why, John Cho being a big part of that.
Stop cutting out the entire context of my post. If you can’t comment on what I actually say, maybe you should just skip over my posts. Anime also consists of plot, dialogue and acting. It’s not just the crappy art.
You know that rule we have that you can’t edit a quote in a box to change it’s meaning? You are doing the same thing by repeatedly only paraphrasing one section of my post so that it’s out of context.
I mean, it’s a Cafe thread, not a world altering debate. I told you why I didn’t like the live action show and none of the explanations had anything to do anime.