COVID-19 Benefit Reminds Us Cowboy Bebop Is Still the Greatest Anime Ever
As a lapsed anime fan, I’m only barely familiar with what’s cool in the art form in 2020. Jojo’s Bizzare Adventure? I’ve seen a few seasons and enjoyed it. My Hero Academia? I’m familiar but haven’t watched much. But there is still a large part of my heart dedicated to the early 2000’s space cowboy epic Cowboy Bebop. I’ll revisit it every couple of years and the story continues to have an emotional effect on me even knowing where it’s going and how it ends. The animation holds up even if the CGI feels dated and the voice acting is one of the rare occurrences where the english translation doesn’t get in the way of how cool everything is.
All of that doesn’t even bring into account the music which is a marvel of music styles. Yesterday the Youtube channel for anime distributor Funimation gave us the gift of reuniting the band responsible for all the original series’ music, The Seatbelts, with the voice actors for the characters Spike and Jet from the series. They’re joined by over 40 special guests including rappers Mega Ran, Substantial and Red Rapper, all recording their parts from home for charity.
The original series is available on multiple streaming services currently with a live action adaption being filmed for netflix as soon as John Cho is healthy enough to resume filming.