News Live-Action ‘Cowboy Bebop’ tv series in the works

[Enterprise is Great]

deadline.com

Tomorrow Studios, Marty Adelstein’s joint venture with ITV Studios, is developing a live-action adaptation of the cult Japanese animated series Cowboy Bebop. Tomorrow Studios has teamed on the project with Midnight Radio (Josh Appelbaum, Andre Nemec, Jeff Pinkner & Scott Rosenberg), who will executive produce alongside Sunrise, the studio behind the original series; Tomorrow Studios’ Adelstein (Good Behavior, Prison Break) and Becky Clements (Good Behavior, Aquarius); as well as Matthew Weinberg. Chris Yost (Thor: The Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok), who started his career writing for comic book-based animated series before segueing to features, will pen the adaptation.

The space Western story follows Spike Spiegel and his rag-tag crew of bounty hunters, or Cowboys, as they try to capture the galaxy’s worst criminals and survive the unexpected dangers they encounter throughout space, sometimes saving the world in the process but always leaving millions in damages.

I know the name but I've never seen the series.If you've seen it do you think a live action version would work?

 

[Commander Richard]

Never seen the series but I like the intro.

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I've heard that the show is a lot like Firefly.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

They definitely have their work cut out for them. Cowboy Bebop is kind of like if Firefly was filtered through jazz instead of westerns. And like Firefly a challenge for this series would be to maintain the vibe and charm of the original and its characters which is as important as its story and setup.

 

[JD]

I've only seen a couple episodes of the anime series, but it seemed to have a very specific style, and I have to question if the live action version would be able to recreate it. Without that style it'll probably just end up a generic sci-fi action movie.

 

[Christopher]

They definitely have their work cut out for them. Cowboy Bebop is kind of like if Firefly was filtered through jazz instead of westerns.

Jazz and Westerns. Hence the name. And various other cinematic tropes like gangster movies etc. (the lead character is a former mob assassin who's now a bounty hunter). It's kind of a free-form mix of a lot of influences and ideas, not unlike jazz.

Like a lot of anime, it's too violent for my tastes, and rather male-gazey in its treatment of the female lead (though she has a pretty poignant backstory); but otherwise it's very good, with rich concepts, superb art and animation, and fun characters, although the best character comes in kind of late. I think the Firefly comparisons miss a lot -- that show tended to go for more of a wild-frontier motif which let them do low-budget stuff in small colony towns and wilderness moons and the like, but Bebop's settings are far more urban and high-tech, a Solar system where Earth suffered an environmental cataclysm and humanity is spread across hundreds of vast artificial space habitats and domed cities on Mars and elsewhere. The tech design, particularly of the ships, is one of its most impressive features.

Anyway, it's not a long series -- 26 half-hour episodes and one movie, so it doesn't take long to get through. And the whole series is available on Hulu, though the movie isn't. So it's pretty easy to satisfy one's curiosity about the show.

 

[DigificWriter]

Having watched about half of the anime, I have a hard time picturing it being done well in live-action without a seriously substantial budget, but we'll see what they do.

 

[Booji]

Cowboy Bebop is one of my top 5 favorite tv shows, so I'd be thrilled if they pull this off. The most difficult character to get right will be Radical Edward, and if they can do that it should be all good

 

[DigificWriter]

I don't think the characters are the 'hurdle' that a live-action Bebop TV series neeeds to clear; it's the visuals and the expansiveness of the world in which the series exists.

Violence and sexual content might also be a problem depending on where/how the series ends up being broadcast.

 

[James Swallow]

Hmmm. *conflicted*.

 

[Forbin]

How in the world can you find a real human woman that looks like Faye Valentine? That's a hell of a casting challenge.

 

[Forbin]

We'll probably get Tom Cruise or Keanu Reeves as spike.


At least there can be no whitewashing scandal for this one

 

[Christopher]

Violence and sexual content might also be a problem depending on where/how the series ends up being broadcast.

Why? There was no explicit nudity in the show, and there's plenty of violence and gunplay on American TV.

Anyway, an adaptation doesn't have to be exactly like the original in every particular; there's no reason to do an adaptation at all if you don't bring something new to the table. Slavish copying is not the purpose of an adaptation -- surely the Gus van Sant remake of Psycho, a shot-for-shot recreation that totally bombed, should've proven that. Mere copying is pointless and soulless. The purpose of adaptation is to use the original as a starting point for creating something distinct, something that captures the essential core of the idea while adding something new to the interpretation, taking it in directions the original work didn't explore.

 

[The Laughing Vulcan]

Jazz and Westerns. Hence the name. And various other cinematic tropes like gangster movies etc. (the lead character is a former mob assassin who's now a bounty hunter). It's kind of a free-form mix of a lot of influences and ideas, not unlike jazz.

Cowboy is a term that the series uses for Bounty Hunters. It's not indicative of a particular style (except for that one episode with Andy). If you're looking for an anime Western to adapt, Trigun would be a better fit. You're more accurate with describing it as a free form mix. Shinichiro Watanabe had another go with this style of anime road movie with Samurai Champloo. In this case the Samurai is accurate, as it's about Edo period ronin. Champloo is an Okinawan cookery term, again meaning free-form mix, and it was a show that covered all manner of styles and stories. There's a baseball episode, a zombie episode and so on. And lots of hip-hop.

How in the world can you find a real human woman that looks like Faye Valentine? That's a hell of a casting challenge.

Google Man-Faye.

 

[NOVE9]

If they pull this off I'll be a very happy man.

 

[JD]

I don't think the characters are the 'hurdle' that a live-action Bebop TV series neeeds to clear; it's the visuals and the expansiveness of the world in which the series exists.

Would it really be that much harder than what see on shows like The Expanse, Dark Matter, or Killjoys?

We'll probably get Tom Cruise or Keanu Reeves as spike.


At least there can be no whitewashing scandal for this one

Actually, this is a TV series, so I doubt they'll be able to get names that big. I could maybe see Keanu Reeves being at a point in his career where he might do a one season role on something like American Horror Story or Fargo, but I couldn't see him doing a multi-season role like this would potentially be. No way Tom Cruise would be available for a TV role though.

 

[Forbin]

Google Man-Faye.

By the sound of it, I believe I shall decline.

 

[Christopher]

Would it really be that much harder than what see on shows like The Expanse, Dark Matter, or Killjoys?

If you wanted to capture the visual style faithfully, then it would certainly require a bigger budget than Dark Matter or Killjoys have. The Expanse or Caprica is more in the ballpark. Think of the "Ariel" episode of Firefly, the one time they went to a core world and were in the midst of a high-tech, heavily urbanized environment. Capturing the look of Cowboy Bebop's world would require doing that almost every week. So that's something that might have to be dialed down if they don't have the budget for it.

And heck, maybe they should. Like I said, different designers and directors couldn't accurately capture the style of the original artists, so they probably shouldn't try to imitate it exactly. Instead, they should bring their own design sensibilities to it, their own way of conveying an urban feel that's at once jazzy and high-tech.

Actually, this is a TV series, so I doubt they'll be able to get names that big. I could maybe see Keanu Reeves being at a point in his career where he might do a one season role on something like American Horror Story or Fargo, but I couldn't see him doing a multi-season role like this would potentially be. No way Tom Cruise would be available for a TV role though.

Even in fantasy casting, I couldn't see Cruise as Spike. He's totally the wrong type. You need someone lanky, laid back, sardonic, world-weary.

 

[sojourner]

Tom Mison is available I hear.

 

[JD]

If you wanted to capture the visual style faithfully, then it would certainly require a bigger budget than Dark Matter or Killjoys have. The Expanse or Caprica is more in the ballpark. Think of the "Ariel" episode of Firefly, the one time they went to a core world and were in the midst of a high-tech, heavily urbanized environment. Capturing the look of Cowboy Bebop's world would require doing that almost every week. So that's something that might have to be dialed down if they don't have the budget for it.

Oh, I didn't realize it was that complex, I thought it was mostly just generic cities.

 

[Christopher]

Oh, I didn't realize it was that complex, I thought it was mostly just generic cities.

Like I said, the whole series (except the movie) is on Hulu and it's only 26 episodes. It's not that hard to find out for yourself, and it'll be worth it.

And yeah, there are a certain number of scenes that are set in dingy back alleys or open fields or the deserts of Mars or the ruined Earth, but there are plenty others that involve extended chases through large and complicated cityscapes of varying degrees of complexity, most of which are in artificial space habitats of complex design. And that's not even getting into the vast diversity of spaceships.