Cowboy Bebop Showrunner Opens Up About the Show's Multicultural Focus
This November, the bounty hunters of the Bebop are getting a major makeover thanks to Netflix's live-action adaptation of Cowboy Bebop, with the series releasing the first images of John Cho as Spike Spiegel, Daniella Pineda as Faye Valentine, and Mustafa Shakir as Jet Black. In a recent interview with Polygon, the showrunner Andre Nemec discussed how the upcoming adaptation will be true to the multicultural presentation of the original anime series and how this presentation truly helped in getting the upcoming Netflix series to get its feet off the ground while giving fans a new take on the beloved franchise.
Nemec had this to say about the multicultural aspects of Cowboy Bebop and how the live-action series plans to stay faithful to this aspect of the original anime, which the showrunner believes was one of the reasons why the series became more beloved:
"I think anybody who's a fan of Cowboy Bebop knows that Cowboy Bebop presents a multicultural view of the future, and so you will see elements of all cultures. It's not a dystopian world presented in the anime. It's a very beautiful imagining of a future. People are more bonded. It's a cowboy show — so they're a little violent, and people kill each other, and life is a little cheap — but the multiculturalism of the anime is what we translated to the screen as well."
Nemec expanded on how the three-dimensional characters themselves were another big reason why the creative minds behind the live-action adaptation decided to return to the franchise:
"I think that the telling of that story was exciting to me because there were things in the anime that were alluded to and hinted at, and … I think that there's a deep soul to Spike Spiegel, despite his laconic and sort of laissez-faire, brush-it-off presentation. To be able to tell a story about who you are, what made you who you are, and where you go from there was very dynamic to sit around and figure out."
Cowboy Bebop is set to release on Netflix on November 19th this fall.
Are you excited for this new take on the world of the Bebop? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the world of Spike Spiegel and his galaxy hopping companions.