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cowboy bebop (review)
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VISUALS: Cowboy Bebop has excellent visuals. The drawings themselves are incredibly detailed, and the animation is fluid as well. The overall atmosphere of the anime is very well-set by these visuals, which tend to be dark and moody. There is a bit too much tendency towards using dull shades of colours for environments, but that is excusable, I suppose, since the atmosphere of the series is meant to be moody. There is some use of 3D graphics in places such as animating planets as well as the warp gates that are used to travel between planets, but other than that the use of CGI is pretty scarce. Everything else, from the space fights (of which there are a lot), to the scenes on planetary surfaces, is hand-animated. I consider this to be a good thing - there are a lot of series that go gaga over the CGI but fail in other areas. *COUGH*Gatekeepers*COUGH*
Anyhow, Cowboy Bebop is no slouch in the visuals department, and is a real treat to look at.
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9/10
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SOUNDTRACK: The Cowboy Bebop soundtrack was composed by Yoko Kanno, who also did excellent work on The Vision of Escaflowne and X, and her work shines here as well. The score is mostly composed of jazz and blues tunes, which suit the mood of the series perfectly. From the opening theme "Tank!" (which sounds like one of the opening themes for a 60's detective show) to the ending theme "The Real Folk Blues," the soundtrack screams "quality." Even if you don't watch the series, the OST is a must buy.
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10/10
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STORY: Cowboy Bebop chronicles the exploits of the interstellar bounty hunters, Spike Siegel and Jet Black, aboard their ship the "Bebop." The timeline is one where the Earth has been ravaged because of an incident with the warp gates that happened almost a century before. The beginning is fairly low-key, but by the fifth episode it becomes apparent that there is much more to Jet and Spike than it really seems. The main storyline is interesting, and it kept me watching, and thinking, long after the last episode was over. One complaint, though, is that there seem to be a lot of filler episodes without direct relevance to the storyline. These episodes are mostly enjoyable, but a bit more cohesiveness to the storyline would have been much appreciated. And be forewarned: the ending is not what you would expect.
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7/10
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CHARACTERISATION: Cowboy Bebop's characters have very simple designs. However, they are full of depth. It's very clear from early on that every character has some secrets to hide, even the dog, Ein. Each character has a mysterious past, and some motivation for continuing to live life. The characterisation is not quite as good or as deep as that of X (which also had simple character designs), but it's still a commendable effort. I do like the fact that the series devotes two or more episodes to each character to explore their past and their feelings. Great job.
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8/10
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OVERALL: Cowboy Bebop is great. It's got action, drama, humour and tragedy, and is a great choice for any anime fan to watch. The cool soundtrack is just a bonus.
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A-
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