Cowboy Bebop‘s Tone Was the Biggest Challenge for Showrunner André Nemec

From the consequence that Netflix ’s live - action adaptation ofCowboy Bebopwasannounced , fans of the original anime wanted to know what showrunner André Nemec could peradventure bring to the classic story that wasn’talready baked into the author cloth . Rather than just wondering , io9 ask Nemec directly .

When we lately sat down with Nemec for a conversation abouthis take on Cowboy Bebop , the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theater director explicate how attend to Shinichiro Watanabe ’s work helped guide him through the process of distilling the show ’s characters into their most elemental forms . “ For me , it became about take out the characters , and really drawing down deeply through a forensic analysis of who they were in the gum anime , ” Nemec tell io9 . “ And then once really arriving at sort of the core theme of who each one of these lineament … was then figuring out the narrative floor body structure to recount sort of a very classic tale . ”

Nemec explained that , while the Bebop gang is always prostrate to making the worst possible conclusion , he want to make viewers understand whyJet , Faye , and Spikedo the dumb things they do . Because so much of Cowboy Bebop ’s protagonists ’ personality are well - defined in the Zanzibar copal , Nemec felt confident that taking cue from the source material was the right direction . But when it number to figuring out what the new show ’s various timbre would be and how it would vacillate between them , Nemex aver he struggled . “ smell was really hard , ” he said . “ get that tone , not just in the character storytelling , but throughout the intact serial publication , and filming , and editing cognitive operation . The musical note of banter and humor , some silliness , but also at the same fourth dimension , mystifying emotional underpinnings of pain , and firm pulpy action sequence , and then laying jazz underneath all of it . ”

André Nemec at the premiere of Cowboy Bebop.

André Nemec at the premiere of Cowboy Bebop.Screenshot: Netflix

Comedy emerges as one of the modes Cowboy Bebop is most comfortable in as the serial goes on , and Nemec described how he and the quietus of the show ’s creative squad took care to verify that Spike and other characters always walk a ok line between being jokey archetype and tangible multitude . Spike is basically a surly teenager in the same way that Jet ’s an exasperated father figure , and Faye ’s an annoying kid sister character , Nemec said , and being one another ’s incur family is the key to understanding the springy - natural action serial publication .

“ When you look at it , it is a mob fib , ” Nemec said . “ It ’s a disparate crime syndicate of low toys , and they ’re number together to draw together , and to find some solace in the pain of their existences in the families that they could n’t have with the fresh family that they now want to form themselves into together . ”

Cowboy Bebop is now stream on Netflix .

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