Who needs a trailer when you have opening credits like these? Just kidding. We obviously need a trailer. But as far as first real peeks at Netflix’s live-action Cowboy Bebop go, the show’s opening credits—revealed this weekend as part of the platform’s Tudum fan event—are gorgeous and effective.
The credits are ninety seconds of nifty animation crossed with brief scenes from the upcoming first season—highlighting all the stars, including Ein, the corgi. Cowboy Bebop‘s space bounty hunters will clearly have their hands full with the range of ominous-looking folks (and weapons) teased in this sequence.
Showrunner André Nemec (High Fidelity, Zoo) has described the series as an “expansion to the canon” of the original Bebop, and you can see that sensibility here: The sequence begins and ends very similarly to Shinichirō Watanabe’s 1998 series credits, but in between, the new version mostly does its own thing. The style overlaps, with the boxes and animated elements (some of which mirror the original credits), but Nemec’s team has packed in a lot more characters and scenes.
Cowboy Bebop stars John Cho as sharp-dressing Spike Spiegel; Mustafa Shakir as his crewmate Jet Black; Daniella Pineda as Faye Valentine, a rival bounty hunter who crosses paths with the Bebop crew; and Alex Hassell as Vicious, with whom Spike has a history. The score, as it must be, is by original composer Yoko Kanno, who is responsible for that iconic theme.
Cowboy Bebop lands on Netflix on November 19th.
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