Imma Take A Break

I don't know when I'll be back, but I will... maybe not doing the same thing (that is, Bebop), but I'll get back to this blog eventually...

Cowboy Bebop Session 14 - Kings and Queen

Session 14 - Bohemian Rhapsody

Monkey Noises - YouTube

And now you're up to speed.

"Bohemian Rhapsody" is definitely one of the good episodes of Bebop... that is, there are pretty good episodes, then there are really, really good episodes (and then there's "Boogie Woogie Feng Shui"); "Bohemian Rhapsody" is a really good one.  The premise is that small-time thugs have suddenly been committing very un-small-time theft, and they seem to be under the authority of a mysterious chessmaster... literally.  All we see of him is a withered old hand moving chess pieces, and the only lead the Bebop crew picks up is a white king piece.  Unless they nab the leader, all the bounties on the criminals they picked up so far are no-go.  Ed figures out that the chess pieces are "tokens" for an online game of chess, which.... probably has something to do with.... something.  Like the fact that, little does Team Bebop know, Ed's opponent is the mysterious old hand and his parrot.  As you may have guessed, the theme here is games.  Ed playing the mastermind in chess, the Gate Corporation using bounty hunters to cover their own asses, basically it's all one giant chess match.  With more than two players.  And no rules.  And corrupt corporate scheming.  And so, finally, the mysterious mastermind is given a name: Chessmater Hex, a "ghost from fifty years in the past."  See, fifty years ago, Hex was a genius - and also a brilliant chess player - who worked on developing the hyperspace gates that are now used to link up the world of Bebop.  But when the time came to implement them, he claimed there were still some defects which needed testing.  So, of course, the Gate Corporation fired him and made the gates anyway.  He's been missing since.  So what does he want now, at nearly ninety-eight years old?  His final revenge?  The destruction of the gates?  To make the Gate Corporation squirm?  Once everyone figures out Hex is who Ed's been playing chess with all this time, they have a fairly easy time of tracking him down, and so they suspect a trap.  Could it be something sinister awaits in this far, far-off space scrapyard??

Nah, all this guy wants is to play chess.

Yeahhhh, turns out, Hex is a biit senile.  He totally just wanted to find a formidable opponent to play against, totally forgetting his intended revenge scheme which he set up fifty years earlier.  Now he's just "an old man who like to play games."  And I like how he and Ed were the only ones to latch onto this straight away (Hex's line about being "either and idiot or a genius" comes to mind), because of how unique both of their respective perspectives (ooh, that's fun to say!) are.  Also, let me just say how this show has an uncanny ability to make me happy.  Or make anything happy.  Hex's *SPOILER* death comes as no big surprise, but the music, situation and heartfelt characters all come together to make this a  surprisingly feel-good moment.  The guy totes left the world content, despite being a little crazy by the end.

So nothing at all like King Bumi.

Finally, let me take a moment to mention Spike's line during the space-flight: "Whatever happens, happens."  This is pretty much Spike's mantra, and the fact that he says it so casually in the middle of the climax makes it a lot less obvious.  But for all the time we know him, this is how Spike has lived.  Whatever will be will be, whether this is the real life, or just fantasy.

Cowboy Bebop Sessions 12-13 (Part II) - WoooaOH, Livin' On A Prayer

Sessions 12-13 - Jupiter Jazz
Welcome back for part 2 of Jupiter Jazz!  Where were we?  Oh, right.

WHAT.
So much wtf going through my mind right now.  A quick recap to soothe the nerves?  Faye went and left the Bebop, taking all the money with her, but while searching for her, Spike heard mention of his girl from another lifetime, Julia.  Immediately going down to Callisto to investigate, he found Vicious again, this time smuggling Red Eye for a guy called Gren.  Though, "guy" maybe isn't the word to use, as Faye figured out the WHAT way.  Spike and Vicious were about to go at it, which seems to be all they have left to do with each other, but Vicious' eager henchmen Lin gets in the way.  Not wanting to shoot Lin gets Spike shot, and that's where we pick up...
Oh, wait, he's still sleeping.
Let's check in on Faye.
Gren explains how Vicious and he were comrades in some kind of war on Titan, and Vicious even saved his life, despite saying he didn't need any sort of comrades.  He only goes on to, as Gren heard, frame him as a spy which leads to an experimental drug being tested on him and... WHAT.
So you know what's so disappointing about this episode?  If you're gonna have just three stories featuring Vicious, why would you make it so him and Spike hardly even interact for one of them??  Not to spoil to much, but even the ending doesn't refer to Spike (most people think the "fallen warrior" is Lin or Gren).
There's a lot of bits and pieces of flashback in one part of the episode, and it's left up to the viewer to piece everything together, which I appreciate.  I myself hate it when a show has to spell out each and every last bit of metaphor or symbolism, like we're such dumbasses we can't sit and think what stuff means on our own.  And in a way that's what some works of fiction have trained us to do, just wait until the work itself comes out and explains everything plain as day.  Which is just another reason why Cowboy Bebop is so very refreshing and unique.  There's lines during this sequence about Julia spoken by Vicious, some that sound like conversations, one where Vicious seems to be threatening Julia, one where Spike says his eyes "are different colors", that his right eye sees the past (still fuzzy on all that now, but still glad they didn't come right out and explain exactly what happened).  Most important, is Spike saying he wants to leave the Syndicate, and wants to know if Julia will come with him.  All of this gets picked up (more or less) in the finale, but for now it's all foreshadowing.  Back to the present... Spike has woken up, and the "bullet" he was shot with turns out to be just a tranquilizer.  Jet has successfully found Gren's apartment, but he opens the door to find... Faye's ass-- I mean, Faye.  Gren's gone off to find out if Vicious really did betray him all that time ago.  Here we are again at the theme of dealing with the past.  Funny how this is never a cliche in the show's entirety, because everyone is handled so realistically and uniquely from one another.  No matter what anyone seems to do, their pasts ends up deciding their futures for them.  And so, Jet and Spike are all cool again; Spike is after Gren for his bounty and Vicious for his score that needs settled.  The Red Eye trade-off is arranged, but that sonofabitch Vicious still tries to kill someone.  The music box didn't get the job done, so he tries again with a bomb in the suitcase the Red Eye is traded for.  Lin dies protecting Vicious, the man who genuinely believes there is nothing to believe in.  Who then proceeds to try and shoot down Gren, when he's "in the way" of him and Spike's dogfight.  What an evil prick.  Gren planned ahead though, and the same music box Vicious booby-trapped and gave Gren ended up costing him the battle and the Red Eye.  And without even a follow-up to Vicious's condition, we go to Gren's ship, and a dying Gren.  Like I said, rather a disappointment that Spike and Vicious are in the episode together, and hardly do anything.

Gren wants Spike to set his controls for Titan, so even if he doesn't make it, "at least [he] was on the way,"  The final payoff: Gren finally realizes, this is Spike, the guy Julia talked about all the time, whose eyes were different colors.  "What a smile.  So sad... so beautiful..."  The less said in this case, the better, and somehow with very few words everything is explained that needs to be, in this scene, for the rest of the episode through everyone's interactions and the repeat of the beginning scene, and in the finer moments of the show period.

Cowboy Bebop Sessions 12-13 (Part I) - Ooooh, We're Halfway The-ere...

Sessions 12-13 - Jupiter Jazz

Congratulations; you've reached the halfway point.  What better way to celebrate than with another rude awakening, so to speak, for Spike Spiegel?  The funny thing is, no one on the Bebop is actually living their "real life": Jet's an ex-cop who left on bad terms with his girl (though that got resolved a few sessions back); Faye is later revealed to be the Steve Rogers of this show, Ed kinda just goes wherever the wind takes her,

and

even

Ein

was a data-dog (or something) before Spike reluctantly took him in.  Spike is supposed to be the main attraction, of course, and as was elaborated on (barely) in "Ballad of Fallen Angels" (and my god is that a cool title, just sayin'), Spike used to be in the Space Mafia, and he had a partner Vicious who was, surprising to exactly no one, totally vicious, and betrayed his friend and his friend's love interest (possibly shared?).  Spike and everyone else on the Bebop have spent their time running, some away from their old lives, some towards it (Ed runs to wherever the shiny thing is), but no matter what they do, the past always comes up behind up, like a bad dream there is no waking up from.  That's life, and that's what Jupiter Jazz is all about (well, there's more than that, but-- oh just keep reading).

Here we have a strange case in that this is one of only two two-parters, the other being the finale.  When Bebop does a two-parter, you can rest assured they did it for a reason.  Not a moment in any one episode is wasted, and this is no exception.  I guess I should start talking about the plot now...

Remember the Native American guy from the very first session?  I almost forgot him, then went "Oh yeah, he was a guy" (what planet even is this?  Is he even "American"?  Whatever.).  So he notices a shooting star in the sky, and explains it was "no ordinary star", but the tear of a warrior, who, somewhere, had finished his battle.  Meanwhile, in a ship above Jupiter... it's Vicious!!

He's got his hands in something nasty as usual, like the shipment of Red Eye.  Yeah, that drug that we also haven't seen since Session 1!  Vicious and his lackey will be dropping it off on Callisto, a super-cold planet, which Vicious would need protective clothes for if he weren't so goddamn evil.  No, he doesn't need logic.  Nor a moral code.  Nor love.  He's just... you know, vicious.

Meanwhile on the Bebop, Spike is complaining about, ironically enough, how hot it is, Ed is derping about, Ein is asleep, Jet is trying to fix the cause of the heat problem, and Faye... is the cause of the heat problem.  Wotta bitch.  Of course, Spike doesn't wanna go after her this time, he's free at last!  Then he finds out she took the money as well.  One 180 degree turnaround later, Ed is looking for her on the nearby Callisto with her magical Internet powers (this *was* 1998, computers *could* do that, right?).  She finds someone, and says their codename is Julia.  Spike immediately loses his shit and runs for the Swordfish.  Ed uses Ein as a pillow; Ein has no choice but to accept it.  Spike is hellbent on looking for his woman, leaving Jet to find "the other one".  Jet actually threatens kicking Spike off his ship, which Spike is surprisingly unfazed about.  He's got more important things on his mind... or he's just being stupid, as Jet insists.  He storms out, saying he doesn't understand why Spike is even doing this.  Neither does Spike, says Spike.

Faye has certainly made herself at home, though.  Spike's search for Julia leads him to the sax player in the exact bar she is in... or it would if Spike hadn't got jumped.  Meanwhile the sax player, Gren, would be chatting up none other than Faye.  They split up, but Faye runs into the same guys as Spike, and Gren comes back to her rescue.  Back with Spike, he finds out Vicious is involved, and that he only used Julia as a codename... so yeah, Spike's pissed.  Jet, of course deciding to get involved, discovers almost everyone in the town is a criminal, including Gren, but doesn't actually seem to care.  Hey, look, Spike found Vicious!

Hey, look, Spike got shot!

And at Gren's place, Faye makes a startling discovery...

What.

What.

WHAT?

Confused? Disturbed?  Wondering how Spike's holding up?  What was Ed doing all this time? It would be a two-parter, wouldn't it?

Cowboy Bebop Session 11 - Livin' In The Fridge (I apologize in advance...)

Session 11 - Toys In The Attic

Ohhh, this one's great.  It's so spooky, so unusual, so strange, so funny, there's really not another episode of Bebop like it.  It has the distinction of being the only episode to be divided into "lessons", the only episode where (spoilers) everyone dies by the end; it just seems so out-of-place, which is why I love the brilliance that is Toys In The Attic so much.  (edit: Dear god I must be tired; I didn't even realize how completely retarted I was writing until I looked over it again... meh it's kinda like this episode: weird and blessed with the inability to focus on one thing.)
Credits roll, duhDUN duhDUN duhDUN duh duhhhh..., Predator-vision of something beastly crawling around in some sort of ventilation tunnels.  What could this be??  You have me mildly interested, plot...  Meanwhile, on the Bebop, Ed is sleeping and, prepare yourself for this one, Jet and Faye are gambling for each other's clothes, and Jet is losing, little does he know Faye is cheating.  Done laughing?  Meanwhile, somewhere else, Spike is cooking shish kebabs with an effing flamethrower.
Where are we going with this?
In addition, something thrown in for this episode and this episode only are "lessons" from each crew member.  Basically these serve as words of advice that separate up the episode into parts.  Jet's lesson, appropriately, was that not having money can lead to a person foolishly getting some through desperate measures.  Aaand Spike getting boxers tossed in his face.  Later, the spooky vent monster is still on the prowl, killing rats and growling a bunch.  Ein's Corgi-Sense starts tingling!  And that's when Jet notices...
THE FRIDGE.
Faye is still taking inventory of everything she swindled when we learn Lesson 2, cheat or be cheated, kill or be killed.  Oh hey, speaking of, what's that sloshy, growly noise slowly closing in from behind Faye- oh wait it's Spike brushing his teeth.  See, now this bit I didn't even notice the first time through.  It's all about the rewatch, as I've come to learn.  Especially with
OH GOD ALARMS NOW EVERYONE'S RUNNING
When Faye, Spike and Ein look to see what caused the alarm, they find Jet was bitten by the thing in the vents.  They're leery to believe him though, thinking it was just a rat.  When Jet says how it happened near
THE FRIDGE.
Spike seems to recall something, but doesn't feel like thinking hard enough to remember it fully.  Whatever bit Jet leaves a nasty purple welt where it attacked, and Spike is forced to call upon his sage experience as a connoisseur of medicines.  So now Spike is brewing up lizards, and Jet is drinking the lizards, and Faye is being critical of everyone, and Ein is flipping his shit, and Ed... is still fast asleep.  Nice.  But then Jet collapses.  The bite would seem to have been more serious than anyone thought.  Too baaad, Jet has ebola.

Ed is several steps ahead of everyone else despite having just woken up and tells them all the thing is an alien, but they just don't listen.  Later, Faye gets in the bath, because nothing bad ever came from a female character taking a shower in the middle of an alien/monster/killer pudding incursion.  While nothing terrible or bitey is happening there, Ed and Spike try to find the creature with Slow-Down-VLC-Player-Vision.  Lesson, lesson: if you see a stranger, follow him.  Once again, things sorta just happen with no one really contributing to the outcome at all.  Ein smells the creature and Ed chases after him WAIT EIN NO dammit he got bit too.  Now they all have ebola and only Spike is left!!!  Here we be at the climax, and it's down to the chase, Spike and the monster, mano e pudding.  Prepare for the final lesson.  Spike tries everything to kill the black blobby thing: shooting it, trapping it with a net, smoking it out, burning it, but it can't be stopped.  At this point I would have been totally content with the alien explanation, but this being Cowboy Bebop, we're thrown one last twist.  The thing that's stalking the ship grew forth from
THE FRIDGE.
The story is, one year ago, on a full blood moon, Spike bought a cursed Ganymede rock lobster from a guy off the street, and stored it in this fridge so no one else would eat it.  But there was something... wrong with this lobster, it craved sustenance so it could please its lord and dark master Satan.  And the fridge it was being stored in just so happened to be in a cold spot in the thirteenth room of the thirteenth floor of the Bebop, and this room had six-hundred and sixty-six cracks in the walls.  And so it began to feed, and all because Spike forgot about it in the fridge.  Actually, just thought this was interesting, the fact that Spike says he hid the lobster from other people one year ago suggests the Bebop crew have actually been together for quite a bit longer than it would seem just by watching the episodes.  That completely tonally jarring fan theory out of the way, the ebola pudding lobster and its fridge dwelling are ejected into space like the unholy abominations they are, but not before it kills everyone.  And what an avant garde ending!  Edward is the lone survivor, and she gets her own show from this point on.  Next session, "Ed Rides Again!"

Cowboy Bebop Session 10 - Flashback Blues

Session 10 - Ganymede Elegy

Where Spike Spiegel has his three sessions with Vicious, Faye has "Speak Like A Child" and shares "Hard Luck Woman" with Ed, and even Ein sort of has "Stray Dog Strut", this is one for Jet Black's past, and the man before he stepped foot on the Bebop.  This is one of three episodes which were solo Jet adventures (the less said about "Boogie Woogie Feng Shui", the better).  My angle on Jet for every episode prior to this one was that he was the sarcastic, easygoing everyman of the show.  After this episode... it stayed exactly the same, but this one does add a new depth to his character and still lets Jet be Jet, showing a sensitive side we hadn't seen just yet but was handled brilliantly and believably in this episode, as well as exploring the theme of how quickly time can pass when you're not there for it.
Seeing as Ed just came aboard last session, the episode begins with her doing what she does best: making me laugh my ass off.  The tied-up criminal responds in the only rational way possible: "What the hell are you?"  Weird characters are just the freaking best.  Meanwhile, Jet is standing at the ship's controls, but he's transfixed on a pocket watch, and flashes back to him standing in a doorway, with pouring rain... and a girl.  Just then Spike would come in and ask why it's taking so damn long to land.  As it turns out, the planet below is Ganymede, Jet's homeworld.  In fact, the cop Jet calls to turn in the bounty is an old friend of his, as Jet is revealed to have been a cop on Ganymede.  All it takes from the old man is one mention of the name Elisa and Jet's cool is lost.  What's sad is how the writers made it so very few things seem to have changed in Jet's old life on the surface, while time has marched on at the same merciless pace while he wasn't there.  Jet's old friend is still an active duty cop, but he's old, really old.  Elisa still has her bar, but time hasn't stayed still just because Jet was gone.  To compare it to something else, it's a lot like the episode "School Reunion" of Doctor Who.  Jarringly disruptive side-note: I love Ed's line "Yes!  Futile!  Useless!" because she says that she understands, while in the same breath confirming she has no idea what she is talking about. 

So cute. 

What was I even... oh right, so Jet finds Elisa, who, unsurprisingly, has a new boyfriend, but he's immediately pretty shady.  It's funny how Jet is such a gentleman when he cares enough to be one, as you can tell by his conversation with Elisa.  It's also sad, because at times you can see them falling into that insignificant small-talk phase that people who have been out of touch for too long get into.  Jet cuts right to the point and pulls out the old pocket watch.  We're told Jet came home one day and, for once, his Elisa wasn't there; just a pocket watch and a note, saying 'Farewell'.  The way Jet describes what happened, so matter-of-factly yet so like he knows how it felt, like it's something he's thought about countless sleepless nights since, which he most definitely had.  And still, Jet doesn't want to point a finger, he's just looking for an explanation.  But, while Jet had this as his last memory of Ganymede, something to contemplate and question ever since, we're hit with the sucker punch that Elisa had forgotten.  "Time never stands still."  Elisa, too, has a new life of her own, and Jet gets that it's time to leave.  From Spike chasing Elisa's boyfriend and Elisa to the end, it's all about what must be going on in Jet's head as he's trying to arrest the boyfriend of the girl he loved.

The ending is meaningful and satisfying, as Jet tries to protect Elisa as he sees fit, and Elisa's want for a life of her own clashes with her simply wanting someone to love.  Elisa gets a fresh start (after a fashion...), and Jet comes away from the experience with the understanding that time waits for no one.  As he's walking away, he feels something in his pocket... it's the pocket watch that brought him here and played a hand in his leaving, his memento of Elisa from all that time ago, the symbol of a time now past.  He looks down at it, smiles, then tosses it into the lake.  Time to move on...

Up next... oooooh!  "Toys In The Attic!"  A favorite of mine!  Okay, they're all favorites, but this one's like "Alien" with the Bebop crew!  And moldy food.

Cowboy Bebop Session 9 - Jam Session

"HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!"

Session 9 - Jamming With Edward

Spike: Jet, do you know that there are three things that I particularly hate?
Jet: Really?
Spike: Kids, animals, and women with attitudes. So tell me, Jet, why do we have all three of them neatly gathered on this ship?!

Ahhhh, Ed.  So adorable.  So very strange.  So very, very glued to a computer screen (all things I can appreciate).  And yet still really, really thoughtful and lovable as a character.  Yes, most people would agree she's only good for comic relief and point out that she's absent from all three serious plot-involved stories, but I say who cares??  She's still totally awesome and a valid, important member of the group (I'm a little biased as, as you may have guessed, Ed is my favorite).  She's the last person to join the team, this being nearly the halfway point of the series.  The episode itself is, I believe, the first we see of future Earth, which is now a barren wasteland due to meteor showers.  The first thing our senses are bombarded with this time is a talking satellite, which is apparently lonely.... okaaaay... on Earth, a strange little red-haired boy is lying in the wreckage, surfing the Internet.  The boy seems to have found what he was looking for: the Bebop; and the Bebop seems to be looking for him-- oh no wait ok her.  And ERMAHGERD I just wanna squee at everything Ed says!!!!!  Thank you, Melissa Fahn! (speaking of, can anyone else hear a bit of Gaz in her early lines??)  

squeeeeeee

Memorable parts-- err, memorable Ed moments include her very warmly welcoming the police, the realization that Ed completed bullshitted (bullshat?) her name,  "MPU is good at drawing!" and my favorite, Ed's seeming complete lack of motives for wanting to be a member of Bebop (though I guess 'she thought it'd be fun' counts).  It's almost like she joined them because she needed people to drive insane.  Add in beautifully drawn and animated spaceships and Earth scenery, sharp, tight dialogue and of course a perfect fit for music and you've got one of my favorite episodes of one of my favorite anime out there.  Next on deck, "Ganymede Elegy"...

Oh, and "compooters".