Board 8 > Gauntlet Crew Ranks the Cowboy Bebop Episodes

(+) Yeah! (+)

Snake really pushing for that worst user title.
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Holy shit, that's definitely not one I expected to see get a bottom ranking. Glad it made it to the top 10 though, regardless!

while I liked Waltz for Venus a good bit more than Snake did, I definitely get that perspective and feel like it's a bit overrated here. It's definitely got a heart-wrenching ending, but the buildup to it ultimately made the great ending feel a little unearned
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7. Jupiter Jazz (Part 2)
Total: 129 pts.

charon - 4
Johnbobb - 4
scarlet - 6
Gen - 9
Snake - 10
JONA - 11
Stifled - 11
Ermine - 13
KBM - 13
Inviso - 15
Wickle - 16
Karo - 17

charon - Gren's a great character, and this episode featuring a battle between him, Vicious and Spike probably represents the moment where I really wanted the character I figured was going to die to actually die. His plan to trick Vicious into letting him get close was pretty cool, by pretending he was a woman and all. It was also nice to see the Red Eye drug make a comeback here, connecting this plot back with the first episode of the series. I kinda wish there was a little more of that throughout the show.

Johnbobb - Excellent music and tense drama, pretty much what I've come to expect from the handful of "Spike's story" episodes. Funny enough though, it's not Spike or Vicious that steals the show like in Ballad of Fallen Angels, but Gren. We only get a brief glimpse of him, but he's mysterious and interesting and just fun to watch. Of all the dramatic one-off character deaths in the show's first half (and there's a lot of them) Gren's is by far the biggest tearjerker.

Mickayla's thoughts:
Holy shit is Gren an interesting and complex character.
1/26

scarlet - Despite the setting and the world-building being crucial to Cowboy Bebop, its the intimate storytelling between a handful of characters and their relationships that keep the show grounded and tightly written. Too many shows lose cohesion when they dive into worlds they feel need explanation; not so here. Spike and Vicious remain the center of a world spinning around them in a way that summons up shows like Battlestar Galactica and Game of Thrones. Great stuff.
Rating: 87/100

Gen - I suppose it's good to know Vicious was always... an intense person. It's difficult to tell what motivates him sometimes. He cares enough to warn Lin not to get too close to him, but callously leaves him to die of a wound sustained protecting him. Talk about hard to read... I hate that Gren died for basically nothing, but he raised the death flag himself when he said he wasn't afraid of it. At least he ascertained the truth of it all and got to die on his own terms. One question regarding "Anything but blue..." Will the color remind her of Gren because Faye met him at the Blue Crow bar?

Snake - For whatever reason, the second part of this episode didnt really hit as hard as the first. However, there will still some things I liked a lot; the whole episode has a really depressing overtone, and the idea of the crews overall isolation from the rest of the universe is felt extremely heavy here. Faye is practically catatonic after her encounter with Gren, who also gets a pretty sad ending thats surprisingly emotional for a character we only knew for 2 episodes. Still, Vicious nihilisms dont come across as particularly meaningful and the action, like Lin dying (talk about night or day compared Gren) and the subsequent dogfight come off as hollow as a result. The ending is still touching and could be almost be considered a finale for the series, with plenty of things left unsaid and uncertain, just like it always is with the Bebop crew.
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JONA - The episode begins with Gren telling Faye his backstory and it's also revealed that the hormones from drugs ended up giving him breasts. There's a cool flashback with Julia but it's also noteworthy how Faye is in the flashback as well. Definitely shows that it could be possible that Spike could move on. Faye ends up in handcuffs again but Jet ends up finding her. I like how Jet implies that she wanted them to find her. I also like how Jet rolls his eyes up when he acts surprised that there was a relatively small amount of money in the safe. That, along with letting back Spike on the Bebop, despite not getting the bounty, help show how Jet just wants his family to be together. Also interesting that Faye has Julia on the mind at the end of the episode. The second half of the episode deals with Gren and Vicious and it has some good action. Lin's line about being loyal to Vicious in Part 1 comes back to bite him during the fight with Gren. The ending is quite haunting with Spike's conversation to a dying Gren, the book end with Part 1 and the lack of "The Real Folk Blues" credits and instead there's the slow camera going upwards towards space. Great episode with great action and a fantastic ending.

Favorite Song: Space Lion

Stifled - The backstory and conflict of Spike and Vicious intensifies as we add new pieces to the puzzle. We have Gren and Lin, both of whom have their lives deeply altered by loyalty. Gren feels the sting of betrayed loyalty by Vicious and Lins life is run on loyalty. Both, ironically, lose their lives in their pursuits of these ideals. Its an interesting duality to have, adding more weight to an already intense feud between Spike and Vicious. The matching combat is just as frantic as the emotional charges leading to it. Jupiter Jazz Part 2 serves as an outstanding midpoint to the series and a teaser for the shows finale.

Ermine - Hmmm... well things turned out about as I expected. Gren was actually a pretty interesting character but I very much expected him to die. The music used throughout the episode was pretty good and overall everything was decent. I like that even Ein sighs at having to deal with Ed's craziness. Seriously that kid is messed up. Still feeling pretty meh on Faye though.

7/10

KBM - So, while it's interesting that this two-parter seemingly tried to have a bit of serious discourse and commentary on the nature of gender, I'm not sure I quite understood the context of what happened to Gren or the message the episode was trying to convey regarding his story. That said, I did love the WWI-chic flashbacks we got in this part, and the episode also had a lot of what the show does best, featuring its signature style, use of color, and compelling story arcs for both the lead characters and the one-offs. I just wonder if, like I said in my review for the first part, some things didn't get a bit lost in translation.

Inviso - Im a broken record on this, but these episodes just arent long enough for the depth of story theyre trying to portray. You only have about 22 minutes to tie up a bunch of plot points established in part one, and everything just feels rushed. Faye and Spike wind up back with the Bebop crew, after Jet figures out the connection to Gren. Gren has his whole backstory explainedexcept Vicious backstabbed him forsome reason? And guy who we barely know gets killed defending Vicious, and I ASSUME were supposed to care? Really, its the ending that winds up salvaging this, because the combination jazz/tribal chanting really help to convey an emotional tone that the writing fails to create.
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Wickle - We finish Jupiter Jazz, and honestly it does not do much more in terms of anything that occurs. What is nice is we got info that Spike is heterochromatic and information about Julia. Also nice that the indian from the first ep basically narrated the ending of Gren. But thats about it.

Karo - It's part 2! Spike is actually still alive. Gren apparently gained curvacious breasts from being an estrogen addict or whatever. Coldsteel the Hedgeheg gets several better characters then him killed. A very poignant ending isnt nearly enough to salvage this mess of an episode by this point, and you'd think they would handle a season finale better than this but oh well.
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huh, that was one of the episodes I just kind of assumed would be unanimously liked (like many of the Spike-focused ones)
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Outlier

Stifled - 158
Wickle - 145
Karo - 138
Johnbobb - 134
Ermine - 108
Snake - 98
Inviso - 86
JONA - 76
Gen - 75
KBM - 74
charon - 72
scarlet - 37

The camera pans up to find Stifled as the top outlier.
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Just need charon to gain 2 more points on me.
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scarletspeed7 posted...

Just need charon to gain 2 more points on me.

I don't get why
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Presumably so the next-lowest outlier will still have double his points

I continue to be pleasantly surprised at how high Mushroom Samba is climbing.

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As much as I enjoy it I've got to admit Mushroom Samba placing over some of the mythology sessions is a little depressing.

Vengeful_KBM posted...

Presumably so the next-lowest outlier will still have double his points

Ah. Yay for maths.

Anway I've been at DragonCon all weekend while some of my favorite episodes have gone down and I'm dying to get in on some discussion. Does anyone else want to weigh in on their theories on the significance of "Anything but blue"? Also

JONALEON1 posted...

KBM - So, while it's interesting that this two-parter seemingly tried to have a bit of serious discourse and commentary on the nature of gender, I'm not sure I quite understood the context of what happened to Gren or the message the episode was trying to convey regarding his story. That said, I did love the WWI-chic flashbacks we got in this part, and the episode also had a lot of what the show does best, featuring its signature style, use of color, and compelling story arcs for both the lead characters and the one-offs. I just wonder if, like I said in my review for the first part, some things didn't get a bit lost in translation.

In regards to the first bold I personally don't think the writers were trying to convey anything beyond the very surface level of showing the physical repercussions of Vicious' betrayal. I don't think they were going for shock value, because even though Part 1 ends on that cliffhanger the next session continues on that revelation and doesn't treat it like it's a huge deal. Yet I think it serves as a better metaphor to betrayal than a huge scar or something generic like that.

Here is a significant physical change to a person who was once considered "normal" by societal standards brought into motion directly because a former comrade stabbed Grencia in the back. Now that person feels they don't even belong within society itself, or at the very least not in any binary society defines. I don't know if Grencia was asexual before the events of the war or not, but honestly it doesn't even matter. Regardless the betrayal of a comrade (I have come to appreciate this word as well) left him forever changed, scarred in an entirely different manner, and unable to form intimate relationships with anyone out of fear of being betrayed again and that's tragic.

In regards to the second bolded statement I recently had an epiphany where a line I thought nonsensical came to make a lot of sense to me. I don't know what you thought got lost in translation, but to me the exchange between Gren and Faye where they first met always eluded me until my last watch through. At the risk of sounding totally slow I'll admit that I didn't get what Faye meant by already being a fairy after she sneezed. I just thought it was an odd Japanese custom I wasn't getting, but if it's meant to be humorous it actually makes perfect sense in English if you think about her name. Faye sounds like "fae" which is to say faefolk or faeries/fairies so even if no one said take care she wouldn't have to worry about becoming a fairy as she's already a fae.

All that is to say that maybe something got lost in translation or maybe you have to think about it in a different way for it to make any sense. Of course I don't know what exactly you're referring to so I could be totally off base there.
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Mushroom Samba doing well is redemption for my Stray Dog Slut doing so terribly.
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Zigzagoon posted...

Stray Dog Slut

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scarletspeed7 posted...

Zigzagoon posted...

Stray Dog Slut

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v_charon posted...

scarletspeed7 posted...

Zigzagoon posted...

Stray Dog Slut

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Yikes
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I'm not editing that
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Don't, it's amazing.
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Spike, we need to track down the rare slut dog that knows every position.

I never knew you were such a freak, Jet.

...its for the BOUNTY, Spike.

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I really liked your insightful writeup for Jupiter Jazz Part 2 Stifled, even if you low balled Part 1 which I enjoyed a bit more!

And Inviso,
JONALEON1 posted...

Gren has his whole backstory explainedexcept Vicious backstabbed him forsome reason? And guy who we barely know gets killed defending Vicious, and I ASSUME were supposed to care?

You are absolutely not supposed to give a flying shit about Lin. I feel that he and his brother Shin are literally just proxies to show how differently Vicious and Spike are as characters by how they treat the people closest to them. All that matters is that the two part session conveys that Spike cares about Lin (and later Shin), and I think it was a success in that regard. I don't really get what motivated Vicious to testify against Gren either. It seemed like he had absolutely nothing to gain from it, though maybe there's some Syndicate related reason that escaped me. I suppose it just ties back into Vicious treating people like they're disposable. Lin and Gren are good parallels in that regard.
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6. Mushroom Samba
Total: 120 pts.

Ermine - 2
Inviso - 6
Snake - 6
Karo - 8
charon - 10
Gen - 10
JONA - 10
scarlet - 10
Stifled - 10
Johnbobb - 11
KBM - 11
Wickle - 26

Ermine - Ahhhh now here's some great filler! I could do without Ed to be honest but still this episode was really good fun. The whole train chase scene was hilarious and great. Ein was fantastic all the way through and all of the mushroom shenanigans were awesome. Ein bouncing around takes the cake though. This is probably the only episode with decent amounts of Ein that I'm going to get since Stray Dog Strut so I'm glad it was quite a bit of fun. Great stuff.

9/10

Inviso - I cant stand Ed, but godDAMN if this wasnt one of the first episodes of this entire watchthrough that felt fun and enjoyable, and didnt have problems with its pacing. This sort of plot if perfect for a twenty-five-minute anime episode. You have the set-up with the Bebop crash-landing on a planet due to lack of fuel, and the crew being starving due to lack of rations, and everything from then on is just a comedy of errors, and multiple people are chasing the bounty for the episode, only for Ed and Ein to bumblefuck their way into catching the guy all on their own, and scoring a whole haul of mushrooms for their troubles. If this episode somehow happened without Ed being involved, I could see it topping the list. But Ed was there, and prominentand even though it was one of her least-annoying roles, shes still the worst member of the Bebop crew.

Snake - The overplayed joke of the Bebop having no food aside, Mushroom Samba is a hilarious adventure that gives Ed and Ein a chance to shine together for practically the first time since they were both introduced. I wasnt expecting the blaxploitation elements here, but I loved how hilariously incompetent almost everybody was, and seeing Shafts coffin get ran over probably gave me the biggest laugh of the show so far. The drug trips were also well-done, and didnt overstay their welcome; Spikes was especially hilarious. All in all, this is an episode that appropriately knows how to have a little fun, and pulls off an all-comedic episode with aplomb.

Karo - A different sort of episode where Ed goes off on her own to find food, but takes a wrong turn and ends up in a 1970s blaxplotation movie. Oh, and there are a lot of hallucinogenic mushrooms. Possibly in the animation studio as well.
It has its own sort of unique tone to the story and humor that sets it apart from most other episodes in the series. It is weird, bizarre, and yet somehow it works and ends up being way better than it has any right to be.

charon - Much like Toys in the Attic, this episode takes on a different sort of style than the usual. It's the comedy to the horror themes of that one. The best part is the mushroom-induced trips the cast members go on and then seeing them from a sober point of view. This is probably Ed's best episode where she's treated as the "lead" character, and I guess the tone matches her personality.

Gen - By far the best purely comedic session in the series. The visual gags Spike and Faye go through in their hallucinogenic states versus how they appear and act from Edward's perspective are laugh out loud moments for me. I only wish we could actually see what Jet was seeing too. Kudos to that guy who carried the coffin around. He was hilarious too. Oh and how could I almost forget the best part: shiitake stir fry, shiitake salad, shiitake stew, and shiitake on ice. Man I was rolling.
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JONA - Ed and Ein take the spotlight in this one. The episode starts with the gang starving and trying to find out who ate the emergency rations. Spike has a pretty humourous line about wanting bell peppers and beef, referencing Asteroid Blues. I love the shot of Ed opening her snack and then the zoom out to everyone else who have great facial expressions. Ed and Ein end up having to get food when the ship crashes on a planet due to a hit-and-run, with Spike and Jet fixing the ship and Faye being sick due to eating the rations. The montage of Ed and Ein walking is great due to Ed's offbeat movement. There's some fun shenanigans with the blaxploitation inspired one-shot characters, with the cops finding Ed and Ein in Coffee's car and Shaft having his coffin ran over and getting brain freeze. I love the effects that the mushrooms have on the crew. They're fun scenes and can kinda explore their characters' issues. Spike is destined to go to heaven when he deals with the Red Dragon syndicate, but he just tries to avoid it, not taking any steps closer to his redemption. Faye's scene can represent her past with has her swimming with fish so she can belong with them, but not actually being there. Jet just wants friends he can have meaningful conversations with. The chase scene climax is just a blast, with some funny stuff afterwards with Ein talking to the cow, the cop analyzing the mushrooms and the all-mushroom diet the crew is forced to have. An incredibly fun episode.

Favorite Song: Mushroom Hunting

scarlet - Everything about this episode, including the focus on Ed and Ein, felt fresh and therefore fantastic. The tone was unusual, the setting was unique (at least up until this point of the series), and I just all around enjoyed this one.
Rating: 83/100

Stifled - Ed and Ein go on an adventure to find food and return with some magic shrooms. That in itself is enough to sell me on a top ten appearance, but the episode goes even farther to show me the Bebop crew tripping balls on those shrooms. Youd be forgiven for calling this a weird quasi-filler type of episode, but I love it. Sometimes a nice dose of fun (mushroom pun not actually intended, but Ill take it!) is all you need out of a TV episode.

Johnbobb - Maybe not the BEST episode but easily the funniest.

Mickayla's thoughts:
Kind of another non sequitur. So much fun jam-packed into one episode. I kind of wish the girl bounty hunter would have tagged along because she definitely seems more interesting than Faye.
12/26

KBM - Okay, can I just say, I've never had a mushroom trip remotely like the ones featured in this episode. That said, the sequences where the characters are high on shrooms are one of the show's comedic high points. Ed's adventures on a strange, seemingly Blaxploitation-inspired Io are a little more touch-and-go, but still makes for some entertaining viewing.

Wickle - When the only good things in your ep are laughing at non-dialogue subjects, you know you found the worst episode.
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Outlier

Wickle - 165
Stifled - 162
Karo - 140
Johnbobb - 139
Ermine - 112
Snake - 98
Inviso - 86
JONA - 80
Gen - 79
KBM - 79
charon - 76
scarlet - 41

Wickle's truck runs over the coffin that had Stifled's dream of winning outlier in it.
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JONALEON1 posted...

When the only good things in your ep are laughing at non-dialogue subjects

what does that even mean
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Johnbobb posted...

JONALEON1 posted...

When the only good things in your ep are laughing at non-dialogue subjects

what does that even mean

Jet's mushroom trip, I'm guessing.
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=( my outlier coffin filled with magic shrooms! I will avenge you!

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Scarlet will probably give me a hard time about being anti-fun for saying this but I really don't care for Mushroom Samba. It's ostensibly a comedy episode but I find the more dry, understated sense of humor that's present in most of the rest of the show funnier than the over-the-top nature of Samba or Cowboy Funk.

It's inoffensive for what it is but I can't believe how many episodes it beat out on this ranking.
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I appreciate that position in a short series like Bebop. I don't appreciate that position in a company where all you've got is Yano for 150 hours a year of content.

For me, variety is the spice of life, so the off-beat episodes to me ring out as courageous in any series.
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I enjoyed that Bebop wasn't afraid to be overly comedic when it wanted to be. You never knew what to expect from any episode.

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Zigzagoon posted...

I'm surprised I'm not the only one who didn't really like Faye

Oh but I also don't like Ed so that's the double combo

If it wasn't clear at this point for me

Ein >>> Jet > Spike >> Faye => Ed

I love every member of the Bebop crew, but to varying degrees and for different reasons. Not that anyone probably gives a damn, but here are my rankings of the gang and a short explanation why:

Ed > Spike > Faye > Jet > Ein

Radical Edward provides a necessary levity to the crew. Without her every other session would just be a group of adults bickering like children over money and responsibilities. Yes, some sessions still have quite a bit of this, but Ed is always there to grant a momentary reprieve from it. I'm not going to say she's the glue that holds the Bebop together, but I mean there's gotta be a reason half the crew were reeling after her departure by choking down a bunch of hard-boiled eggs. You might not even realize it the first time you watch through it, but Edward is an important character despite her appearance and behavior. Plus the girl is smart as a whip. I've never been bothered by quirky characters, especially if they're kids.

I feel like it's impossible to dislike Spike. He has a generic sort of cool factor from the moment he's introduced and this intriguing back story that's developed over plot significant episodes that are few and far between. It's amazing to me that with so little to relate to on the surface level he managed to endear himself to me and become one of my favorite anime characters of all time.

Faye is the sort of character I love to hate or hate to love. She's multifaceted, I'll give her that. On the one hand she's kind of a selfish bitch, but on the other she's damned entertaining. I can't say I like the person she is, but I could like the person she has the potential to become. After the events of Speak Like a Child, a session that was desperately needed to humanize her, I felt sorry for Faye. It made me think back on My Funny Valentine and forced me to acknowledge that it's not necessarily entirely her fault she is the way she is, that outside forces influenced her into becoming cynical, selfish, and greedy, and that given the right influences she was capable of change. By the end I'm positive she had already begun.

As the most lawful and responsible member of the crew, Jet brings a gravity that no one else can. I both love and resent him for this. Because he has to be the parental figure reigning in the others from their more entertaining impulses he does come across as kind of a bore and a downer at times. Still he is a necessary evil, as once again, without him the Bebop wouldn't even exist, and if Spike and Faye ever met they'd probably kill each other. I love Jet more as a side character than as a focus. That said I do wish I ranked Black Dog Serenade a tad higher.

Ein is of course a good boy, and my second favorite corgi in fiction. However I can't in good conscience rank him over any of the human characters because he's woefully underutulized. Even the anime itself recognizes this by not including him anywhere within the intro despite him being the first to join the crew. He's a fantastic secondary character, and plays off all the other characters very well, but a secondary character is all he is.

Notice how there aren't any double >> or >=. It's because every member is crucial, and enjoyable to me, though again in different ways and to different degrees. Cowboy Bebop just has a stellar cast. If I have time and motivation I might factor in some major non- Bebop characters into this ranking as well. Spoilers: Gren would be high.
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5. Ballad of Fallen Angels
Total: 83 pts.

charon - 1
Gen - 2
KBM - 2
scarlet - 2
JONA - 4
Snake - 4
Stifled - 4
Wickle - 4
Johnbobb - 9
Ermine - 12
Karo - 19
Inviso - 20

charon - The debut of the series main antagonist as well as the backstory elaboration for the main protagonist remains my favorite overall. While I don't feel the series completely capitalized on this love triangle storyline in the way I had hoped they could, this launching point in just the 5th episode sets off a lot of interest for the characters going forward. I think placing this episode so close to the beginning of the series, but not right at the beginning, was about as intelligent of a decision as the writers could have made. It appears after we are introduced to the main cast, get a feel for the show's format and then we finally get hit with something with tons of substance, history and impact on the future.

Gen - I would call this the objective best session of the series, but obviously I can't call it my favorite. It's got beautiful animation, very cinematic moments, great action, high stakes, and an ending that's sure to make you chuckle. This is also the first episode to involve the overarching plot, of which there are very few making Cowboy Bebop made up mostly of filler. A small rant about filler: it's not inherently good or bad. It exists to entertain, and can expand on character or backstory even without being plot heavy, or it can simply be used to provide an excursion in an anime when a manga needs more issues to get plot resolved. Either way filler can be done well, particularly with an anime as character centric as this. Rant over, Ballad entertains and sets off more questions than it answers leaving a good audience begging for more.

KBM - This is the moment where the overall arc of the show really hits the ground running, and where I really started to feel genuinely invested in this story. It's really got just about everything going for it: great music! lofty religious themes! dark, moody backstory! artsy camera angles! grandiose settings! and the introduction of a genuinely intimidating villain in Vicious. Definitely an episode that felt tailor-made for my own tastes in a show like this.

scarlet - 'Ballad' has strikingly gorgeous animation to it and cinematography that evokes the finest film-noir. Spike's history with Vicious is never explicitly stated, though the flashes of their backstory we do get leaves us thinking that there's a whole lot more to what's going on than what is on screen. Its too bad more anime cant reach this sort of height in quality.
Rating: 91/100
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JONA - The first of only 5 episodes of the series which make up the main plot. Vicious's introductory scene is great. It's really ominous how it just cuts to the goons being dead. After the title card, it cuts to a scene of Spike and Jet arguing regarding the bounty who died in the intro. It's interesting to see that Spike and Jet don't really know about each other's past. I enjoyed Faye's shenanigans of getting into the opera but being taken hostage by Vicious. It's wild that he brought Mao's body with them to the opera. Spike has an intriguing conversation with Annie and then goes on to rescue Faye. The organ music playing when Spike walks into cathedral helps give off an intense vibe. It's neat to see Jet's hobby with his bonsai trees and how he can't even focus on it because he's worried about Spike. There's some great action and I love the shot of Spike and Vicious having their gun and sword at each other's chest. The scene with Spike falling through the glass is just absolutely fantastic. We get to see the flashback from the first episode again but we get to see bits of Julia as well. The last scene is funny too with Spike telling Faye that she's off-key while he's just wrapped up. Excellent episode.

Favorite Song: Green Bird

Snake - The strongest example of storytelling in Bebop so far. I feel like the show is actually firing on all cylanders here, as the episodes main plot throws a wrench into the friendship of Spike and Jet. This is the type of episode Ive been waiting for, a chance for the world to truly breathe and expand the mythology of the shows main characters. For the first time, it feels not like a floaty instance of happenstance, but a truly driven, inspired plot that gives every character a reason for being there. Vicious is a truly effective villain and the way he kills Mao and sets his dead body up at the opera house for a little too adventurous Faye to find is one of the shows best and darkest examples of horror so far. The church shoot-out is action-packed and the confrontation between Vicious and Spike feels like its from a show Ive been watching for at least three seasons instead of at the fifth episode. I also like how it ultimately connects to the opening shots of the first episode, giving it more meaning, even if Its just ever so slight.

Stifled - Here we have the first major backstory episode, and man is it a doozy. Spikes past returns with a vengeance and everyone gets sucked into it. To folks still expecting this to just be a fun bounty hunting romp, welcome to the plot! Vicious just has this crazy presence as the villain. He gets a bit more character development later, but even if he only got this introduction episode to flesh him, out Id be satisfied. It was the perfect way to toss the shows main villain into the mix and I loved it. Also, that scene with Faye at the end of the episode was so well done. It reminded me of the scene from Trigun where Meryl is singing and Vash mistakes her for Rem.

Wickle - Here we have a look into Spikes past, and its pretty brilliantly done. Put in a bit of explaining but dont explain everything, just give us a cinematic of Spike falling out of a church while Green Bird plays and a few scenes happen that are a bit fast to understand, of course, its probably more understandable on a second watchthrough. Spike messing with Faye at the end was good too.
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Johnbobb - I inititally was considering downing this episode some spots for how slow it starts. I appreciated what it was trying to do, but while the suspense was effective, it also dragged a bit more than I was hoping for. In the last 3rd of the episode though, we get a great shootout, an awesome fight, and some of the first glimpses into Spike's past, which left me feeling very positive about the episode overall. The tone of the episode feels at home by the end but it's jarring early on, leaving it to sort of sit and fester in your mind as you continue on.

Mickayla's thoughts:
The scene with the church window could be one of the best scenes in anime.
3/26

Ermine - Thank goodness that this episode was actually pretty decent. I was considering jumping ship after this episode if it had been anything like the last 2. Despite Faye messing it all up and being annoying, overall there were a lot of good points to the episode. We got a showdown vs Sephiroth, some cool music and interesting use of flashbacks as well!

7/10

Karo - Here we get a look into Spike's past when he was in the mafia or whatever when the crew takes on a bounty of someone in organized crime. After a lot of stuff happens Faye ends up kidnapped and Spike is forced to confront an old friend.
First off, let me say that I really really hate Vicious. Cowboy Bebop is known for its unique and varied antagonists that help keep each episode fresh and exciting, and yet weve got to keep coming back to this cliched anime edgelord Twix (EDITED BY JONA) who gets his hair done at Salon du Sephiroth and only uses a fucking katana in a space age society because he's toooo cooooool!
It's just a below average episode that not a whole lot happens in until the very end and only seems to exist to introduce plot lines that honestly the show would be better off without.

Inviso - Im writing this, having not watched beyond this episode yet. Maybe shit gets explained. Maybe it doesnt. But the problem Im having with ranking these on an episode-by-episode basis is that a lot of plot stuff happensbut I have no context for it. Theres a cool church shootout with a guy who weve never met before (and has little characterization), who murdered a guy we never met (and has little characterization). Im justI know this is a praised anime, but Im really not enjoying it.
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Wow I thought this one would win. Oops!
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Hey JONA, I meant to ask this earlier. Do you know if Vergil from DMC is based on Vicious at all?

Also, Ballad is extremely good. I disagree with Vis a lot, I think there's enough context clues to the past of Spike and Vicious to make the episode really compelling. It drops a lot of the expository stuff from the prior episodes and tells it instead through feeling and character actions, which is always excellent.

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Outlier

Wickle - 166
Stifled - 163
Karo - 154
Johnbobb - 143
Ermine - 119
Inviso - 101
Snake - 99
Gen - 82
KBM - 82
JONA - 81
charon - 80
scarlet - 44

Wickle still on top while Stifled was thrown out the window.
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I just dont care for it. To me it felt like the show dragged for four episodes and then WHAM! Heres some darker action to keep your attention. Ballad, I think, is emblematic of the problems I personally had with the series as a whole. To me, it did not feel coherent enough, tonally, to justify episodes like this one.
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Snake5555555555 posted...

Hey JONA, I meant to ask this earlier. Do you know if Vergil from DMC is based on Vicious at all?

Hmm, not that I know of.
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Oh wow. I assumed Ballad would be top 3. Pierrot is going ham in real life too.

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JONALEON1 posted...

Hmm, not that I know of.

It would be interesting to know. Their mannerisms, voice, and of course weapon are all very similar to me.

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This pretty much reconfirms for me that Inviso has the worst overall taste in the gauntlet crew.
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Ballad of Fallen Angels too low. Should have been Top 3 easily. =(
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I feel like a lot of people here just want to be bashed over the head with storytelling episodes and that's a huge problem. Yeah, Bebop doesn't have the most depth ever but not every show is going to be a 10 season 200 episode collection of Stephen King novels. I don't know, I feel like the art of storytelling without telling the entire story in engrossing detail has been lost to a lot of modern day audiences. It really correlates well if you look at video games too. A great example is how modern games, sans a select few, love to hold your hand. There are lengthy tutorials, tool-tips bombard your screen and even midway through some games you are being reminded of shit you probably already know about. Back in the day, as in, back when this anime was released, most games gave you a book to read and threw the game right into your face. I feel like a lot of modern shows do a version of this handholding too, where it's very staged and confined to a space. Where a show like this one or for instance, The X-Files, existed in the 90's where you could tell a story in between standalone episodes. Now I feel like everyone is expecting Game of Thrones or The Walking Dead, where every episode is just this long continuous story to tell. People have become unable to appreciate stories like these in this era I think.
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Yeah, it doesn't matter that not every episode of Bebop tells the story of Spike and Vicious. Every episode of Bebop does tell the story of a group of bounty hunters struggling to deal with their respective pasts in a cool sci-fi world, and that's the story that matters.

Spike vs Vicious wouldn't have been interesting for 26 episodes or maybe even 13. The mysteries that are left by the relatively little screentime dedicated to it are part of what makes it compelling.
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I can still appreciate an episodic television show that intersperses deeper plot amidst its overall narrative (I like CSI, Criminal Minds, Elementary, etc.) I just don't think Cowboy Bebop does a good job of that. Like I've said multiple times, I think that, if you want to drip-feed us Spike's personality and backstory, you need to do it over the course of a longer runtime, rather than "filler-filler-filler-filler-PLOT-filler-filler-filler-filler-filler-filler-TWO PART PLOT". The show just didn't work for me for that reason.
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If every episode told the story of Spike and Vicious, I would stop watching the series after like the third episode
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You get plenty of looks at Spike's backstory and personality in non-plot episodes, I'm not sure what you mean there.
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It's only filler if you want it to be filler.
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