With nothing else on TV, I flicked on (as I rarely do) to Cartoon Network to catch Cowboy Bebop, one of the most popular anime shows around. And what can I say, it's got something - perhaps a little pretentious at times, but it does have something. It's hard to draw the line between artistic and pseudo-artistic/pretentious, but I think CB is planted on the former. The animation style is intriguing, like nothing I've seen before. But caveat emptor, because I've never seen any other anime in my life (excluding kids' ones like DBZ, etc.), and for that matter very little animation.

The story is impossible to judge without seeing more episodes I suppose. The episode I saw yesterday was a little simplistitc in the storyline - genetically enhanced man who goes psycho but when he sees an object from the past (a cat, no less) becomes terrified. But like I said, it would be foolish to judge the story based on one episode, because perhaps it has continuity and what have you.

Animation wise I found it most entertaining, although I suppose "like nothing I've seen before" sounds tacky. It is true for the most part though! I read a while ago that The Matrix was influenced by a lot of anime, and it doesn't surprise me given the action scenes from this one. Usually well choreographed with interesting visual techniques, although my only complaint would be that there was perhaps too much action. Then again, it's just one episode.

Now, some parts struck me as just trying to be artsy, but perhaps that's just me. The hero (Spike?) playing pool, for instance, where they have an interesting animation of the ball getting hit in, that was a turn-off because it seemed like they were trying to be too artistic, but then again, what do I know?

That was no review by any stretch of the imagination, but merely another musing. I should mention that I saw a bit of Bubblegum Crisis: Tokyo 2040 and it freaked me out. There's something about animation with that old (80s?) look and feel to it that really scares me. The bit I saw was when three of these robot-knights (?) are fighting these strange things that come out of the ground. The barren landscape, the ruins, the dark sky, gah, all too much for me! I think it fills me with a sense of foreboding that plays very deeply on me, but at the same time of course, I feel like I must watch.

Oh and incidentally I have these things called exams next week. Think they're important or something.