Hollywood is shut down right now thanks to the coronavirus, but networks everywhere are sitting in wait, eager to jump back into action as soon as the coast is clear. That includes Netflix, which is working on several high-profile projects aimed at animation lovers. First, it’s making a live-action version of Avatar: The Last Airbender — the original show just dropped on the service. It’s also making live-action versions of two beloved anime series: Cowboy Bebop and One Piece.
Cowboy Bebop is a stylish sci-fi drama from director Shinichiro Watanabe, who will consult on the new series. The original show is nice and compact with very little fat, meaning Netflix could theoretically knock it out in a season or two. The network, which partnered with Marty Adelstein’s Tomorrow Studios to make the show happen, was actually well underway with production when star John Cho — who’s playing interplanetary bounty hunter Spike Spiegel — injured himself on set, and this was months before the coronavirus pandemic shut everything down.
Happily, it sounds like the show was pretty far along by the time this happened. “So, we have finished three episodes,” Adelstein told Syfy Wire. “I think we’re into six; then John Cho tore his ACL, unfortunately. But I have to tell you I really like the show. It’s really fun.”
"And we have gone out of our way, because of all these anime movies that have come out and been accused of being whitewashed, we have really gone out of our way. We have the original composer, Yoko Kanno, doing music. The characters are all sort of multiethnic, and it’s a great cast. And the two episodes I have seen are so much fun. It’s really fun."
It’s true that a bunch of anime adaptations have been accused of being whitewashed. Movies that quickly spring to mind include Scarlett Johansson in the live-action Ghost in the Shell movie and the casting in M. Night Shyamalan’s loathed movie adaptation of The Last Airbender, although I don’t know if that show qualifies as anime since it didn’t come from Japan. But I think we can all agree that the movie sucked and that Netflix will hopefully do a better job.
In addition to Cho, the cast for the new Cowboy Bebop show includes Mustafa Shakir as Jet, Daniella Pineda as Faye Valentine and Alex Hassell as Vicious. And also they got a dog to play Ein the space Corgi:
Then there’s One Piece, created by artist Eiichiro Oda. While Cowboy Bebop is tight and self-contained, the phenomenally successful One Piece is a sprawling epic, a decades-long story about pirates on the hunt for the legendary treasure known as “One Piece.”
And also the main character’s body has the properties of rubber because he ate something called Devil Fruit. It’s more common than you think.
The One Piece manga has been running since 1997 and the anime since 1999. I don’t know what Netflix’s plan for all that is, but they’ve started small with a 10-episode order, although shooting hasn’t begun yet. “We were supposed to start filming in August in Cape Town, South Africa. We anticipate the date being able to film September, at the latest,” Adelstein said. “We have basically all 10 scripts written. We will start casting when we go back. My suspicion is June 1, but we will start doing our casting. We have a lot of names that we’re talking about, and we should be in production in September. We have been working very closely with Sensei Oda. So, we’re going to get started, and this one is very big.”
Tomorrow Studios has some tall mountains to climb. At the moment, you can see their work on Snowpiercer, which is running now on TNT.
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