“I’m really psyched to be be part of the new crop of non-binary and transgender artists who are given such big platforms to tell their stories so that hopefully the next generation of queer kids don’t question the validity of their experience in the same way.”Īnd of course, they’re excited about the show itself, too. “It’s remarkably meaningful to me because I didn’t grow up with a lot of gender-variant representation in the media,” Park says. For the upcoming live action adaptation, the character is being reimagined as nonbinary with a nonbinary actor. Introducing Cowboy Bebop's Gren ? Revolutionary as the original anime was, the vocabulary we have today for LGBTQ+ people didn't quite exist when it aired. Park took to Twitter to share their excitement:
The original show never specified exactly where Gren lay on the gender spectrum, but in this version, they will be nonbinary, played by nonbinary actor Mason Alexander Park, who played Hedwig in a Broadway tour of Hedwig and the Angry Inch. As capable with their wit as a glock, as confident in a dress as a suit, they are a Bowie-esque embodiment of 22nd century handsome and seductive beauty. They run the front of the house for Ana’s jazz club. Mason Alexander Park portrays Gren, Ana’s right-hand person. That’s more or less like it was in the original. Cool and intense, Ana is definitely not a woman to be trifled with. And while she acts as a surrogate mom to Spike, there is nothing warm and cuddly about her. Tamara Tunie plays Ana, the proprietor of the hottest underground bluesy jazz club on Mars. I’m betting the Netflix show will be a little more serialized, especially with all the cast members playing members of Spike’s former criminal cronies. Now they’re twins, a brother and a sister. Alex Hassell plays Vicious, the closest things the very episodic original show comes to having a consistent villain. In the original, Shin and Lin are brothers. Despite being fearful of their volatile boss, they are fiercely loyal to Vicious in his quest (for reasons we have yet to understand) to take down Spike Spiegel. Dressed to kill (because they do), Shin and Lin serve as Vicious’ twin Syndicate henchman.
Why is White Tigers better than Red Dragons?Īlso, it looks like they’ve gender-flipped the role.Īnn Truong and Hoa Xuande are Shin and Lin. Only now it’s the “White Tigers” family? I never get weird little changes like that. In the original, Mao is the leader of the Red Dragon Crime Syndicate that Spike was once a part of. Despite, or perhaps because of, her blue collar background, Mao is more cunning, adept, crafty and deadly than her counterparts. Rachel House ( Thor Ragnarok) is Mao, the Capo of the Syndicate’s “White Tigers” family. Also, Chalmers definitely wasn’t dating the Jet’s (Mustafa Shakir) ex-wife in the original. That’s pretty detailed for a character who wasn’t around much in the original anime.
And that’s only partly because Chalmers is dating his ex-wife these days. He wears a chronic smile that makes you want to punch him square in the face… especially Jet. He is also Jet Black’s former co-detective in the ISSP’s Homicide Division. Geoff Stults ( Little Fires Everywhere) is Chalmers, the epitome of a Western lawman. Production had to shut down after star John Cho (Spike) injured himself, and then the coronavirus came along, so it had to shut down even harder.īut things are back online now, with Deadlinereporting on a bevy of new cast members filling out supporting roles.
Is it a good idea to remake something this iconic in such a drastically different style? The jury’s out on that one, but it’s definitely happening, although the show has had trouble getting off the ground. Netflix is making a live-action version of Cowboy Bebop, the popular, stylish sci-fi anime that made a big splash when it first came out back in the late ’90s. Netflix is changing lots of little things about the classic anime Cowboy Bebop for its live-action adaptation, and possibly one big one.