Not That Guy - Favorite Anime OPs part 4 - Cowboy Bebop

In the genre of anime the openings are a serious component. Any anime worth their salt will put substantial effort into a polished opening sequence. While in the American market we treat openings somewhat like a book cover, something appreciated but nothing to judge by, for the anime an opening is often used as the first judgment of a series. It is the chance to not only illustrate the visual appeal and aesthetics but also gives the viewer an indication of the quality of the audio through their choice of soundtracks. In a genre where the visual and audio style can make or break a series the opening serves a vital role of promoting their creation. In many of the examples that I will be covering, you will be left with a strong impression of how you feel about the specific anime just from the OP's. The beauty of this though, is that often, this impression is correct.

Allright its time to cover some classics. A few of the animes that defined the genre. It the next few days I will cover both Samurai Champaloo and Baccano, but today its Cowboy Bebop. Cowboy Bebop is a bold statement in anime. How to define it? Is it a space Opera? Kinda... Action... sorta. Comedy? It has its moments for sure. The creator claimed he had created a whole new sub genre the quote famously being "The genre will forever more be known as cowboy bebop."

The anime focused heavily on exploiting American jazz and beat music to add depth to already amazing plot. The intro is a jazz compilation and is now fairly famous. Many of us have already heard it outside of anime (because of the animes fame). It has even been featured by sirlemming himself using the Cosby voice from Family Guy to much internet fame.

It is of course the music that makes this OP great for me, I can be rather biased towards good music. But remember that this anime came out in 1998, and for an intro this was pushing the packaget. For years afterwards the quality of an anime would be compared against Cowboy Bebop. The bar was set high.

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Posted in: Anime,Editorial,Not That Guy