Live-action anime adaptations seem to appear and disappear with alarming frequency, almost everyone stumbling into an ocean of hate from which they never emerge. One would almost start to think there's something fundamentally wrong with the logic of trying to force a beloved story to work in a completely different medium.
Twenty days after the premiere of Netflix's Cowboy Bebop, the series was canceled. This came as a response to overwhelming fan backlash to the series, and while attacks targeted every aspect of the show, constant derision was piled on the very concept of making a live-action Cowboy Bebop.
The gigantic, inescapable, blatantly obvious, fundamental reason that every live-action anime adaptation is basically doomed is that the animation is key to the storytelling of anime. Visual storytelling is crucial to all forms of cinema, certainly live-action film is full of it, but the methods must change with the medium. A live-action production faces limits and not just the budgetary limits that everything must face, but the very limits of time, space, and biology. These limits are not present when every aspect of the production is created by artists. Every detail falls under the control of the team, which means the only limits are imagination, and of course budget. At the end of the day, the awful truth is, there are just some things that a creator can do with a drawing that they cannot do with real human beings. Even with CGI.
It's tempting to frame this as a purely financial concern. Some figures put the average season of anime in the same price range as a single episode of the average Netflix original series, and that shift reduces possibilities dramatically. Without even examining the artistic intent or skillful execution of a particular adaptation, on a logistical level, something as simple as the main character using their superpower becomes an issue of resources.
This bad news comes alongside the fact that a huge percentage of adaptations never see the screen, many are canceled before production or early into their runs. There are dozens of projects that were announced, enjoyed the requisite mix of hype and dread, and were quickly scuttled, leaving nothing but concept art behind. The ones that do make it out almost always fail. The best-selling amongst them is probably Alita: Battle Angel, a film which may or may not have broken even. So the idea rarely works out on a business level, but on an artistic level, its much worse.
Cowboy Bebop is the perfect example here. In the first episode of each series, an action scene occurs around the halfway point. The scene is comparable in its place in the storyline, but executed very differently. In the anime, Spike encounters his target, the drug runner Asimov. The pair have a fistfight in the outdoor seating area of a restaurant, and Spike is able to show off his martial arts skill for the first time in the series. The pair use the environment, Asimov chases Spike as he gracefully rolls over obstructions, Spike holds an arrogant smirk the entire encounter. In a brilliant shot, the camera takes the point of view of a gun in the hand of Asimov's wife Katerina as she struggles to follow the action and get a clear shot. Spike establishes his confidence and playful nature, but is often distracted goofing off. Asimov demonstrates his strength and ferocity, but is clearly unskilled, relying on raw power. Katerina comes across as dangerous, yet cautious, the cooler head that winds up underreacting. Three characters are established in about a minute, all through the medium of fast-paced action anime.
The live-action iteration abandoned all of that. Instead, in order to get Faye Valentine into the series early, she appears to challenge Spike for Katerina's bounty. The pair have a brief standoff, argue over who can claim the money, Spike disarms Faye, the pair struggle long enough for Asimov and Katerina to escape, Spike prepares to shoot them but is stopped by Faye. There is no interesting environment to play off of, so the struggle is dull. Nothing is established about any of the four characters involved in nearly the same amount of time. This is clearly inferior, but the creators and purse-string holders treat it like an honor, and that's the real problem.
Animation is often viewed as a lesser medium by producers. It's seen as a mark of prestige, an upgrade of sorts, to get a live-action adaptation. Though fans are quick with cynicism, the studios are quick to proclaim their respect for the source without understanding its merits. Animation is key to anime and it deserves more respect than it gets. A live-action adaptation of an animated work is rarely anything other than a pale imitation, and pretending like it's a step up is an insult to the animators who made these beloved works what they are today.
