John Cho, Mustafa Shakir, Daniella Pineda, Alex Hassell join cast of ‘Cowboy Bebop’
John Cho, Mustafa Shakir, Daniella Pineda and Alex Hassell have been tapped to join Netflix’s all new live action Cowboy Bebop, based on the original Japanese animated series. Alex Garcia Lopez (The Witcher; Marvel’s Daredevil and Marvel’s The Punisher; Utopia) will direct the first two episodes. Writer/Executive Producer Christopher Yost (Thor: The Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok) will write the first episode.
Based on the worldwide phenomenon from Sunrise Inc., Cowboy Bebop is the jazz-inspired, genre-bending story of a ragtag crew of bounty hunters on the run from their pasts, as they hunt down the solar system’s most dangerous criminals. They’ll even save the world…for the right price.
Cho (Star Trek, Searching) will play Spike Spiegel, an impossibly cool “cowboy” (bounty hunter) with a deadly smile, a wry wit, and style to spare. He travels the solar system with his ex-cop partner, Jet, pursuing the future’s most dangerous bounties with a combination of charm, charisma — and deadly Jeet Kune Do.
Shakir (Marvel’s Luke Cage) is Jet Black, one of the few honest cops in the solar system before an ultimate betrayal robbed him of all that he loved, forcing him into a vagabond life of hunting bounties to put food on the table. Jet is an inveterate jazz enthusiast and Captain of the Bebop.
Pineda (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom; What/If) is Faye Valentine, a bold, brash and unpredictable bounty hunter. Suffering from amnesia after years of being cryogenically frozen, Faye does whatever it takes to survive. Whether she’s lying, stealing, or just being a thorn in Spike and Jet’s side.
Hassell (The Red Sea Diving Resort; Suburbicon) is Vicious, a man who thoroughly enjoys a good kill and is the Syndicate’s most notorious hitman. He’s also Spike Spiegel’s ex-partner and arch-enemy.
The series will consist of 10 episodes with Josh Appelbaum, André Nemec, Jeff Pinkner and Scott Rosenberg of Midnight Radio (Limetown, High Fidelity, Knightfall) as showrunners and executive producers. Netflix and Tomorrow Studios (a partnership between Marty Adelstein and ITV Studios) will co-produce with Netflix handling physical production.
He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.
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