Pinkie Watches: Cowboy Bebop Episode 7 – Heavy Metal Queen

Hello again little lights!  Little by Little I am trying to get back into the swing of anime reviews! Well not so much reviews anymore as it is episode reactions! I hope to bring back an anime review every day sometime soon! Who knows by the time you see this we might be close already!  Of my seven anime I watched per week, Zombie Land Saga was the one I wanted to continue the most as it’s most in my style.. the second one I really wanted to pick up again was Cowboy Bebop! So here we go!  Let’s see how much I liked the seventh Episode.

Big Rigs In a shitty place

Unlike my review of Zombie Land Saga I completely watched this episode before I gave my reaction, I did not like the review format to much.. because it made me whiney or praise something I did not like at all, yet the as we go reaction causes a lot of pauses in the view , I get distracted and end up doing a lot of other stuff, so this is another way to try and approach it.  The Episode starts with a butch woman going by the name of V.T. She is a space trucker and she is walking into a trucker café.  She’s playing a lot of Heavy Metal on her speakers as she does. I don’t like heavy metal all that much but I must admit Cowboy Bebop uses it well.. I found the music annoying but it conveys that trucker atmosphere. The character design is quite gender ambiguous and since the voice kind of reminds me of Frieza.. that feeling was aided. Yet that is also kind of how I feel 80’s or 90’s  trucker women would be depicted and I don’t mean that in a bad way..there is this 80’s  action movie flavor to this episode and she fits right in it. 

There is a game going on to guess V.T.’s true name.. which no one does.. But I get it fairly soon as soon as I hear some bikers talk about rumors of a legendary bounty hunter… well her last name at least… but that one is SUPER complicated… so I forgot. Her favourite bar is crowded tonight as someone named Decker is on the planet and all these guys are Bounty Hunters… a great bridge is made to our no hung-over hero.  V.T. gets in a 80’s action fight with some ruffians and they spill Spike’s Anti hangover drink over him so he gets involved as well. I really like the choreography here, it really feels so 80’s.. including the narrative beats and music beats.. it really rocks! It kind of reminds me of Jack Burton from my favourite action movie!  He was a trucker as well!  Regardless the two bond a bit , she finds Bounty Hunters to be the worst people ever and of course this makes me know I have guessed the name right.  Spike plays along as she buys him a drink for helping.  She then withdraws that offer as she finds out the truth because of Faye.

Faye is sitting at a sort of Chuck E Cheese restaurant hoping to find Decker, who they only know has a Dragon Tattoo. When a big gorilla of a man walks in with a serpentine tattoo drawn on his chest she wastes no time and decides to confront him!  Obviously in typical 80’s fashion she got the wrong target and the real guy is a weasley nerd looking guy! Showing appearances can be deceiving. She chases him but with a little container he deals massive damage to her beloved ship!  Now he can get away freely so she has to call spike for help!  Those walkie talkies they have really cover some distance. I wonder where they got those!  V.T. wants nothing more to do with Spike and he leaves the “diner”  just to see his ship has been vandalised!  One of the Waitresses does the whole dumb blond thing that once again we see in 80’s movies. So much atmosphere!

Big Rigs in Space

Spike and Faye have to get towed.. and what better way to do that as with a truck. Spike catches a ride with V.T  so Jet can start working on their repairs.  Faye complains a lot about the heavy metal music but VT tells her to shove it basically because it is her ship! Which is completely fair. We also get a funny scene of Ein not eating Bean Sprouts which is the only food they have left.. showing money is scarce for the crew.. this means the bounty is probably going to get away again! Poor Ein! Going hungry like that!  This is a trope that I do kind of like but I also feel like we should at least be shown the crew making enough money to stay alive. I like dogs a lot so I kind of feel pained to see poor Ein be sold short! Last episode Faye ate his dog food as well.. What if that was his last can!  I would like to see them do a bit better at least.. if only for Ein’s sake. The whole atmosphere that we build up towards with the broken ships is pretty neat though! 

Having dropped off Faye and Spike, VT hears about a man in a space truck that rammed another trucker.. they had some dragon tattoo and some sort of buddhist art on their truck. VT knowing who it is seems to think she might be able to snag up a bounty and  deliver some street justice? I  am not really sure what her motivation is here.. I am bad at things like these. Truckers code maybe?! Who knows?!  She pursues the guy towards some Asteroid and Spike tells her not to go, thinking he is a stupid Bounty Hunter she ignores his call and we get a Truck Off!  Trucks ramming each other moving through asteroids and in general a pretty good space chase scene.. which kind of is reminiscent of … an 80’s action movie chase scene.  The villain however plays dirty and uses his weapon which turns out to be some advanced form of Nitroglycerin. VT is too skilled of a trucker to get done in by that and as she smirks, she realises the entire asteroid she is one is being used to mine some kind of explosive material and it has become totally unstable.  The villain meets his demise by his own doing.. which is quite conform.. that’s right 80’s action movies.

VT however is now up a creek without a paddle!  Her “truck”  crashed on a more and more exploding asteroid and her only shot to get out of this alive is by relying on the help of Faye and Spike. Both of them are rather bummed out on having missed yet another bounty but that’s when I notice the dialogue in this episode is really to the point. There isn’t a lot of “fluff” dialogue going on, these characters talk to each other but it’s not a conversation persé , all the dialogue is in service of the action and the main story.  At least after the first bar meet up. The characters don’t joke around here or say stuff like “If I ever am going to see a sunrise again I will. … <blank> “  No there is no lesson these characters learn, no larger appreciation for life and no witty banter to pad out the episode. I feel they talk like how normal people would which is a credit to the amazing writing. They just help and coach each other through certain actions and it still feels vibrant and interesting. 

This Trucker shows her real Face

The rescue operation becomes a lot more complicated when the meteorite collapses due to explosions and the exit is blocked. Now they have to use some tricky actions to get some Nitro into the collapsed part. Spike decides to use a play using his escape pod which forces him to space walk without a suit.  Without a shadow of a doubt he does it and he leaps towards VT.. He knows how she really is! He knows she will help despite her claiming to hate Bounty Hunters with a passion! I loved this scene! Spike doesn’t tell what he is going to do.. he just does it.. and while he is doing it everyone realises what is going on giving them the focus to do what they need to do.. but also drop those masks they sometimes hide behind. VT is forced to drop that harshness and Faye has to stop pretending to be weaker then she actually is.  She often plays the damsel in distress to gain an edge or to let others do her work but right now she can’t! She is forced to step up!

Spike is saved by VT in a rather weird way.. he misses the jump and falls into a weird form of  gravity.. so he uses his pistol to create momentum?!  That seemed odd to me.. I know there is knockback to a gun but would it really give him that much lift? Among all the anime I have seen so far where beams and magic is used as propulsion this feels.. flimsy and it looks kind of silly. For a slight moment it takes me out of the episode. Not for too long though! With an amazing explosion the group  makes it out of the destroying rock… just like an 80’s movie and we get a great conclusion! Spike just floats on the spaceship.. his near death experience still very present in his system.. he lights up a cigarette and thanks VT by her original name.. something I had already guessed. She is the wife of  one of the greatest bounty hunters after.. she lost him during a job and that’s why she hates them so much. That was really easy to guess I would be a great bounty hunter! 

The predictable ending can be justified with the words that it was well set up! I never minded it being so obvious and the same goes for most of this episode! I really enjoyed the story that happened here with the exception that I would have liked it if they would at least be able to feed Ein.. I don’t mind them being poor but I really hate to see a dog go hungry! That might be a weird thing for me to be so concerned about .. but in episode 5 the stealing dog food really made me angry and this time not being able to feed the dog kind of makes me sad! Luckily Ein is engineered to be smart so maybe he will understand!  I do hope we at least see one successful bounty or at least see them get some income! This episode Spike won a ton of cash but he did not accept it. I do look forward to the next episode though! The 6th episode was a bit middle of the road for me but with this I got pulled back in!