Cowboy Bebop is regarded as one of the greatest anime series of all time.

When Netflix announced they were producing a live-action series based on the show, many fans of the series were worried that they would ruin the series by trying to “modernize” the source material for progressive audiences, and that is exactly what they did.

Netflix’s effort to fix something that wasn’t broken and that no one asked them to fix as led to their latest series being universally panned.

Netflix’s “non-binary” actor Mason Alexander Park was cast in the series to play the character of Gren. In the original anime, Gren was a male character who was a victim of an experimental drug he was forced to take in prison that increased his estrogen levels causing him to have feminine body features.

Gren’s true backstory is a little too bit problematic for progressives however due to the fact that he was portrayed as a tragic character who was pivotal to the series rather than someone who was just openly LGBT. Park said that André Nemec, the series showrunner were more concerned with how Gren’s story will affect a new generation of the “LGBTQIA+ youth”.

“We wanted to make sure that it was an opportunity to right some of the uncomfortable wrongs of a film like The Crying Game that Gren’s entire track is sort of based on. And then, plus, righting some of the issues in the anime.” – Park said.

“It was an opportunity to right some of the issues in the anime.”

Issues no one asked them to fix.

Another progressive update to the Netflix series was casting Daniella Pineda in the role Faye Valentine. When fans criticized the casting choice and the costume design of the character, Pineda took to social media to mock fans who complained about Netflix’s attempt to “desexualize” the character.

As of this writing, Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop currently holds a 50% ‘rotten’ rating on review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes, among both critics and audiences. On Metacritic, twenty-six critic reviews have left the show sitting at a 47/100 rating.