keanu will star in cowboy bebop

It's confirmed. Last week, Variety reported that Keanu Reeves will indeed star as future bounty hunter Spike Spiegel in 20th Century Fox's live-action adaptation of the popular anime series Cowboy Bebop: Keanu Reeves set for 'Bebop'.

Don't hate me for saying this, but I don't think this is an entirely bad idea. Keanu gets a lot of hate for his low-charisma surfer-dudeness, but in the right role, he isn't half-bad. For Spike, I'd argue the most important elements is cool. Can Keanu pull this one off? For now, I am willing to find out.

The series follows Spiegel and a ragtag group of bounty hunters traveling on their spaceship, the Bebop. I've always thought that out of all the anime properties to be translated for the big screen, Cowboy Bebop has enormous potential, particularly because the series itself successfully borrows pop culture elements from a variety of other genres.

What's most encouraging though, is the close involvement of Sunrise Inc., which produced the original series. Sunrise's Kenji Uchida and Shinichiro Watanabe will serve as associate producers alongside series writer Keiko Nobumoto. And series producer Masahiko Minami will serve as a production consultant.

Will Sunrise's participation help preserve some level of Cowboy Bebop's badass-ness? Or will this just be another crappy Hollywood handling of a beloved anime series? (Let's face it -- that Dragonball movie looks and is going to be baaaaaaaad.) I guess we'll see, whenever this actually happens.