But I have to admit that, beyond the laughs and the fun, what keeps me glued to the show for episode after episode was the unexpectedly intelligent zaniness of Herc's best friends at Prometheus Academy, Icarus and Cassandra. No high school that I ever attended - and I've gone to quite a few - ever had such deliciously quirky characters in it. How much more fun high school would have been if it did!

Lets look at Icarus. Not listen to him, no! French Stewart's delightfully gleeful voice-over of this character is the loudest and most obnoxious in all animation (OK, maybe with the exception of Iago). Come to think of it, looking at him is no great pleasure. He's dwarfishly short, skinny, and bowlegged. His head is too big for his body. And then there's the hair and the odd eyes from the "flying too close to the sun" thing. He's weird. He's wacky. And he's also fascinating and adorable.

Did I make you blink? It's true. From that loud mouth come statements that make me gasp - sometimes with laughter, sometimes in shock, and sometimes in appreciation of a real home-truth. Icarus makes teenage angst, moral philosophy, and unrequited love hilarious. As for adorable, just watch him stand up for and stand behind (or hide behind) his friend Herc. Loyalty and friendship are good qualities. Right?

And then there's Cassandra. Not your stereotypical heroine. Way too tall, way too skinny, and never a good hair day. No long-lashed sparkling eyes, no sweetness and light, and no domesticity. No way. This girl is as tart as a persimmon. She's the girl who sees disasters in the future, which supposedly explains her pessimism, but personally I think she'd be a wasp-tongued woman no matter what. Her Death-Valley-dry sarcasm is an oasis of intelligent humor in the usual goofy Disney comedic line-up (no pun intended).

Yet Cassandra, too, has her soft side. But whoa, is it hard to find! She doesn't dispense hugs or good cheer. But when Herc needs her, she's there. She's there with a blisteringly sarcastic criticism, but she is there.

Scripts and stories:

Intriguing, thought-provoking stories. Dialog that can be snappy, witty, profound, or just plain human. What more do you want? Bebop made me think. (No, it didn't hurt.) It made me laugh, uproariously. It made me cry. Every serious episode left me with something to think about, usually a lot of things to think about. Every funny episode left me chuckling for days afterward. It challenged my philosophies and my views of life, and never failed to entertain me. It was adult in the best sense of the word. If you don't believe me, check out the very first episode. If you're still the same afterward, then you're tougher than I am.

Characters:

Relax, I'm not going to rave about Spike. Well, not any more than the others. Bebop gathered a cast of quirky individuals, gave them interesting pasts, then let them behave accordingly. Spike, yes, with his grim past, his destiny, his love of risks, and his occasional childishness; Jet, the Black Dog who never lets go once he bites, with his unexpected banzai trees, philosophies, and compassion; Faye, irresponsible and amoral, whose shell of tough self-sufficiency is so easily punctured that sometimes even she doesn't believe her lies; and Ed, the loopy, kooky, uninhibited child we all remember being, once upon a time, courageous and venturesome. Not even the secondary characters were slighted - in fact, some of the secondary characters, such as VT and Twinkle Murdoch, are among my favorites in all animation.

Pop culture references

Every time I watch the show, I see things I miss. Tossed like spice into the plots are seemingly endless references and homages to, or spoofs of, pop culture of several generations. You don't need to understand them to love the show, but they are there for your enjoyment anyway. My favorite? - the extended spoof of "Alien" in the episode "Toys in the Attic", the title itself a reference to an old rock album. A close second is the destruction of "Goofy" in the spoofed Disneyworld.

Etc.

The attention to detail in Bebop is astounding. Its universe is as full of clutter as a real life world is. Tiny, fascinating, fun little bits are tossed in constantly, many of which foreshadow the action to come. That's one reason, although definitely not the only reason, that I doubt I'll ever get tired of watching Bebop.