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Live-Action Cowboy Bebop Production Put on Hold for 7-9 Months Due to John Cho's Injury

Netflix has put the production of its live-action adaptation of Sunrise's Cowboy Bebop anime on hold due to lead actor John Cho injuring his knee on the New Zealand set.

The Deadline website reports that the accident happened on the last take of a "routine and well-rehearsed scene" a few episodes into the 10-episode production, and that Cho has returned to Los Angeles for surgery and rehabilitation. Deadline adds that Netflix decided to keep Cho instead of recasting, and will wait until late spring or early summer to resume production so Cho can rehabilitate.

Netflix had posted a "Behind the Scenes" video on October 7 to mark the start of production:

Netflix describes the series:

Based on the worldwide phenomenon from Sunrise Inc., Cowboy Bebop is the jazz-inspired, genre-bending story of Spike Spiegel, Jet Black, Faye Valentine and Radical Ed: a rag-tag 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.

The series stars Cho as Spike, Mustafa Shakir as Jet, Daniella Pineda as Faye, Alex Hassell as Vicious, and Elena Satine as Julia.

The series is a co-production between Netflix and Tomorrow Studios, with Netflix handling physical production. Tomorrow Studios is a partnership between producer Marty Adelstein (Prison Break, Teen Wolf, producer for the live-action One Piece project) and ITV Studios. Shinichiro Watanabe, the original anime's director, is serving as consultant for the project. Andre Nemec, Josh Appelbaum, Jeff Pinkner, and Scott Rosenberg of Midnight Radio are credited as showrunners and executive producers.

Tomorrow Studios' Marty Adelstein and Becky Clements; Yasuo Miyakawa, Masayuki Ozaki, and Shin Sasaki of Sunrise (the studio that animated the original series); and Tetsu Fujimura and Matthew Weinberg are also credited as executive producers.

Chris Yost (Thor: The Dark World, Thor: Ragnarok) is writing the series, and is also credited as executive producer.

The original anime series follows the motley crew of the spaceship Bebop as it travels throughout the solar system in search of the next job. The anime inspired Cowboy Bebop: The Movie in 2001. Funimation released the series on Blu-ray and DVD in North America in 2014, and recently screened the film in the United States in August. The series is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year.

Source: Deadline (Nellie Andreeva)