Spike and Jet, a pair of bounty hunters, travel to Tijuana to capture a deranged drug smuggler. Their quarry, Asimov, has stolen the experimental red eye drug from a corporate laboratory. And now, together with his girlfriend, Maria, Asimov attempts to unload the goods before escaping to Mars.

Spike and Jet chase down Hakim, another smuggler who has stolen an experimental data dog. The bounty hunters' only lead is that their man carries a certain kind of suitcase. When a local street thief swipes the case out from under Hakim's nose, a comedy of errors ensues, which leaves Jet and Spike with a permanent addition to the Bebop crew.

Spike and Jet court lady luck at a deep space casino. But the casino owner, Gordon, takes a cut from shady dealings. He has hired veteran con artist Faye Valentine as the go-between in the exchange of a valuable microchip. Faye mistakes Spike for her contact, accidentally entangling our heroes in Gordon's sinister plans.

Spike and Jet stake out a swanky restaurant to nab a criminal, but a gang of eco-terrorists gets to him first. Spike manages to kidnap the gang's ringleader, and, in doing so, becomes involved in a plot to release a deadly devolution virus into the atmosphere of Ganymede. The terrorists' extreme plan to save the Ganymede sea rat comes to an abrupt end when Faye, stranded in space, finds the virus vial.

The head of the Red Dragon Crime Syndicate wants to make peace with his rival bosses, but his second-in-command, the cold and evil Vicious, doesn't like the idea. He kills his boss, kidnaps Faye and sets a trap to catch former colleague Spike. Jet speculates about Spike's past, which somehow involves both Vicious and a mysterious woman named Julia.

With its frenetic beatnik jazz music and its Freudian combination of gun barrels and James Bond shadow dancing girls, the introductory credits for "Cowboy Bebop" recall the classic spy genre and set the tone for this tongue-in-cheek adventure series. Replete with exciting plots, quirky characters interesting and crisp dialogue, "Bebop" is a tour de force of postmodern, cyberpunk fantasia.

What really sets "Cowboy Bebop" apart from other anime, however, is its willingness to subvert audience expectations. In the first episode, Spike swipes Asimov's vial of red eye with pickpocket confidence and returns a triumphant hero to Jet. But the victory means nothing. Asimov's girlfriend carries an entire cache of the drug, and she ends up being the central protagonist, leaving Spike and Jet observational bystanders. In "Gateway Shuffle," Spike and Jet capture an eco-terrorist leader only to release her when her gang threatens to infect a nearby planet with a deadly virus. Once free, she decides to go through with the plan anyway. But her ship lurches suddenly, causing her to smash the virus vial. Though skillful, cunning and brave, the heroes of "Cowboy Bebop" owe more of their success to fortuitous coincidences than to quick wits or detailed plans.

The same dumb luck falls on the antagonists as well. Most of the villains fail miserably each time despite their impeccably well-laid plans: Asimov's back-up plan proves useless when his girlfriend betrays him; confusion over two identical suitcases foils the schemes of master smuggler Hakim in "Stray Dog Strut."

And far from the stereotypical psychotic cyborgs that pervade so many anime science fiction outings, these evildoers live and breathe originality. Asimov looks a typical nutjob when he's high on red eye but, otherwise, he's the least interesting of the lot. Hakim, the afro-sporting baddie, could easily have walked off the set of a 70s blaxploitation film. The head terrorist of "Gateway Shuffle" is a cadaverous matron who exerts an almost Oedipal influence over her gaggle of pathetic, Norman Bates-wannabe sons. Vicious, a heartless assassin with a gothic trench coat and a nasty pet raven is by far the creepiest villain, breezing through the episode with effortless cruelty. An unpredictable lot, they fit perfectly into the chaotic, twisted world of "Cowboy Bebop."

Anything can happen before the final curtain. The heroes' plans can collapse just when they seem most promising. Or fate may rescue them just when doom seems inevitable. The show refuses to take itself seriously, indulging self-mockery as its characters puzzle over their own absurd adventures. In this context, "Cowboy Bebop" feels more like playful ribbing than obnoxious mind games.