Cowboy Bebop began with Bandai wanting an anime featuring spaceships.
Why?
Because in the late 90s,
they expected a new Star Wars boom
and hoped to sell plastic models of original spaceships.
That is the funniest origin story ever.
A company asked for cool ships.
Shinichirล Watanabe gave them jazz, cigarettes, loneliness, bounty hunters, trauma, and a man who looks like he owes money to the moon.
They wanted plastic models.
He delivered depression with a saxophone.
And somehow, it became one of the coolest anime ever made.