When I was looking for a series to watch, I came across Coyote Ragtime Show. All of the promotional material showed something that hearkened back to classic sci-fi action adventure series such as Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, and Outlaw Star, and a lot of people who had seen it seemed to be making the same comparisons. With all that going for it, this series definitely drew in my interest.

Our story starts in the future, there are space outlaws called Coyotes who commit crimes but share a strong bond of friendship that a true Coyote wouldn’t betray. One of the most infamous Coyotes is Mister, who goes by many different aliases. Detective Angelica Burns has spent the last four years trying to track him down. She finally received an anonymous tip that Mister was at a prison and the desert planet of Sandvil. A loyal but clumsy assistant named Chelsea meets her on the planet to help her.

Right as Angelica and Chelsea arrives at the prison Mister is located at, Mister breaks out only 10 days from released with the help of his old partners Bishop and Katana. As he is escaping, an elite squad of android assassins show up sent by Madame Marciano to take out Mister. As Mister escapes, he seeks out Franca, the daughter of his best friend Pirate King “Blue” Bruce, as they seek out the treasure Blue left for Franca to inherit on a planet called Graceland, which is in a civil war and faces immanent destruction from the Milky Way Federation in a week.

Soon, the group of Coyote’s are chased by the Twelve Sisters who want to take out Mister and capture Franca along with Detective Angelica and her assistant, as she wants to take Mister into custody, as the time is running out to get the treasure.

With those comparisons and a plot like that, this series is setting some fairly high standards for itself, but is it anywhere as good as those series? Unfortunately, the series never reaches the heights of the influences that it’s taking from. But that’s not to say this series is bad by any stretch, and there is a lot to enjoy here.

The series comes with a large colorful cast of characters with varied and interesting designs, and while not all of them get a fleshed out backstory, they all get enough of a time in the spotlight, all being memorable in their own ways and it’s really easy to tell them all apart. And sure, there is a lull somewhere in the middle, but I imagine the series as a whole would be worse off if it tried to keep the action amped up to 11 the whole time.

Aesthetically, the series goes for a very rustic lived in world for it’s sci-fi setting, which helps this series to stand out from other stuff coming out around the same time. And I kinda wish more series used a rustic sci-fi setting, just in general. It feels like a highly underused setting.

While there isn’t too much to say about this series, it does stand on it’s own and a good time. Coyote Ragtime Show might not come close to being a classic like the shows that it’s been compared to, but much like those series, it’s not going for high class or arthouse, simply trying to be a fun space adventure, and with those intentions, it does succeed, and is worth watching for those looking to find something like the classics, even if itself is not a classic. Also, it’s OP is pretty catchy.