It's right before Halloween on Mars. The crew of the Bebop are up to their usual routines, which means:

1.		Ed is sleeping
2.		Faye is gambling
3.		Spike and Jet are playing a game, which Jet is taking much more seriously than Spike.
4.		Ein is yawning and walking around waiting for someone to pet him.

As Faye is speeding along above the freeway in search of a bounty, she witnesses a tractor-trailer suddenly explode. She sees a lone man in a long coat and a beard walk away from the explosion—and suddenly disappear.

Meanwhile, on the news the explosion is being reported upon, as is the fact that people within several kilometers of the blast radius have suddenly fallen ill with a mysterious disease. It is this report that the Bebop crew is watching when Faye returns and tells them where she's been. Of course, not knowing what's going on, she's more than a little irked when they all shrink away from her.

As the signs begin to point towards some sort of terrorist attack with a biotechnological weapon, the crew begins to investigate; each using their individual strengths to uncover what they can. Unfortunately, drawing is not one of Faye's strong points and they have to struggle to find a reliable image of the suspect. But when they do, they notice a strange mark on his hand...

The crime has both the ISSP and the Mars local police in a frenzy as well, and Spike crosses paths with one of Mars' finest, but he doesn't know it. The lovely Electra is also on the trail of the bomber, and she is also a match for Spike's martial arts skill.

Meanwhile, Vincent (the bomber) has big plans. He's throwing a big party on Halloween and everyone's invited. Unfortunately, it's not the sort of party you want to go to unless you don't mind leaving in a pine box.

There's a lot of what fans have come to expect here, and the old characters don't disappoint. Faye's scenes are a mixture of some really funny moments and some very serious (and scary) ones as well. Spike is his usual cool self, and he gets most of the screen time. Everything he does—from tracking a murderer to flying his ship through a crowded city—is all so effortless. Jet gets a lot of scenes of him doing legwork and talking things over with his old ISSP buddies. And of course Ed and Ein provide not only their zany brand of humor, but also some very sharp flashes of insight that help the crew with their investigation.

There are also some really fun surprises in the film. Little in-jokes and cameos. Some minor characters from the television series, for example, make a rather noteworthy guest appearance. But I don't want to give it all away.

The story itself, with the terrorism and nanotechnology angles, isn't really new ground for director Watanabe, but that doesn't mean that he's turned out something that we've already seen. Fans have come to expect a lot from BEBOP, and Watanabe delivers. When Spike visits Morocco Street, you can almost feel the desert heat and smell the air of the open markets. And when the ISSP makes its move, it really feels like a large-scale police operation. There's also Halloween, which in the future on Mars has turned into something like a combination of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade (complete with giant balloons of ghosts and jack o' lanterns) and Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve, as represented by the giant "Happy Halloween" sign that is supposed to light up at midnight.

This is one of the areas where this movie really excels. It takes the familiar and makes it just different enough to be interesting and new. An old holiday like Halloween, which had long ago lost its more terrifying aspects and become a big party, has gone further in that direction. And yet, at the same time, disaster is imminent. It certainly keeps viewers on their toes. This future is still far-off, but because part of it is familiar, it is accessible to the audience.

And in the background all this time is Vincent: enigmatic, charismatic and ultimately psychotic. He is a snake in the grass who doesn't work too hard at hiding himself. He is so confident that everyone he encounters wonders why—if they survive.