Appledehli: Age: 42. His full name is Appledelhi Siniz Hesap Lütfen. In an attempt to restore peace and stability to the world, he's trying to create a map of the Earth. Though he's Ed's father, he forgot that he left him in childcare and the two were separated. He's the type of man who doesn't sweat the details and has enough arm strength to send Spike flying.
Sally Yun: Age: 77. An elderly woman living in Singapore who relies on an electric wheelchair. She is Faye's former high school classmate and seems to be aware that her friend was put in cold sleep, although a shaken Faye runs away. It's possible that she appears in Session 18 as the girl standing to the left of 13-year old Faye.
McIntire: Age: 22. Appledehli's assistant who assists him in creating a map of the Earth. An unfortunate young man whose name Appledehli can't be bothered to remember.
Clara: Age 45. A nun who took care of Ed. She gathers and takes care of orphans. While she's a good person, her can be brash and fairly excitable.
Sally's Granddaughter: She comes to get Sally, and is asked if she knows who Faye when they're introduced by her grandmother. She's an extremely polite young woman.
Children at the Orphanage: Children who are cared for by Clara. The one wearing a pot on his head who showed Faye a strange machine is named Cain, the girl collecting nails is Suzu, and the number-muttering boy whose eyes are covered by his bangs is Sean. There are three other children shown, all of whom are wearing clothes that don't fit them right. As seen when Clara had to use a hose to wrangle them, they're a strong and stubborn group.
Faye's Parents: Faye's parents, who appear at the end of her restored memories. It seems like they were caught in some kind of accident (Perhaps the Gate Accident) while riding on a shuttle. While Faye was injured and placed in cold sleep, the fate of her parents is unknown.
The Apple: The amphibious vehicle Appledehli and company use in their mission to redraw a map of Earth. In order to tackle the ravaged Earth's harsh terrain, it is equipped with 4-wheel drive, 4-wheel steering, and adjustable balloon tires. Additionally, a chicken coop is housed in the vehicle's rear section.
In my mind, the finale of Cowboy Bebop isn’t just Sessions 25 and 26; it includes this one as well. You can’t call it a conclusion unless you also include the conclusions of Faye’s and Ed’s story and character arcs.
Let’s start with Faye. While she’s always been searching for her memories, she ends up running away back to the Bebop when she fails to remember anything at the Merlion statue Ed guided her to or when she’s reunited with a former high school classmate. Just like with Hagas Matsumoto, why didn’t Faye ask Sally anything about her past?
More than likely and much like in Session 18, she was probably afraid to reconfirm the fact that she doesn’t know or understand anything about her situation. This time, however, she realizes what she’s looking for. Or rather, she’s made to realize it.
In the end, what she really wanted wasn’t her past. Seeing a video of her past self only left her with a sense of longing. What she was looking for was reality. While she might say that what she wants is “a place where she belongs,” something that someone can just tell her about, what she really wants is the sense of reality that should be buried underneath. While she wasn’t able to find it there, that’s probably why she was searching for her past. If she was somehow able to get her memories back, the world would once again be filled with color.
“Humans don’t treasure their bonds”
When Clara at the orphanage said this to Faye, it surely must have weighed on her heavily, almost like a prophecy. Not long after, she encounters Sally, her former classmate, and the gap between the present and 54 years ago hits her. The reality that all of her bonds from the past have been severed collides with her. To someone like Sally, who’s old enough to have a granddaughter, she’s nothing but a ghost. That won’t change, even if she does get her memories back.
After Faye returns to the Bebop, she stares at Jet with a complicated expression on her face. In that moment, perhaps she decided that she would let go of the past she’d spent so much time chasing. While she doesn’t know if her past is worth taking back, she does know that her present is on the Bebop. However, acknowledging that would mean the past she was chasing was all just an illusion. And then her memories return to her. Or at very least, she’s finally able to truly feel like she is that lively girl in the video. And so, when she runs into Spike as she’s bolting from the shower, all she can say is:
“... Sorry. I have to go.”
In that moment, Spike and Faye were probably feeling the past and the present at the same time. And the reality that life on the Bebop had become a reality for both of them. Piercing through all of her confusing feelings, she’s resolved to unearth the “future” buried in her past.
And of course, there was no “future” to be had in her past. Lying on the red earth where her bed used to be, she realized that the only thing here was the empty feeling that everything was gone. And so she returned to the Bebop, the final piece she’d been looking for of the reality she was left with.
Contrast this to Ed, who realizes in this episode that where she belongs right now isn’t with the clumsy adults of the Bebop. Ironically, it’s time her for to pursue the bonds in her past. While she certainly sees her comrades on the Bebop as “a real family,” there’s no real future for her to pursue there. And so she sets off to begin living her life again. Perhaps she knew that it was time to leave before the drama around past-obsessed Spike began.
I think it’s deeply symbolic that Spike wasn’t able to lay a hand on Ed’s dad, Appledehli. While he’s certainly a lacking father, unlike Spike, his eyes aren’t fixated on the past. Rather, his goal of drawing a map the Earth and his identity as a father keep him firmly anchored in the present and facing the future. As unreasonable as he may seem, his strength of his positive outlook allows him to take anything that comes his way and makes Spike seem like a punk. In his case, it seems to be natural too. By not letting the ups and downs of life make you retreat into fantasy and pessimism and accepting that you “just have to keep living somehow,” you become a “true adult.”
Faye doesn’t return and Ed departs the Bebop, leaving Jet and Spike to eat boiled eggs in silence. These half-heartedly self-conscious and clumsy men can neither laugh off the women leaving like Appledehli would, nor can they calmly express how they’re feeling. Seeing them sheepishly put Faye’s and Ed’s portions on their plates is a ridiculous and tragic sight that makes you feel sympathy for this hopeless duo.
In the final shot, we see the pinwheel Ed received from Clara attached to the front of the Bebop and freely spinning in the breeze. Though we won’t know whether Jet or Spike put it there is unknown, but it seems like it’s their small way of saying, “Even [though you've left], this was once your home.”
Cowboy Bebop is a work that's full of unexplained mysteries. Though we learn the pasts and feelings of people throughout the work, much of the state of the world remains a mystery.
Among fans, the current state of the Earth is at the forefront of these mysteries. While it's explained in Session 09 that it's not a normal situation, we're never provided with a detailed explanation. And based on what we see in another session, the situation in Japan seems quite dire. The map of Japan that we see for a split-second in "Speak Like a Child" is almost unrecognizable. It seems like that's the case for most of the Northern Hemisphere. In this session, we see a livable portion of Singapore that wasn't too badly damaged, though the fate of the surrounding areas is unknown. The biggest change seems to be the damage caused to the Merlion statue.
In Session 9, a man seems to be living in the ruins of a subway station. Since meteorites are constantly falling on the Earth, it only makes sense that people would live underground.
Tokyo in Session 18. While we can guess what other cities are like, considering the atmosphere of Ganymede, it seems like only the Tohoku area is safe?
While a portion of the area has been destroyed, given that Sally is able to live there, it doesn't seem like Singapore is bombarded by meteorites very often.