Gene Starwind: adventurer, treasure hunter, space-phobic star pilot, expert fighter, and skirt chaser extraordinaire in the anime series Outlaw Star. The series starts with Gene set up working as a bounty hunter, bodyguard, or whatever else will get him enough money for his rent on the backwater dump Sentinel 3. In the very traditional lead guy/backup guy scenario (Spike Spiegel/Jet Black, Sakura Kinomoto/Tomoyo Daidoji,
etc), he is teamed up with Jim Hawking, a 12 year old genius. Among his most impressive arsenal (including several rocket launchers, who knows how many knives and pistols, and a pistol grip short barrelled shotgun), he has a Caster, an extremely rare and powerful weapon.
Through a sequence of events, Gene comes into possession of the Outlaw Star, the most advanced ship in the galaxy, along with Melfina, the navigation system who happens to be a biological android. The Outlaw Star is the key to
entering the Galactic Leyline, a place rumored to grant you anything you desire - if you can find and enter it. Gene promises Melfina that he will help her discover the meaning of her life (as she has no memory prior to Gene waking her up from a cryogenic sleep). In the meantime, they travel to Haphong and try to make a go of business in a big city, while gathering information about where the Galactic Leyline might be.
Gene is the captain and pilot of the Outlaw Star, and for a guy who spent most of his time throwing up when he first went out into space, he's a pretty good one. There are a number of pirates who have the strange idea that the Outlaw Star belongs to them, probably because they built it and then Hot Ice Hilda stole it. Perhaps it can be put down to the Outlaw Star's excellent computer system (named Gilliam II) and weapons systems, but whatever the case, they pull through a lot of nasty battles relatively OK.
While a sympathetic and cool character, Gene can be a real jerk at times. In particular, while he really does like Melfina a lot, he can't seem to resist either propositioning her (along with around half the other girls he meets), or treating her like a little kid (or both, at times). In one scene (not shown on the Cartoon Network run) in the episode The Anten Seven Emerge, Melfina came to talk to Gene the night before he was to duel to the death. He tried to kiss her (pretty roughly), and when she resisted, he accused her of being a stupid machine who just played with people's emotions. Remember, that at this time, Melfina had about 3 months experience dealing with humans, and was completely unsure of herself as it was. It was mean.
On the plus side, the guy can drink like a fish. In the same episode, he downs about half a bottle of something nasty (probably either vodka or grain alcohol), when he knew he would be in a duel the next morning. Now there is a character I can appreciate.