The Series (4/5)

   Being a huge fan of Cowboy Bebop, Cartoon Network, and things inspired by Batman, I don't know how I missed the Big O when it aired as one of the first smash hits on Adult Swim in the late 90's. However, when the Blu-ray arrived I was taken in immediately by the dark noir-ish artwork on the cover, and immediately took it upon myself to watch the series as quickly as I could. I was immediately thrown into an amazing world of film noir and mecha battles, and regretted not digging into this universe much sooner.

    The Big O is the film noir meets mecha follow up to Cowboy Bebop that came about in 1999. The series follows Roger Smith a billionaire negotiator in Paradigm City.   He is good at his job, and even better when things don't play out in the normal fashion, as he has a mecha known as the "Big O" as his ultimate negotiating tool, and at night when things don't go his way he hops in his mecha and does battle to help protect the city and resolve conflicts.

    The show itself is very light on overarching plot especially in its first season, as it was considered a one and done affair for Surrise, but with its success on Cartoon Network, it was brought back, and some of the background elements, such as the city's residents having their memories wiped 40 years prior is explored further. The animation for the show is excellent with a style that blends film noir tones with something out of Lang's Metropolis, this might have some people recalling the Alex Proyas' film Dark City. The series does have some great action, and some nice twist as things go on, and I never really found myself bored with a single episode.

Audio/Video (4/5)

    The show is presented full frame as was the TV standard at the time with a 1080p AVC encoded transfer. Everything looks quite solid here with deep blacks, nice color reproduction, and excellent line detail. Audio is handled with DTS-HD MA 2.0 tracks in both English and Japanese.

Extras (2.5/5)

Extras included the usual opening and closing, trailers, interviews with the Japanese staff Japanese commercials, and promos.

Overall

    Quite a nice surprise from late 90's animation that seems to have oddly evaded me, The Big O is nice blend of mecha and film noir that needs to be seen. The Blu-ray has a decent, but slim extras slate, and a solid transfer with fine audio. RECOMMENDED.