The Big O: Lost Memory [Ariga Hitoshi] volume 1 summary

Keywords:

Mecha, Action

Warnings:

Spoilers for first manga series

Volume 1 Information:

Publisher: Magazine ZKC

ISBN: 4-06-349121-8

Price: 500 yen(?)

First Published: ??/??/2003

Cover: Orange, with Dorothy, Roger, and shillouette of Big O

     (Foldout) Color, Roger fighting in the Big O

Contents (parts in parenthesis are the Japanese subtitle for the chapter):

    1 - Long Vacation (Roger no Yasumi - Roger's break/vacation)

    2 - Old Wives' Tale (undertaker)

    3 - Show up (Yami no Otoko - man of darkness)

    4 - Trick or Treat (Doko?! - where?!)

    5 - Meet by Chance (nemurenai kioku - memory that won't sleep)

    Making of Big O

Recap (Big O Original Series, Manga 5):

In Heart of Darkness, Roger fights Beck in an enormous "Gigadeus' - a three-legged, three-headed monstrosity that's more than twice as big as Big O! During the fight Beck keeps repeating the phrase "Paradigm, Paradise, Paralyze" and during the battle, a lot of memories are dredged up (we see images of trees and animals and other trippy stuff.) In the end, Roger is victorious (of course) but has a terrible vision of Beck with black holes where his eyes should be. At the end of the chapter, Roger says that he would never forget that face in the darkness.

Chapter 1 (Long Vacation):

We see a few scenes from the fight scene, and then Roger wakes up to Dorothy's piano playing XD After a typical introduction (the "this is Paradigm City, 40 years ago "something" happened and all memories were lost, blahblahblah") Roger is off to meet a client. The client asks Roger if he knows about Soldarno (which of course, he does, since thats where the Dorothy's were made). I think (and I'm not sure about this, since I read it really fast without any dictionaries) that the client (whose name I don't even think is mentioned..) wants Roger to protect Soldarno's factory. Afterwards, Roger is driving back when he's struck by a vision of the eye-less Beck...

Later, we find that the Robot-of-the-day is piloted by a "prince" who calls it his "Snow White" and has 7 people in pointy caps who call themselves the "dwarves" and... yeah, it's really kind of nutty. (And Roger/Big O is the wicked witch, that part was hilarious) Roger tries to call Big O and halts the first time, shaking, wonders whats wrong with himself, and successfully calls it the second time in order to lay the smackdown on the other robot... but while in the cockpit, he's struck again by visions of Beck and the previous fight, which renders him unable to pilot Big O, until Norman calmly talks to him over the intercom and Roger pulls himself together and defeats the other robot, saying "That's the end of that fairy tale" (hehe.) He then leans back and is able to take a nap, apparently his visions of Beck have been preventing him from getting any decent rest? (Or Dorothy's piano playing..)

Chapter 2: Old Wives' Tale

Dorothy wakes Roger up (again) with her piano playing. In fact, the first two pages are almost exactly the same scene as the previous chapter. Dorothy makes her comment on why everything (from Norman's uniform to the Megadeus (Big O) to his coffee to the Griffon to his pajamas!!) is black (Roger's a bit surprised and defends the Big O's color scheme by saying 'But it was already black') and reiterates his rule of the household about black, to which Dorothy reiterates the fact that Roger has no sense, and that his inner shirt is white. Roger protects his rule while Norman (I think this is his speech bubble) says "She just wants to wear something that's not black."

Back to work, Roger meets up with the same client as before, who tells Roger that in the Western Dome there's a graveyard being haunted by a ghost. Roger is skeptical; the client says he wants Roger to protect the graveyard because his parents are buried there, Roger agrees. He talks with Dastun about the dome, then goes to check it out. It appears that the graveyard not only houses the client's parents but Dorothy's fathers, Soldarno and Weingwright...he waits at the graveyard until morning, but nothing happens.. Getting out of the Griffon he walks back to Soldarno's and Weignwright's graves, when he sees a strange shadow, which is apparently the Robot-Of-The-Day. He defeats it, and then goes to a boutique where he looks at dresses...

Chapter 3: Show Up

No more piano ^^; Roger's walking around his office while Dorothy's trying to mop up the floor. He heads out and meets up with the same client, and fights another robot, then goes driving around the city again (note: buy stock in Red Lobster, Office Depot, and Little John's family restaurant... all three survive in Paradigm City :P) and apparently fights another robot.. by the time he gets home, Dorothy observes that Roger looks REALLY tired, but Roger says he's not, just really busy, and goes out again, meeting with the same client (who IS this guy?) Worried, Dorothy tells Dastun about the situation while Roger heads down into a rather wrecked room to meet with the client. Suddenly the client has eyes (or rather, lacks eyes) like Roger's vision of Beck! At this point, Roger starts going majorly delusional (everything he sees is at least someone curvy, and even the panels are drawn at crazy angles to show this!) and starts running off, confronting a (rather comical) Beck-Bot which he punches. He ends up in the Speak-Easy, but Big Ear has the same eye-less face as Beck.. he drives off in the Griffon and Norman contacts him, but Norman lacks eyes.. he crashes the Griffon and the delusions really start pouring in, with images of Angel, Dastun, Schwartzwald, and even the Big O lacking eyes and making fun of him! He wakes up in the wrecked room (did he even leave? I'm not sure) and sees...

"R. Dorothy..."

Chapter 4: Trick of Treat

Yay, Dorothy's playing the piano again. But Roger is sitting in his PJ's in a rocking chair, not noticing anything. Meanwhile, a new Robot-of-the-Day is driving through the city and distributing flyers with a rough sketch of Beck (eyeless...) saying "Do you think you can catch me?! You guys are too stupid to catch me!! Ha ha ha ha! Beck Gold" Meanwhile, while Dorothy and Norman try to wake up Roger, there's a knocking at the door, and Beck's 3 cronies are there. Dorothy only admits the woman (I think her name is Yam? I forgot..) because it's one of Roger's rules (harkens back to the first few eps/chapters..) They want to find Beck, but are disappointed when Dorothy accompanies them, not Roger. They go to the Speak-Easy where the 3 cronies ask Big Ear for information, but he's tightlipped until Dorothy puts down some money a la Roger. They find one of the flyers the Robot was distributing, and then go to find the robot (the cronies are disappointed again that Roger is absent.) They go to the Nightingale (where Dorothy sang in an early episode) which is suddenly destroyed by the Robot. They go chasing after it, the cronies jumping up and down and waving their arms and calling for Beck, all happy until the Robot speeds right by them without pausing. Dorothy (in all her ubercoolness) grabs a fallen pillar, runs in front of the robot and drops it there, causing the robot to collide and stop. She opens the door and some unknown person is there. The cronies are very sad, but there's nothing they can do..

Dorothy plays the piano again for Roger, who apparently hasn't moved from his rocking chair..

Chapter 5: Meet by Chance

Dorothy meets with Dastun, who says that Roger's client died in a traffic accident.. he also meets with Norman to discuss Roger's situation when another Robot-of-the-Day attacks. (Okay, this RotD wins my prize for strangest Robot, totally beating the eagle-headed one from Godhead (volume 4) - it's a giant.... sheep. Okay, it's a ram. But still. Baa.) The military police attack in force with little avail, and Dastun isn't happy that he can't rely on Roger and the Big O in this situation.. Roger starts to respond to the sounds in the distance (of the attacking robot, I assume) and moves out to the balcony, where he sees another wacky vision of Beck.. Norman tries to tell him Beck isn't there, but Roger's delusions make Norman all wacky-looking too. He tries to summon Big O but it doesn't work.. He walks down to that place where Big O is stored and goes into the cockpit (still in his jammies, heehee) where he's assulted by more visions of fighting against Beck.. Norman just stands there while Roger sits in the Big O cockpit in the storage room.. Roger feels like he's surrounded by darkness (which he hates, since that's were Beck is) when he hears someone calling his name... It's Dorothy.

And she's in a white dress! (Note: The same white dress she wears in the original manga series, volume 6)

Apparently the boutique called and she had to pick it up. Roger thinks back, trying to pick out the truth from the illusions.. obviously his trip to the boutique was real.. He finds that extremely amusing, and this seems to wake him out of his delusions. He asks Norman what's going on. However, Dorothy asks Roger why he chose pajamas for her when she's an android and doesn't sleep.. Roger replies that it's the rule to wear a black uniform.. but he thinks that at the end of the day, when you go to sleep, it's okay not to wear black.

Dastun is seriously stressing over the Sheep Robot of Dooooom.

Roger and Dorothy are in the cockpit of Big O.

Roger: Big O! Showtime!!

...to be continued...

The Making of Big O

This section is pretty typical; Hitoshi Ariga and his assistants each get a page to talk about anything they want to. Interestingly, Ariga's new assistant is an American named Michael Lindow! Pretty cool, on his own page, Michael says he's very happy to get a chance to work on the Big O ^_^

And...

The BONUS COMIC!

This one features Roger and Dorothy. Roger is blissfully sleeping when !!! Dorothy plays the piano and wakes him up. He angrily reprimands her and stumbles off; she turns and looks at an empty vase on the table. Later, Roger is going through the city and notices a flower shop. When Dorothy looks at the vase again, there are some star-shaped flowers in it ^_^

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