"The Show Must Go On", But Should It (Spoilers) [Archive]

View Full Version : "The Show Must Go On", But Should It (Spoilers)

DianaGohan

11-02-2003, 10:29 PM

(Note: Respond to this after watching the final episode tonight).

As you know, the Big O is ending (after a week's delay) it's second season tonight on the 26th episode entitled "The Show Must Go On." Beyond many other meanings, this could also be interrpted as "Let's Hope This Gets High Ratings And We Can Make a Third Season Of 26 Episodes." My question is, should CN make another Season Of Big O? Does it end well enough on it's own here? Where should the new season go if it's made? Anyway, make your opinions here.

Duke

11-02-2003, 11:27 PM

Yes, it should have a Season 3, to explain what the fark just happened....

Dr Kain

11-02-2003, 11:29 PM

That was a pretty good ending. All of Paradigm City is a world of actors who were given their memories from a previous person. Roger will continue to do his job, and will worry about the present and future.

Nearly everything was answered. I don't think it is worth it to have another season, but maybe a 6 episode OVA series, or even a 2 hour movie.

Also, I was thinking about the name Paradigm City. Someone who is trapped within a paradigm doesn't realize what is going on on the outside, and just keeps repeating the same things over. Paradigm City contains people who don't know what is going on on the outside world, and events just keep repeating themselves.

One more thing, I loved how they started it with ep 20, and said we had to. I'm surprised they didn't have any cards saying they goofed though.

SSJPabs

11-02-2003, 11:30 PM

I think this ending laid the groundwork for a fascinating number of options regarding Season 3. As I said on the main thread...

We have NOT come to terms!
Big-O Season 3, come to me!

Juu-kuchi

11-02-2003, 11:37 PM

I'd like some more thank you please.

kaine23

11-02-2003, 11:38 PM

If anything we need an "End of Eva" movie to explain this.

G1Ravage

11-02-2003, 11:38 PM

I'm fine either way.

SSJPabs

11-02-2003, 11:42 PM

As of this writing 76% would not be opposed to watching Big-O if there was a third season.

IWDP Lim

11-02-2003, 11:43 PM

No no no a thousand times NO.

I actualy ended up writting about half of a story that pretty much went the same way as the whole of the Big O series (well, it was really like two half stories that were mixed together, but still), and really, I've wanted to see a series end liek this for a long time now too, so, just leave it. Bah, whatever, it made sense to me anyway, and theres not a whole lot that really NEEDS to be explained either I think.

So just leave it as it is.

Dr Kain

11-02-2003, 11:43 PM

Something just dawned on me, Angel is the director.

sandwichman

11-02-2003, 11:44 PM

If anything we need an "End of Eva" movie to explain this. I don't need to see a giant naked angel having Big O injected into her forehead to explain everything. Or do I...

Dr Kain

11-03-2003, 12:00 AM

Something more to add as I think of it more:

everything seemed to have been repeating itself. Now, I'm figuring all those Bigs you saw in the flashbacks were not all there at the same time. They were 1000s of flashbacks going on at once, but it looked like it was the same time because the same thing happened every time, Roger lost. Remember the flashback where you saw him in a police uniform while piloting Big O? Did you noticed the seen when Roger was sinking into the ocean of him seeing himself dead in the ocean? He made the choice to live, thus breaking the same cycle that would repeat itself continuously. Angel and Dorothy would be there from the beginning because he decided he wants to remember them no matter what, and only rely on the present and future. Things will go on differently, while events will happened similar. That means Alan, Alex, and Schwartzwald may have the chance to come back. Beck seemed to know what was going on, and he was having fun because Roger chose to live on and fight.

I'm trying to think of an easier way to explain it, but I can't. This series is a great mind ****, and after thinking about every episode, you can come to figure what is going on.

Like I said before, I think an OVA or movie would be nice, but I don't want another season. Hell, I wouldn't mind if there wasn't anymore at all.

Dr Kain

11-03-2003, 12:22 AM

Oh yeah, and I want to add that everytime, Big Venus came in and basically did RESET on the world, but because Roger was there to know who the pilot was, he was able to stop it to change things.

mactbone

11-03-2003, 12:23 AM

You know what, they could just write a whole new Big O, the Series. That's what it looks like they're setting up, just ignore the first 26 eps except as a kind of prologue for the real series. It could be episodic in nature and just follow the adventures of Roger, Dorothy, and Angel or they could try and explain where the hell the studio was, how the elvator and Rosewater disappeared, why they bothered to construct huge ass machinery in the ocean, the purpose of constructing Bigs, and what's going on in the rest of the world.

SSJPabs

11-03-2003, 02:41 AM

I love the polls where you can see who voted for what.

Slay the non-believers! They are GUILTY!!

Just kidding.

CaptainRed

11-03-2003, 02:42 AM

Yahr... must... have... more...

I don't care how they make more... they've shown me that what they make is not crap...

I mean, they offered, right? :¬D

*honks hugs and whatever else*
Cappy "I'm still not a Rosewater" Red

RogueMartian

11-03-2003, 03:52 AM

I'm not sure, it could definitely use some sort of movie or ova. I'm still in the land of wondering what just happened. I mean I guess the ending said that Paradigm city is doomed to repeat it's cycle of destruction and rebuilding over and over againor maybe it's more like: The whole world is fake, built for people's amusement and destroyed and rebuilt for the next...er...gamer or whatever each time
Of course those of us that know anime, know that if there is another season, it will be just as confusing and enigmatic as the rest. Such is the nature of anime. We watch for tension and character development more than explanation and closure.

Idioteque

11-03-2003, 08:12 AM

Another OVA or movie, maybe.

However, I think another series after an ending that climactic would take away from the ending's effect.

Andrew

11-03-2003, 09:27 AM

Correct answer: it depends.

If the staff had ideas for a third season in mind prior to Cartoon Network being given the option of 26 episodes, then yes. Go for it, CN, you have my blessing.

If, however, they very much intended for episode 26 to be the end, and would then have to come up with a plot for the third season if CN exercises their option, then I say no. Instead, use the money to get Kazuyoshi Katayama, Chiaki Konaka, and the rest of the key staff back together to create an entirely new and different series.

MJC

11-03-2003, 10:22 AM

I'd like to see a third season from another POV

1. A prequel (maybe from Gordon Rosewater's POV)
2. A sequel from the POV of someone outside of Paradigm looking in

Mynd Hed

11-03-2003, 03:37 PM

I voted "I Don't Know," but I'm leaning towards "no." The thing is, Season 1 > Season 2 by a really wide margin. Season 1 was fantastic, incredible, awesome. Season 2 was just kinda, "Meh." If Season 3 took as big a drop in quality from Season 2 as Season 2 took from Season 1, well, it wouldn't even be worth watching. I could see a third season being done well, but, well, I just don't think it's that likely.

Beat

11-03-2003, 03:44 PM

Definetely.

JohnCrichton

11-03-2003, 03:56 PM

Definately.

At the very least a 6 episode OVA that really explained and gave real resolutions. I hate to think I was following the fight and struggle of characters in a world that didn't exist in the first place.

I need a better more satisfying resolution.

GWOtaku

11-03-2003, 04:08 PM

Bring it on.

Hades

11-03-2003, 04:46 PM

we need something. an OVA or a movie, either would be fine. though, its going to be hard to top the ending of the series. after all the heavy story arc episodes this season, i'd like to see Roger get back to some negoation, like we saw for most of the first season. take two episodes or so to explain the ending and then lets have episodes dedicated to Norman and Dastun. we really know very little about Norman.

Lord Dalek

11-03-2003, 05:20 PM

I'm all for it!

randomguy

11-03-2003, 05:52 PM

Nope, stick a fork in it, it's done. Maybe a movie to tie up loose ends (and boy, there are plenty of them), but 26 more episodes would be overkill.

Ultra8

11-04-2003, 01:46 AM

I'd say make some more Big O, but that depends on if this episode was meant to be the "End". Then maybe a movie or OAV, or they could do just another 13 eps. season focusing on the other cast members. :D

Animation Otaku

11-04-2003, 08:25 AM

Definitely. Besides helping explain, I'm guessing the creators wanted 26 more episodes, otherwise they would have said 'No, we don't want anymore after this', rather than giving CN the option for more.

eyager

11-04-2003, 10:21 AM

The plot of the Big O has reached to point of no return. Saying "Everything is just a computer simulation" and hitting the reset button to start the story over again is a very cheap writing ploy. A third season trying to rehash the same storyline, but with a slightly alternate sequence of events (parallel universe) is of little interest to me. Close off the series with an OVA to make the fans happy.

Instead of a third season of Big O shouldn't Bandai start focusing their efforts on dubbing Wolf's Rain?

Delthayre

11-04-2003, 11:22 AM

Instead of a third season of Big O shouldn't Bandai start focusing their efforts on dubbing Wolf's Rain?

Ummm, I somehow doubt that the two have any effect on eachother. The writing and animation of season 3 would be handeled by Sunrise, Bandai is mostly financial backing. And dubbing would be handeled by the American branch.

Jaguar

11-04-2003, 03:14 PM

Oh HELL YEAH.

I.R Joey

11-04-2003, 05:44 PM

Do I feel the ending was kind of a cop out? Yes.

Should they continue it and gives us something that isn't so confusing. Yes.

I mean come on. If Rodger is a robot how can he bleed? Why was it that people could tell that Dorthy and others were androids but they couldn't see how they were robots? Then there's R.D why was she out to kill Rodger? What was Rodger seeing in his vision during ep 14 memories from a past paradigm, "True" reality? What was it?

Yes they leave alot open, and they should continue provided they can keep up the level of quality prevelent in the 1st 24 eps.

P.S Is anyone getting the idea that the writers are just laughing at us for overanalyzing this, and that in fact it's all just jibberish?

Pimmelmann

11-04-2003, 10:41 PM

Such is the nature of anime. We watch for tension and character development more than explanation and closure.

I worry about this with the Japanese material sometimes. The endings of Rurouni Kenshin and Love Hina mangas just made me smile, but I didn't expect Big O to have an ending like that because it's such a different animal. However, it's plumb irresponsible to make a show of unanswered questions and recurring symbolic elements and so forth and then feel you have got an escape clause from tying it all together. Big O was surely no great work of character development, and the robot battles aren't exactly going to put the show in the hall of fame for such things. It was this weird mystery of Paradigm City, the past, and the nature of memory and identity that kept me watching. If the third season would develop this further, as I hope and expect, then bring it on. I'd be a fool to think that the possibility of more Big O was not considered while crafting the ending-foreign money brought the second season, and could bring a third.

*votes for more, and will watch and buy DVDs if there is more*

Sheamon

11-04-2003, 10:50 PM

Ummm, I somehow doubt that the two have any effect on eachother. The writing and animation of season 3 would be handeled by Sunrise, Bandai is mostly financial backing. And dubbing would be handeled by the American branch.

More precisely, Animaze. Bandai, like many anime distribution companies doesn't do the dubs themselves but rather pay another company to translate, write and dub things themselves. When you consider that its not even Bandai of America thats making Big O in the first place (actually Sunrise, a Bandai owned animation studio in Japan) both can be done at the same time.

Dogasu

11-05-2003, 10:24 AM

Mynd Hed, I completely agree. Season 2 was just terrible, and I have no reason to believe that a third one would be any better. Let the series end.

SSJPabs

11-05-2003, 10:39 AM

Mynd Hed, I completely agree. Season 2 was just terrible, and I have no reason to believe that a third one would be any better. Let the series end.As you've so astutely said, you have unpopular opinions (i.e. opinions that have little popular support).

I would live if a season 3 weren't made, but I'd like it to be made. I am not ready to give Big-O up (and just purchased the season 1 soundtrack on e-bay infact).

Delthayre

11-05-2003, 11:20 AM

Big D'oh

11-05-2003, 12:32 PM

I liked season two rather a lot. I just didn't like that they made almost everything irrelevant with the ending it had. I think there are a number of very interesting premises they could expore with a third season and I'd like to seen it tried.

It remains to be seen if everything that we've seen previously is now irrelevant. After all, "fragments" of previous loops came into play during the first 26 episodes. Who's to say that "fragments" of eps 1-26 wouldn't come into play during eps 27-52?

I think it would be interesting if "season 3" had a Dorothy-centric POV. I remain convinced that Dorothy, unlike everyone else in Paradigm, retains her memories of the previous loops. Either she refuses to express this or she is somehow restrained from expressing it.

Let's say that Big O has two narrative "tracks". One track is the inside track, about the lives of Paradigm's inhabitants. In this track, the possibilities of loops, superdomes, and existence-erasing Big Venuses are not a factor. Paradigm's world is real, and that's it. The outside track of course is the loop, the possible rewriting of everyone's lives, etc. Dorothy's scenes often often felt like their a seperate show unto themselves, as if there's a Big O show and then also an R. Dorothy show, both taking place at the same time. I believe that this is because Dorothy is the only character on the show that continually percieves *both* the inside and outside narrative tracks. I've always thought that if you took all of Dorothy's scenes from all the episodes and cut them together, one right after another, they would be their own little character arc that made a weird kind of sense. From the outset in season 1, Dorothy's actions and reaction are usually chalked up to eccentricity. In reality, I think it's because she and she alone is experiencing Big O's complete narrative thrust in a way we as viewers aren't privy to until very late in the game, around #25-26. Most of time, we are as clueless as Paradigm's inhabitants.

Now, if this is the case, we as viewers would have almost no choice but to begin experiencing Big O from Dorothy's perspective in the 3rd season, if she still retains "The same body, the same heart". We've been through a loop *with* her, and so she would actually be our anchor in further seasons, and we would view everything through her eyes. I think this sets up some incredible possibilities for further character and thematic development, if true. Season 3 please...

The Landstander

11-05-2003, 03:11 PM

I thought season 2 of Big O blew season 1 out of the water. Season 1 was good, but had WAY too many random/forced/pointless robot fights. Half the shows opened with a cool, film noir-esque beginning, and by the second act it was a robot fight I could care less about. Yawn.

Season 2 actually gave MEANING to the robot fights, went more into the central plot, gave some neat new character while phasing out the lesser elements of the show. Though Season 1 was better in keeping the film noir vibe (which was the only dissappointment of season 2) and had a more styled animation, season 2 wins in...well, just about everything else.

As for the original question, I think it comes down to what someone said earlier. If episode 26 is supposed to be the last episode of Big O (and the several theories I've read on it vary on what it was exactly supposed to be [I have no idea, myself =P ]), then end the show at episode 26. If the creators had ideas for furthering the story beyond episode 26, then go for it.

That's what I say, anyway.

Jaguar

11-05-2003, 03:12 PM

Mersault

11-05-2003, 04:39 PM

No Season three thank you, mainly because my theory rests on the idea that Paradigm City broke out of the loop (if you want to read this theory, just check the Big O C&C Thread, pg 14, I love cheap plugs :p) Therefore I don't think a third season would be as good, or have any deeper plot to it rather than just episodic episodes. While I did like how season one had self contained episodes, I thought season two was better because it focused more on one main plot with a few small stories scattered in there (The Greatest Villain, that one with the robot assassin).

lostrune

11-06-2003, 01:55 PM

tenken

11-06-2003, 05:15 PM

not necessarily a season 3, just SOMETHING new with Big O. without it, my life has lost meaning. i have nothing to stay up for on sundays anymore. siggghhhh. :(
and the ending sure as hell leaves room for some explanation!!! I mean, we can make up as many theories as we want, but you don't know which is right!
to quote schwarzwald: is it a crime to try and learn the truth?
I just wanted to completely understand wtf Big O was really about.

randomguy

11-06-2003, 06:52 PM

You know what would be hilarious? If a Season 3 was announced, but episodes 27-52 ended up being EXACTLY THE SAME as episodes 1-26, because of the loop. Man, that would crack me up...

ClockStomper

11-06-2003, 10:41 PM

They could do that in the cards for the repeat runs. :)

Anyway, I question whether or not the loop started over, since all of the buildings were in rubble when we saw the "first scene" again. Wish I had a copy of episode 1 to check to see if it is, in fact, the same.

Teek

11-06-2003, 11:33 PM

It is the same with a few minor changes, episode 26 added Angel and Dorothy (wearing their post-episode 1 clothes) and in episode 26 Roger does not look at his watch to see the time. I've read some say this means Big O and the rest aren't around this time. One would think if they wanted to highlight Roger no longer had his Big O watch they would explicitly show he didn't have it. Besides... Roger still has a million uses for that damn thing outside of calling Big O.

HumanoidTyphoon

11-09-2003, 04:18 PM

Anyway, I question whether or not the loop started over, since all of the buildings were in rubble when we saw the "first scene" again. Wish I had a copy of episode 1 to check to see if it is, in fact, the same.
I don't remember in ep 26 if all the buildings were in rubble but the clocktower was knocked down in both episodes. I'm pretty sure it was shown at different times though in ep 26 as the sequence starts and in ep 1 as the sequence ends and he goes to negociate with Beck. Also I think it may have been facing a different direction. As Teek said there is also the addition of Angel and Dorothy (which I believe replaces a shot of Roger's hood ornament) and Roger not looking at his watch. Maybe because he doesn't have an appointment to negociate with Beck this time. In ep 1 you can't see the watch because it's covered by his sleeve it's just reflected in his glasses so he could still have it in ep 26. Also one of the weirder changes is the thing Roger runs over makes a much louder sound in ep 1.

PaQ

11-09-2003, 11:59 PM

I would like to see at least one more season. This season really just confused the heck out of me and I always hated shows that ended but not really ended and that's what would happen if they didn't do another season..