Picture: The picture was presented in full frame 1.33:1 ratio and looked great. I noticed no problems and even the dvd transfer looked great.

Sound: The audio tracks were either in English 5.1 Dolby Stereo or the original Japanese soundtrack with English subtitles in 2.0 stereo. Both sounded very crisp and clear but I think the English track sounded a bit better most of the time (although some of the voice acting wasn't as good as it could have been). The music sounded good enough that I wanted a CD of it.

Extras: The dvd had 5 full episodes so I wasn't too worried about getting a full plate of extras here. It had the usual open and closing sequences without text, a few production sketches and the trailers found on ADV releases. As a side note, I hear that ADV has a high end version of this one coming out too which has a t-shirt and other extras although it costs more.

Final Thoughts: I think ADV has a winner here. The show has enough depth to give it great replay value and enough familiarity to get a lot of anime fans supporting it. For the most part, the technical aspects were top notch and the story compelling enough to want to see more, much more, as quickly as possible. I wish ADV accelerated production of some series, this one in particular, as I wanted to see more after each episode. In these days of impending war with Iraq, it's good to see some anime that explores the hidden aspects of war as well as RahXephon does and not just a "rah rah blow them up" pro-war commercial. I left out a lot of discussion about specifics here because I didn't want to ruin the fun with spoilers as many reviewers do but feel free to email me if you simply must know more. Highly recommended by me and I hope the rest of the series is as good.