Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.5
Overall		4.0

Archer: The Complete Season Six Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman March 31, 2016

“You don’t know me.”

Chances are if it’s one Sterling Archer saying something like that, it’s a defensive response that only indicates that someone does in fact know him, probably all too well. Sterling is the “owner” of that quote above in a typically hilarious early scene in the sixth season of Archer, when in a chaotic phone conversation with Malory and Lana, Lana indicates exactly what Archer is probably doing, which is of course exactly what he’s doing (hint: it’s not anything “noble”). Archer’s petulant, childlike manner is one of Archer’s most fecund areas of humor, and it’s once again fully on display in this latest season, an aspect made probably only funnier due to the fact that Archer is now a father of sorts, after Lana has given birth to a baby girl (made possible by Archer’s “unwitting” donation of sperm). Archer retooled itself at least somewhat for Archer: The Complete Season Five, which bore the soubriquet Archer Vice, an obvious tip o’ the pastel beanie to Miami Vice. While the sixth season of Archer at least partially jettisons the whole drug cartel angle to get the characters back into the espionage game, the showrunners have probably wisely come to the conclusion that utilizing the acronym ISIS for the “agency” employing the spies is too problematic to continue, and so suddenly the good old CIA is involved. Otherwise, it’s largely business as usual, which in this case is a good thing, for Archer still continues to provide regular laugh out loud moments as Archer and his cohorts struggle to complete missions or even everyday activities at times.

Reviews of the previous five seasons of Archer can be accessed by clicking on the following links:

Archer: The Complete Season One Blu-ray review

Archer: The Complete Season Two Blu-ray review

Archer: The Complete Season Three Blu-ray review

Archer: The Complete Season Four Blu-ray review

Archer: The Complete Season Five Blu-ray review

The delirious insanity that has made Archer such a fan favorite for years is still percolating quite winningly throughout this sixth season, and there seems to be a new energy in the writing, with a broad range of often laugh out loud sight gags (more about that later) and the typically snarky bantering between the main characters very much in evidence. What consistently makes Archer so funny is its attention to character detail—there’s probably nobody in Archer’s principal cast who would qualify as completely “normal” (whatever that means), but their individual quirks are so finely depicted that all of these lunatics are instantly accessible and, even better, at least occasionally lovable.

With the erstwhile ISIS operatives now more or less firmly ensconced back in the spy game, this season has its expected bevy of patently insane missions, with various sidebars that routinely exploit weird references like Hell in the Pacific while also clearly delineating the fact that Archer is often spectacularly unprepared to get that “accomplished” tag added to “mission”. The running gag of Archer refusing to look over mission dossiers recurs in virtually every episode, leading to expectedly disastrous consequences.

Various other subplots play into this season, including Malory’s dashed hopes for a luxe new office to replace the one that went poof last season (hint: she doesn’t get it). There’s also a silly cast “addition” courtesy of Milton, an office copier/robot which (who?) just happens to be a toaster as well. And just for good measure a hot tub offers a few vignettes with the cast in various states of undress (this season has a couple of more graphic sex scenes than in past seasons, including one especially overt but hilarious one featuring Archer and Lana).

The new “little” Archer also plays into the series throughout the season, and one of the standout episodes this year features Lana taking the new baby and Archer back home to meet (or, actually re-meet) her parents. This episode has one of the most delicious sight gags of the entire season, in a brief flashback where Lana reminds Archer of his first introduction to her parental units. Without spoiling the gag, just keep your eyes on the table that Archer drunkenly lurches into and falls over—it’s a near perfect example of wonderful comedic timing. The sight gags this season are routinely inspired and give the series a number of laugh out loud moments that typically unfold even while the equally funny verbal sparring is playing out.

The featured cast is surrounded by some fun guest bits this season, including a recurring role for Christian Slater as the appropriately named Slater, a CIA operative whose watchword is “because I said so”. But the strength of this series has always been its main ensemble, and these voice performers have their characters down so perfectly that everything works together like a finely oiled machine—even if that machine is a copier robot that makes toast.

Archer: The Complete Season Six Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Archer: The Complete Season Six is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Archer continues to be one of the coolest looking animated shows on television, offering a photo realistic accounting of locations and characters that also exploits a technique that resembles rotoscoping. The visuals are routinely quite striking throughout the season, with exceptional levels of detail in elements like foliage or some fairly busy textures on things like buildings. There are some fun elements featuring holograms this season where transitions and/or glitches look properly digital. Colors are bright and bold and relatively realistic looking, at least given the often absurd storylines that are being animated. Line detail continues to be sharp and precise looking and there are no issues with compression anomalies or other distractions.

Archer: The Complete Season Six Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

While perhaps a little more restrained than last season, Archer: The Complete Season Six's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 still offers a glut of nicely nuanced surround activity, with lots of panning effects when things like car chases are utilized, and punches of good low end activity in the frequent outbursts of gunfire. Dialogue is presented cleanly and clearly and is typically well prioritized even in some otherwise very noisy sequences.

Archer: The Complete Season Six Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Conan and Archer Battle Russian Mobsters (1080p; 4:34) is a hilarious vignette featuring a certain late night host.


• Slay-J (1080p; 6:31) is a longer fantasy sequence presented in part in one episode with the team imagining a rather fanciful future for Archer and Lana's baby girl.


• Cooking with Milton (1080p; 3:42) is a faux piece of vintage videotape.

Note: All of the supplements are contained on Disc 2 of this two disc set.

Archer: The Complete Season Six Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Archer shows no signs of slowing down, and in fact this season seemed to catch a bit of the energy of the series' early years that had perhaps been a little diluted over the past couple of years. The characters continue to do any number of boneheaded things, all of which of course present ample opportunities for both smart dialogue humor as well as some pretty inspired sight gags. Archer is just flat out silly most of the time, which is frankly one of its most winning attributes. Technical merits continue to be strong, and Archer: The Complete Season Six comes Highly recommended.