AnimEigo does it again, with their release of the second Lone Wolf and Cub movie, Baby Cart at the River Styx. Like AnimeEigo's other Lone Wolf and Cub DVD, the video quality here is spot on in all fields, the sound is superb (putting into consideration the limitations set forth by the film itself), and the extras are adequate.

Video:
Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx is a shining example of how superior DVD video quality can be compared to VHS, when in the right hands. The best aspect of the video presentation being the vibrant array of colors, an area which VHS is notable inferior in. The DVD format is not without its faults though, and the most infamous of these is artifacting (introduced blurriness and pixilation due to compressing the video); thankfully, the picture quality here is sharp, with no noticeable signs of artifacting. The brightness, unlike other more infamous releases of the film, is set at just the right level here adding just the right amount of atmosphere to the night scenes, but still making it so the viewer can see the details. As far as scratches are concerned, they are present on the print used for the DVD, but in very small quantities (even less noticeable than AnimEigo's Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance release).

Audio:
As with other Lone Wolf and Cub films, it's hard to gauge the audio quality present on this DVD. A lot of the music sounds very scratchy, almost hitting what some would call a "painful" level during the course of the film, but this is just the way that Hideaki Sakurai did the scores for his films, and one can't really hold it against the DVD. Furthermore, the film was originally done in mono, which accounts for the very "modest" sound quality which is present on the disc. In conclusion, given the limitations set forth by the film itself, its probably the best presentation one could hope to get. AnimEigo has complemented the Japanese audio track here with English subtitles, which like their other DVD releases is color coded to signify when more than one character is talking during a scene; furthermore, the subtitles can be toggled on and off if the viewer chooses.

Extras:
The extras found on this disc, while numerous, don't really stand out. The DVD contains the trailers for two Lone Wolf and Cub movies (Baby Cart in the Land of Demons and White Heaven in Hell) along with the trailer to Zatoichi the Outlaw and Zatoichi: The Festival of Fire. Missing is the film's own trailer, unfortunately, which Animeigo stated as not being able to locate when releasing Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance and it seems that they weren't able to get it in time for the second Lone Wolf and Cub DVD. Also included on the disc are "Linear Notes," which show an impressive amount of research done on the background of the time period in which the Lone Wolf and Cub series takes place, and appear both in print format and on the DVD itself. The disc also includes a list of credits, for the both the film and DVD, in English, which makes for a good resource for those who can't read Japanese.

Overview:
Bottom line, AnimEigo out does themselves with a release that's superior, in terms of the quality of the print used for the transfer, to their excellent Sword of Vengeance release, and this is a DVD which no fan of the Lone Wolf and Cub series should be without.

This disc is also featured in the box set: Lone Wolf and Cub: DVD Collector's Edition Box.