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"We didn't set out to be superheroes, but sometimes life doesn't go the way you planned. The good thing is, my brother wanted to help a lot of people, and that's what we're gonna do. Who are we? BIG HERO 6!"
— Hiro Hamada

Big Hero 6: The Series is an American animated series based on Big Hero 6, set after the events of the film. It is co-created by Mark McCorkle, Bob Schooley and Nick Filippi, who had previously worked on Disney animated series Kim Possible, the former two having also done several other Disney animated adaptations including Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, Aladdin: The Series, Goof Troop, The Lion King II: Simba's Pride, Tinker Bell and the Legend of the Neverbeast, and so forth.

The series, which picks up immediately following the events of the film, continues the adventures and friendship of 14-year-old Hiro Hamada and his compassionate, cutting-edge robot Baymax. Along with their friends Wasabi, Honey Lemon, Go-Go and Fred, they form the legendary superhero team Big Hero 6 and embark on high-tech adventures as they protect their city from an array of scientifically enhanced villains. In his normal day-to-day life, Hiro faces daunting academic challenges and social trials as the new prodigy at San Fransokyo Institute of Technology.

It is also notable for being greenlit for its second season before it aired, like Tangled: The Series, DuckTales (2017), and Star Wars Rebels, the last of which was revealed later on to have been greenlit as a show entirely rather than season by season, suggesting a similar case for the other shows.

The show properly started in the US on June 9, 2018, while the show had already aired new episodes in the UK and Australia, among others, since March 1, 2018.

On April 16, 2019, the show was renewed for a season 3 a few weeks before the Season 2 premiere. Season 2 premiered May 6, 2019. Season 3 premieres on September 21, 2020, switching to a format of two eleven-minute episodes instead of the previous half-hour blocks. On January 28, 2021, it was confirmed the third season will be the last, and the show closed out on February 15, 2021.

IDW Publishing announced a comic book series based off of the show in July 2018, but only three issues were published in total over the course of the next two years due to editorial conflicts. Yen Press, who made a manga based on the movie, announced a new graphic novel based on the show that was released on August 17th, 2021. The first issue features the episodes "Issue 188", "Failure Mode", and "Baymax Returns Part 1".

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This show provides examples of:

     A to G 
  • Abandoned Laboratory: Lenore Shimamoto had a laboratory hidden underneath her living room. It took a century after her death to be discovered by the gang.
  • Abhorrent Admirer: In the Big Chibi 6 short "Love Letter", this is Hiro's reaction to receiving a love letter from Karmi. Karmi then proceeds to chase him to the ends of the earth to make him accept it.
  • Aborted Arc: "Portal Enemy" ends with Hiro discovering Baymax's original body remains in the portal dimension from the movie, implying this will be a future plot point, but ultimately it is never followed up on for the remainder of the series.
  • Absurd Phobia: Honey Lemon and GoGo are afraid of hippos and leprechauns respectively. The former isn't so absurb, however, as hippos are very ferocious animals. Good luck seeing a hippo (or leprechaun for that matter) in a city like this though.
  • Accidental Tickle Torture: In "Aunt Cass Goes Out", when Mel is hiding behind Fred from the "buddy" robots, the former's unintentionally tickling the latter from outside his suit.
  • Actionized Sequel: Downplayed. The movie already contained action scenes but mostly focused on the drama. Meanwhile, the series has many fight scenes with more than one foe.
  • Action Prologue: Most episodes start unexpectedly with an exciting fight scene, the best of which is Season 1 finale "Countdown To Catastrophe", where the first shot is Hiro being thrown against a stash of boxes by Globby.
  • Actually a Doombot: In "Countdown To Catastrophe", Hiro thinks he found Obake in an abandoned deli, but it turns out to be an android version of him, that Obake used to lure Hiro away while he puts his plan in action.
  • Actually Pretty Funny: In "Hardlight", upon learning that Hiro had his ass handed to him in his video game, Wasabi visibly stifles laughter. It gets harder when Baymax says that Hiro was defeated in under 5 seconds.
  • Adaptation Expansion:
    • The two part pilot is a more fleshed out version of the epilogue from the movie, detailing the team's decision to become superheroes, the new dean for SFIT, and revealing Obake, the next major villain the heroes will face in the series.
    • The episode "Killer App" shows the runaway cable car incident from the newspaper article; it was part of a plot to use a predictable algorithm battlebot to defeat Big Hero 6.
  • Adorable Evil Minion:
    • Noodle Burger Boy is this to Obake and Trina, when he's not going solo.
    • The Mayoi become this for Mr. Sparkles.
  • Affectionate Gesture to the Head:
    • In "Baymax Returns", in a re-animated scene from the movie epilogue, Wasabi tussles Hiro's hair in a brotherly way.
    • Krei does it halfheartedly to Hiro in "Aunt Cass Goes Out". In "Muira-Horror!", he does it in a genuine Pet the Dog moment, demonstrating his Character Development since Season 1.
    • Krei's assistant also sarcastically does it to Hiro once in Season 2.
  • Alliterative Name: In addition to Hiro Hamada, we have Frederick Flamarion Frederickson IV, Grace Granville, Trevor Trengrove and Wendy Wower.
  • Alone with the Psycho: Happens too many times to count to Hiro. The most notable examples would be when he's kidnapped by Obake, who wants to be his Evil Mentor, then in Season 2 he got held hostage by Liv Amara, and then he went and invoked this by invading Trina's secret base.
  • Alternate Aesop Interpretation: In-Universe, Obake thinks the reason Icarus fell to his doom is because he needed better wings. Fair point, but still.
  • Alternate History: While All There in the Manual in the film itself, this universe's version of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake does come into play here, with further differences between it and the real world version being it happening two weeks earlier than it did in reality and being the result of Lenore Shimamoto's experiment, not a natural event.
  • Ambiguous Ending: "Big Problem" ends with the Monster of the Week defeated, but it's never explained how Orso Knox was turned into the monster to begin with. This is a Sequel Hook into Season 2.
  • An Ass-Kicking Christmas: During the Christmas Episode "The Present", the team has to battle with a horde of villains in order to get Tadashi's gift back.
  • Animesque:
    • Courtesy of Jose Lopez, the same character designer behind Transformers: Prime and Transformers: Robots in Disguise (2015). Though it's more of a downplayed example, since the show is inspired by anime and the funny facial expressions are nothing out of the ordinary like animes are.
    • Played straight in the chibi shorts, who is definitely a shout-out to chibi animes.
    • It's played more straight in Season 3, as since it focuses more on comedy, includes more exaggerated expressions and reactions reminiscent of animes.
  • Apocalypse How: Class 0. This was Obake's eventual plan: destroy the city using Lenore Shimamoto's work and rebuild it with him as the savior and Hiro as his student.
  • Art Evolution: The animation is somewhat stiff at the beginning, but becomes more fluid. This is because the animation in the first season was handled by two different studios. A entirely different studio was used from Season 2 onward, resulting in a more consistent animation style.
  • Art Shift: Between episodes- the ones animated by Snipple Animation have a cleaner, more fluid look. While the ones animated by Nørlum (in their first outsourcing gig) are rougher and exhibit a choppier framerate. Toon City, who joined for Season 2, is a combination of both studios in terms of overall animation quality.
    • "Fan Friction" has Karmi's fanfic portrayed in a chibi style somewhat reminiscent of Teen Titans Go!, shifting to a more realistic anime style when she's gushing over "Captain Cutie".
  • Art-Shifted Sequel: Instead of the CGI animation of the movie, the series is done with hand drawn animation.
    • The experimental Baymax Dreams series of shorts were animated in Unity, albeit the computer-generated imagery is more in line with the show’s polygonal look than the movie, bookended with 2D segments.
  • Ascended Extra: Yama, a very minor antagonist of the first movie who quickly becomes irrelevant when Hiro decides to attend SFIT, is The Heavy of the pilot and works with Obake, the Big Bad of the 1st Season.
  • Aside Glance: Hiro is prone to doing this. Also Chris gives a deadpan one at the camera when he hears Honey talking in her sleep.
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever:
    • In "Kentucky Kaiju," disappointed at the size of the Kentucky Kaiju figurine he ordered, which came in a shipping container, he modifies a crane in his father's shipping dock to be the internal skeletal frame of his Kentucky Kaiju robot, which is soon taken over by Noodle Burger Boy, and goes on a rampage in downtown San Fransokyo.
    • A second giant mech appears in "Steamer's Revenge", piloted by Baron Von Steamer. It was initially disguised as a statue dedicated to Boss Awesome.
    • In "The Globby Within", Nega-Globby grows gigantic, à la Godzilla.
    • Cobra builds a giant mechanical snake in her debut episode as an attempt to get rid of Heathliff.
  • Attention Whore:
    • High Voltage wants attention just as much as money, if not more.
    • Mr. Sparkles goes so far as to kidnap Mochi, set up a lethal obstacle course, and threaten to shoot the cat into space if no one completes it in time. All because the video Honey Lemon uploaded of Mochi slow-clapping outshined his show. He actually likes the notoriety he gains as a wanted criminal, although he eventually reforms.
  • Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Hiro and Karmi get a few of these due to their Tsundere dynamic. Hiro had the chance to tell Karmi to stop writing her fanfics, but just gave her a Captain America-esque speech instead. And we see Karmi watching Hiro's speech online in the finale, as stated below.
  • Back for the Finale:
  • Bait-and-Switch: Trina does this in the finale to Season 2. "Thought it was Obake, didn't you?"
  • Bait-and-Switch Credits: The opening credits give false assumptions about the Rogues Gallery:
    • In Season 1, Mr. Sparkles, Yama and the Mad Jacks have their pictures in the hexagons next to Hiro's hands. Yama was the main antagonist of two episodes, while Mr. Sparkles and the Mad Jacks only appeared in one episode.
  • Badass Bystander: In "Big Problem", Karmi, a normal civilian and occasional Damsel in Distress, uses her latest invention to take down the monster Orso Knox. Right before he attacks Liv Amara.
  • Badass Teacher: Professor Granville reveals herself to be one in "Seventh Wheel".
  • The Baroness: Di, Liv's clone.
  • Batman Gambit: Obake tried to pull this off in the finale, making Globby attempt to steal a failed prototype of an Energy Amplifier counting on the fact Hiro would want to make a working one. It worked, and the entire plan would have gone off without a hitch were it not for Globby's sudden but inevitable betrayal.
  • Bat Signal: Fred bought a search signal to act as such which is supposed to read "help", however he received one that says 'Halp'. Since he didn’t keep the receipt, he decided to roll with it.
  • Batman Cut: Invoked by Fred in "Issue 188" to transition from the campus cafe to his house.
  • Beat Them at Their Own Game:
    • Played with in "Muirahara Woods", where the team loses their tech and tries to defeat Ned Ludd by way of improvised gear and traps... and when the fight actually goes down, he spends a lot of the conflict poking traps with his staff and setting them off prematurely, and otherwise apparently being better at this than they are. He's finally tripped up when he's surprised by Baymax having befriended the local moose.
    • Actually inverted in "Hardlight". Roddy tells Hiro that playing in Hardlight's game will only result in losing since he already knows how to win, so he tells him to play his own game.
  • Behind Every Great Man: In "Small Hiro One", we learn that the thesis that inspired Tadashi to build Baymax was actually made by Wendy, and Trevor stole it and got all the credit.
  • Big Bad:
    • Obake, an enigmatic, highly intelligent supervillain, who serves as the first season's antagonist.
    • Diane "Di"/Liv Amara as of Season 2's first arc, then Chief Cruz and Trina for the second arc.
    • Noodle Burger Boy and his "sisters" for Season 3.
  • Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti:
    • In a Funny Background Event, while Boss Awesome talks on the videophone with Fred, his companions run around chased by a huge yeti. When the yeti gets close to Boss Awesome, he knocks it out with a single punch.
    • The "Hibagon" is a Sasquatch-like creature rumored to roam Muirahara Woods. It's actually the insane hermit Ned Ludd whom people mistake for the Hibagon.
      • In "Muira-Horror!", Di Amara turns Ned into an actual Hibagon.
  • Birthday Episode: "Steamer's Revenge" celebrates Wasabi's. His friends retrieve his car from the bottom of the bay, and give it many upgrades.
  • Blob Monster: Globby is a human transformed into one of these. Come Season 2 and there's Globby Evil Counterpart Nega-Globby, who's this trope too.
  • Body Horror: Season 2 gives us Sub Level-9 of Sycorax that has jars with eyes and beating hearts.
    Fred: (sees them all, and puts his Yaki Taco back in the bag) Yep; just lost my appetite.
  • Borrowed Catchphrase:
    • A variant. After defeating Noodle Burger Boy thanks to his super strength device, Hiro mockingly tells him "Howdy and goodbye!" (instead of "Howdy and hello").
    • When Supersonic Sue voices her Villain Respect, GoGo smiles and replies, "Supersonic Sue me, why don'tcha?"
    • The team tend to use Baymax's when it's appropriate: "Oh no."
  • Bound and Gagged: As a Damsel in Distress, this is how Hiro finds Karmi in the abandoned Akuma Island lab. Then the light turns on, revealing all the other members of the team bound and gagged as well.
  • Brain Bleach: Fred, Gogo, Wasabi, and Honey Lemon in "The Bot Fighter" see something on a DVD that horrifies them. It's Yama samba dancing.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy:
    • Noodle Burger Boy, having been reprogrammed by Obake to serve him.
      • Noodle Burger Boy then does this himself to 3 other mascot robots in Season 3.
    • Obake gets a hold of Baymax himself in the Season 1 finale.
  • Call-Back: Remember Wasabi's car that the team drove into the river in the movie? It gets brought back up in "The Impatient Patient" and becomes a focus point in the plot of "Steamer's Revenge".
  • Canon Foreigner:
    • Professor Granville, Obake, Globby, Bluff Dunder, Fred's mom (seen only in a picture in the movie), Richardson Mole, Mel, and Karmi are new to the series.
    • Virtually everyone outside of the Big Hero 6 are created specifically for the show, with no basis in the Marvel comics the movie was based on.
  • Card-Carrying Villain: The mother-daughter duo, High Voltage. Obviously very, very keen on having an adoring, public audience to their crimes, and are very well received by the public.
  • Cassandra Truth: In "Something Fluffy", Hiro thinks that the Mayoi are Liv's evil work, while everyone else, including the rest of the team, are enthralled by their cuteness. He's right.
  • Casting Gag: In the episode "Food Fight", the host of the underground cooking competition is played by Alton Brown, and Cass's first opponent is played by Gordon Ramsay.
  • Casual Danger Dialogue: Fred wants to know if by "get rid of them", Yama means toss them out, or something more "permanent". Fred's tone is utterly conversational the whole time.
  • Christmas Episode: "The Present".
  • City of Adventure: San Fransokyo has certainly become this due to the actions of Obake and Liv.
  • Clark Kenting: A lot of people cannot recognize any of the main characters while in their Big Hero 6 costumes. But, Go Go points out that, Granville being Granville, she would easily recognize them even in costume, which was proven true in the Season 1 finale.
  • Collapsing Lair: Obake ended up getting Hoist by His Own Petard when the shock wave from his attempt to recreate the Great Disaster made his Supervillain Lair unstable. He lets it crush him.
  • Cooking Duel: The main premise of "Food Fight", where Aunt Cass gets caught up in an underground cooking competition circuit.
  • Comical Angry Face: Hiro gives a hilarious one as a Shout-Out to anime in "Write Turn Here" when Honey Lemon tells him he actually likes Karmi.
  • Comic-Book Movies Don't Use Codenames: It isn't until the second half of the pilot that Fred proposes the team name: Big Hero 6. The others think it's a lame name.
  • Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: Callaghan was a good man corrupted by his desire for revenge and to save his daughter. Obake is an out-and-out evil Visionary Villain and tech genius who wants to destroy San Fransokyo so he can be remembered forever. Liv Amara is another Well-Intentioned Extremist who prefers to use genetic engineering in her plans. Chief Cruz is a Badass Normal Hero Antagonist. And Trina is a Shadow Archetype who wants to make her daddy proud. Finally, Noodle Burger Boy is a reprogrammed robot who wants to cause trouble against humans with a robot family.
  • Cool Airship: The Mad Jacks have their own personal one.
  • Cool Bike: "The Fate of the Roommates" gives GoGo her own hypercycle.
  • Cool Car: Wasabi's car, who was retrieved from the bay by the gang and updated by them to double as a submarine.
  • Cool School: The San Fransokyo Institute of Technology (they have their own VR Lab and their food court has a machine that feeds you hot dogs and a super efficient squad of mini-roombas.) The San Fransokyo Art Institute looks impressive as well.
  • Cool Sword:
    • Wasabi's upgrade in Season 2 gives him a plasma sword complete with a shield.
    • Hardlight has one, that can also shoot lasers.
  • Copiously Credited Creator: In-Universe example. Karmi's chibi series was done by her from A to Z, and the credits at the end of the episode Fred and Hiro is watching shows her username everywhere.
  • Crush Blush: Karmi blushes when Hiro as "Captain Cutie" holds her hand in "Fan-Friction".
  • Crush Filter: Karmi's doodles in her notebook as well as the beginning of "Fan-Friction" showcases that she sees her beloved "Captain Cutie" as a bulky Tall, Dark, and Handsome Bishōnen straight out of a shojo manga. Ironically, Hiro, the ACTUAL identity of "Captain Cutie" is smaller than she is.
  • Cute Is Evil: The Mayoi (until the events of "City of Monsters"), and later on, Big Hero 6 chibis made by Hardlight.
  • Cyber Cyclops:
    • The Skymaxes, the robots that transports the team's armors, are doted with one eye.
    • The Buddy Guards have one eye that turns red when they go haywire.
    • Professor Granville's security bots look like one-eyed spiders.
  • Dance Battler: High Voltage use dance moves in their fighting style.
  • Dance-Off: Barb and Juniper does one as they are feuding in "Big Hero 7" in Joe's Diner, and their electricity powers just ends up with them destroying everything.
  • Daddy's Little Villain: Trina to Obake. She's an android created by him, whom she sees as a father, and Obake is shown to love her in return.
  • Darker and Edgier/Denser and Wackier: The show fluctuates between these two, being either Darker and Edgier or Denser and Wackier than the original movie, or even the original comic for that matter. We have episodes like "Fan Friction", a parody of fanfic tropes with chibified versions of the characters, as well as the Season 1 finale where Obake tells Baymax to let him die and Baymax acquiesces, and the "City of Monsters" two-parter, where a certain fan-favorite character suffers a Painful Transformation and is mind-controlled into fighting Hiro. That character is Karmi.
  • A Day in the Limelight:
    • Aunt Cass in "Food Fight", where she participates in extreme cooking competitions.
    • Heathcliff gets his in "The Fate of the Roommates"; he participates in an underground racing competition to take down Mr. Sparkles.
    • After over 2 years, Wasabi finally has his moment in "Fear Not", where he's hired to fill in for an absent teaching assistant. After several failed attempts to get over his stage fright, and two moments of freezing up in front of the students, he's able to go through the class with flying colors. Plus he devises a plan with Mini-Max to save his friends, and it works flawlessly.
  • Death by Secret Identity: Tends to be averted, with the one (possible) exception being Obake, who found out the secret identities of all of Big Hero 6. Most of the villains who avert this only know of Hiro, which may justify it.
  • Decomposite Character: The character Marys Iosama from the original Big Hero 6 comics seems to have been divided into Karmi (a Teen Genius at Hiro's school and occasional Damsel in Distress) and Megan (a sassy Nice Girl who's Hiro's first friend his age).
  • Did You Get a New Haircut?: In "Internabout", Trina trades her android body for a Mini-Mecha. While rescuing Noodle Burger Boy, who's last seen her with her android body, he realizes "something is different" and asks if it's her haircut. Funnily enough, she did cut her hair into a mowhawk, but he doesn't seem to see it's not the biggest change Trina did to herself.
  • Disney Villain Death: Subverted in the fact that Yama is the one who attempts to use this in intimidation.
  • Dramatic Irony:
    • It takes until the second half of the first season for the team to discover Obake's existence. During the first half, only the viewers know the team is being watched by Obake.
    • Through Season 2, the viewers are aware of "Liv Amara's" villainous side way before the titular heroes. Then in "Lie Detector", we find out that she is not the real Liv, which is then discovered by Hiro and Baymax only in "City of Monsters".
    • In "Prey Date", Hiro finds out that Orso Knox is a Non-Malicious Monster in need of help. Then, they get separated, and Hiro's friends give Knox a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown thinking that he did something bad to Hiro.
  • Driven to Suicide: Obake's death comes about because he refused to be saved by Baymax.
  • Dumb Muscle: Supersonic Stu.
  • Eating the Enemy: In "Nega-Globby", Globby eats his Evil Counterpart. That might not be the best idea as the last scene of the episode shows Nega-Globby's red eye opening on Globby's shoulder.
  • Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Obake, Momakase and the ringleader from the botfights.
  • Emerging from the Shadows: Both Season 1 and Season 2's Big Bads, Obake and Di Amara seem to love doing this.
  • Enemy Mine: Hiro and Momakase do this in "Hiro the Villain". In the first Big Chibi 6 short, Obake is also briefly seen aiding the team's attempt to make popcorn from scratch.
  • Engineered Heroics: In "Something Fluffy", Hiro publically asks Amara what exactly her company does and why monsters seem to show up wherever she goes, and her company seems to benefit from them. In response, she creates the Mayoi who wreak havoc in the city, then shows up and saves the day, reinforcing her good publicity.
  • Evil All Along: Liv Amara (actually named Diane).
  • Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: This is Obake's main flaw as a villain. The same accident that gave him his Two-Faced look also robbed him of his empathy. This causes his Batman Gambit in the finale to fail, because he didn't conceive of a certain Globlike fellow's concern for his friends would cause him to betray him.
  • Evil Counterpart: Nega-Globby to Globby.
  • Evil Doppelgänger: "Liv Amara" is one; the real Liv Amara is kept in stasis in a pod at Sycorax. The Liv we met in "Big Problem" is Liv's clone Diane who tries to cure her disease while simultaneously experimenting transmutations on people.
  • Evil Genius: Obake and Di Amara.
  • Evil Is Petty: Subverted in "Brunch Rush". Obake initially appears to have given Aunt Cass' diner one star... but then changes it to three, then five.
  • Evil Knockoff:
    • In the pilot, Yama creates an army of Baymax copies, sans vinyl "skin", in the pilot after briefly obtaining the rebuilt Baymax body and adding a Hand Blast. This works against him when Hiro takes one out and has Baymax impersonate it.
    • In "Rivalry Weak", Obake traps Fred and Wasabi in a replica of Fred's room who has for riddle "The hardest thing to face is yourself". It's quite literal as Fred and Wasabi have to fight evil clones of themselves to escape.
  • Evil Luddite: One that is actually named "Ned Ludd". He used to be a real estate developer, but a meteorite strike gave him a revelation that all technology is evil and a threat to nature. Unfortunately, this also includes Baymax.
  • Evil Old Folks: Baron Von Steamer and Supersonic Sue are old-timer supervillains and arch-enemies of Boss Awesome who become new foes to Big Hero 6.
  • Evilutionary Biologist: The main Big Bad of season 2 Diane "Di" Amara is this to a T.
  • Evolving Credits: Season 2's end credits change from just having Baymax's head and shoulders displayed at the bottom, to having chibi forms of the various characters pop in from the edge of the screen. The opening is also updated to include Mini-Max, the new villains, Baymax using his Overdrive Mode against Orso Knox and the new costumes for the heroes. Season 3 has similar updates to reflect villains who were Put on a Bus, the team using their original costumes again, and Pirate Noodle Burger Boy subbing for Orso Knox.
  • Exact Words: In the episode "Lie Detector", Baymax asks Liv Amara with his lie detector if she was responsible for the recent monster attacks. To paraphrase what she said: "Liv Amara is not making the monsters." It turns out that this is technically correct. As the 2 part episode "City Of Monsters" reveals, the person who said that is Liv Amara's evil clone Diane. The real Liv was in stasis the whole time due to how an experiment on herself went horribly wrong, and she's devastated when she finds out what Diane did to revive her.
  • Explosive Overclocking: Granville's paperweight is revealed to do this to any electrical device.
  • Face–Heel Turn: Mini-Max in "Mini-Maximum Trouble". Justified since it's due to water messing with his personality chip, and once Hiro fixes him, he goes back to being a good guy.
    • All the Maxes in "De-Based", after Fred opens a spam email with Basemax.
  • Face Your Fears: "Obake Yashiki" has Obake tricking the team into wearing contact lenses that makes them face their worst fears: spiders for Fred, heights for Wasabi, hippos for Honey Lemon and leprechauns for GoGo. Hiro's hallucination? Tadashi, indicating his brother's death is the thing that shocked Hiro the most in his life, and also is a way to manipulate him.
  • Family-Friendly Firearms: As showed in "The Globby Within" and "Hardlight", the SFPD use taser guns instead of firearms.
  • Fat and Skinny: Barb and Juniper from High Voltage, respectively.
  • Faux Final Line: Hiro uses one in "Rivalry Weak" to hide the fact that the group is working on a plan to prank the other school.
    Hiro: ... and that is why covalent bonds share electron pairs! Super interesting...
  • Five-Second Rule: One episode had Fred try to invoke this, only for Baymax to explain how it's a load of bunk.
  • Foil:
    • Professor Callaghan to Professor Granville. Callaghan was more laidback and seemingly reasonable, but ended up being a Broken Pedestal and was ultimately consumed by his hatred, becoming a villain. Granville is a strict-but-fair type who ultimately becomes an ally and Secret-Keeper to the heroes.
    • Trina to Hiro. Once, Hiro lost someone very dear to him. And he almost let his desire for vengeance lead him down a dark path, but with the help of his friends, he managed to remain a hero. But Trina was never a hero, and the only person she had in her life was her father, Obake. And just like Hiro, she's determined to continue his legacy.
  • Foregone Conclusion: Considering it's Disney we're talking about, any Big Bad will of course end up being stopped by the heroes.
    • You know the villains that were turned into monsters by Di Amara will get turned back to normal at one point.
  • Foreign Exchange Student: While not seen, Honey Lemon mentions in "Something's Fishy" that she used to have a crush on a french exchange student named André in her high school years. His mention becomes sort of a Running Gag.
  • Foreshadowing:
    • During the two episode pilot, a still frame of Mr Sparkles and a billboard with his name are shown. Mr Sparkles is revealed to be a one off villain in a later episode.
    • "Countdown To Catastrophe" has a scene with Karmi and Liv Amara, who has nothing to do with the present story arc. However, it hints their more prominent roles to the first arc of Season 2.
    • That same scene had Karmi's final project being an electricity-powered rose. It comes in handy in the Season 2 mid-finale.
  • Form-Fitting Wardrobe: In "Killer App", Wasabi and Hiro exchange armors in order to trick Noodle Burger Boy. Other than Wasabi's laser blades and loose pants which seem too big for Hiro, their armor looks skin tight on them, especially for Wasabi, who seems to be perfectly wearing the armor of a 5'0 feet tall boy. See for yourself.
    • Sirque's bodysuit counts as well.
  • The Ghost: Tadashi, both literally and figuratively. It was stated by the creators during their panel at the 2018 San Diego Comic Con that he would always have a presence in the show.
  • Gilligan Cut:
    • The show cuts to Yama and Obake right after GoGo says that real supervillains don't exist.
    • There's one in "Internabout" where it cuts to Hiro realizing he has to pick up Krei's dry-cleaning right after telling Karmi he has important work to do at Krei Tech.
  • Girly Scream: Wasabi's makes a triumphant return in "The Impatient Patient", when Hiro accidentally sneezes on his new computer, twice.
  • Given Name Reveal:
    • Krei's assistant gets finally named in "Internabout". It's Judy.
    • Aunt Cass calls Chief Cruz by his given name, Diego, revealing it to the audience.
    • Mr. Sparkles reveals his first name to be Frank during Season 3.
  • Giver of Lame Names: All of the names in Karmi's fanfic, including Captain Cutie (Hiro) and Tall Girl (Honey Lemon).
  • Go-Karting with Bowser:
  • Good Versus Good: In the second half of Season 2, the heroes get into a conflict with the new police chief who believes that superheroes attract supervillains.
  • Green and Mean: In the series, the color green is associated with villainy. In Season 1, Obake's lair is depicted in bright shades of green. Recurring villainess Momakase also has green eyes. In Season 2, Sycorax, the company belonging to Liv Amara and now led by her evil clone Diane, the new Arc Villain, is bright green like Obake's lair, and looks more terrifying at night.
    • A minor case: Wasabi's chibi in season 3's "Big Chibi 6" is green, and albeit adorable, evil.
     H to M 
  • Hair Color Dissonance: Honey Lemon's blond hair is represented by shades of orange.
  • Ham-to-Ham Combat: In "Supersonic Sue", the titular villainess and Baron Von Steamer have an Evil Laugh contest.
  • Harmless Freezing: Courtesy of one Honey Lemon, done first to Yama. She later repeats this to her (former) roommate, destroying their shared apartment in the process, and to a bunch of police officers.
  • Halloween Episode: "Obake Yashiki" has the gang dress up and go to a haunted house; afterwards, Hiro starts seeing Tadashi around the city.
  • Heart Symbol: Karmi's depiction of her fanfiction contains a LOT of hearts.
  • Heel–Face Turn:
    • Globby switches sides to the heroes at the end of Season 1, horrified by the potential fallout of Obake's master plan.
    • Mr. Sparkles reforms during Season 3.
    • Noodle Burger Boy and the other mascot bots have their evil programming removed in the Series Finale.
    • Momokase is an ambiguous case, but she becomes an ally on two different occasions during Season 3.
  • Here We Go Again!: "Baymax Dreams Of Too Many Freds" has Fred get split into multiple tiny copies of himself inside Baymax's mind. Just as they manage to resolve the situation, Fred inadvertently pushes Baymax into his memory-processing machine. Fade to Black, as many high-pitched Baymax voices cry "oh, no..."
  • He Who Must Not Be Seen: André, Honey Lemon's french high school crush, is a character mentioned often by the latter, but never seen.
  • Hidden Agenda Villain: The first two main antagonists keep their motives hidden before their respective Grand Finales. Chief Cruz subverts it.
  • Hidden Depths: In "Muira-Horror", Krei is revealed to be quite the skilled outdoors-man. Hiro is, needless to say, surprised at this.
  • High-Altitude Interrogation: Yama does this to someone who owes him money, and to Hiro.
  • High-School Dance: Megan invites Hiro to one from her school in "Something's Fishy".
  • Hope Spot: "City of Monsters, Part 1" is a big one for people who were rooting for Karmiro to happen, or at the very least for Hiro and Karmi to bury the hatchet once and for all. They do become friends, but Karmi's parents understandably decide to move out of San Fransokyo due to what happened to their daughter.
  • Icarus Allusion: Obake references Icarus to Hiro and combines it with Alternate Aesop Interpretation.
  • I Heard That: In "The Present":
    Baron Von Steamer: [whispers to Hiro] You might wanna skip Sue's fruit cake! Blargh!
    Supersonic Sue: [offscreen] I heard that!
  • Imagine Spot: In "Fear Not", after using reverse psychology to help with his glossophobia (fear of public speaking) Wasabi imagines becoming a successful SFIT professor when he has to fill in for an absent teaching assistant.
  • Immediate Self-Contradiction: In "Something Fluffy", Wasabi tells Hiro that he won't fall for the Mayoi's cuteness; when they walk in the lab, and see the others playing with one, Wasabi falls head over heels.
  • Immediate Sequel: The beginning of the series takes place around the time everyone thought Baymax was dead. The two-part pilot even overlaps with the film's epilogue, expanding upon Hiro rebuilding Baymax and the team fully forming.
  • I'm Okay!: Fred says this word-for-word in "Food Fight":
    Fred: (pinned to a wall by Momakase's knives, when he pops his head out of his suit unharmed) I'm oookay!
  • I Never Said It Was Poison: At the end of "Small Hiro One", when Trevor Trengrove returns the flash drive to Wendy Wower and confesses that he stole it, Wendy mentions that she was just going to tell Trevor how nice it was to see him again.
  • Inopportune Voice Cracking: This moment in "Fear Not":
    Granville: (calling via Baymax) Wasabi, the teaching assistant in first year quantum optics had a family emergency; I'd like you to fill in.
    Wasabi: (high-pitched voice) Me?! (clears his throat) Me? Teach a class?
  • Inspector Javert: Chief Cruz is this to Big Hero 6, attempting to apprehend them by whatever means necessary.
  • In-Series Nickname:
    • Karmi calls Hiro's alter-ego "Captain Cutie". Characters in-universe and even fans of the series use the nickname as well.
    • Chief Cruz is called "Chief Snooze" by Hardlight.
  • I Resemble That Remark!: In "Big Roommates 2", Gogo, exhausted from a lack of sleep due to Honey Lemon's snoring, claims that she's fine. Baymax starts playing soothing music, and she's out in 2 seconds.
  • Injured Limb Episode: "The Impatient Patient."
  • In the Future, We Still Have Roombas: SFIT has a bunch of roombas in the cafeteria that cleans up the mess not even a few seconds after it's been dropped.
  • Irony:
    • Karmi hates Hiro Hamada the youngest genius at SFIT, but is in love with "Captain Cutie", not being aware they're actually the same person.
    • Richardson Mole has a Precocious Crush on GoGo and hates Fred Frederickson, while he idolizes "Lizard Guy" (Fred in costume) and couldn't care less about GoGo's alter-ego.
  • Journey to the Center of the Mind: The "Baymax Dreams" shorts are themed after this. Baymax's mind is a terrifying place and you would do well to steer clear of it, as Fred discovers to his peril.
  • Kissing the Ground: Wasabi does this in "Obake Yashiki", but quickly comes to his senses.
  • Knight of Cerebus:
    • Unlike Yama, who has a plethora of fairly comical antics, Obake's shown to be a fairly dark villain, and threatens to kill Yama once he fails at trying to obtain the MacGuffin of the pilot.
    • Di Amara, ooh boy, yes. Each time she appears on screen in Season 2, there's a heavy sinister ambiance. She shows herself beating Obake in terms of villainy and puts Season 2 in a much darker territory than the entirety of Season 1.
  • Late-Arrival Spoiler: Due to its nature as a sequel to the movie, it assumes you already know about the major plot points of the movie, such as Tadashi's death, Obake/Callaghan's defeat, and Hiro's proper acceptance into SFIT, which is where the first episode of the series picks up.
  • Lighter and Softer: After the serious story arcs of the first two seasons, season three is more lighthearted and gag-based, indicated by poising Noodle Burger Boy as the Big Bad in the season premiere.
  • Logic Bomb:
    • In "Mini-Max", Fred and Mini-Max use this tactic to overload the robotic spiders' circuits:
      Fred: Okay Fred, think: How do you defeat a security system that thinks everything is a threat? By threatening me, the security system is a threat to the school, because I'm there to protect the school. So, to defeat all threats to the school, the security system must fight itself.
      Security computer: Threat detected.
      Fred: But if it fights itself, then that's also a threat, so it must fight the part of itself that's threatening the part that's not a threat.
      Security computer [computer smokes from overheating and lights flashing frantically]: Fatal logic error. Warning: fatal logic error!
      Fred: But the threat in that is figuring out which is the non-threatening part.
      Security computer [shuts down]: Logic circuit overload! Logic circuit overload!
    • Mini-Max himself becomes a victim of that in the end of "Supersonic Sue".
      Fred: It's like my dad says: a real hero helps everyone in need. Even his enemies.
      Mini-Max: Help an enemy? You have blown my mind! Ha-ha-ha! I am in need of repair.
  • Loves My Alter Ego: Karmi is in love with Hiro's alter ego, who she calls Captain Cutie. Meanwhile, Richardson Mole inverts this with Go Go, who he tries to woo and refers to her as "dream girl". The one time he talks to her while she's in costume, it's clear he couldn't be less interested.
  • Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter: Trina sees herself as Obake's daughter, and is beautiful enough to catch Hiro's attention.
  • Maker of Monsters: Sycorax, the new villains of Season 2. They're named after the witch who sired the monster Caliban in The Tempest, and are responsible for turning Orso Knox and many others into monsters.
  • Mama Bear:
    • Aunt Cass. She's shown in "Food Fight" that using knives isn't beyond her in order to bring Hiro back home safe.
    • Don't insult Juniper if you know what's good for you. Barb will fry your ass.
    • Bessie is a literal example. Hurt Ned, and be ready to face her wrath. She also has cubs in "Fred the Fugitive" that she's quite protective of.
    • Supersonic Sue is shown to be very protective of her grandson Stu.
  • The Man Behind the Man:
    • Obake is implied to be behind some of the more minor antagonists, like High Voltage, Globby is working for him in his second appearance onwards, and he reprogrammed Noodle Burger Boy.
    • Liv Amara's doppelgänger is shown to be responsible for the villainous upgrades that occur throughout season 2.
  • Meaningful Name: The series seems to be fond of these:
    • "Obake" is a name for a type of shapeshifting yokai. Over the course of Season One, Obake reveals himself to be a pretty effective Master of Disguise.
    • Liv Amara's company, Sycorax, is a Maker of Monsters named after the mother of one.
    • Globby's human name, "Dibs", means "a small amount of money". Dibs was your average purse-stealing thief before becoming the supervillain Globby.
    • Ned Ludd is named after the iconic leader of the "luddites", and just like his namesake, he despises all forms of technology.
    • The name "Wendy" was invented by Peter Pan's author J.M. Barrie; the name comes from the word "fwendy" ("friendly") that was said by the young daughter of a friend. In Wendy Wower's case, she's definitely friendly.
    • "Carl" means "strong man", which definitely fits Felony Carl.
    • Barb is a common nickname for the biblical name "Barbara". The saint wearing her name is the protector of fire and lightning. Barb uses electricity powers and bolts of lightnings as a supervillain.
      • "Barbara" also means "strange", which makes sense considering High Voltage is a more comedic pair of villains.
    • Juniper means "young", "youth-producing". She's the Younger and Hipper part of the High Voltage duo.
    • "Mayoi" written in kanji can mean doubt, hesitation or bewilderment while katakana can refer to lost. They were engineered to sow doubt of Liv's culpability in the monsters, people are hesitant to believe they're a threat, Hiro is confused on how they could even be at first in spite of his suspicions and they ultimately end up escaping with Mr. Sparkles in the end.
  • Mega Neko: Mochi as the eponymous "Mochizilla" in one of the "Baymax Dreams" shorts.
  • Mirror Monster: Played with in "Super Driver". Obake terrifies Wasabi by hijacking his phone and then appearing in his car's mirror. But then Wasabi looks back, and Obake is nowhere to be found.
  • Mistaken Age: In "Obake Yashiki", the host of the haunted house thinks Hiro is younger than 14.
  • Monochrome Past: All of the flashback scenes with Lenore Shimamoto, who lived in the early 1900's, are shown in sepia coloring.
  • Monster of the Week:
    • Season 1 has Dr. Mel Meyer from "Aunt Cass Goes Out", and The Mad Jacks from "The Impatient Patient". They are the only antagonists not to appear again after their debut episodes.
    • Season 2 has this in the literal sense. In each episode released so far, the Big Bad turns each one of the Season 1 villains into a more powerful monster.
  • Mood Whiplash: Whenever an episode ends on a cliffhanger or ominous note, it is then followed by the upbeat end credits. Unlike Tangled: The Series, this is never subverted.
  • More Deadly Than the Male: Liv, a.k.a Diane "Di" Amara, is the first female Big Bad, and shows herself to be FAR WORSE than Yokai and Obake combined.
  • Most Fanfic Writers Are Girls: In "Fan Friction", Karmi writes a fanfiction where she's paired up with Hiro's superhero alias. As if it couldn't get more uncomfortable for poor Hiro, she calls his alias Captain Cutie!
  • Moth Menace: Subverted. Globby has a moth form, which is helpful when it comes to defeating Nega-Globby.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • Fred comes up with the name Big Hero 6 just like in the manga adaptation of the film.
    • Obake's plan, as revealed in the Season 1 finale, is to destroy San Fransokyo with a giant explosion, thinking he'll remake the city as an example to be followed and a cautionary tale for the rest of the world. This sounds very much like one of the original Big Hero's villains, Deadline, who also happens to be a tech-savvy Evil Genius like Obake is.
    • The villain in "Food Fight", Momakase, is a skilled sushi chef and knife expert who uses infeasibly sharp sushi knives in combat. This is very similar to the original comic book version of Wasabi, who also shares with her a blue color scheme and headband. And they keep getting into one-on-one fights with each other.
    • Fred piloting the Kentucky Kaiju is a nod to him being able to transform into a kaiju in the original comics.
    • Karmi, being inspired by Marys Iosama, Hiro's love interest in the comics, was mutated by the Big Bad and forced to attack Hiro under Diane's mind control on her in "City of Monsters". A similar thing happened to Marys in the comic as well, as she was possessed by a villainess and was turned into an Ax-Crazy muscled woman who attacked Hiro.
     N to Z 
  • Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Good Luck Alley, named as such cause it stands for "good luck getting out alive".
    • Sycorax. A biotech firm being named for the witch who bore Caliban does not inspire confidence in the Board’s ethics.
  • Never Mess with Granny: Supersonic Sue is as badass as she is old.
  • Never Say "Die": Zig-Zagged Trope:
    • When Fred asked if Yama meant 'get rid of him', as in Hiro and Fred get thrown out or if Yama meant the 'permanent' get rid of. Yama's smirk tipped Fred off that he meant the latter.
    • Averted in “Issue 188” when Karmi blames Hiro for N5-4’s death, by saying “killed”.
    • One of the episode titles is known as "Killer App".
    • Also averted in non-threatening situations, where "dead" is used every now and again in casual conversation.
    • Played straight in “Countdown to Catastrophe” where Hiro cuts himself off before completing the sentence "everybody will be killed" and Obake asks Hiro how Icarus fell to his “doom”.
    • Averted in “Portal Enemy”, where Fred outright says Hiro almost died the last time he went through a Krei Tech portal.
    • Played straight again in “Fred the Fugitive” when Chief Cruz mentions that his father “paid the ultimate price” at the hands of one of Boss Awesome’s enemies.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
    • If Hiro had decided to complete the testing first, Yama would not have been able to get Baymax's exo-skeleton and be able to make so many copies.
    • Honey Lemon gives Globby an inspirational speech about how his powers are truly unique and how he should make use of them to better himself. This gives Globby the confidence boost he needs to decide to become a supervillian, gain perfect control of his superpowers and he begins his career by secretly stealing Krei's wallet, demonstrating he's also mastered the thieving skills he failed to before his transformation.
    • Lenore Shimamoto causes the Great Catastrophe when creating a source of powerful energy that's too unstable.
    • Hiro tells Liv that Ned Ludd is the one keeping the tech-nullifying meteor Bessie. Though at that time he didn't know Liv was a shady individual.
    • Karmi tells Liv Hiro helped her with finding the cure, prompting her to mutate Karmi and have her kidnap Hiro. Though she only realized she was evil when it was too late.
  • Nobody Here but Us Statues: Dibs, before his transformation into Globby, manages to hide by pretending to be the criminal in a crime awareness ad, which was painted on a waiting shed.
  • Non Sequitur, *Thud*: After being curb-stomped by Chris in "Muira-Horror!", Ned lets out this gem:
    Ned: Out of nowhere, from above... handsome sky man, beautiful eyes.
  • No Power, No Color: In the episode "Cobra and Mongoose", supervillain Cobra is using remotely controlled robotic cobras with bright green patterns. When Hiro removes the neural interface that is used to control them, the cobras power down and the patterns turn a dull grey.
  • No-Sell: Noodle Burger Boy, a repurposed battlebot strikes Fred several times in the midsection, but inflicts no damage at all. He then realises even if he can predict all of their combat moves and fighting styles, he still lacks the ability to harm them.
  • Noodle Incident: Sadly, neither of these involve Noodle Burger Boy.
    • In "Internabout", Krei makes Hiro get his brown cow costume back from the dry-cleaner's and to not ask about it. Later, Krei states over a phone call that he had to wear it for some unspecified incident.
    • What Felony Carl did to end up in the same police car as Fred in "Fred the Fugitive" is never explained. Did he finally do his name justice? We don't know.
  • Not in the Face!: This moment in "Muira-Horror!":
    Krei: (to Hibagon!Ned) Please, not in the face! It's new!
  • Offscreen Teleportation: Professor Granville gets to Hiro's class well ahead of him despite having been talking with him in the hall moments before. She claims that it's because of "shortcuts" that she can use and he can't.
  • One Degree of Separation: "Mini-Max" reveals that both Callahan and Obake knew Granville the first time she was at SFIT.
  • Painful Transformation:
    • Dibs's transformation into Globby is far from being pleasant, as Dibs screams in pain and his horrifying transformation is only seen from a shadow on the wall.
    • While Liv Amara's monsters go through gradual and pain-less transformations, the same can't be said about poor Karmi, whose transformation was instantaneous and she wailed and groaned in pain the entire time.
  • Police Are Useless: In season 2, Chief Cruz brands Big Hero 6 as vigilantes, a problem he plans to correct, because no city with a skilled police force needs superheroes. Well, San Fransokyo is not that city.
    • No one but Big Hero 6 has a clue that Liv/Di Amara creates the monsters and no one but the heroes can stop them.
    • Chief Cruz tries to handcuff and taser a Blob Monster, with predictable results.
    • In general, the San Fransokyo Police Department is just plain unprepared and unequipped for supervillains, since they lack the advanced scientific minds and equipment that Big Hero 6 have at their disposal. Chief Cruz's refusal to cooperate with the team does not do him any favors in improving police efficiency.
  • Parental Sexuality Squick: Of a sort. Hiro isn't pleased by the idea of his aunt Cass going on dates with older male characters. When Baymax states that Cass and Krei are of legal age to marry and Krei would be his uncle, a disgusted Hiro is determined to break off their fling.
  • Posthumous Character: Tadashi, who died in the events of the movie. He mostly appears through Baymax's recordings.
  • Promoted to Opening Credits: Mini-Max in Season 2, along with various villains who were previously introduced or will be introduced in the coming episodes.
  • Punny Name:
    • Momakase's name is a pun on "omakase", a Japanese phrase that means, "I'll leave it to you." It can also refer to multi-course sushi dinners created at the chef's discretion rather than the customer's, tying back into Momakase's cooking motif.
    • Supersonic Sue uses her own name as a pun for her catchphrase "Supersonic sue, why don'tcha?"
    • The Buddy Guards' name is a pun between "buddy" and "bodyguard".
    • Liv and her clone Diane "Di" are basically "live and die".
  • Put on a Bus: Karmi moves away from San Fransokyo on her parents' request after everything she's been through in the "City of Monsters" two-parter.
    • Then, in the third season, after Karmi has returned as Hiro's love interest, Megan's role became unnecessary and she disappeared without any explanation. Multiple characters lampshade this, asking "But what happened to Megan?" usually when talking about Karmi.
  • Quirky Ukulele: Wendy Wower uses a ukulele to sing songs about the joys of science to kids. Karmi borrows it from her to sing her own song at one point.
  • Rapid-Fire "No!": Hiro is prone to doing this when he makes a mistake or when something bad is about to happen.
  • Real Event, Fictional Cause: The Great Catastrophe is the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. It was caused by Lenore Shimamoto, who was creating a new power source that accidentally became a star. This is what Obake is trying to recreate through Season 1.
  • Real Men Ride Pink Glittery Motorcycles: Felony Carl agrees to Honey Lemon making his motorcycle pink and cover it in glitter because it shows how comfortable he is with his masculinity. He's even holding her purse while she's decorating it.
  • Recurring Element: For the chibi shorts, Obake will always make some sort of cameo, usually without explanation.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning:
    • The evil Baymax copies have these.
    • Noodle Burger Boy's eyes glow a bright red before shooting his lasers.
    • Nega-Globby has a single red eye.
    • The Buddy Guards' eyes turn red when hacked.
    • When SFIT's security robots see a threat, their green eye turns red.
  • Refusal of the Call: Other than Fred, the rest of the team isn't initially that enthusiastic about continuing superhero work in the premiere, with GoGo saying that they aren't needed since there are no supervillains in real life, especially after a supposed car thief turns out to be a man trying to get his wife, who was in labor, to the hospital. Hiro was less reluctant, but wanted to focus on doing well at his new school like Tadashi would have wanted.
  • Repetitive Name: Fred's full name is revealed to be Frederick Frederickson IV. Although in "Internabout", he later states that his middle name is technically his mother's maiden name, Flamarion (so his name would be Frederick Flamarion Frederickson IV), though not everyone follows this naming convention.
  • Retool: Season 3 has the show switching from 22-minute episodes to 11-minute ones while putting a greater emphasis on comedy. This is according to executive producer Bob Schooley.
  • The Reveal:
    • Professor Granville started teaching at SFIT before 20 years ago, and Callaghan knew her too.
    • Obake was actually a star student at SFIT and was taught under Professor Granville.
    • Liv Amara is actually a clone of the original woman, named Diane, who's gone rogue in order to save her creator from parasynths that are killing her healthy cells.
  • Reverse the Polarity: Hiro does this to the paperweight to stop himself and Baymax from uncontrollably flying out of the atmosphere.
  • Ridiculously Human Robots: Trina, Obake's android "daughter".
  • Rogues Gallery: The Super Hero series has a number of recurring antagonists: Mr. Yama, the first Big Bad Obake, Momakase, Globby, Trina, Noodle Burger Boy, High Voltage, Mr. Sparkles, Ned Ludd, Baron Von Steamer and Supersonic Sue, Orso Knox, the second Big Bad Diane, Chris, Bessie, Mayoi, Nega-Globby, El Fuego... Most of them are science-related, making it a Thematic Rogues Gallery.
  • Running Gag: Baymax's slow walking when they need to hightail it. It's a Slowly Walking Gag.
  • Sarcasm Mode:
    Baron Von Steamer: (to Wasabi, after kidnapping him, thinking he was Fred) You scoundrel! How dare you impersonate a Frederickson!
  • Save the Villain:
    • Supersonic Sue breaks into Steamer's jail cell and kidnaps him. Later exploited by both Steamer and Supersonic Sue, who actually teamed up and pretended that Steamer was in danger in order to lure Big Hero 6 into a trap.
    • Karmi rescuing Liv Amara in "Big Problem" technically counts since Liv, or actually her clone Di, turns out to be the Big Bad of Season 2 who transformed Knox in the first place.
  • Screw Politeness, I'm a Senior!: Both Baron Von Steamer and Supersonic Sue are old supervillains that are somewhat rude.
  • Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Krei seems to go this route at times, to his assistant's dismay.
  • Secret Public Identity: Everyone on the team refers to each other by their given names, even when suited up. Averted in "Fan Friction", when they use Karmi's codenames when in her presence.
  • Secret Secret-Keeper: In "Countdown to Catastrophe", Big Hero 6 finds out that Professor Granville knew their identities all along.
  • Series Continuity Error:
    • A minor one. Hiro is shown in his coat when he tests Baymax in his new body, in spite of not wearing it in the epilogue of the movie.
    • The flashback of Tadashi's death in "Obake Yashiki" shows Tadashi wearing a white T-Shirt, while he wore a black T-Shirt in his death scene in the movie.
    • Hiro wears sneakers as part of his super suit in the movie, while in the series, he wears boots. Though justified, since his boots cover his whole legs to his knees, while sneakers left a huge part of his legs unprotected.
  • Servile Snarker:
    • How Krei's assistant Judy copes with her boss' narcissism and cut corners.
    • To a lesser extent, Heathcliff, though his snark is not aimed at Fred.
  • Shadow Discretion Shot: Dibs' transformation into Globby is shown dramatically from a shadow on the wall. It's justified since the chemicals, turns his whole body flesh, muscles, bones included into glob.
  • Shipper on Deck:
    • The gang are seen giving Hiro thumbs up and Fred mimicks a heart with his hands when they see Karmi hugging Hiro (in superhero costume). The biggest shipper of the gang would be Honey Lemon, who encourages Karmi to give Hiro a chance to be her friend and her fanfiction in "Write Turn Here" depicts Hiro and Karmi almost kissing.
    • Aunt Cass is one big time for Megan and Hiro.
  • Ship Tease:
    • Hiro and Karmi, if you view it as a Tsundere type of relationship.
    • Hiro and Trina's relationship is full of this in "The Botfighter", though it stops the instant Hiro learns she's a villain AND a robot.
    • On the other hand, there's Hiro and Megan. The two get along swimmingly and Megan even takes him out to her school dance.
    • Also on a lower level, there's Honey Lemon and GoGo. Even if they're different personality and hobby-wise, Honey Lemon is one of the people in which GoGo shows her sweet side around the most.
  • Shout-Out:
  • Siblings in Crime: Trina and Noodle Burger Boy in Season 2. In Season 3, Noodle Burger Boy forms a new team of evil mascots (Hyper-Potamus, Hangry Panda and Crushroom) and they all consider themselves siblings once they all have Obake's chips in their system.
  • The Sixth Ranger: Seventh Ranger, to be exact. The show makes fun of this Fandom-Specific Plot with Richardson Mole and Professor Granville, who are shown in their respective attempts to join the team as being unable to catch up with the others and not taking the job seriously, which ultimately results in them quitting (or accidentally, in Richardson's case).
  • Small Name, Big Ego: Mr. Sparkles. Also the news anchor Bluff Dunder.
  • Smitten Teenage Girl: Karmi towards Hiro's alter-ego, to Hiro's dismay.
  • Spanner in the Works: Obake's Evil Plan would have worked if only Globby had not betrayed him to heroes, because there would have been nothing to protect San Fransokyo from the shockwave if he wasn't there.
  • Speaks in Shout-Outs: Orso Knox, after being turned into a monster, can only vocalize Shakespeare references. This leads to Big Hero 6 discovering who he is.
  • Spiders Are Scary: Fred is revealed to have arachnophobia; his worst fear is spiders. Each time he sees something that remotely resembles a spider (such as Baron Von Steamer's spider mecha and Professor Granville's security drones robots), he visibly recoils and shudders in horror.
  • Spider Tank:
    • Professor Granville's security drones at SFIT resembles white four-legged spiders.
    • Baron Von Steamer has a steampunk spider mecha.
  • Spiritual Successor: To Kim Possible, courtesy of sharing the same creators. Both superhero shows have charming characters who are either the only sane men and snarky, weirdos that seem to have a problem picking up social cues, or citizens that are apathetic and credulous.
  • Spoiler Opening: The season 2 opening has a quick shot of Liv Amara with the other villains, who was only revealed to be villainous in the second episode of the season, though there were hints in the first season.
  • Spotlight-Stealing Squad:
    • Hiro and Baymax, due to being the main characters.
    • Fred has been accused by many fans to be this, as he had a lot of episodes dedicated to him, and the others from the nerd squad (GoGo, Honey Lemon and Wasabi) don't even have episodes developing them on the count on one hand together.
    • Mini-Max as well, since he is a sidekick of Fred, as stated above.
    • Fans agree that the "Fugitives" arc was more bland compared to the "City of Monsters" arc, mostly due to too many episodes being stand-alone and focusing on Chief Cruz antagonizing Big Hero 6, instead of building up Trina's ascend as the Big Bad in "Legacies" (which instead was barely mentioned in two episodes from the first arc and was treated as a rushed twist).
  • Status Quo Is God:
    • Richardson loses his memory by the end of "Big Hero 7", so he also forgets the fact Fred and his friends are Big Hero 6.
    • Aunt Cass remains single and does not romantically persue Krei once she sees he's kind of a jerk.
    • Each time a member joins the Big Hero 6 team (Richardson, Granville), it only lasts one episode.
    • All of the monsters from Season 2's first arcs are turned back to humans in the arc's final episode.
  • Strange Minds Think Alike: In "Big Problem", both Fred and Krei describe the monster as looking like somebody put "a whale, a dinosaur, and some hair in a blender, poured it into a human-shaped ice cube tray, froze it, then let it thaw just a little".
  • Stupid Sexy Flanders: Basically every man that crosses paths with Chris ends up questioning their sexuality somehow.
  • Suddenly Speaking: Krei's assistant gets speaking lines here, after not having spoken in the movie.
  • Super-Deformed: The "Big Chibi 6" shorts, being inspired by chibi artstyles in anime.
  • Super Mode: Baymax's Overdrive Mode, which makes him more powerful at the expense of draining his battery.
  • Superstition Episode: Mini-Maximum Trouble; skeptic Fred tries to prove to superstitious Wasabi that bad luck doesn't exist by provoking every event that causes it. But when Fred starts having bad luck, Wasabi helps him find a good luck charm (face-up coin). But it turns out, there's another reason for his misfortunes.
  • Talking in Your Sleep: Honey Lemon talks in her sleep.
    • In "Rivalry Weak", GoGo learns Honey takes classes at SFAI because she stated it in her sleep:
    Honey: Ssh! I'm taking art classes at SFAI. It's a secret. [snoring] GoGo, GoGo Don't tell anyone, okay? It's a secret.
    • In "Nega-Globby", sleep-talking Honey returns:
    Honey: You need a puppy, GoGo. Everyone needs a puppy. [snoring] André, I named the puppy. André... [still snoring]
  • Take That!:
    • "Fan Friction" is a lighthearted jab towards self-insert romance and out-of-character fanfiction. On the other hand, it is also acknowledged that fans can come up with good ideas that can sometimes be better, with Hiro and the others taking some of Karmi's ideas into consideration.
    • "Aunt Cass Goes Out" seems to be one to Ships That Pass in the Night, starting out with Aunt Cass and Krei — who never formally met in the movie — going out after Love at First Sight, only for Aunt Cass to learn that Krei is a Jerkass and she decides to break it off.
  • Static Stun Gun: The SFPD uses taser guns instead of firearms. Justified since it's a children's show and they're not allowed to show firearms.
    • Professor Granville's security robots' have a taser rods encrusted in their legs to neutralize threats.
  • Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: In the season 3 premiere "The Hyper-Potamus Pizza-Party-Torium", Hiro and Fred are short-handed when Wasabi, Gogo, and Honey Lemon look for jobs.
  • Teen Genius: Hiro and Karmi. Also, Obake was one twenty years ago.
  • Thematic Rogues Gallery: The science heroes mostly fight mad scientists and/or tech-based villains, with occasional Evil Luddite thrown in.
  • Tempting Fate: GoGo tells Fred that there aren't any supervillains in real life. Cue Obake calling Yama in the next scene.
  • Terrible Trio: The Mad Jacks.
  • Theme Naming:
    • The villain of the movie was named Yokai, and The Big Bad of Season 1 is named Obake. An obake is a type of yokai.
      • To go on a further level, Callaghan's name is Robert, and Obake's name is Bob, a nickname for the name "Robert".
    • All the robots that help the team have their names ending with "Max".
  • This Is Reality: GoGo tells Fred that in the real world, there aren't any supervillains. Too bad this is a superhero show.
  • Third Time's The Charm: In "Fear Not", Wasabi has to fill in for a teaching assistant. The first two times, he freezes up. At attempt number 3, he brings Mini-Max in, and makes it through.
  • Tickle Torture: Fred turns one of his dad's signature moves into his own, and it includes this, that he inflicts on Baron Von Steamer.
  • Tsundere:
    • Karmi, oh so very much.
    • Hiro is also a male exemple when it comes to Karmi, too.
  • Trauma Conga Line: "City of Monsters" puts the poor Karmi through a horrible one. She realizes too late that Hiro was right about Liv being behind the monsters when Liv/Di implants her with a bio-chip off-screen. She manages to escape to SFIT, calling Hiro. But what she doesn't know, is that Di used her as bait to capture Hiro, so she puts her through a painful mutation into a monster, and she's basically her puppet forced to attack her new friend. She luckily manages to snap out of Di's control and is turned back into normal by the real Liv, but the whole experience causes her parents to make her move out of the city for her safety. Since she's Put on a Bus, we don't see how she copes with it, but it's implied she uses her fanfiction as an escape from her trauma.
  • Two Girls to a Team:
    • Honey Lemon and GoGo to Big Hero 6.
    • Although they never worked (or even appeared on screen) together, Momakase and Trina are the only female members of Obake's team.
  • Two Shorts: Season 3 switches to this format as part of a Lighter and Softer initiative.
  • Two-Person Love Triangle: Karmi is smitten with Captain Cutie, not knowing that the leader of Big Hero 6 is her annoying classmate, Hiro. She spends the better part of two seasons crushing on the superhero and belittling Hiro before being Put on a Bus midway through Season 2. When she comes back the next season, she tells "Captain Cutie" that she likes someone else now (who is strongly believed to be Hiro).
  • Unexpectedly Dark Episode: "City of Monsters", oh so very much...
  • Unfazed Everyman: Felony Carl meets Globby for coffee after his transformation and isn't bothered in the slightest that he's talking to a humanoid goo man. He isn't even bothered by Mr Sparkles's over-the-top ego-derived antics in a later episode.
  • Voice with an Internet Connection: Obake does this to tell Yama where to go and what to steal for him.
  • Wake Up, Go to School & Save the World: The Big Hero 6 have to balance between their heroic personas and their academics, though unlike Kim Possible, they still have secret identities to maintain, though a few characters — both allies and villains alike — seem to be aware of it anyway.
  • Was It Really Worth It?: In "Countdown to Catastrophe", Hiro decides to defy Prof. Granville and re-create the broken energy module he recovered from Globby, which has some near-disastrous results: He spends a bit too much time researching it, and by the time he gets to Krei Tech, the battle is just about over, and Baymax appears to sustain minimal damage, with the rest of the team rebuking Hiro. Unfortunately, the battle ended with Obake achieving the intended results; later on, when Hiro fights what turns out to be a robotic duplicate of Obake, the real Obake breaks into Hiro's lab, stealing the energy module. When Hiro goes upstairs to his home bedroom, Baymax neglects to ask if Hiro is all right, and Hiro discovers that Obake had planted a chip in Baymax, with Baymax taking Hiro to Obake's lair.
  • Was Once a Man: Except for Globby, all the examples end up being subverted by "City of Monsters":
    • Globby was your average purse thief named Dibs before Honey Lemon's chemicals from her purse and Krei's neurotransmitter transformed him into a Blob Monster.
    • Orso Knox has mysteriously turned into a beast. Sycorax takes him in so they can figure out how to cure him. Early on in Season 2, Karmi finds a cure for him... but it turns out Sycorax were the ones who mutated him in the first place and Amara blackmails Knox into providing good PR for her company at the stake of being mutated again at the touch of a button.
    • In "Seventh Wheel", Momakase is gradually transforming into a feline-like beast after Liv mutates her.
    • In "Something's Fishy", High Voltage are turned into eels thanks to Amara.
    • In "City of Monsters: Part 1", Karmi gets turned into a beast by Amara.
  • Weak Boss, Strong Underlings: Alistar Krei is a morally gray corporate executive who tends to let his ambition get the better of him. Whatever promising technological invention that picks his attention must be his, either by legally buying its rights or resourcing to questionable methods such as stealing it or blackmailing its creator. The thing is, Krei doesn't possess any superpowered, robotic armor nor he is shown to be adept at fighting. As a result, he almost always employs hired muscle to do this, even the titular superhero team (he's great at exploiting their strong sense of justice).
  • Wham Episode: Season 1 has "Countdown To Catastrophe", which got dethroned by "City of Monsters" in Season 2.
  • White-and-Grey Morality: The conflict between Big Hero 6 and Chief Cruz during the second half of Season 2 is this. Big Hero 6 are clear-cut good guys. Chief Cruz may be for the safety of civilians and won't hesitate to help an old lady cross the street, but he's not 100% good. Deep down he's very selfish and vindictive against superheroes when their interest is saving innocent lives, to the point where he's willing to execute a sting operation that results in them responding to supposed people in distress (which is NOT a crime) just so he can arrest them.
  • Will They or Won't They?: "Big Chibi 6" confirms loud and clear that Karmi and Hiro (his civilian self) return eachother's feelings. The end makes one wonder if they confessed or not off-screen.
  • Wingding Eyes: In the chibi short "Love Letters" Karmi has heart eyes when she holds Hiro's hand (as Captain Cutie), who himself has spirals in his eyes since Karmi's overly packed hearts letters dazed him.
    • In "Big Chibi 6", Evil-Chibi!Wasabi has spiral eyes when Hero!Wasabi swings him around as a weapon.
  • World of Action Girls: San Fransokyo possesses lot of capable female fighters, good (Honey Lemon and GoGo) and bad (Momakase, High Voltage, Supersonic Sue, Cobra, etc.)
  • World of Snark: San Fransokyo inhabits many Deadpan Snarkers, both heroes and villains alike.
  • Would Hurt a Child: Villains such as Yama, Momakase or The Mad Jacks have no qualms trying to harm Hiro.
    • Di Amara exaggerates this, due to having no ground morals and seeing children as much as lab rats she can transform into monster "pets" than adults.
  • Write Who You Know: In-Universe, Wendy based off her TV character from Professor Granville... somehow.
  • Xanatos Gambit:
    • Pretty much all of Obake's plans; even if Big Hero 6 stops them, it turns out to be either exactly what he wanted them to do, or still gets him something he wanted.
    • Di Amara excels at those too, as she was able to be seen as a hero and her name being cleared thanks to creating the Mayoi and have Mr. Sparkles take the blame.
  • Yank the Dog's Chain:
    • Obake uses augmented reality to tease Hiro with the possibility of Tadashi being alive as a distraction at one point.
    • The instant Globby feels genuinely happy with his life, Nega-Globby takes control of his body and brands him as a fugitive.
    • When Hiro and Karmi finally pushes their differences aside and are going to become friends, Karmi gets turned into a monster by Diane, and the trauma that ensued causes her parents to make her leave the city before she could officialize her friendship with Hiro.
  • You Can't Thwart Stage One: Hiro manages to get the component Obake stole from him out of the star-making machine, seemingly disabling it, but the reaction had already become self-sustaining.
  • You Have Failed Me: Obake almost does this to Yama before he shows his boss the Baymax knockoffs.
  • You're Insane!: Hiro is usually the one to call out villains on how crazy and evil their plans are.

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Obake

The main antagonist of Season 1.

How well does it match the trope?

3.5 (8 votes)

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