I was totally going to mention some things. I have no idea what they are, though. =/
The concept of the V'nothrians at Winter Solstice (or the rough equivalent) is getting stronger with me, and I'm quelling it (or trying to) because I have one or two things I really should do first and am finding rather difficult to accomplish with present living arrangements. A tad frustrating, and really only solvable by methods which run totally counter to the original problem, so.
In the meantime, I've been watching a lot of anime. Finished Last Exile and Wolf's Rain, am watching one GitS a night until I go back (except for last night where I watched two because the one I watched was the cliffhanger with Togusa), and have started in on Le Chevalier D'Eon and Ergo Proxy, and will probably start Gankutsuo and Blue Gender once those two are finished.
I have found I have difficulty maintaining an interest in a series if I don't either pace myself with episode consumption or watch them all in one go. If I watch something a good ways in and then stop for a long time, I tend to not really care about continuing unless I start over from the beginning. Thus it was very difficult to decide to watch the last eight episodes of Last Exile, and is the reason I am starting Ergo Proxy and eventually Blue Gender from the beginning again.
Le Chevalier D'Eon is interesting. I like the core intrigue concepts and the more political/mental feel to it, but I am put off by two things.
First, it feels like a minor variant on the protagonist archetype wherein a weak main character is possessed of either the spirit of a very strong semi-main character or a very strong alter ego and invariably switches to this stronger persona at crucial moments. It's nice and well-explained but still feels strange to me.
Second, I do not like the way the series insists on reminding me every episode that these characters are essentially spies, that this is the same road D'Eon's sister once traveled, that his sister was basically a political god, and that D'Eon is insistent on finding out The Truth of what happened to her. Seriously, it's been stated in one way or another in almost six straight episodes. I think I can remember it now.
Other than that, a minor discontent is that I suspect the intrigue might be a tad too transparent, but we shall see. At any rate, I am hardly disappointed in it.
Incidentally, something that really ticks me off in anime is when a villain goes "go get me that thing; you know, the thing I've been asking you for for a while now" or some variant involving essentially broadcasting "We have a secret weapon and we're totally not going to tell you what it is until you see it but you know it's really nasty because we call it:"
THAT. THING.
What a load of crap. Seriously, if you're going to have a secret weapon that's totally going to throw the good guys for a loop and make the audience collectively go "Gasp and horror!", don't bloody tell us about it!!!"
BECAUSE NOW WE KNOW.
We don't need to know specifics to figure out that this is going to be bad for the home team. And once that bit of knowledge is in the brain of your audience, the whole "Gasp and horror!" part is completely ruined in favor of "Oh, I see, that is most certainly diabolical, good sir." [/monocle]
And the reason I am ranting about this? GitS: SAC did this to me. Freaking Ghost in the Shell did this to me. The one series I will watch over and over and over again just for the sheer love of the mental aspect pulled a stunt this obviously stupid.
Arg.
Also there's the archetype of the Perfect Wife which Japan appears to shove down people's throats. I should write something about that sometime; Togusa's wife is getting to me a bit.
Uhm. Hooray?
