Well, today I attended the little (and I do mean little) theOtaku meet-up at ACen - which was just Katana, Schultzie, Bellpickle, and myself. All except me and Bell were cosplaying, and Bell had brought Remy with her. I felt like I had let the whole affair down in some way. I'm sure they have a better perspective than I on how to judge these things, so I'll leave it to them to fill in all the details (HINT: apparently opening day registration was a disaster, and ACen has now been redubbed LineCon).
In other news, I dropped Soul Eater (any show which spends an entire episode on several of the leads fighting it out for no good reason is dragging its feet). Additionally, Dagger will perhaps be happy to know that I've finally got myself around to watching Utena. Properly this time (not random episodes screened during lunch break in the high school anime club like last time). I have to say, I'm enjoying it. After ep. 12 it's hit a bit of a slump (black rose-of-the-week!), but I suspect this is the kind of show that can recover quickly. Really, it's consistently good, and I think I admire it most for being just about the kinkiest damn series ever to air (I now count THREE creepy and occasionally murderous incest relationships alone). If I had to complain, I'd compare watching Utena to driving a Chrysler-made car (in the sense that despite how well the whole effect works, you get the sense that any number of things went wrong during the making of the thing). Characters drastically change their behavior (they become idiots or backstabbers) whenever the plot requires them to; characters also tend to have the emotional depth of a wading pool, and are more often than not clingier than newly-mixed bread dough; Zettai Unmei Mokushiroku has now been drilled into my brain at least a dozen times; post-Eva cryptic syndrome is here in force; and finally, there's those fucking shadow girls. Of course, many of these things are common foibles in much anime (and shoujo in particular), and I like the show so damn much otherwise that I can overlook them pretty quick. One might say: sure, a Dodge Viper's a huge mess of a car, but you've got no joy left in your soul if you don't want to try driving one at least once. Good god, though, I hope they put this black rose arc to death soon. (also: would anyone object to my becoming a Jury fanboy?)
Oh also, I posted a lot in a recent "faith and reason" thread on OB. I'm quite proud of some of it, except for this one line that... well, you'll see. Check it out if you've got, you know, a week or so to kill.
