March 11, 2005:

It appears Keiichi's cross-dressing senpais are fans of Debian as well. Although I can appreciate their loyalty and enthusiasm in this matter, I think their method of expression leaves something to be desired.

Tamiya and his wacky promotional tactics

Episode 10 gave Sora Hasegawa the most screen time she's had all season.

Belldandy with a pickax

It also somewhat dubiously featured Belldandy doing some manual labor in a part-time job.

She also spends a lot of the episode looking kinda irate.

February 25, 2005:

Urd joins the Ah! My Goddess cast this week, bringing her direct (if somewhat unreliable) approach to doing things with her.

Urd

As you may have guessed, Urd has her own interests and goals at stake, which contribute to some magikal clashing and sibling differences with her younger sister.

Middle-sister magikal aggression

This is another pretty good-looking episode, with a nice look at the control center above it all.

Skuld also makes a cameo here in episode eight, and from the few lines she has, it appears Aya Hisakawa still has the role down cold.

Urd and Keiichi

The big news this week is that Aa! Megami-sama TV has been licensed by Media Blasters. This caught me by surprise, both at the early announcement, and in that it wasn't licensed by Geneon. Frankly, I have my doubts about Media Blasters. Despite my disturbingly large anime DVD collection, I don't own a single Media Blasters DVD. Some of the reports I'm seeing regarding the quality of their releases are a little disheartening. I can only hope they invest additional care and effort for their Ah! My Goddess DVDs. Something this high profile could possibly make or break their reputation, depending on how they turn out.

P.S. Four or more episodes per disc, please. I hope all y'all paid attention when they covered diminishing marginal returns.

March 04, 2005:

Episode nine features Urd and Sayoko Mishima clashing during a swimsuit competition. Then Belldandy zooms into the fray with her full-power one-piece to break it up. Well, sort of.

Urd and Sayoko

Toshiyuki Aoshima and Sayoko team up to coordinate their efforts at investigating Belldandy, suspecting that there is more to the new girl on campus than it seems. As they try to gather evidence that could expose Belldandy, Sayoko ends up tormenting Keiichi in some rather humorous ways.

Aoshima and Sayoko

It's not an earth-shattering episode, but it does introduce some of the characters' quirks (including Belldandy's penchant for talking to animals, and Urd's musical weakness to enka), and it gives some of the side characters some more screen time and reasserts Sayoko's evil side.

March 18, 2005:

The demon Mara drops by in epiosde 11 of Ah! My Goddess to stir up some trouble, finding time to mess with Keiichi's senpais and Hijiri in addition to the usual suspects.

Mara

I found it to be a fairly amusing episode with some funny moments, and a good introduction for Mara. (The actual spelling of Mara's name is debatable, since it's been "officially" romanized like three different ways.) The only problem I had was they weren't drawing enough attention in the park towards the end of the episode.

In other news, Belldandy talks to a cat.

Urd

We are also reminded that Urd's potions are not to be trusted. Oh, and it is unwise to try her patience, too.