>I love the way Dorothy handled the creep at the bar. Heck, somehow,
>physically disabusing him of his notions that he can treat women like
>that seems so... petty for Dot.

Dorothy is very strong, and not bound by the First Law, but she doesn't like violence. She's not a pacifist or anything as elaborately-thought-out as that - it's not really a philosophy per se - but she doesn't enjoy the thought of resorting to force. And in that case, there was no need for it, since she was not in direct danger. SH3 doesn't work on her any more than any other biodrug would, and there was no way he was forcing her to go anywhere.

>#1) Kate and Utena wern't able to get their licences until 16.

Not so! Utena won't be 16 for another nine months, and Kaitlyn is still, as of the last day of Hogtown Rhapsody, four days shy of her sixteenth birthday.

>Corwin not only has a Drivers licence but a Spacecraft MASTERS
>licence! AT 13! Without illumination from our great Gweeping Gods,
>this seems like a plot hole large enough to drive a truck through...

Corwin tells Utena in Christmas Rose that a human can take the Zeta Cygni Republic's Master's Certificate examination as early as 13 if he can prove he's had and passed a course of instruction in spacecraft mechanics, piloting, astrogation and emergency management, or as early as 15 without said proof - but he also mentions that the test is brutal, and it is. He also mentions that most people don't bother trying it until after college, because it is so difficult, and it takes a long time and costs a bit of money to take. You can take it at his age, but not many humans are capable of passing.

Driving works similarly in Zeta Cygni. Kaitlyn could have taken her driver's license exam two years ago, if she felt like it, but she didn't. She didn't have much time to practice, and it didn't seem that important to her anyway, so she took her time about it. If she hadn't received the not-so-subtle nudge from her father in the form of a testing authorization sheet sent special messenger (one of Corwin's many functions :), she wouldn't have bothered in Question, either.

As for Utena, well, she's only lived here six months, and didn't know how to drive before Corwin and Uncle Keiichi taught her. When they'd finished with her education, she tested and passed without trouble, but before then, though she could have taken the test anytime she liked, she wouldn't have passed because she lacked the skills necessary.

>#2) While you felt compelled to cut off the exposition, I was
>wondering just how it is Toronto DID become known as Hogtown.

Dorothy was right - there's a lot of disagreement on that score. Some maintain that it's because Toronto used to be a major meatpacking center, like Canada's Chicago. Others claim it comes from the fact that Toronto was considered a no-fun sort of place in the late 19th century, with low standards of living and a lot of mud - a place only fit for hogs to live, so to speak. I think the former is more likely...

>#3) Ok, this one will probobly be answered in later chapters, but I
>for one am looking forward to future scenes between Utena and Dios...
>and I was surprised that el-creepo was Dios' body that didn't have the
>good sense to die. Kinda also explains why he was trying to all but
>rig the tourney, doesn't it?

"All but", heck, that's exactly what he was trying to do. That scene represents the first real outright spoiler for the not-available-in-English part of Revolutionary Girl Utena (unless you count Miki's description of Anthy's departure from Ohtori Academy, but that was somewhat more predictable), but I knew that was going to happen sooner or later and I'm not terribly worried about it. If people are that hung up that they don't want to know, I guess they can stop reading the Symphony until Software Sculptors catch up, if they ever do.

Anyway, plunging ahead with that spoileriffic line, that's exactly why Akio was trying to rig the Tournament - he wanted his old self back. Well, actually, he wanted his old self's power back; whether he actually wanted to go back to being a nice guy is open for debate, but I personally don't think so, and so that's the way it is in UF. He couldn't enter the Tournament himself, so he stocked it with people he figured would be easy patsies, then waited for one of them to win.

Fortunately, it didn't quite work out the way he figured it would.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor in Chief, Netadmin
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/