>I'm very curious: people seemed to love NGE and Lain.
>I hated them both, mostly for the same reasons that
>I hear other people liked them.
>However, I'm curious to know: do people who like NGE tend
>to like Lain, or not?

lain, key and cowboy bebop are three shows
i'm really glad to have seen. much more so than eva.

my opinion of eva changed over time from enjoying it for being the best
show i'd ever seen (because it was the first anime i'd ever seen since
robotech when i was eight). there was great characterisation, and what
may have been the most detailed anime project design ever, but when i
stopped loving it for being a cool mecha story (it wasn't really) i
started loving the way it pretended to be things that it wasn't, and
pulled it off so well while you were watching.

on the hostility thread Gryph mentioned that he disliked it as Anno used
it to foist off his neuroses onto the audience; i hated this too (i don't
need *more* neuroses), but i really, really admired the fact that he
managed to do it in secret. it made eva a tragedy in as real a sense as i
can describe - it started off looking like it was something good and pure,
and the characters tear themselves apart by their own good intentions.
it's not hamlet, but it's cool.

there's a book called Foccault's Pendulum, which is half of why i
love lain (and about a third of why i love utena ^_-). it's a novel about
secrets and secret societies, and specifically the Knights of the Templar.
lain managed to be sad, a little dark, and uplifting. it was a challenge
to follow (which i like), and the plot essentially worked backwards - very
little was revealed, but you could work out a hell of a lot in reverse (the
bear suit was a good example). sure it seemed slow, but the content wasn't
action.

key was just brilliant. it was a little sad at the end, but it has to be
one of the best robot shows i've ever seen, as well as one of the best
mixes of character-driven and event-driven plots.

then again, key, lain, rei .. is this some underlying trend in my watching?

although ed doesn't follow suit, so i guess it isn't.

cheers,

.rugle
"i'm sailor nothing .. and i'm very tired" -- himei, SN