9 In the pseudo-musical nomenclature of the Symphonies, an Intermezzo is a story that centers mostly or entirely around events in Cephiro. This was more relevant during the part of the story arc in which there was a mostly-impenetrable divide between Cephiro and Midgard.

20 The White Tower is naturally named for the campus's signature feature, the belltower, which contains, among other things, the offices of the Student Council and (in this era) Akio Ohtori's personal living quarters. The Tower will also be featured in Eiko and Bijou Kageshoujo's 2408 breakout comedy hit, Eiko and Bijou Go to the White Tower, which establishes the Kageshoujo sisters as Cephiro's hottest young filmmakers.

22 Here Tsuwabuki unintentionally echoes one of the common openings of the shadow play scenes that recurred throughout Revolutionary Girl Utena, in the middle of almost every episode and at the beginnings of some. Given that this episode takes place primarily in Cephiro, at Ohtori Academy, this was a subtle way of giving this part of the First Symphony a more RGU-like flavor. PJM

38 It didn't occur to us at first that, with members of the series cast disappearing one by one, people back in Cephiro were eventually bound to notice something, even if almost all of them had forgotten the Lost Tournament (and that Utena had ever existed).

63 Wakaba had a colossal crush on Saionji for most of the original series, and he treated her very badly at pretty much every turn - at times of his own accord, and at times because he was being manipulated by Akio and/or Touga.

88 As previously noted (and as will come up again and again in the next little while), the final episode of RGU contained an unsatisfactory montage in place of anything resembling actual resolution. In one of the vignettes of that montage, Wakaba is seen more or less taking Utena's place as the popular student underclassmen look up to. With Akio unable to grasp that the Lost Tournament is over and can't be repeated, it's only logical that he'd look to her as the next likely candidate.

132 So did Wakaba, kind of, for a little while, but at this point in the story she doesn't remember her time as a brainwashed thrall of the original Black Rose Order.

179 And so the dance begins once more, or so Akio thinks, anyway.

204 Akio's car is an oddity. As it appears in RGU, it's a carefully detailed 1957 Corvette, included in the show by an artist who had obviously done some research - except it has a back seat.

223 Ohtori Academy has four residence halls, one named after each cardinal direction. At this point in history, East Hall is abandoned.

311 Not until the Third Symphony will Wakaba overcome her inertia as regards her hairstyle.

409 What nobody realizes is that, with the exception of Nanami, all of this year's councilors were Black Rose thrall/duelists last year. Each has a particular piece of psychic baggage connected to a member of the previous year's council - Wakaba's doomed crush on Saionji, Kozue's love/hate relationship with her twin brother, Tsuwabuki's slavish devotion to Nanami, Keiko's unrequited desire for Touga. Apart from Kanae Ohtori (Akio's unfortunate fiancée) herself, only Shiori (with her star-crossed friendship with Juri) is missing - and she will eventually replace Wakaba.

431 Here Keiko, who was something of a cipher in the TV series, shows the beginnings of an arch sense of humor that will become my favorite feature of our version.

436 As seen in the you-didn't-really-need-a-finale-anyway montage in the final episode.

441 Soundwave superior; Constructicons inferior. (I should really have had Keiko snort at that point and remark, "No one would follow an uncharismatic boor like you.")

469 This may be the only time anyone has ever pictured Akio Ohtori as anybody's grandpa.

523 Nanami's not just whistling Dixie: she saw them at it toward the end of the TV series and nearly had a nervous breakdown.

550 Nanami seems to have some inkling of her eventual fate here. She counts herself among those already destroyed.

572 An attempt, in prose, to make a Shadow-Girl play. Which came out pretty well, if I do say so myself. PJM

670 In their strangely prescient way, the Shadowplay Girls hint about the drive that leads to "The End of the World". PJM

676 The sound that a popped-off hubcap makes when it rolls free of a car wheel and spins to a stop. Onomatopoeia is your friend! PJM

688 Kunihiko Ikuhara, director of the Revolutionary Girl Utena TV series.

710 As Meat Loaf put it, two out of three ain't bad.

764 Phil probably knows the number and title of the episode this happened in. Its events were a major hinge point not only in the series, but also, thanks to the way it affected my thinking, in the way Utena's personal arc developed in the Symphonies. That was the day that comes back to haunt Utena and Corwin in Interlude at the Hotel Monolith.

Episode 33, "The Prince Who Runs in the Night". PJM

781 One of the running jokes in the original Magic Knight Rayearth is that everyone of significance in Cephiro is named after a kind of car. Sonett Beach carries on that tradition; it's named for a previous Pillar of Cephiro, who was in turn named after the Saab Sonett.

820 Cinematically, this is one of those moments where the camera zooms in and pulls back at the same time (or vice versa, I can never remember which does what), so that the background seems to become vast and yawning while the focus of the shot (in this case Wakaba) remains the same relative size. In the trade this is called a dolly zoom or "the Vertigo shot" (as Alfred Hitchcock made it famous by using it in that film).

864 Strictly speaking, Akio never was a student, but Dios was, and Akio remembers. Dios's vice-president - and his best friend - was Zagato, who would go on to become High Priest of Cephiro... and one of Akio's many victims.

915 She'll know why in the next movement.

956 The Secret Forest is more correctly called the Forest of Secrets - the forest itself is clearly not secret, it's right there for everyone to see, but it contains secrets.

983 This is not always the case - we saw the platform at night at least once in the original series - but then, it is a place of high magic.

1022 Clef gets this a lot.

1038 Oh ye of little faith!

1127 It's never specified in the source material what Akio's family name was before he was adopted by the Ohtori family. It seems unlikely that it was "Himemiya", Anthy's stated surname, as that's Japanese for "shrine maiden", and is probably an artifact of her Rose Bride status.

1172 Wakaba didn't do Nanami any favors with this line...

1175 How does it feel?
How should I feel?
How does it feel
To treat me like you do?

1201 A nod to the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons spell, which, it must be said, doesn't do anything nearly this impressive.

1213 The original Black Rose Duelists fought with the stolen heartswords - and the fighting styles - of those with whom they had the emotional entanglements that made them susceptible to the Black Rose Order's influence in the first place. It's never noted in the original that the transfer is permanent, but then, it's never noted that it isn't either, so.

1232 Wakaba's arc in Revolutionary Girl Utena is about the agony of being second-best. She admires Utena in large part because Utena has that undefinable spark that makes a person stand out, makes her indomitable, and Wakaba doesn't. Her desperate yearning to feel that herself - to be special, a woman of action, a leader, a hero - leaves her open to manipulation, exploitation, and crushing disappointment. And that's not right. So in this story, and most of all in this moment, we set out to light that flame within her... and just for good measure, burn Akio's fingers with it.

1270 "Hey buddy - did you jus' see a real bright light?"

1277 Unlike Rina Dragonaar.