Welcome to Gaia! ::

Oh, I don't think it's so bad. It's not surprising really, that another idea just fought it's way out of Sunrise. And the general response both here and across the Pacific has been positive; everyone really enjoys it so far. If you haven't checked it out, Makoto Translations has been translating it, and MakiMakiScanlations has been typesetting it on the original scans, so you can see all the images that go with it.

I myself am pretty pleased with it- all the characters have a fresh start (again) that suits them; I'm especially pleased with how Shizuru turned out, and the Haruka/Tomoe rivalry inspired a laugh or two. And it's nice to see Chie with her cell phone out again, and Aoi as a carefree highschooler instead of a tortured maid sweatdrop (cmon, you know she deserved another shot).

Besides, can you blame Sunrise? This is a true moneymaker, the Mai Franchise.

I do agree that to some degree, it is dissapointing that there hasn't been a HiME sequal yet. But I think that it's not a bad thing that Sunrise is moving on with the concept. After all, how many properties manage to build a following large enough to allow enough individual series to provide so much dimension? While at some point they certainly will take it too far, I think that the expansion of the Mai universe isn't something that needs to be made so "evil" overall. I really don't think that this is a step too far yet. (Besides... I'm kindof hoping Mai-HiME Desiny Mai's MiKO power will be pyrokinesis.... sweatdrop )

It certainly is true though, that none of these expansions would have been so popular without Mai-HiME, and that HiME is a truly classic anime in and of itself.