I just got through watching Bodacious Space Pirates (Moretsu Pirates) last night.
On a future world where space travel is common, a high school girl named Marika Kato discovers her father has died. She also learns that he was a space pirate, and that she must take over his ship and crew. Her mother has groomed her all her life for this, and combined with her natural talent and hands-on experience through her school's yacht club, she actually gives it a shot. It turns out she's very good at it, which is good because they have to engage in privateering at regular times to retain their official letter of marque. But she also wants to graduate from high school, so she has to juggle two sets of responsibilities as best she can: one set as a civilian student; the other as a pirate captain.
While the weird anime fixation on high schoolers doing unbelievable stuff continues here, it manages to make it fun and engaging. It starts with likeable characters, from the lead to her crew to her classmates (and, later, crewmates). Even though the piracy is sanctioned and largely benevolently applied (they often raid cruise ships who request them to do so as a show for their guests), there are regularly developing dangers for Marika to overcome on the job while she gets a handle on things...all while maintaining her grades, club activities, and part-time job on the ground.
The visuals are animated nicely for a television series, with nice ship design and character art. Although most of the girls sort of blur together to start with, they begin to be used more towards the end of the run, so it's not a problem. If you're wondering, there's not a lot of service here, which is appropriate for the majority of ages depicted, so don't look to this show for that.
I didn't expect to care for this series too much, but I really enjoyed it and look forward to it continuing. They should be making a movie to expand on the conclusion, and I hope it proves successful enough that they shoot for a second season.
TL;DR version: Bodacious Space Pirates is a whole lot of fun. Highly recommended.
The third Evangelion movie premiered today. I just read some of the spoilers. Hideaki Anno has apparently gone bat-crap crazy! Again!
Now the wait for the blu-ray (and inevitable fan-sub) is on, and then it'll be sometime in 2014 before an English version floats around. The fourth film was supposed to have been done simultaneously for release come spring, so hopefully we won't have to wait so long for the conclusion.
After the wholesale changes made in the second movie, I can't wait to see how they gloriously mangle the last two! The manga is magnificently going awol with the original progression of the series, so hopefully it and the Rebuild movies will conclude concurrently.