less time on my hands (I finally found some damn employment a few months ago). I decide to bypass the episode discussion threads in particular because I prefer to read through a thread before posting, and when it comes to those.... good god, it's like there's a good 80+ posts by the time I watch the damn thing.
Though, to answer your second question... yes, I can say I'm a little disheartened about DP. You know damn well how much that last-minute appearance by Satoshi's Kantou starters practically broke me, and combined with Haruka's departure in spite of how much focus she got... there's just no future for these guys. Naetle's gonna get upstaged by Fushigidane just for the hell of it shortly before being boxed (same goes for the rest of his DP team), Hikari's just gonna be thrown away too (BTW, I'm still in full agreeance with you about her being a rehash)... and the only one who's gonna stick around, other than the obvious Satoshi, Pikachu, and the series' token comic relief in Rocket Dan, is the one overused character everyone wishes could just die already. Pokemon's f***ing repetitive, there's no denying that, but AG just improved on so many things... what the hell happened in the end? I guess I'm not really finding much of a drive to comment on most of the current going-ons as I used to.
Maybe DP will get better, who knows? But right now, nothing's looking very promising. Mimiroru with Ice Beam doing appeals, a Naetle with a peacekeeping Fushigidane-like personality using Razor Leaf and dodging attacks like no tomorrow (that thing BETTER become a tank when it evolves), Mukubird with Aerial Ace (face it, unless they give that thing Brave Bird, it's just gonna look like an Oosubame rehash, only unlike Oosubame, he won't have the friggin' sweet Japanese voice), etc.