Note: Badly written and unnecessary off-topic self-centrement follows. Keep
away if you think I'm a git.

#1 - Belldandy.
I can't really come up with anyone else. She is, to me, perfect. This is
going to sound pretentious but when I first read an issue of AMG (the first
tankoubon, with only the Japanese I'd picked up from an ex-girlfriend) the
Belldandy character seemed to just crystallise things I'd always been
attracted to and fascinated by. She's how I'd always thought of an angel,
but with the depth befitting such a real character. In my more intellectual
moments (note: I hate those and would far rather be stupid and happy) I
perceive that I like Belldandy formost as a concept, as an ideal, as a
metaphor for perfection and reward. The same with the series, no separation.
This is normally about the point I'll get drunk.

OK, problem. I can't come up with nine other anime gals I want in this list.
I could've done so a few years ago before discovering AMG, but my tastes
have changed.  ^_^  Therefore I'm going to try to remember the sort of gals
I would've put in a list like this in the days before coming across
Belldandy. Most will be of the sort that appeals to teenaged boys since
that's what I was. Most won't be anime. Sorry, as I said this was at least
one taste iteration ago. Bear with me.  ^_^

Zealot.
Anyone remember the comic WildCATs? First Wildstorm comic, early Image, Jim
Lee's reason for breaking from Marvel? The Wildstorm universe, at least in
the early days, was very well done. Only thing that actually got me buying
comics. They did a great job of coming up with a background with a real
sense of history and inter-character relationships. The backbone of this was
the excellent Team 7, but my own personal soapbox was WildCATs, and
specifically the character of Zealot. Tall lass, long white hair, tight
fitting (aren't they always?) red suit, two swords, stern warrior attitude,
thousands of years old (survivor of a humanoid alien race known as the
Kherubim whose presence was, according to the Wildstorm universe,
responsible for all the Greek and Roman myths and gods) and the ex-leader of
the Coda, a warrior sisterhood. Most of my friends (who were all into
Wildstorm comics at the time) thought her a frigid and overly aggressive
bitch but I was absolutely obsessed with her (in a sad, fanboy way that only
someone who's been introduced to geeky things for the first time in his life
can be). I was very much set on her relationship with the Grifter, ex-Team 7
and the most popular of the WildCATs, and brought this defence of a
relationship with me when I came to AMG and applied it to the
Belldandy/Keiichi relationship. (She rescued Grifter and trained him as a
Coda.) Let's see. Other Zealot related fanboy information? Her real name is
Zannah. She went under the name Lucy Blaze in the sixties. Zealot is
rumoured to have had at least one child in the last few thousand years; the
leading candidates are, in order, Backlash, Winter (Stormwatch) and Christie
Blaze (Divine Right). (Yes none of this will mean a thing to people who
don't know Wildstorm. Oh well.) I no longer have any of my Wildstorm comics,
since I purged them all from my life (and more realistically my room  :o)
when I found AMG.

Otonashi Kyouko.
Hey, someone from post-AMG-discovery! This is kinda in opposition to what I
said above. Oh well, I'm just jotting these down in the order that I think
of them. I find MI to be sweetly sad, something that has always attracted
me. Kyouko is wonderful. Very human. She's one of the only real seeming
characters that Takahashi Rumiko has ever written. (I think I'll say that
much as I'm fond of her other work I don't think any of her, for example,
Ranma characters seem in the remotest bit real.) I'm also finding writing
about her problematic.

Angela.
Damn, another comic book character. Sorry. Spawn was, uniquely amongst
mainstream comic book universes, devoid of the comic book "babe" characters.
Neil Gaiman had never written a superhero comic before. Todd McFarlane asked
Neil Gaiman to write issue nine of Spawn for him. Neil took the opportunity
to, in an obviously amused way, write in a vehicle for an infinite number of
these so-called comic book "babes" to be introduced. Namely, he brought an
angel into the picture. Neil Gaiman's take on the "bad girl" craze that was
sweeping comic books. A babe, bad-girl angel from a Heaven full of them.
Here to hunt Spawn as she had hunted so many before. In a smart-ass way. And
with a costume that, while as gratuitous as all these comic book female
costumes always are, actually had a reasonable reason for being like it did.
From her introduction Angela was a sensation, far outstripping even Spawn
himself in popularity. After issue nine Neil was invited to come back and do
a three part Angela miniseries. Which he did. And it was great.

Death.
Didn't see this one coming. Talking about Angela reminded me. Before
introducing a major female character in issue nine of Spawn who was
instantly more popular than the main character, Spawn, himself, Neil
introduced a major female character in issue eight of Sandman who was
instantly more popular that the main character, Morpheus, himself. Morpheus'
elder sister struck a chord with almost everyone. I can remember a friend of
mine commenting that there was something very 'right' about Neil Gaiman's
Death. Everyone read Sandman. Don't forget, Neil Gaiman scripted the western
release of Princess Mononoke. (And he lives in Minnesota now. Hi Carole!
^_^)

Lady Piercing Blade.
Ooh, I feel the need for spoiler space! The odds of someone having heard of
*this*character, and even if they have the odds of them actually recalling
her, are exceptionally slim. Lady Piercing Blade was a character from the
one and only Star Trek novel I ever read (TNG #8, "Masks"), read on a train
going from Sevenoaks to London in 1990. She was from a planet still in a
medieval tech level, a world where everyone wore elaborate face masks
signifying what they were, were being without a mask was equivalent to being
naked. She was a swordswoman and warrior (given a later fascination with
Zealot I think I can see a trend appearing in my pre-AMG tastes :o) and I
thought she was really rather grand. I really must find a copy of that novel
and read it again. It's been a suitable amount of time.

Matsu Tsuko.
The Daimyo of the Lion Clan from Legend of the Five Rings, a background by
John Wick that was used for a collectible card game, a roleplaying game and
many stories. Tsuko, I'm now realising, appealed in the same way that many
of the characters in this list have.  ^_^  A serious, warrior-like,
honourable swordswoman. I found her part in the Clan War storyline the best,
and her Death gave so many of the following actions so much meaning. Despite
having quit L5R numerous times I'm still very loyal to Clan Lion, enough to
get angry at people in certain circumstances.

Damn. I'm having a real problem coming up with more characters. This is
partly due to having blocked out a four year teenaged period in England and
Tauranga, and before then I was young enough that the only possible
contribution I could've made to a list like this would probably have been
along the lines of someone like She-Ra (oh man, anyone remember THAT
eighties show?  :o) or Helen Slater's portrayal of Supergirl from the
self-same movie (which I can remember being rather impressed with at the
time).

I KNOW that there were many characters and images that contributed to my
recognition of Belldandy, but given that they were almost certainly all
one-offs I can't place any (also I'm sure I've overwritten most of them in
my head with Bell-chan). This is annoying. Doubt I'll get any sleep tonight
now.  ^_^

Come to think of it now I think I *could've* done a top ten anime gals list
without too much of a fuss but, with the exception of Kyouko, there were
none that I could put in a list with Belldandy due to a problem with
thinking in comparisons. Hence this attempt at a list of gals I would've
named a few years ago that Kyouko happened to sneak in to.  ^_^  An anime
list would've included other AMG gals, Sakura Taisen no Sakura etc, I'm sure
you can work out the types.

If I'd continued listing along the comic book line (it's what I was doing in
the year and a half before AMG) you would've seen a bunch more, along the
lines of Voodoo (from WildCATs), Shi, Psylocke etc, I'm sure you can see
where these are going too. (This reminds me: X-Men fans, Zealot can be
looked at as Jim Lee's next iteration of the character he "invented" with
Psylocke.) Oh, and I hear that Scott Lobdell and Travis Charest are doing a
new series of WildCATs, not as a superhero book (which it never really was
and attempts to pull it and others in as ones were the sort of thing that
screwed Wildstorm after the first few years), but as a "This is what's
happening to these characters. They have lives. Watch them."

Now my WinAmp playlist has arrived at a track named Icelandic Cowboy, all
this typing has gotten me annoyed, and I have a guitar lesson early tomorrow
morning. See you guys around,

Sam the man
(pushing the envelope in stream-of-consciousness off-topic uber-posts)