It's true. GiTS is hugely popular, in all incarnations, even with non-anime fans, and I've yet to meet a single person with a bad word about Mushishi.


With FMA, the manga's by far the fan favored medium. In fact, most manga fans hate the anime for being different (whereas I love the manga but hate the new anime "loyally" based on it more than any single thing I have ever been forced to sit down and watch in my entire life).

The authoress made that her single irrefutable term on the first anime production: that it have a different story such that no part of her story was aired before it was published in the manga, because she didn't want to have to rush any of her story or have spoilers for the manga spilled out in the anime. Whether that excuses what some term as a BAD rewrite is the question. Basically, the anime is the manga with a lot more punching the viewer in the nuts. Depending on who you ask, the first anime is either heavier and angstier or melodramatic and wangstier.

I'm more of a casual viewer/reader of the GiTS series. Is there much of a popular opinion split on its incarnations?