I was completely unaffected by the massive amounts of death in the ?2nd? episode; however, I was fairly effected by Maria getting slapped in the face. Perhaps it was just the episode I downloaded, but it seemed to me that they were constantly making her noises louder and louder as the action was beginning to build until I eventually had to turn down my speakers with a big smile on my face as to how creeped out I was at the scene. Her noises were annoying, but I feel it was meant to be that way. Nothing in this series is supposed to be particularly pleasant (unless axe murdering is your secret fetish

)
Episode two finally shows the Shion evil laugh from Maria which was awesome and had me evil laughing right along with her. They all made those goofy evil faces and had strange knowledge about murders and things in original Higurashi so I honestly don't know why you guys are complaining about Maria being crazy without anyone noticing. Those faces and that knowledge is meant more for the viewer as an aside than directed towards the other characters I think.
one thing, I would absolutely HATE to see this in English dubs. English dubs are usually way over the top compared to Japanese, but how can these characters get any more over the top than they already are? I'm terrible with remembering names so I'm having trouble figuring out which freaking characters they are talking about all the time. Still, as cliched as this story seems, I know there is going to be something crazy behind it all, and it's only 3 episodes in, which is hardly enough to draw any conclusions about the series.