Yup and I had to take two modules on it for my degree. I've never encountered anything so dull in my life! [That was probably because the material was presented in such a dry way, I'm pretty sure anything can be interesting if someone with passion is also a skilled presenter]
It's definitely the presentation. I also studied formal verification in my second year and used it as an opportunity to catch up on missed sleep.
However, the third year I studied how to formally define programming languages and really enjoyed it. It was all about delivery.
I think class size has an effect too - it's much easier to engage with smaller classes. The second year module was mandatory, whereas the third year module was optional.
