25 Years of Seeing The Ghost: Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex

                               Take A Pick Tuesday: Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex

 

 

In anticipation for the new Ghost In The Shell film coming out this summer and a desire to spotlight the twenty five years of Ghost In The Shell. We look at its ambitious TV show series Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex.  Often a corner stone in the evolution of anime and one of the titles that managed to influence film  and bring a new generation of viewers from the western world,  it stands as both a technical achievement,  the use of computer animation integrated with hand drawn 2-d animations as well as the dark turn over it’s head dystopian political thriller story telling pinnacle in anime. Of which a wealth of stories would be built on, insight would allow for expansion, which is always interesting but can be boggled down with mixed results but this is Ghost in the Shell we’re talking about, so it’s expanse  brings something else, something entirely new.

 

      After the groundbreaking film and hot off the heels of it’s follow up, in came Stand Alone Complex, a TV show that highlighted an even broader aspect of the themes with the franchise and allowing the real purpose of Section 9 which the main character Motoko Kusgani and the rest of her until work for show more evident.  Some have compared it in some ways to being a cop show and yes in a way they are cops or investigators though what could seem like a procedural cop show genre is still Ghost In The Shell and so it is its own special thing. Truly it is.  Though that really should make sense, the person responsible for bringing the films to life Mamoru Oshii had worked on and would continue to work on Patlabor: The Mobile Police Anime films, show live action films. A classic show that built something new on certain concepts that honestly felt incredibly unique being introduced by these shows and films in the first place.

 

     Many of the issues dealt with in the series are now issues we deal with nearly ten years since, as well as other issues that we are on the brink of looking at, those that may bring questions by certain groups and will become the subject of massive debate. Maybe sometimes in a not so friendly way. While both seasons of the TV show have an undertone, a story line, the individual episodes look also at the concepts and ideas raised.  Concepts of immortality, the ghost in the machine, or even what has a soul to begin with, religion, corruption, refugees, addiction, human trafficking, various political and bureaucratic limitations as well as the things played with behind the scenes, something more than intrigue, misinformation and also obsession and even mythology if you can believe it.

 

      The final theme brought to mind an episode where one of the members of Section 9 the least changed with cybernetic implants internally Tougasa, leaves a 500 yen coin on a body, saying it’s for the river ferry  before they zip up the bag. Lies and truths juggled so much that only the capable hands of someone like Section 9 could make it possible. Though what seems like assisting another section of the government isn’t always what it seems, a challenge they always have to face. As in the films there is a clear interpretation of how governments sometimes work, how sometimes they don’t play well with each other and the fallout from that can be quite something.

 

       There’s something about the way each episode is directed and written, it can easily hook someone no matter which episode their sitting down to. You get sometimes this question at the end and they won’t spoon feed the answer, it’s intentional because in some ways they are giving you the answer.  It leaves it to be thought provoking, even when the answer is actually handed to you, there is the sense of lingering that doesn’t hurt the fresh takes of the episodes.   Another driving force in the series that can't be ignored is the music composed by Yoko Kanno famed for her work for Cowboy Bebop to The Vision of Escaflowne. The sometimes jazz sometimes electronic, sometimes classical  fits very well into the thought provoking series. It's only fitting that such a legendary composer would work with such a legendary series. It helps to show how polished this show is right off from the start. It also invites for a widening scope of what the series is.  The length of the Stand Alone Complex allows more than just themes to be expanded and explored but the characters in it as well.

 

     What was it like for Motoko Kusgani, who has lived in a cybernetic prostatic body since she was young, even since before most had. What desires lie under the surface of the tough as nails major, what memories. That is something you'll definitely see in pieces, whether when helping a child with a prostatic body like herself, a strange place she dives into where people watch a movie they can never tear there selves away from or perhaps the story of when first got her body, how she managed to move on.

         Moral walls bumped into repeatedly and how interesting when Batou is the one to hit them, it allows a little more of what makes him the way he is an understanding thing. Batou has evolved in the films and show, always maintained his humor, he can be quick tempered in certain situations when the wall is hit and he too looks at many of the themes in the show as all characters do in it, interesting contrast to the rather philosophical Batou in the second film Ghost In The Shell 2 Innocence. Or is it really, the times that he gets serious aren't too different from those that are in the movie and there are quite a few times that it involves the Major. Even Batou's time as a ranger comes into play, reminding you that Batou is more than what he shows on the surface. The show isn’t satisfied with just having the Major the fascinating one.

        Certain decisions like not wanting to kill robot dogs, rather running from them out of pity and the anger of a killer he remembers from the jungle are just a couple of twists from the character. Everyone, even down to Chief Aramaki of Section 9 gets a broader tale told, while we are already attached to these characters because of the films we watch over and over again, you grow newfound attachments to the characters as well as get interesting stories into how they became the people that they are.  Not to leave out all the other characters of Section 9 in fact you may get a little insight in who they were before they joined, what might have led them down the path, as well as knowing them beyond what you may have seen in the films.

In the first season the underlining case is dealing with the Laughing man, a supposed remerging first class hacker that had originally become known by bringing a CEO of Serano Genomics at gun point on national television to confess the crime he committed. Which really was a stand on corruption in the corporate world. With this reprisal six years later of the supposed return of The Laughing Man it leaves Section 9 to investigate why exactly this hacker who leaves his trademark smile symbol with the hat on the side. Used to block his identity as well as to hack into major networks and figures. What exactly is it that the laughing man wants this time, what does he bring with his reemergence and how deeply affected will Section 9 be after investigating it.

      Soon it becomes clear that anything that is happening now is linked to what happened six years ago. It has to do with the suppression of a vaccine for cyberbrain sclerosis. Even in the future there are diseases we struggle to cure but instead of approving the vaccine they decided to veto it in favor of micromachine treatment which had already been proven ineffective but the profits they stood to gain from the process were far more appealing. As Section 9 plunges deeper into exactly how this came to be realizing that the laughing man could have been trying to expose something far worse, far more corrupt than what anyone could have feared him to be, it will lead so deep into the government that it will even threaten their existence as a unit.

What's interesting about the case is the how something that stands for truth can be twisted into something that is mass marketed, where does something that reveals what is phony also become phony. It definitely has a way of showing how so many struggles for a resolution to a problem in society can become a problem in themselves.  Which begs the question where does the real Laughing Man stand in all this,  what does he comprise of and can anything that had been the purpose of something such as The Laughing Man really survive intact.  

The second season. "2^nd gig" deals with the individual eleven and starts from the repercussions of the first season.  With a let’s say affected Section 9 just to keep you guessing.  However they would come in need after a terrorist group would become a threat known as the Individual Eleven, a group that spurs from the issues of refugees that had come into Japan for cheap labor and later were tossed to the side. Their train of thought and concern for refuges could very well be something that someone is manipulated but their belief in the cause could very well out weigh any outsider's personal motive. It’s up to section 9 to stop the group as well as one person in particular Hideo Kozua that like the laughing man is a particular interest to Motoko. Except in this case there is a possibility she is connected to him in a far more personal way.

       This one focuses more on war as opposed to the statement of effects on relying on technology as the first season had. It also reinforced the time frame of the series and manages to shed a little light in how Japan had come to where it was from before and after the two World Wars. To say these particular threats are nemesis would probably downplay their significance as they reinforce the problems that are present in this future world/Japan. One that would see two more world wars and it’s range of issues can be seen as quite relevant to today.

Ghost In The Shell is all about showing the boundaries we set for ourselves and how we sometimes transcend them, how we search for a way to or do so without knowing. There is no bounds in the future but of course that isn’t the end merely the beginning of something with its own set of dilemmas.  It does something very unique in which it begs you to examine and reexamine certain things in our lives,, almost everything as well as to understand the future they’re in is something close to what the present is becoming and can become.  What the movies have done for fans and may have not for those that had watched it but may have not been nearly as interested, has now something they can offer into spades. The fifty plus episode count has plenty to sink your teeth in and if that’s not enough there was a movie that took place after the second season. The Solid State Society. If the potential of these stories now begins to pique certain viewers interest than they should be prepared for more to come.