Two years have passed since the Individual Eleven
incident. Section 9 is now commanded by
Togusa in the wake of Major Motoko Kusinagi departing the team. The now expanded Section 9 finds itself on
the trail of a mysterious hacker known as the Puppeteer. With little to go on, simply a trail of dead
bodies and a road paved with lost yet unconnected children, Togusa, Batou and
their teammates find themselves in a race against time to prevent more
murders. And it only becomes a matter of
time before their investigation brings them face to face with Motoko once
again.
At long last, after two seasons of reviews we come to the
(for now anyway) final chapter of the Stand Alone Complex saga. So how does this TV Movie stack up to the
levels of greatness of the TV series?
Well to start off I did like the two year leap in
time. The difference in this new Section
9 was a great move to make. The Major is
gone, Togusa is now team leader and Batou is off sulking when not getting into
trouble. It’s cool to see how the team
manages without Motoko and with Togusa at the helm it seems like they’re doing
surprisingly ok. It’s true testament to
how far Togusa has come since season one.
He’s no longer the rookie of the team trying to keep up, now he’s the
lead and a gifted one at that. It does
make you wonder if Motoko pictured this from the start, making Togusa, an
almost all natural human, leader of a cyberized division that specializes in
cyber warfare. That being said, you know
Motoko, who is working through her own unexplained issues, would probably pop
up at some point cause let’s face it, she cant stay away from her old team
forever and at the end of the day, her talents are, like always, essential to
getting the job done. We don’t get to
see too much of the new Section 9 and even some of their character problems for
the series still pop up from time to time, a sign that some things will never
change. I did have to laugh for a second
when Togusa basically hands off the rookies to Pazu and Borma during the
opening scene…im sure you can guess why if you know full well my thoughts on
those two characters. The only other character
from the past who is given any kind of extra material is Azuma, a rookie from 2nd
Gig, who has become Togusa’s field partner but even he gets sidelined pretty
quickly once the focus returns to the original seven man team.
The story of Solid State Society can be pretty confusing
at times, even for writer Kenji Kamiyama standards. Heck even though 2nd Gig got
mouthy with it’s ideology and themes, the goals of Kuze and Gohda were all
pretty clearly explained by the end of their plot lines. SSS tends to juggle too much with elements
from all over the place being thrown on the table to piece together a puzzle
that only the writer could see in full and leaves everyone else to catch up
without being clear but also not giving enough to go on. There is some good commentary about the role
of the elderly in society in the world of tomorrow but personally I was
constantly scratching my head as to how all of the pieces fit together for this
case.
I do, however, feel that Solid State Society is strongest
with its core characters. Most of the
cast is in a far different place than where we left them at the end of 2nd
Gig. Even Aramaki is beginning to think
long and hard about where he’d like Section 9 to be in the future. It’s kind of scary to hear the Chief talk
about a day when he wont be around to oversee Section 9 but it’s an inevitability
he accepts…like the boss he is. And
though some relationships are strained between team members, some like Batou
and Togusa are never broken. Possibly
the best scene in the movie is when Batou nearly loses Togusa right before his
eyes. The look on Batou’s face, the way
he falls to his knees with hands behind his head in disbelief, plus Yoko Kanno’s
perfectly tense and toned accompanying score, tell you everything you need feel
with great success.
While the production quality of the feature never really
rises above the animation from the series, we still get a bit of age added to
the character designs, especially Togusa and Aramaki, but beyond that the
animation is nothing we haven’t seen before.
And when the story becomes a bit too mind numbingly confusing, we still
get some great Ghost in the Shell action with guns, tanks and even Saito gets a
scene stealing sniper dual towards the middle of the film. And while several of her tunes make a return,
Yoko Kanno still churns out some awesome brand new tracks, including the piece I
mentioned above for a pivotal Batou and Togusa scene and the opening “Player”
which easily joins “Inner Universe” and “Rise” as some of the best Anime intros
ever.
Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex-Solid State
Society, never really rises above the grand masterpiece drama of SAC 2nd
Gig. The time jump is fine and the
evolution of some of the core characters is top notch. But its story feels a bit too crunched
together for a just under two hour feature.
It probably could have been explored better in a more expanded third season,
even an shorter one of like 12 episodes if need be. And it ends the saga on a note of sort of
finality but also maybe a hint of possible continuation. As I said, for now this is the last chapter
of the saga with all the focus now on the reboot/prequel series Ghost in the Shell:
Arise. So as a possible finale, I think
2nd Gig was a better note to add on.
But if you want a little more time with the Section 9 crew and a mystery
with an interesting twist ending, it’s still Stand Alone Complex and it’s still
enjoyable.
Will this be the last time we see this iteration of
Motoko Kusinagi and Section 9? Who know
but as Motoko is fond of saying when a big case ends, “The net truly is vast
and infinite.” In other words, who
knows.
7/10
One more film to go in this little set of films based on
shows ive covered in the past. And we’re
going to end it with a Christopher Nolan esque take on an otherwise sunnier
(sort of) Anime. Well lets just say this
isn’t your Daddy’s Escaflowne. See ya next week.
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