A.D. 2034. It has been two years since Motoko Kusanagi left Section 9. Togusa is now the new leader of the team that has considerably increased its appointed personnel. The expanded new Section 9 confronts a rash of complicated incidents and investigations reveal that an ultra-wizard hacker nicknamed the Puppet Master” is behind the entire series of events. Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: ANIMATION/ADULT SWIM UPC: 669198251702 Manufacturer No: 25170The television movie Ghost in the Shell: Solid State Society (2006) continues the adventures of the cast of Stand Alone Complex, the TV series based on Mamoru Oshii’s watershed feature. It’s been two years since Major Kusanagi left Public Security Section 9 and struck out on her own. Batou pursues only investigations that interest him. Togusa is in charge of the Section, largely by default. All three characters, plus Chief Aramaki and the Tachikoma robots, join in the investigation of a string of suicides by agents of a foreign general. The trail leads them to a terrorist plot involving micro-machines created to release a deadly virus, and to the master-hacker known as the Puppeteer. The depiction of a corrupt politician using resources earmarked for the care of an aging population for his own ends reflects recent scandals in Japan. But Solid State Society feels derivative. The plot borrows heavily from the “Laughing Man” storyline, and the general lack of inspiration is evident in the failure to resolve the mystery satisfactorily. (Rated 13 and older: violence, grotesque imagery) –Charles Solomon
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March 9, 2010
#1
I’m really looking forward to seeing this but that would really suck if they didn’t dub the film in english. GITS Innocence was hard to enjoy having to look at subtitles…
March 9, 2010
#2
After all the positive reviews and my wife away for a few days I thought I’d geek out on some animated sci-fi goodness but . . . yikes! I couldn’t tell what was going on about. . . 90% of the time. The “animation” most of the time consisted of slightly panning stills where only the character’s bottom lip would wiggle slightly. . . Robot nurses with dental floss for uniforms? Robots that act like little kids and get NO reaction from anyone with this behavior!?! People putting “cyber” parts in their brain that can be hacked just by receiving a call phone call? Did none of you watch this? It was utter stupidity. . . Big thumbs down for me.
March 9, 2010
#3
I keep hearing that GITS is one of the best, deepest, and most thought provoking animes of all time, and everytime I hear it, I keep wondering why.
The series does have its good points, but I’ve seen both this movie and the “2nd Gig” and they both feel like something is missing.
Just what makes GITS so appealing anyway? Is it good as a military series? Is it he Action? The characters? The themes and philosophical points behind it?
If that’s what you’re looking for, you should check out Full Metal Panic, especially The Second Raid; It will SMOKE Ghost in the Shell in all the aspects mentioned above, but most notably in the “characters” department -the characters from Full Metal Panic actually have charisma.
People keep talking about the depth and philosophical meaning behind Ghost in the Shell, but what does Solid State Society have to offer in these aspects? Mainly, it brings up the role that the elderly play in society, as well as the problem of child abuse…Okay.
Sounds more like political and social than philosophical.
That is precisely where I think Ghost in the Shell fails: It’s supposed to be a military anime, but it doesn’t feel like one.
March 9, 2010
#4
I might rate it higher if I got to watch it. It began skipping at 10 minutes in on my main DVD player. While it didn’t skip at 10 mins on another player, it did have the Ch15 skip (an earlier reviewer had mentioned) on all my players. I am currently in the process of getting a replacement through Amazon, hopefully it won’t have the errors.
Edit: There was a recall of the first pressing of this disc. The replacement was fine, and the movie was good. Not as good as the original, and perhaps not as good as SAC (but that was a series), but still pretty good (on par with “2nd Gig”).
March 9, 2010
#5
Ghost in the Shell’s success has always been a bit of a fluke, as it was to be Appleseed that was Shirow’s magnum opus. I really wanted to like Solid State Society, I really did, but just found it to be very lacking.
The first season of Stand Alone was amazing, as it managed to capture some of the feel of the comic: counter terrorist ops fighting terrorists and drinkin a cold one afterwards. Second season was passable, grasping at straws to develop characters meant to be nothing more than a talking head or plot device, plus the inclusion of a Mary Sue villain.
Still, I’d hoped that all the money that the GitS property has made studio IG over the years could’ve produced something better than what was essentially an almost two hour episode of Stand Alone with at most three minutes of amazing action animation.
Had they simply retold the classic Puppet Master story from the comic using the Stand Alone characters, it could’ve been a much better movie. The further GitS breaks from the original source material (specifically the original comic run), generally the weaker it becomes. I can’t help but think that by borrowing more heavily from Man Machine Interface (particularly the whole rogue Motoko and Motoko’s split consciousness bit), Solid State Society lost the potential to be an action packed thriller to wrap up the series in a hail of gun-fire and car chases. It all felt rather unsatisfying.
After the unyieldingly convoluted, pandering, and nearly unreadable debacle that was Man Machine Interface, I hope, as a Shirow fan, that the Ghost in the Shell franchise can be laid to rest with some of its dignity in tact; a solemn procession that should not end with a 21 gun salute, but rather a crudely drawn Batou going colon “d” while firing a miniature shoulder mounted rocket into the air.