{"id":1159,"date":"2017-03-23T21:59:59","date_gmt":"2017-03-23T21:59:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/?p=1159"},"modified":"2017-03-23T09:11:40","modified_gmt":"2017-03-23T09:11:40","slug":"review-ghost-in-the-shell-solid-state-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/2017\/03\/23\/review-ghost-in-the-shell-solid-state-society\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Ghost in the Shell: Solid State Society"},"content":{"rendered":"

Director<\/b>: Kenji Kamiyama
\nWriters<\/b>: Kenji Kamiyama, Shotaro Suga, Yoshiki Sakurai
\nProducers<\/b>: Mitsuhisa Ishikawa, Tomohiko Ishii, Shigeru Watanabe
\nStarring: <\/b>Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, Richard Epcar, Crispin Freeman
\nDistributor<\/b>: Bandai Entertainment, Manga Entertainment<\/p>\n

By 2006, after a steady run with the Ghost in the Shell<\/i> franchise, coming off the two-season run of its acclaimed television series, Stand Alone Complex<\/i>, both in Japan and here in the US on Adult Swim, things were starting to slow down for the series. Shirow Masamune had all but ceased writing new manga adaptations, and talks of a full-on feature film were nearly a decade away, but there was something left in the tank to leave people with. To cap of the serialized story of Stand Alone Complex<\/i>, a feature finale was produced to serve as one final blowout, and that\u2019s what we\u2019ll be talking about this week. For the third installment of this retrospective, let\u2019s take a look at Solid State Society<\/i>.<\/p>\n

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It has been two years after Section 9\u2019s case of the \u201cIndividual Eleven\u201d came to an end, and during that time, Major Motoko Kusanagi (Mary McGlynn) has since resigned from her duties within Public Security. Now lead by Togusa (Crispin Freeman), there\u2019s a new case worth looking into, surrounding a mysterious hacker known only as the Puppeteer, a figure in the forefront of some mysterious and conspicuous terrorist acts, kidnapping, and suicides. But that doesn\u2019t mean the Major has been away from the investigation, quite the contrary; she\u2019s gathering leads of her own, and offering Batou (Richard Epcar) a sage piece of advice, during a chance meeting: \u201cDon\u2019t go anywhere near the Solid State, or you\u2019ll end up killing yourself the way they did.\u201d The mystery of the identity of the Puppeteer, of who or what it might be, is only growing larger and deeper with each passing day, so it\u2019s all up to Section 9 – and one lone, rogue Major – to put an end to this scandal.\u00a0Because of my preference toward Stand Alone Complex<\/i>, I\u2019m in the camp of people who like Ghost in the Shell<\/i> more when it\u2019s playing out as a police serial, and not so much when it\u2019s waxing philosophical and serving as a platform for Mamoru Oshii to spout off his views about the notion of existence itself. And luckily for me, and people like me, Solid State Society<\/i> is well within the notion of a police serial. Here on our side of the world, we have shows like NCIS <\/i>and Blue Bloods<\/i>, which are substantially strong ratings draws, but I\u2019ve never really gotten into all these cop procedural shows; clearly, it\u2019s the lack of sentient tanks with childlike voices and the occasional bit of sex appeal here and there.<\/p>\n

But being serious here, I really liked the mystery angle and element of suspense that built throughout the movie; a red herring is thrown in, at the start of the second act, with an implication of the Major being the Puppeteer, and even though such an idea couldn’t be bought, it does add\u00a0a deeper layer to the mystery, and more to uncover, both about the Puppeteer and the motives lurking beneath, thus stretching the suspense and mystery out a bit further. Let it be known, when it comes to this series, there\u2019s always something larger that\u2019s waiting to be uncovered. And of course, there’s a sprinkling of political commentary to be found here, much like there was in\u00a0Stand Alone Complex<\/em>, and at the risk of sounding clich\u00e9, the big bad political villain of this film is very… Trump-ian. Conservative nationalism, collusions with foreign affairs, hungry for money, you can figure out what all of that means. The story as a whole is fairly simple and, dare I say, a bit stock, with some callbacks to the original movie and\u00a0Innocence<\/em> in a few choice scenes, but if I’m being honest, the ending falls a bit flat. I won’t give away any vital spoilers, but\u00a0I will say that if the Puppeteer were something a bit grander, like the Laughing Man was, instead of what we got of it\u00a0in this movie, there would have been more of an impact toward the climax\u00a0and in the denouement, instead of playing out a callback to the original film. It’s not quite a perfect story, from start to finish, but it’s palatable and serves as a strong entry of the larger\u00a0Stand Alone Complex<\/em> section of the\u00a0Ghost in the Shell\u00a0<\/em>universe.<\/p>\n

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The art style and direction, as expected, is on the level of the television series, so you don\u2019t have to worry about there being any Oshii-esque long shots or any prolonged shifts in focus, which makes it a very accessible film for fans of the franchise that want something a bit more, in a way, \u201cmeat and potatoes.\u201d But don’t expect the production quality to be on par with, say, Innocence<\/em>.\u00a0At 108 minutes in length, though, this is not a quick flick to watch, but if you\u2019re used to the structure of Stand Alone Complex<\/i>, you\u2019ll get into the film a lot easier. Think of it as an extended-length episode of the series, or four episodes in one. As opposed to the Kenji Kawai scores that the first two films had, this one has the incomparable Yoko Kanno at the helm, supplying more of the great work she suppled for the TV series in this film, with a blend of electronica and rock tracks, as well as a brilliant opening theme with the late, great Origa supplying her beautiful vocals to the song. And lastly, the acting – on the English side, at least – is incredibly superb and very much on par with the TV series. This will be my only chance to do so, so I\u2019m just going to gush and become a total fanboy for a moment: I absolutely LOVE Mary McGlynn\u2019s performance as Major Kusanagi, as well as her acting in general, and her voice directing – she did the ADR for Cowboy Bebop<\/i>, she\u2019s earned her clout and praise several times over. And with all due respect to Mimi Woods and her performance in the original film, Mary McGlynn adds an extra level of nuance to the role that was very much needed before, a level of nuance that could never be replicated or duplicated by anyone else. In my mind, Mary McGlynn IS the Major, and nobody else could ever top her performances in this great role.<\/p>\n

Produced on a budget of \u00a5360 million (roughly $4 million), the film was made with a combination of the 2D digital animation used for the TV series, as well as 3D layouts and CG, and everything does look incredibly well-crafted from start to finish. That\u2019s the thing with Production I.G., they have one of the best track records I could ever run through of any Japanese animation production company, and they\u2019ve built up a level of quality that, generally speaking, they can make good on. Just as long as it\u2019s their own frontline production, anyway. Unlike the original film and Innocence<\/i>, Solid State Society<\/i> was not released in theaters in Japan, instead premiering on the SKY PerfecTV! satellite broadcasting platform. Stateside, though, the film would make its first premiere at the 2007 New York Comic-Con, before getting its television debut later that summer, only not on Adult Swim, where it had aired both seasons of Stand Alone Complex<\/i>. No, instead, this film made its one and only American television broadcast on the (then-called) SciFi channel, to kick off their Ani-Monday anime block. And that\u2019s a story for another time. Of course, the film was released on DVD in the states in 2008, and again on Blu-ray in 2011, courtesy of Bandai\u00a0Entertainment and Manga\u00a0Entertainment, and it\u2019s still in print thanks to the latter\u00a0of the two. Interestingly enough, though, the film was rereleased in Japan in 2011 on 3D Blu-ray; the only downside of that is that 3D Blu-ray never really took off, so for the 5 people who own a copy of it, I hope it looked great. Especially with the sniper rifle scene, at the 60-minute mark; seeing two bullets fly past one another, being shot upward and shown in stereoscopic 3D? Wicked.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In a way, the universe of Stand Alone Complex<\/i> is a much more accessible entry into Ghost in the Shell<\/i>, and it\u2019s not, in any way, a bad thing. Who knows, maybe sometime soon, I\u2019ll talk more about the TV series, but if you\u2019re interested, it\u2019s on Toonami every Saturday night, at the tail end at 3am Eastern.\u00a0The series is fantastic, and this movie serves as an excellent extension and conclusion to the series; if I were to pick an entry point into the franchise that wasn\u2019t the original movie, I\u2019d say start with the Laughing Man storyline episodes of Stand Alone Complex<\/i> and then check out this movie. The only somewhat negative point I’d make, along with the rather flat ending, is that if images of suicide attempts are something you’re not comfortable with, this might not be the film for you. But that\u2019s all for now, we\u2019ve got two movies left of this trek through this franchise, and I can tell you right now, at least one of them will be serviceable.<\/p>\n

Verdict: <\/i><\/b>Find a copy on the cheap,<\/i>\u00a0after you\u2019re done with <\/i>Stand Alone Complex.
\nGhost in the Shell: Solid State Society is available on DVD and Blu-ray from Bandai Entertainment & Manga Entertainment\/Anchor Bay Entertainment.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Director: Kenji Kamiyama Writers: Kenji Kamiyama, Shotaro Suga, Yoshiki Sakurai Producers: Mitsuhisa Ishikawa, Tomohiko Ishii, Shigeru Watanabe Starring: Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, Richard Epcar, \n [...]<\/a>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1160,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"yasr_overall_rating":0,"yasr_post_is_review":"","yasr_auto_insert_disabled":"","yasr_review_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,11],"tags":[5,29,199,167,198,197],"class_list":["post-1159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animation","category-film","tag-animation","tag-anime","tag-fiilm","tag-ghost-in-the-shell","tag-solid-state-society","tag-stand-alone-complex"],"yasr_visitor_votes":{"stars_attributes":{"read_only":false,"span_bottom":false},"number_of_votes":0,"sum_votes":0},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.surrealresolution.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/vlcsnap-2017-03-23-00h52m36s180.png?fit=1920%2C1080&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8GYHU-iH","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1159"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1159\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1170,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1159\/revisions\/1170"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.surrealresolution.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}