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Your Ghost in the Shell Cheat Sheet


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diamoundheadx



Joined: 30 Sep 2016
Posts: 188
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 11:10 am Reply with quote
the movie is going to be bad
i mean it's an a american adaptation of a Japaneses manga/anime you know that is a recipe for disaster
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12skippy21



Joined: 25 Nov 2008
Posts: 785
Location: York, England
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 11:55 am Reply with quote
A good summary. I own a good chunk of GITS media (except the games) and the movie at least looks like it has the asthetics right. To cater to the masses it will aim to be a good action movie first with the philosophical banter taking a back seat. This much is obvious as it happens in most adapted works. If we get at least that, then I will be reasonably happy. There is so much other material to enjoy than hark on if the movie is bad.

It also puts the source material in a better light, try watching the Avatar cartoons after the movie, it reminds you how good the series is. Smile
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meiam



Joined: 23 Jun 2013
Posts: 3442
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 12:50 pm Reply with quote
Personally I never really cared about the techno philosophy and all that stuff, but I really liked the movie from a visual point of view, the way scene are shoot and the detail in it is what kept me going back to it.

I also really liked stand alone complex, but mostly because of how serious it treat the whole investigation aspect and the fun personality of the characters that aren't obnoxious teenager.

Arise did absolutely nothing for me, there were a few cool scene but overall it fell flat. The character weren't as interesting ("you know what people want? Obnoxious teenager Moroko! Obviously!"), the plot was rather boring and the format didn't feel like it was appropriate for the story.
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Ajc228



Joined: 29 Dec 2015
Posts: 264
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 1:06 pm Reply with quote
The original Ghost in the Shell film isn't a bad place to start but it might be a bit too slow and introspective for some people. Ghost in the Shell:SAC is probably the most accessible for new audiences. It contains a fair share of techno babble and politics but the stories are easy enough to follow. The fluid action sequences and procedural narrative also lend itself to greater accessibility among new audiences.
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gravediggernalk
Space Cowboy



Joined: 13 Oct 2013
Posts: 246
Location: Alabama
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 1:26 pm Reply with quote
I wish all of the anime could be licensed by the same company, for consistency. Regardless, I'm looking forward to watching the Hollywood film only because it looks good; I don't think the story will be worth a damn. I should get around to finishing the PSone game one day, too. It's held up well, in my opinion.
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pachy_boy



Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 1323
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 1:37 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
Kusanagi returns properly in Shirow's Ghost in the Shell 2: Man-Machine Interface, which began its run right on the heels of the original. In a departure from the previous stories, this manga took a new direction by focusing almost entirely on Kusanagi and her new life.

You were able to comprehend it more than I could. I read Man-Machine Interface twice, and all I took from it was that it was 95% technobabble, and 5% actual story, which really didn't seem to take off until the last couple of pages.

Quote:
Just as Oshii's films were separate from Kamiyama's series, Arise also exists in a separate narrative universe that can't quite be reconciled with other aspects of the franchise

Really? I thought it was made clear by the end of the Arise movie that it was a direct prequel to the manga, since it ends right where the manga begins in a near-exact way, and among other things Motoko was much closer to her manga's characterization in terms of having more of a sense of humor.

Nothing about the 2.0 version of the first Ghost in the Shell movie? Count me as one of the few that actually appreciates this version. Aside from my one beef with the CG-Kusanagi in the opening sequence, I felt all the updates Oshii applied to it (such as the change of coloring from green to gold) gave it the sense of being less sci-fi than the original version and more of a spiritual tone, which doesn't at all betray the movie's themes and even complements it. I would daresay it gets the story's points across better than the original due to that, regardless of how much a classic the original is.

The only real concern I have about the new live-action movie is that the latest trailer seems to indicate that Section 9 will become the Major's enemy--which is certainly something that wasn't done before, but if not handled carefully it could truly alienate some fans. Hopefully it only seems that way, and I'm still intrigued enough to give it a shot.
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russ869



Joined: 22 Dec 2006
Posts: 421
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 2:14 pm Reply with quote
pachy_boy wrote:
Really? I thought it was made clear by the end of the Arise movie that it was a direct prequel to the manga, since it ends right where the manga begins in a near-exact way, and among other things Motoko was much closer to her manga's characterization in terms of having more of a sense of humor.

Um... wasn't it actually the end of SAC 2nd Gig that looked exactly like the beginning of the manga? If I recall correctly the end of the Arise movie (aka "The New Movie," aka "worst title ever") actually looked exactly like the beginning of Oshii's 1995 movie.

In my opinion, they're just screwing with us in the same way that the Resident Evil films keep somehow forcing the characters to go back to that dumb laser hallway. We all know there is no way these very different version of GITS can connect, so why do they even bother to show that nonsense?
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pachy_boy



Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 1323
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 2:29 pm Reply with quote
russ869 wrote:
Um... wasn't it actually the end of SAC 2nd Gig that looked exactly like the beginning of the manga? If I recall correctly the end of the Arise movie (aka "The New Movie," aka "worst title ever") actually looked exactly like the beginning of Oshii's 1995 movie.

The end of 2nd Gig based itself on a scene from near the beginning of the manga, but the only similarities it shares is that Kusanagi's unit was standing by cherry-blossom viewing with their tachikomas before moving into action. And the end of Arise wasn't exactly like the start of the first movie. The man that Kusanagi takes out was the same one from the manga, and likewise it was Aramaki who was there about to make the arrest but instead witnesses the shoot-out. All of this is before Aramaki essentially corners Kusanagai into joining her unit with Section 9 a bit later into the manga, and said manga references some events that took place in Arise, such as the PM's assassination. So as far as I can tell, Arise was indeed written as the true prequel to the original manga, but I guess this is one of those things that'll remain debatable.
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Kimiko_0



Joined: 31 Aug 2008
Posts: 1796
Location: Leiden, NL, EU
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 3:25 pm Reply with quote
I was going to ask about the 2.0 movie, but I see @pachy_boy beat me to it. Why wasn't it at least mentioned in the article? Seems like it could be confusing to newcomers. I agree btw that it's an improvement over the original, though not so much that I'd recommend buying both versions if you're not a hardcore GitS fan.

Good to read that I didn't miss much by not watching Arise yet. I'd postponed it originally because of the overpriced luxury editions. Maybe I'll give it a try one of these days after all.

Btw, what's up with the GitS Arise and GitS Arise Alternative Architecture versions? From the ANNcyclopedia it looks as if AA is the same but longer?

And what about this "New Movie"? Hmm, now that I look into it, it seems that I've missed quite a bit in recent GitS developments, and that the article is also not quite complete Confused
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Venus_Angel9



Joined: 22 Oct 2012
Posts: 55
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 3:57 pm Reply with quote
Alternative Architecture is the same as the Arise movies, just rearranged in a different order with some extra scenes. I liked AA better though it highlighted to me just how forgettable Arise really is because I didn't remember most of the plot and it hadn't even been that long since I'd seen the movies.

I agree with Brian though, it's not bad, but something's definitely missing. I kept thinking it would be a pretty good sci-fi series if it wasn't Ghost in the Shell
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pachy_boy



Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 1323
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 3:58 pm Reply with quote
Kimiko_0 wrote:
Btw, what's up with the GitS Arise and GitS Arise Alternative Architecture versions? From the ANNcyclopedia it looks as if AA is the same but longer?

It's the OVA series broken down into a TV series of half-hour episodes, including the last arc that Funimation has yet to license.
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One-Eye



Joined: 08 Mar 2011
Posts: 2260
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 4:03 pm Reply with quote
A general heads up to people thinking about purchasing some GITS.
Anchor Bay got their dirty little mitts on the first GITS movie and the SAC shows. The 25th Anniversary BD had zero extras, a few sound effects missing from the dub and for some strange reason decided to not use original subtitles and change them which seems inferior to me plus some errors. They released a steel tin version with same cover art and didn't make any fixes. Fans complained and were ignored. They will be releasing a new tin with fancy new art (because of live-action movie no doubt), but who knows if they will have fixed any of the issues.

So far the SAC shows are barebones and according to some early reports:

No slip covers
No extras besides the shorts
No chapter stops, so you can't skip past the OP, ED.
SDH English dubtitles which are in Caps with the accompanying brackets sound effects, ex. [airplane taking off], so no regular subtitles.
The English dub switching to Japanese for a few lines in the first episode of first season.


Kimiko_0 wrote:
Good to read that I didn't miss much by not watching Arise yet. I'd postponed it originally because of the overpriced luxury editions. Maybe I'll give it a try one of these days after all.
Funimation released regular editions with dub and its currently on sale on Amazon. Was on sale at RightStuf a few days ago.

Quote:
Btw, what's up with the GitS Arise and GitS Arise Alternative Architecture versions? From the ANNcyclopedia it looks as if AA is the same but longer? And what about this "New Movie"?
They took the the Arise OVAs and broke them down to show as tv series and added basically 2 episodes which lead into the New Movie. Alternative Architecture has not been released.


Last edited by One-Eye on Fri Feb 17, 2017 5:56 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Kimiko_0



Joined: 31 Aug 2008
Posts: 1796
Location: Leiden, NL, EU
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 4:35 pm Reply with quote
One-Eye wrote:
They took the the Arise OVAs and broke them down to show as tv series and added basically 2 episodes which lead into the New Movie. Alternative Architecture has not been released.

Ah, so the New Movie is a continuation of the Arise story. Good to know.
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gwdone



Joined: 01 May 2008
Posts: 272
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 4:39 pm Reply with quote
For over 10 years I have spent $0.00 on anything Hollywood produced. I also ditched TV on or around the same time, so without fail, I'll be going to check out this movie. I put all my cash into Anime releases and have proudly never looked back.

Watching the promo event the crew did in Japan let's me know that they do know the material, however, it's a lot to implement in a 2 hour movie.

Being a big fan of the Ghost in the Shell movies and series, I'm sure there will be some "add two and two together" aspects, which is fine with me.

Something I don't look forward to is that wallpaper'ish stereo typical "low bass note" when something big happens (usually in slow motion) that's in every single movie ever made since Lord of the Rings or before.
Couple that with the one liner comedy relief section(s) that has become a permanent staple in any movie, and timed to be inserted at the most serious of times-- up to, and including movies that are non-comedy related is a dread that hopefully won't ruin things with this release. Maybe they'll actually astray from the generic recipes that forms the typical Hollybore template.

I'll have an open mind, and I don't keep up with ANY Hollywood stars, so it will all be new to me. I do miss the big screen, I just never could tolerate the "monkey see, monkey do" aspect of the whole business in general.

I also hope the soundtrack sticks with some of the most intense and gripping soundtracks I've ever heard, being the original Ghost in the Shell movie and of course the follow up Ghost in the Shell - Innocence.

Thanks for existing Mr. & Mrs (most) Anime productions. You've saved me from lots of pain over the years.
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7jaws7



Joined: 17 Aug 2013
Posts: 704
Location: New York State
PostPosted: Fri Feb 17, 2017 5:32 pm Reply with quote
diamoundheadx wrote:
the movie is going to be bad
i mean it's an a american adaptation of a Japaneses manga/anime you know that is a recipe for disaster


I hope it succeeds. The more dough it brings in, the bigger chance Hollywood does another live-action manga, and the more spotlight our anime community gets.
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