1Q84.
12 Episodes. Starring: Atsuko Tanaka, Akio Ōtsuka, Taro Yamaguchi & Yutaka Nakano. Created By: Masamuns Shirow.
New Balance flagship, Harajuku, Tokyo, Japan. Like a Rolling Stone we see the cover of a Major billboard that they passed out in magazine form at Tower Records, Shibuya, like a stream of pamphlets people scramble for. Adorned like all the police warning posters plastered on Koban's across the greater Tokyo metropolitan area. Telling you, if you see something, say something. And call the law, because this really is that. 'Ghost In The Shell: SAC_2045' Season 2 streaming on Netflix at the same time as 'Love, Death + Robots', plus Volume 1 of the fourth and penultimate before the fifth and final season of 'Stranger Things' in a big month, is worth of all the promotional press. Diving into her own upside down, in an iconic shot down the skyscrapers that goes 'Into The Spider Verse' for that classic 'Shell' shock, this Ghost is Major. Directed down by Shu Sasaki and Yuhei Kanabe. Sky swimming between Tokyo metropolitan monoliths of concrete, steel and glass like she can fly. And boy does she, through everything and everywhere, all at once like Michelle Yeoh in this multiverse. All to the tune of not one ('Secret Ceremony'), but two (the closing credits, 'No Time To Anchor') stellar songs from the massive Japanese collective Millennium Parade who also led the march of the first seasons theme (the uplifting 'Fly With Me'). All for a show that has more iconic themes and opening and closing sequences than a 'Tokyo Ghoul' reply. The synth of 'Stranger Things'' 80's horror may have the best theme-tune of all-time (I'm sorry, 90's animated 'X-Men' series), but you'll never click 'Skip Intro' on this Major either.
Celluar animation may still be king. Just ask Studio Ghibli, who shouldn't have made that computerised change, all the legendary studios that were part of 'Star Wars' Japanese animated visions (and will be again, thankfully in 2023) and the student I teach whose company made the best episode of Volume 3 of 'Love, Death + Robots' ('The Martian' like 'The Very Pulse Of The Machine' with Mackenzie Davis)...but I've already said too much. Still you will now get used to this digital animation that in itself is amazing, even if sometimes it looks like 'The Incredibles'. Sure its soulless in comparison to the cellular crafting, but it's still lovingly rendered and matches the Major military clinical precision of the shows nature in a world gone mobile like a cell phone into cyber and crypto cryptic code. Getting us up to speed with this complex, stand alone series like the 'Sustainable War' movie anthology of Season 1 recently released, 'SAC_2045' may be a shell of the classic 1995 movie and all the super sequels and spin-offs that came after. But there will be some who think at least it's not the 2017 Scarlett Johansson movie. For the record, we loved that film and before its '2049' time thought it even had better digital skyscraping visuals than Villeneuve's 'Blade Runner'. Ghost my be haunted by problems. They could have really used a more sensitive name for their 'Autistic Mode' and why is the one black character called Clown, made to act like one too, in the face of everyone's ridicule? But still like passing jello pudding in a hospital waiting room, this Orwellian story of posthumans and doublethink's heart really is in the right place. Even if by George we do now live in a world where "war is peace and freedom is slavery."
Haruki Murakami made his magnum-opus '1Q84' on the raised highways above the streets of Sangenjaya (and my work, as I eat Frosties this morning...why? Because, theeeeyre...you know the rest). And these roads lead to all the classic 'Ghost In The Shell' amazing action here. Especially the paved first episode cliffhanger that culminates in a chorus of gunfire for this ghost in the machine and one well worked stand-off sequence for the entirety of the second part. Sure right now it's the wrong time for something like this to be released. Just like the image of a plane flying too low and close to the city is still as unsettling as it is jarring. But these sensational set-pieces still stir the senses, even if it is in different ways than they intended to under the snow of your name, Yuki. All these bright lights, first-person shooter camera visuals and artillery of action amongst this digital graffiti is merely a brutally beautiful backdrop to the true essence of the story that plugs into the fact that we as a hive...excuse me, I mean people, are a slave to the machine in this matrix of a world that has become true. Murakami based 'Q' (the number 9 is bad luck in Japan) on '1984'. But we don't need to be scared of George Orwell's nightmare anymore. Because we're living in it. Oh, brother. It's a good job Major and her right hand man Batou with coins over his eyes like he's ready to pay his way to the afterlife are here. Atsuko Tanaka and Akio Ōtsuka lending their vocal talents again, alongside Taro Yamaguchi and Yutaka Nakano for Masamuns Shirow's concept and creation. The N of this A.I. taking our intelligence and humanity to task in a force of a show that makes us look at what's real and fake in a world that revolves with a scroll. These nuanced notions amongst vivid visuals, still missing the complex cyberpunk of the more artistic anime form still stay with you like a spider on the wall, or a Tachikoma tank. Creeping and crawling as it brings the animal energy of its equivalent. Even if these ghost stories are full of more artillery shell than spirit, you're still plugged into a major part of cult Japanese, science-fiction storytelling (see 'Man's Search For Meaning'). And that's a fact. No puppet without a ghost. In your descent, don't look before you leap. Get on site and jump into this ghost of cyberpunk anime's past. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Further Filming: 'Love Death + Robots', 'Bubble', 'Spy Family'.
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