Koukaku Kidoutai: SAC_2045

The year is 2045, and artificial intelligence has undergone tremendous developments. Governments use them as weapons, engaging in never-ending warfare to sustain their economies. The mercenary group GHOST, headed by Major Motoko Kusanagi, is no stranger to this landscape. However, the rapid innovation of this technology causes a new threat to loom over the horizon.

Having left Public Security Section 9, Kusanagi and her group are involved in many operations worldwide related to these proxy wars. But a seemingly simple job of locating an arms dealer drags GHOST into a hidden conflict against cybernetically enhanced individuals, who have inexplicably gained extreme intelligence and physical abilities. Dubbed "post-humans," their emergence sets off a chain of events leading to the reunion of Section 9. Armed with a new mission, it is up to Kusanagi and her reestablished team to prevent global chaos at the hands of these post-humans.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Kusanagi, Motoko Main

Tanaka, Atsuko Japanese

Batou Main

Ootsuka, Akio Japanese

Togusa Main

Yamadera, Kouichi Japanese

Aramaki, Daisuke Main

Saka, Osamu Japanese

Tachikoma Supporting

Tamagawa, Sakiko Japanese

Saito Supporting

Ookawa, Tooru Japanese

Ishikawa Supporting

Nakano, Yutaka Japanese

Pazu Supporting

Onozuka, Takashi Japanese

Borma Supporting

Yamaguchi, Tarou Japanese

Esaki, Purin Supporting

Han, Megumi Japanese

Kawaguchi, Tooru Producer

Kamiyama, Kenji Director, Storyboard, Screenplay, Series Composition

Aramaki, Shinji Director, Storyboard

Takagi, Hajime Sound Director

Reviews

Apr 23, 2020

anime-prime

Recommended

Can CGI ruin a show? Yes. Does it here? Thank goodness no, at least not for me.

Ghost in the Shell is a lengthy franchise spanning over decades with at least four different art styles. However, while all of the previous art styles until now were in 2D animation, they decided that they should try a CGI approach. Many will skip over this season because of it, but if that is the only reason, then it is a huge mistake. Despite the animation, all of the characters remain the same and the story feels very similar to SAC previous seasons. So how does it match ... up?

SAC (stand alone complex) is what these seasons do: There are stand alone episodes and there are complex (like an arc) episodes. The complex episodes progress the story while the stand alone episodes progress the characters development. This season starts with a complex arc of six episodes about the emergence of post-humans (super smart and strong humans) and the majors (Mokoto Kusanagi) team being forced to take him down by the American government. Then, there are a couple of stand alone episodes when they return to Japan that showcase the characters of Batou, Togusa, and the new character Purin Ezaki individually. Then there is another complex three episode arc involving another post-human case in Japan but slightly different. Then it stops at a massive cliffhanger which will be resolved in the next season.

While the episodes were all great, I am not a fan of the seasons being split up like this, but I take what I can get.

To talk about the elephant in the room: the art. This will severely prevent a multitude of people of enjoying this season, but that is only because they won't give it a chance. The CGI is very well done for Japan TV standards. It isn't as good as something like Frozen but it is still decent enough to not be too distracting. The character models are great and very closely resemble the original models. The fight choreography is outstanding and the backgrounds, while not the best, are still serviceable. My main problem with the art was the faces of characters. A lot of times that there should have been emotion on faces, there just wasn't. It is hard to accomplish it in CGI but nevertheless they didn't accomplish it. But the art for the OP was phenomenal.

The music was okay...or at least when there was music. While the OP was decent and the ED slightly better, there was rarely any music in the actual show. In the first episode there was a great jazzy instrumentally track which got my hopes up, but after that there was barely any BGM at all. It is sad especially considering that Yoko Kanno did the original SAC OST and it is still known to be one of the best soundtracks of all time. The voice acting was all good. I would have preferred the English dub, especially since the original dub cast returned to reprise thir roles, but unfortunately the dub release was delayed due to Covid19.

The characters are all the same as previous seasons with the addition of Kenjiro Tsuda, an American agent in the first arc but who then leaves (he might be relevant in the second season) and Purin Ezaki in the second arc who was the comic relief and an enjoyably cute and silly character. Togusa goes through some development as well. The Tachikomas are amazing as usual but they have slightly less screen time than they did in the previous seasons. There isn't yet a main villain that we have met yet, but the puzzle pieces are building up and hopefully can actually pull off a great reveal in the next season. The major is a boss, like usual.

I enjoyed this season a lot, and I would recommend it even to people who haven't seen previous seasons or movies. The pacing is fantastic and thrilling while the story keeps building mystery and great development.

My main issue with the season, not including art or sound, is that this season plays it safe. Ghost in the Shell is known for utilizing thought provoking themes which helped it stand out throughout the decades, but this season hasn't really done that yet. The last arc was close, but didn't fully succeed to hit the usual franchise marks.
It went for a more Hollywood style, lots of fights, but very rarely any serious internal conflicts or thought provoking ideas.

Overall, this season was great. Better than what I expected. Hopefully the second season is as good or better and can properly tie up all of the loose threads that were leftover after this season.

Score: 9 (Very good and rewatchable, but not good enough to do so very often).

Reviewer’s Rating: 9

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May 30, 2022

Beatnik

Mixed Feelings

How far the mighty have fallen.

The Ghost in the Shell franchise used to be pioneering. It created new visual iconography, new visual language and cyberpunk tropes. In SAC_2045 we witness a franchise flailing about in a last gasp attempt at being relevant. It's a show that has nothing to say about anything. I found the many references to the Wachowskis Matrix series during the 2 seasons of this show profoundly pathetic.

As mentioned above GitS used to create iconography that influenced cinema and animation, and now it has devolved into blatantly ripping off the Matrix, with no grace about it. Instead we just get straight ... homages to Agent Smith, the burly brawl, the highway chase, along with the obligatory and lazy homages to previous better GitS movies and shows (how many more times will we see a metal claw gripping Motoko's face as she dangles in the air?).

Similarly to the original SAC's Laughing Man subplot, SAC 2045 also has a literary homage which comes to the fore in the second season, but as you can tell by now, it's lazy and superficial. With characters seeking utopia sincerely quoting Orwell's 1984 like it's meant to mean something. It's like the writers have no idea that "War is peace. Freedom is slavery." is supposed to be IRONIC.

I thought GitS: Arise was utterly boring and unpleasant to look at, dropping it within two episodes. 2045 is better looking (despite the naysayers complaints), and watchable as simple entertainment. But as a Ghost in the Shell story, it's woeful, with the ludicrous character Purin behaving like a 12 year old (that we have to see naked for 'reasons'), its typical Japanese treatment of Black characters, and crucially relegating Motoko Kusanagi to a side character who barely gets any attention. We never see her by herself, she has no inner life or character arc. She has less screen time than Togusa and Batou, and is effectively nothing but an exposition device.

Some people will say season 2 is a vast improvement over 1, but take that with a grain of salt. It's simply more of the same.

Shame on Kenji Kamiyama. How the mighty have fallen.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Apr 25, 2020

FuchsiaFree

Not Recommended

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2045 is not Ghost in the Shell, neither standalone, and nor is it complex. This new “installment” mirrors more the drama level of their recent ULTRAMAN anime than it does the cyberpunk classic that established itself in the past. All that is left of the original series is diluted concepts and themes to placate the infamous “Netflix audience.” Such concepts as new beings literally called “post-humans” (real creative), blatant taking of Orwell in it’s backstory of a “sustainable war” along with pertaining to modern sensibilities in referencing “one-percenters.” Everything here is a silly recreation of what the average ... Netflix user would think Ghost in the Shell was about.

It is unfortunate that it seems Shinji Aramaki's vision takes precedence over Kenji Kamiyama on this one, corrupting part of their legacy with this series. I was generally apprehensive about their previous forays in to 3DCG things of the like, and although with this the 3DCG doesn’t look that bad on the Netflix budget and can actually look quite impressive, the show still becomes lifeless both writing-wise and in action. The fight with a naked Patrick Huge, the self-insert of the character designer Ilya Kushinov along with his anime girl maid harem that look like every image he has ever drawn, is laughable on many levels. I had already guessed the whole twist that unravels in that episode in the second episode anyway, since the writing in this is action Sci-Fi and not heady cyberpunk. Ilya Kushinov the known plagiarizer, and even without that bit, is a generally average artist that attracted too much praise given his worth and simply does not have an art style that reliably translates into GitS, especially seen in Motoko among other female characters.

Getting in to the new attachments to this show, we have the introduction of a new character, Stan, nicknamed Clown. His design looks like a Fortnite character and perfectly exemplifies what it seems the creators expect from the exposure to a Netflix audience. He is brash, says the most obvious statements, and serves absolutely no purpose. Pazu and Borma are gone for the first half, the Netflix audience wouldn’t remember them anyway, and instead we have Stan. Most of the first half of the show coincidentally also takes place in America, which has apparently been united under the Empire instead of balkanized with the previous Russo-American Alliance.

This whole sustainable war point simply isn’t interesting and feels like it came out of How to Design a Futuristic World 101, first take some 1984 and then make the concepts more "modern" hmm yes perfect. We already got a close-to-cyberpunk media that did the whole war industry thing better it's called Metal Gear Solid, and the person who did the soundtrack for some of the games on that is the composer for this show as well. A war industry has never been a new concept, and here it is surface level as hell. It even makes itself really obvious what the whole political implications are in the first scene of the show. You’ve got the new GHOST merc group under Motoko and Batou getting chased by “sustainable war victims” in dingy trucks and it just serves as a mindless car chase action scene that gives the little info dump about how The World Be. Then, across the next 3 episodes you will be treated to more car chase scenes which take up the main attraction of the episodes. They really cash in on this mainstream audience they’ll be getting by abandoning what made SAC actually interesting and turning it into stupid action backed up by a hackneyed mystery about “post-humans” (doesn’t even make that much sense given the existence of cyberbrains already inhabiting that concept and all that but who cares amirite) who are just cyborgs that downloaded aimbot and they decide to center the whole show around investigating these people.

There’s this part in one of the episodes where we get the whole virtual chatroom bit, Togusa is watching four disguised guys talk about GHOST so he can get info on them and one of the guys leaves the chatroom, Togusa intercepts him and FLYING PUNCHES him in the VIRTUAL WORLD to STEAL HIS DISGUISE. You cannot make this stupid shit up, none of this shit feels like the Cyberpunk world of the original series despite this supposed to be taking place EVEN MORE into the future. In the end one can’t help but wonder, what is there for anyone to get out of this except for those who have never seen Ghost in the Shell, that being the Netflix Audience? There is nothing, and even if you have not seen Ghost in the Shell, just watch the movies (not Arise not Arise not Arise not Arise), and the SAC show.

And I swear to Allah If I have to see that stupid ass pink haired woman and her moe anime girl idiotic mannerisms one more time alongside her generic dime a dozen kushinov face fuck you ilya kushinov you absolute hack draw a new face for once

(end rant)

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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	Poll: Koukaku Kidoutai: SAC_2045 Episode 1 Discussion ( 1 2 ) SteelingMax - Apr 23, 2020	58 replies	by Ozsidian »» Nov 1, 10:36 AM
	Poll: Koukaku Kidoutai: SAC_2045 Episode 5 Discussion MegamiRem - Apr 24, 2020	11 replies	by abystoma2 »» Nov 15, 2023 1:37 PM
	This series got way too much hate Tyrannicswine117 - Feb 21, 2021	26 replies	by SametTakao »» Nov 9, 2023 4:33 AM
	Poll: Koukaku Kidoutai: SAC_2045 Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Tsarko - Apr 24, 2020	59 replies	by Shawn_Shambley »» Jul 9, 2023 6:38 AM
	Poll: Koukaku Kidoutai: SAC_2045 Episode 11 Discussion MegamiRem - Apr 25, 2020	11 replies	by naturalbrawler »» Jun 3, 2023 11:59 PM