Talk:Ghost in the Shell

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[edit] question

Can anyone provide any definitive information on the order each film and TV series has inside the context of the complete story? This information would be helpful for anyone new to the show trying to start from the beginning and watch it all in the originally intended sequence. Chadstarr 8:02, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

The thing is, there are at least 3 different continuities in GitS and all of them were not necessarily created in chronological order. There's the Manga continuity, there's the Film continuity and the SAC continuity. There may be others depending on future works and what you include as "canon" works.
Here's the three continuities, in chronological order (relative to their story, not dates of creation).
Manga Series:
-> Ghost In The Shell (1991 manga)
-> Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Interface Processor (originals 1991-6, collected edn. 2003)
-> Ghost in the Shell 2: Man/Machine Interface (2001 manga)
Film Series:
-> Ghost in the Shell (1995 film)
-> After The Long Goodbye (2005 novel)
-> Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence (2004 film)
Stand Alone Complex series:
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex - The Lost Memory (2006 novel)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex - Revenge of the Cold Machines (2006 novel)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex - White Maze (2006 novel)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex (2002-3 TV series)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex (2004 PlayStation 2 game)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex (2005 PlayStation Portable game)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig (2004 TV series)
-> Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex: Solid State Society (2006 TV movie)
-> as-yet unknown further SAC project(s), which could also be prequels
(I am assuming that the events of the novel trilogy precede the Laughing Man incident, as it seems important enough that it might be mentioned. I didn't like the book much so I may have skipped or missed references, however I have not read either the second or third books so I am assuming they follow the first chronologically. There is confusion over the two SAC games; the PSP game is totally different from the PS2 one and follows it as a direct sequel.)
Odds and ends:
-> Ghost in the Shell (1997 Playstation Game) (This is probably part of the film continuity; sadly, I've never played it. It may however belong in the manga continuity or may apply to both or neither continuities. Can someone enlighten me/us?)
-> The Laughing Man and The Individual Eleven compilation DVDs (I've not seen these but I doubt they contain any new material. Since they must necessarily omit much of the detail, they exist more as alternative versions for the time-poor Japanese fan. They're not really a seperate continuity, even if the timeframe of The Individual Eleven as summarised in the episode list is out of kilter with 2nd Gig proper, but they don't tell the whole SAC story.)
-> Tachikomatic Days shorts (2002-5 shorts) (don't really have a continuity, being purely for fun)
-> Ghost in the Shell live-action project that apparently is currently under discussion (I'm guessing it'll be a new continuity, not an extension of an existing one.)
This seems to me somewhat like what you are after, I agree this might be helpful for new readers/viewers. YourMessageHere 05:29, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
So what you're saying is that there are three separate story arcs that have little or no relation to each other? The reason I asked the original question in the first place is that I have the two TV series, Stand Alone Complex and Stand Alone Complex 2nd gig, and I have the original 1995 movie as well as the Stand Alone Complex movie and I was just wondering their order. It's pretty obvious that the original movie comes first, but does the Stand Alone Complex movie come in between the first and second gig TV series or after them both? On your list it shows them as after. --Chadstarr 18:56, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
Right. The manga strictly has no connection to the movie story wise. And the first two movies have no connection to the series. The series, Stand Alone Complex runs in a separate timeline and continuity to the two main movies. The movie Stand Alone Complex: Solid State Society follows on from the end of the series Stand Alone Complex: 2nd Gig (the second season of the TV series). Mind you though I haven't seen it yet it's considered that you don't need to have watched the series to see the Solid State Society movie though it's strictly just a very long episode. Ben W Bell talk 19:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
Story arcs is the wrong phrase, really, as the three continuities never intersect. Story arcs strictly speaking follow one another. Three completely seperate versions of the same initial idea, taken to different eventual situations would be better. Three alternative universes is another way to think about it. In each continuity, Kusanagi begins as part of section 9, but because of what she finds while acting under its orders, she leaves and becomes a fugitive from Section 9; but what leads up to and follows this point differs massively between continuities. Technically, you don't need to have seen the two series to understand SSS, but I imagine it makes much less sense if you haven't. YourMessageHere 22:21, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
Now this is actually making sense. Thanks guys. --Chadstarr 17:49, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
OK, so how should this be integrated into the article? I made a version with an explanatory intro and links to the respective pages on my sandbox page but in order for this to work, I think the key factor will be formatting, and formatting on this thing seems dangerously close to being like actual programming. I can't do anything more than basic stuff to save my life. So, does anyone else want to have a go? Also, while I think it's clear there's no reason for making a new page and this is the page where it belongs, should it have a new section in this article, or go somewhere in an existing part? YourMessageHere 02:41, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

For anybody reading this discussion after the fact who still doesn’t quite get it, the Japanese are especially fond of “alternate universes.” Robin Hood might be a good example that’s more mainstream – over the last century, there have been many different Robin Hood movies and TV series. The only thing they really have in common is the same main characters (e.g. Robin, Marian, the Sheriff) and general setting (e.g. medieval England). The stories themselves don’t follow any particular order; they usually have nothing whatsoever to do with one another and each production presupposes itself to be the only relevant one.
As an aside… Story elements are often recycled between productions. One such example in GITS is Kusanagi’s departure from Section Nine. The manga continuity sees her merge/reproduce with The Puppeteer and leave Section Nine in the original manga series, only to become again involved in their affairs in the Human Error Processor manga series and then to have multiple identities both detached and involved with them in the Man Machine Interface manga series. The movie continuity sees her leave merge/reproduce with The Puppeteer and leave Section Nine seemingly never to return, although keeping an eye on Batou. The SAC continuity at present doesn’t involve The Puppeteer at all, but sees Kusanagi leave for soul-searching after her interaction with Kuze. Phew! If this didn’t smack so much of Original Research, I’d work it into the article as “Shared Story Elements” or something like that. — NRen2k5 00:54, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

This is one point that deserves to be contended IMO - the terminal episode to GiTS: SAC 2nd Gig is nearly identical to the opening scene of the GiTS trade paperback manga which launches the puppeteer plotline (the "cherry blossom off", blocky fuchikoma models, departing when Section 9's budget is approved). I feel that this is an attempt to integrate the two story lines despite the "Robin Hood" nature of manga/anime universes. I feel that there is an element of a fictional canon here and that it is possible for all of the GiTS works to be considered canon with the exception of the first film. This is undoubtedly confusing to the casual fan who has only been exposed to the film. KarlThePagan (talk) 14:50, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] reviews

I'm not sure these really belong on the page, precisely because they're uniformly positive. If someone could find a negative review, it should probably be included; otherwise they should probably all be removed. -- Ian Maxwell, 2004 Aug 14, 00:51 (UTC)

I agree. It is just wikipedia is not like other fun sites. Is there any convention in wikipedia regarding reviews? -- Taku 01:01, Aug 15, 2004 (UTC)
one negative aspect of this page is that it hails ghost in the shell as if it was a groundbreaking philosophical movie, in a generous way: it was, but in many other ways it was just another overly hyped anime (not saying that it was a bad movie here, but...). The movie suffers from many manga stereotypes, such as the introduction of a world of slutty women, starting with our slutty main character. In the world of manga, where every girl goes proudly to skimpy-skirts high school for the slutty student, it is not new to see yet another movie with these characteristics. Other things that it shared from several other animes was the violent aspect of it, almost pornographicly violent (yup, its a manga alright), whenever there was a slight chance for showing naked girls and/or violence, the movie felt the duty of exploiting it to the maximum, leave very little importance to whatever story there was in it. speaking of that, the story was clustered in one small drop, as it happends in many manga-to-anime movies (as in akira, where you had to re-watch the movie again for many aspects that where briefly explained, mainly because most of the movie time was spent on violent scenes rather than in triying to give any mayor importance to the plot, i recall several characters that were showned diying in gruesome violent ways at the end, and all i had was one question in my head "who the hell were they?"), and last, and very importantly, Ghost in the Shell was in no ways the first "philosophical" sci-fi movie, the first one was Blade Runner in questioning what it meant to be human (to some lesser degree, 2001 could be considered the very first, although from here to there, one must wonder if 2001 could be considered sci-fi). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 200.28.199.4 (talk • contribs) .
I could say many things, but I shall limit myself to the following:
  1. Motoko Kusanagi loses what one might call her "sluttiness" as one goes from manga to movie to TV. Her lesbian interlude in the manga gets cut in the English translation (and in the French too, surprisingly enough), "toned down" into a cyberbrain drug trip. Why drugs are more acceptable than sex—and violence more acceptable than both—I don't pretend to know. The first time the manga is adapted (for the 1995 movie), Motoko becomes a loner. She stays that way through two seasons of Stand Alone Complex, though she clearly has a past with a couple young women and, by episode 25, some tension with Batou. Nothing consummated on screen, though—just her sharing memories with the Laughing Man! By the time we get to GiTS 2: Innocence, well—if anyone can actually get off watching the Hadaly sexroids, you're a better horny Freudian than I am.
A few points on this bit. In the most recent release of the GitS manga the lesbian sex + drug trip (it appears to be both, as they're recording the experience to sell as some sort of virtual porn movie) has been re-inserted. Also, in SAC season 1 her girlfriends are laced throughout the series (she visits them and is seen putting clothes back on before looking at old footage of the first Laughing Man incident; the nurse at the hospital where she's supposed to get her new body is one of the same girls, etc). Obviously it isn't as explicit as in the manga. Furthermore, Motoko and Batou do still have that implied but never said outright sexual tension in SAC, and while she remains aloof and "loner-like" through most of SAC, there's points where the affection is more obvious than others. Batou's affection for her is, though, much more blatant, and her relationship with Kuze is much more explored than her relationship with Batou. As far as I remember, none of the GitS media that is canon ever show them together. Nijyo 16:38, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
  1. Metropolis (1927), The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Forbidden Planet (1956), Dr. Strangelove (1964) and Truffaut's Fahrenheit 451 (1966) all have philosophical content people still talk about. If we include television series, the original Star Trek (first aired 1966) and The Prisoner (1967) certainly count. Each one of these includes computers and/or robots which display some living characteristics. Moreover, Metropolis features a human mind being copied into a robotic body (Maria into Futura); The Prisoner shows Number Six's mind connected to a computer and even copied into another man's body; and in Star Trek, Spock mind-melds with the Nomad space probe (among many examples I could give). All of these works (or "texts", if you're a postmodernist) examine and blur the distinctions among humans, robots and aliens—even Fahrenheit 451, if you consider humans "roboticized" by their desires for simplistic, orderly lives.
  1. 2001: A Space Odyssey is not "sci-fi". The ugly coinage "sci-fi" properly refers to trashy material confused with true science fiction, which is abbreviated SF. Yes, I am being a pedant, and quite possibly a crusty and outdated one too. See if I care. 2001 is SF, mystical and rapturous, alternating between darkness and sunshine.
Cheers, Anville 21:10, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

It's ok to be a pedant, but it's not ok to be a bad pedant. SF = Sci-Fi = Science fiction. You are imagining that "SF" is a special, superior category of fiction, somehow differentiated from the unworthy "sci-fi", when they are simply synonyms.

Can you elaborate about why 2001 is not "just" sci-fi? Mystical alien obelisks with supernatural powers sounds like bog-standard science fiction to me.

Asteroceras 12:20, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
In My Opinion Wikipedia should stay away from linking to the typical review pages, particularly the typical low brow, unintelligent, focused more on fan service and if it will "get someone off" than the actual intellectual side of the story. I know this is a little strong worded. I've just read too many reviews on netflix recently. (Reading the reviews of Elfen Lied only one of the writers managed to grasp that the show was a dark complex nior that is intended to leave the viewer crying every single time they remember it.)
The type of fandom that I would like to see linked from wikipedia pages on fiction, other than of course the various official sites, are pages with actual in depth analysis of the story and deep personal insight of what struck a chord. Even things like speculation about the unanswered left for the viewer to fill in themselves. This is what brings respect to fiction. We should treat movies and TV series as we would a good novel, not as some lesser art form. As a new form of media we should treat other newer forms of media with the respect other people have failed to, and point to the people who have granted such respect.
Sure there is the few negative critics with good insight as to why they don't like something, and those we should link to, but what should be left out is the typical nonobjective narrow-minded slander reviews that certain people write just because they don't like the fact that a piece of fiction defies their preconceived notions about the world should be left for the reader to find at the nearest video review site where they can find a plethora of them. RuediiX (talk) 09:44, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Film series

The film series should have a dedicated article overviewing the two current films, at Ghost in the Shell (anime film series). Currently it is a dab page... one that Ned Scott wants to delete. 70.51.10.123 05:39, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

ok, why? Other movie articles are not set up this way. If you want an overview then use Ghost in the Shell, which should be an overview of the whole Ghost in the Shell series. -- Ned Scott 18:47, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
Some other movie series are set up that way. An overview article on the continuity, and linkages between the movies in the series. Individual articles focus on the series. There is an entire category for these types of articles: Category:Film series ; a good example would be : Final Destination series or The Chronicles of Narnia (film series) or Critters (film series) or Subspecies series - 70.51.11.34 05:05, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
Incase you haven't noticed.. but we have two articles that can do that, Ghost in the Shell and Ghost in the Shell (disambiguation). Personally I feel that Ghost in the Shell (disambiguation) should be deleted and the task handled by Ghost in the Shell alone as an "overview". Also, the film disambig page is about to be deleted per the AfD.. -- Ned Scott 08:15, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
Yep, it got deleted, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ghost in the Shell (anime film series). -- Ned Scott 06:43, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
We should have an overview article, not just a dab page. It would be an article on the film continuity, as we have an article on the TV continuity. There should also be an article on the manga continuity. Each of these continuities are distinct and different. The GitS article should be a general overview of everything. More specific overviews would go into the sub articles. Each article (manga, film, TV series) would get their own articles. 70.51.8.73 04:25, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
The DAB page is easy to read, so as not to cause excess aggravation for people looking for a quick link to their preferred article. 70.51.8.73 05:17, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I added the new movie Ghost in the shell: Solid State Society to the intro. Its been out for a while now, and i'm surprised it was'nt already there. Slaten 03:43, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Translation of 攻殻

wwwjdic and the japanese wikipedia agree with the pronounciation of '攻殻' (koukaku), but the only reading I can find for those two characters together is that of the manga. What's the source of the reading 'mobile' for koukaku? --moof 05:01, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I think the 'mobile' comes from the kidōtai part, with kōkaku supplying the 'armored' part. I don't know for sure, but I imagine that Shirow created the word, based on an actual word of the same pronunciation, 甲殻, which means "carapace; shell; crust", as in 甲殻類 kōkakurui "crustaceans". (As you may know, the word crustacean comes from the Latin crusta "crust".) The Kanji 攻 kō- in Shirow's coinage means "attack" (as in the verb 攻める semeru), so literally it's "attack-shell". HTH. --SandChigger 16:01, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Intro

I take it that the difference between Ghost in the Shell and Ghost in the Shell (manga) is that Ghost in the Shell covers everything. If so, then the introductions needs to be clearer about the coverage of the articles. Perheps someone should merge Ghost in the Shell (disambiguation) into this page. --Rumping 02:56, 4 November 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Academic Influence

I reverted a removal of the academic influence section. As I noted in the edit summary - if verifiable, this section should stand. Though admittedly the second needs to be expanded as well. Opening floors for discussion. If possible I'd like to verify and cite notable occurrences of mention of Ghost in the Shell in academia. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 15:21, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Also, if verifiable, section may need to be merged into "Impact and Influence." AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 15:28, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I'd suggest you directly ask the editor who removed it, since they are the one who placed it in the article initially and apparently moved it from this article to the one specifically about the film. Pairadox (talk) 15:30, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I was unaware. Thank you for pointing that out. I'll touch base with him on his talk page. I suppose the question is whether the academic influence was born exclusively from the original film or if it more of an over-arching thing that reflects the entire franchise. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 15:39, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I see, that in this talk it's already become clear why I removed the section. The book talks specifically about the film. And seeing my knowledge of the entire franchise isn't big enough to make sure it also fitted in that subject, I switched it to the wiki article about the movie. But it isn't entirely misplaced on this page as well. M.A.Kampman (talk) 14:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
OK. How about we remove the section "Academic Influence" for now but keep it here on the talk page until it can be further expanded upon and verified? I do recall reading an academic thesis a while back, and a couple of other articles. AtaruMoroboshi (talk) 14:18, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Ghost in the Shell was analyzed together with William Gibson's book Neuromancer in chapter 4 "Orienting the Future" of Wendy Hui Kyong Chun's book "Control and Freedom - Power and Paranoia in the Age of Fiber Optics" (2006, The MIT Press). She looks at the aspect of high-tech Orientalism put forth in both works.

Well, I'd be fine with this solution and will keep my eyes open for more academic references to submit to this page. Also, I am in favor of merging the two pages together as suggested above. M.A.Kampman (talk) 12:50, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
I'd be fine with it here. She may have looked specifically to the movie, but unless the themes in it are radically different her analysis would seem to apply to the entire franchise. Pairadox (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 13:03, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ghost defined

I have only recently discovered this series in the Stand Alone Complex series as well as the Puppet Master movie and was hoping to find a bit more explanation of the Ghost aspect of the title. The simple assumption is that it refers to a soul, but the references in the various episodes seem to suggest a more sublime yet direct connection (such statements as "My ghost is telling me..." make this suggestion to me at least).

If anyone is aware of references discussing this aspect I would like to see some edits in the article covering a basic intro to the Ghost concept, just to clear up any confusion. --Tralfaz (Ralraz, yech) (talk) 00:38, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

From what I gather, its usage is usually synonymous to “mind” as separate from the body and physical brain… but that the character of Motoko has a habit of using it in introspection to refer to the soul as separate from the mind. I think the first place to look for a succinct definition (that won’t present an original research dilemma) would be Shirow’s Author’s Notes from the mangas. — NRen2k5 01:11, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
To me "Ghost" refers to "spontaneous instinctual intelligence" usually it's a trace instinctive level of intelligence.
To give further almost tangent-like detail, if a human replaced the majority with AI-enchanced hardware, they would loose a large portion of the feedback loop in the emotion complex of the brain, specifically the adrenals. This would render them slightly "numb" to their emotions. However, the brain will adapt to this, as any neuron. The neuronoid hardware, designed to interact would likely have a lot of hardware in it to manage the rather complex and sometimes conflicting data from the body, otherwise you would result in a cyborg that acts like it has parkensons desease. If you saw 2nd gig you will see some mention of this problem in early cyborgs.
This is probably one of the first science fictions to recognize this potential problem with robotic prosthetics. All this hardware would eventually pick up patterns in the brain and learn that it performs better when it feeds back "fuzzier" data about things to indicate that it is uncertain. Any part that acquired such behavior would quickly resume the function of that instinct providing the same "gut intuition" that was lost due to the loss of the adrenal glands. However, the brain would then be required to make sense of these variances of the signals and complete the loop to provide the function. That loop that creates what would be recognized in a human as "gut intuition" is what would be called a "Ghost."

BTW, the not knowing that the Tachicoma's are capable of producing ghosts and the related emotions in themselves is a dead giveaway that it is either before or in a "like universe" to the GITS movies.RuediiX (talk) 09:11, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] GitS Live Action

Found this info on 4chan. Link: http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117984029.html?categoryid=13&cs=1&nid=2563. Legit? Should it be included? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.202.102.148 (talk) 17:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)