I always considered this season of the show superior to the first season while I still do, I also feel in some ways the first season is more consistent, this season is far more memorable and interesting.
The good stuff about 2nd Gig are all carry overs from the 1st season and more, the great music, directing, stand alone episodes, theming, characters, action, visuals, and just how much it requires it the viewer to pay attention and rewards them afterwards are all still here.However what makes this season more interesting to me are two reasons the first being I find the change of from corporate terrorism to international issues to be more interesting because the stakes are raised and is a natural evolution from the stakes in the first season. I mainly find it more interesting in that and this now leads to my 2nd reasons is as to why I think this season is better is due to the fact that there is an actual antagonist. In fact, there are 2. Hideo Kuze and Kazundo Gohda, where the 1st season didn't really have an antagonist at all and the Laughing Man was a persona that was created by Yakushima so he can blackmail other micro machine companies and Aoi was more of a cyber hacker that was on the side good, this meant that the 1st season didn't really have a true antagonist. I am the kind of guy who tends to gravitate more towards stories that have an interesting antogonists and the before mentioned characters I mentioned are both very interesting. Gohda is fascinating in that he runs everything from the shadows, and only shows up when he has to. What also makes him interesting is that he feels like an interesting subversion of the "ugly villain" trope where he actually has his disfigured face because he will be recalled by other people more and he chose to keep it rather than have no option at all. That and he often drives Section 9 up against a wall at multiple points in the show and pushes them to their limits like many great villains do. 3 examples of this is when he he botched a live firing of the automated helicoptors to stir up the refugees, used Section 9 as a decoy to get the nuclear weapons out of the refugee area, and question Togusa's meaning of justice when he put the character in an unjust trial. Gohda is an example of a villain who pushes the heroes very hard and makes the resinstated Section 9's job a nightmare.
Hideo Kuze is another interesting antagonist in that he is more of a anti villain before they such a dime a dozen like they are these days. Kuze is an intriguing character in that despite being a character who becomes a pacifist idealist later in the series, everything he does is him staying true to what he stands for. Everything Kuze does often revolves around solving matters peacefully like when that one kid who got angry at him for being part of the Individual Eleven, he talks it out with him and on top of that finds a way to buy the plutonium without ever resorting to physical force. When he fights Batou later in the show, it's out of self defense and he never kills the latter either, and only one because the former got lucky. And now what really makes Kuze such a great villain is how much she makes the Major doubt herself and makes her question if she is doing the right thing, which is what a great antagonist should always do. The Major in a lot GITS media tends to be stoic, confident and always sure of herself, basically the leader character in a lot of fiction but with the later parts of 2nd Gig, the Major is a lot more vunerable and not so sure of herself than she is in previous parts of the series and other GITS media in general. This is another big reason why I deem 2nd Gig to be better than the 1st season and to be my favorite GITS related media ever. It was so refreshing to see Motoko make mistakes and ever having members like Batou and Aramaki doubt her leadership which is all tied to how great of a villain Hideo Kuze is due to the personal connection she had with Motoko. If this wasn't here, Kuze would be another generic terroriost for Section 9 to stop but this personal connection adds more of a personal touch to the story, and gives the story towards the end much higher stakes on top of the plot related stuff.
So after all this praise, why don't I give this show a 10? I think it's due to 3 issues, 2 of them not being too big and 1 of them big quite a big one. The 1st issue being that some of the stand alone episodes are kind of weak mainly just 3, those being Night Cruise, Cash Eye, and Red Data. Night Cruise especially being the weakest of the bunch and the whole series for that matter. It's an episode I don't expect GITS SAC to have where it's just visual imagery and theming doing the heavy lifting, as well as the episode being pretty pointless in the grand scheme of things, and stuff like Motoko pretending to be an expensive hooker not really being in her character. That and it feels like Kenji Kamiyama is just refrencing Taxi Driver yet again, I know he loves that movie but I feel this is just homaging Taxi Driver for the sake of it rather than benefiting the story.
The 2nd issue is and I am not sure if this counts as a big issue but I always did wonder how Kuze actually got in contact with Individual Eleven virus, it might be intentionally kept vague but I do kind of wish the story showed how he got infected with it, but this isn't too big of a problem.
This 3rd problem however is a big one and that is the ending of 2nd Gig, I have never really liked the ending all that much to it and it feels especially sub par compared to the 1st season's ending, and the big issue with 2nd Gig's ending is that after Kuze's death, the show abruptly just flashes forward and the refugee crisis is back to square one and the Major goes back to being the reliable confident woman she always was. It's not those 2 things on their own that makes it such an underwhelming ending, it's the fact that it all happens so quickly. I know 2nd Gig throws much more at the viewer compared to the 1st season but I felt 2nd Gig really could've benefitted from one more episode or a longer last episode to really make all this stuff transition more smoothly. The 1st season's ending was better in that after the penultimate episode, the viewer gets to see aftermath of the incident that happened with Section 9 from Togusa's point of view and when Section 9 reunites at the end and also with Inner Universe triumphantly playing in the background, it felt like an ending that felt powerful and earned. 2nd Gig's ending? Kuze dies and then it abruptly flashes forward without even seeing the overall aftermath of the incident unfold or how the Major got over Kuze's death or if it even affected her at all. This to me is what makes 2nd Gig's ending so underwhelming.
Overall, I still love GITS SAC 2nd Gig all these years later. Rewatching the SAC series has been a complete and utter joy for me.
No comments:
Post a Comment