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Click here to visit the Official Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG site! I have really been waiting with baited breath for volume 3 of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG, especially considering the two month gap between this and the last volume. With the refugee situation rapidly going into meltdown,
Section 9 are desperate to uncover what is going on behind the scenes and find
themselves stretched to near breaking point. Fed up of the enigmatic Gohda
being one step ahead of them, Major Kusanagi stages a daring raid on his
computer systems to see if she can find out more about him and his past.
Meanwhile Togusa finds himself in the firing line when his attempts to protect a
woman from a dangerous cyborg fail and she is killed, but despite this the
essential task of assessing new recruits must continue, even with one of their
current agents in court. If this wasn't bad enough they soon find that the
Individual Eleven and the cyborg terrorist Kuze are on the move in south.
What are their intentions? And can Section 9 stop them before it's too
late? |
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Ghost in the Shell has always managed to be the thinking man's action series, blending action and really cerebral plotting together to brilliant effect. Never has it demonstrated this as well as it does in this volume, from the demanding philosophical discussion between Kusanagi and Gohda's online persona to the action of Batou and Togusa's attempts to foil a suicide bomber. There is a lot of 'will they make it in time?' stuff which really keeps you on the edge of your seat, and this volume also harks back to the past, firstly by visually referencing the first film (hooray for crap |
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'futuristic' shades!) and secondly giving the first glance into Kusanagi's back story that we have really seen. It can be fatal to break up the flow of a series
with a background story episode, but it surprisingly works quite
well, despite the unimpressive 'memory depository' explanation
behind it. It works because it doesn't tell you everything, it
gives you some of the dots and lets you fill them in. To be
honest this kind of thing won't appeal to everyone, and neither will
the particularly dialogue-heavy episode 9, which needs real
concentration to follow. In fact a lot of the philosophical
content on this DVD involves concentration to keep up with, in the
past you could pretty much cruise from action scene to action scene
but you may find this volume hard going if you're not prepared to
pay attention to the dialogue in between. |
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Once again the animation and music is top notch, really matching the quality of the story and enhancing the feeling of tension that is apparent this time round. The story really moves forward but best of all ends with a real twist, I must admit I really didn't see it coming, and I'd be very surprised if anyone does. Once again Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG steps up a notch in terms of plot development and drama and is building up an intriguing and impressive story that looks like it will keep you hooked until the very end. Manga Entertainment may have considerably expanded their release schedule this year, but |
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this series remains the cornerstone of their catalogue. Thought provoking and entertaining, Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG vol 3 is an essential purchase. Extras As with the previous volumes disc 1 carries an interviews with the Japanese staff who worked on the series, and disc 2 carries several trailers and the additional DTS audio tracks. There are two interviews this time round, the first is with animation directors Kenichi Takeshita and Toshiyuki Kono, whilst the second is with director Kenji Kamiyama. Both interviews are lengthy and interesting, but it is a shame there are no character biographies or some kind of encyclopaedia of the technology featured in this volume. Ratings Feature:
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