I think it was Stand Alone Complex where the point was made that the Major and Batou have zero interest in sex, so that’s sort of awkward.
And that’s sort of the larger point of how the humans are increasingly dehumanized - shoot someone in the head and their mind can be rebooted in a new body. Oops that guy I just shot in the head didn’t have a cyber brain and is really dead? Well it sucks to be him (shrug). Meanwhile it was the Tachikoma who were arguing about Descarte and singing campfire songs.
Nothing like singing campfire songs while deorbiting the satellite your brain lives on in order to smash into a nuclear missile that would start World War 5.
Not really. She’s a Cyborg for one. It’s Anime, for another, which in my book isn’t any race on earth. But if you showed 100 people her picture with no back story they would probably all identify her as white.
I cried when I saw that the first time. I’m getting a lump in my throat even now. Ghost in the Shell made a profound impact on me, in the same way Star Trek, or Star Wars or Dr. Who impacted a lot of people. That’s why I’m trying to at least be hopeful that this live action GitS is good. But I’m trying not to get too excited about it. I don’t want to go through the same disappointment I did with Star Wars I-III.
[quote=“PrestonSturges, post:41, topic:49321”]
I think it was Stand Alone Complex where the point was made that the Major and Batou have zero interest in sex, so that’s sort of awkward.
[/quote]Probably so that they can actually air it without causing problems.In the manga she’s pretty explicitly having a cyberbrain orgy in her free time, and has a boyfriend at the same time. It’s also clearly stated that she has a sideline from her S9 job in producing shared sense e-sex experiences.
Not sure if it’s whitewashing, since GiTs world do have white people in them (as well as other race), and they look different from Asian characters as well. White folks in anime are often caricatures, often to the point of being racist.
I have another interpretation: faces in manga and anime are not really “whitewashing”, but avoidance of realistic depiction. Think about “uncanny valley” - realistically drawn faces are kinda unpleasant to look at (think realistic Homer Simpson), so people draw stylized ones.
The point? In GiT premise (original and later reinterpretation), Major is Japanese, working for Japanese government. There’s no point in the story that says otherwise, and she has other bodies that she can use that’s scattered all over the globe. Why would she choose caucasian body in Japan? As a fan of the series, I’m pretty bummed out by typical Hollywood homogenization to lowest common denominator. : (
I’m curious why everyone seems to think that a) the Major is going to keep her name and b) the story will continue to be set in Japan?
This is a Hollywood remake we’re talking about here, not a Japanese live-action adaptation. The first step of the screenwriting process was probably to shift the action and all it’s supporting architecture to LA or NYC.
I don’t see that as necessarily a bad thing, but I’ll be reserving judgement on the movie until I get some indication whether the screenwriter and director are making a thoughtful examination of the intersection of humanity and transhumanity, or if they’re making a Hollywood cyber-shoot-em-up.
I just remembered, wasn’t there sorta a nod to that in Jungle Cruise?
Marco Amereti lured sex workers to his setup, where the idea was they’d have shared sense sex, he’d tie her down, and feed his own sensorium into the victim’s cyberbrain while he skinned her alive, and record the whole deal. Then distribute the file as psychological warfare.
Here’s something you might find interesting - some people in Japan actually kicked off a huge stink about the cast of the upcoming live-action attack on titan movie, for practically the same reason. Why?
Because the entire cast is Japanese. In AoT, Misaka is unusual, because she is quite explicitly stated to be one of the last Asian people left in the world. Everyone else is European, or intended to be.
