KOUKAKU KIDOUTAI ARISE: GHOST IN THE SHELL - BORDER:1 GHOST PAIN

DESCRIPTION

CAST

MOVIE ActionKoukaku Kidoutai ARISE: GHOST IN THE SHELL - border:2 Ghost Whispers
SPECIAL ActionKoukaku Kidoutai ARISE: ANOTHER MISSION
ANIME ActionKoukaku Kidoutai: STAND ALONE COMPLEX
MOVIE ActionGHOST IN THE SHELL: Koukaku Kidoutai
ANIME ActionKoukaku Kidoutai ARISE: ALTERNATIVE ARCHITECTURE
MANGA ActionKoukaku Kidoutai: Arise - Nemuranai Me no Otoko Sleepless Eye
SPECIAL MechaKoukaku Kidoutai ARISE Specials

REVIEWS

• 

  ThyMrMan

  50/100
  Bland and uninteresting, a disappointing addition to the series.

  Ghost in the Shell has always been a series that I love and enjoy watching the various movies and tv shows based in the universe. And with the announcement of a Netflix Ghost in the Shell, I figured I should finally get around to finishing up the rest of the existing tv shows and movies at the least. But Arise: Border 1 Ghost Pain just wasn’t a Ghost in the Shell movie remotely close to what I would want and didn’t enjoy in the least. Instead I got more explosions and fight scenes, alongside fast paced story telling that ends up being severely lacking in many aspects.

  The story seems like it didn’t do anything new or expand on the characters at all. Somebody ends up dead so Major must investigate the murder and solve the crime. Along the way she ends up questioning who she is and what is real. Except the pacing of this investigation is so quick it doesn’t have enough time to breath and ask any questions. So, it isn’t so much as an investigation, as going from one set-piece to another in order to get some scene or fight in. I never got a feeling that Major was using her “wizard” level hacking skills to uncover some massive piece of the puzzle and put the murder together or working with other people around her to lead her to the solution. Instead it feels like she just happens to put things together without warning or explanation until the final scene when it all gets explained. None of which ends up feeling deserved or hard fought for, it is just feels handed to us.

  The characters beside Major are essentially non-existent. Major is the main focus of the movie completely, and a main plot point revolves around her and her cybernetics. And once again the question of what is real and what isn’t shows up again in this movie, but it is never explored or questioned. And Major never really has a questioning her humanity moment like she has had in the past, no brilliant diving scene in this movie. Her character design also got a major change which I feel like is the biggest issue with her character really. I can understand changing a character’s backstory and putting the movie in an alternate universe to give everyone more space to work with. So, while I’m annoyed at the changes they made to her backstory, I can accept it and ignore them. What I don’t like are the changes they made that end up having her character look like a 16-year-old. In 3 years, she ends up being this rather badass looking character with an amazing design. But in these movies, she has none of those features that she has in Stand Alone Complex, and instead she looks like a young teenager who looks out of place. It would work better if they had set it farther back in time, but as it is it looks disjointed if your used to the way she looks in essentially everything else.

  Minor touch on the way the movie looks, well I guess it looks bland and kinda boring. It didn’t have any moments of camera pan that make me stop and say…Wow. Instead it looks kinda like a generic futuristic city without anything special. Just another disappointing downgrade from everything in the previous shows and movies.

  To finish this up, I would say that unless you are a fan of Ghost in the Shell like I am. And just want to finish up the video content to say you’ve seen it all, I would go watch a better movie. Cause this doesn’t have anything impressive or interesting when compared to the previous entries.

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• 

  VirginiaHeart

  53/100
  Pedantic bureaucratic conspiracy, undercharacterized characters. Uninteresting but watchable GiTS installment

  This "review" is pretty casual. I started Arise because I had heard it balances the action and philosophy monologuing more for a mass appeal, and I was a fan of that concept for this franchise.

  This movie is 60% monologues about bureaucratic conspiracy stuff, and I can get behind a bureaucratic political conspiracy but this one is boring and pedantic. Writing this review I'm already forgetting details that would help me explain it which is likely telling. I don't want to watch it again to elaborate but it's mostly about this new character who is a deceased benefactor of the Major whom we never see and do not know or have any reasons established for why we should care about him. The plot is about the mystery of his actions and why he did certain things. There aren't any flashbacks that flesh out his personality or his connection to the major which is an odd decision. All we know about him is he favored the Major and gave her leeway but we don't really know his personality or why the Major may feel a connection to him if she does.

  Similarly, we don't have much reason to care about the organization that has Motoko in their employ in the beginning of the movie. The leader, who is Voiced by the incredible Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, my favorite voice for the Major, largely serves the role of the fall guy that keeps her out of trouble for most of the movie, what is Motoko's history with this woman, does she hold reverence for her, is she like her sensei? Who knows she's just kind of there (until the not that interesting plot twist)

  On the voice acting, I can understand why McGlynn is not the Major here because her Major voice is powerful and commanding and this is meant to be a young inexperienced prequel Major. I still found this Major to be very wooden though tolerable. It's probably difficult to find that balance where there are glimmers of emotion but still stoic. That being said I watched the sub version of a later installment because I tired of this voice and although I obviously can't comment on the little nuances of the performance since I don't speak japanese I found the actress has a noticably greater range of emotion in her performance, and thinking about it I don't know if this is meant to be like Mamoru Oshii's ultra reserved Motoko. Besides the Major, Batou has a much deeper voice this time around in the dub and while I can't say its not fitting for his character I prefer the SAC and Oshii voices where he was a grizzled old guy but had more range and wiggle room to be a little goofy and a multifaceted person. Though given the plot circumstances in universe here he doesn't have much room for that anyways

  A major player of this film didn't have that much going on at all, besides being antagonistic to The Major, and when Motoko went after him in climax I was just like "Oh it was him? Ok" We don't know much about his desires or motivations.

  It;s pretty apparent watching this which scenes had more budget than others, like when the major has a suddenly ultra flat no detail face. Somebody told me it's an OVA and not a film which explains why it lacks the production values or gravitas I would expect from film animation. This also isn't my favorite design for the major but it's not that bad I'd say, it helps that I saw the 2045 design first.

  I won't go too in depth about the spoileriffic plot twist except that I thought it was stupid and unearned. A potentially interesting idea but the execution is ultra straight forward where its like Major hunted by others because bad guy? No Major not bad guy because plot detail she found out of nowhere. Since we haven't been acquainted with Motoko's status quo or her dynamics with others once again I don't see why we should care. At a moment near the end Kusanagi pieced everything together and delivered it in a corny monologue to a bad guy and I felt like they were doing the Benedict Cumberbatch Sherlock thing of ass pulling detective details that weren't really foreshadowed earlier.

  I wasn't overly invested in this but while it's uninteresting I found my attention span didn't wander that much, so its perfectly watchable but that's the best I can say about it.

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