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Animation Marathon: Ghost in the Shell The next film in the animation marathon is Ghost in the Shell. Like the previous film in the marathon, Akira, I had already seen this movie a few times before revisiting it for the marathon. Unlike Akira, my original opinion of this film was relatively high, and this most recent viewing hasn't changed my feelings much. Ghost in the Shell is not perfect, but it holds up well and is an excellent animated film. Like Akira, Ghost in the Shell is often held up as one of the essential pieces of anime that anyone interested in the form needs to see. Historically, it was the first anime film released simultaneously in Japan and in other markets (notably the UK and the US), but it proved a little too complex to become a mainstream success. However, it found a market on DVD and has enjoyed cult status ever since. The story takes place in a futuristic world where technology has advanced considerably and has begun to displace biological components of the human body (this even includes the brain). Cyborgs are common, and indeed, many people are more machine than human (those who can afford it, at least). One such cyborg is Major Motoko Kusanagi. She heads up a team that is part of section 9, an intelligence organization that tends to work more in the shadows (as opposed to their counterparts in section 6, whose role could be described more diplomatically). The Major All this technology comes at a price though. Increased internet connectivity and human-computer brain interfaces have introduced new vulnerabilities, and a new crime has appeared: Ghost hacking. The "Ghost" essentially represents a person's individual identity (while the "shell" represents their physical body, be it biological or artificial), and hackers can access and manipulate a human's ghost. A ghost hacker named "The Puppet Master" has appeared on the scene, hacking into various people, erasing their memories and programming them to do his bidding. Section 9, lead by the Major, has been chasing the Puppet Master for a while now, and some pieces of the puzzle are beginning to fall into place... The Major likes to scuba dive It's a dense story, and the technological advances pose a ton of intriguing questions about the nature of identity. The Major, whose physical body is almost all machine, is understandably a little paranoid about her identity. Is she really who she thinks she is? Is anyone really who they think they are? What makes me what I am? If my consciousness is transferred into an artificial brain, am I still me? This is the sort of thing that will stay with you long after the film has ended. After watching Ghost in the Shell, Steven Den Beste wrote a fascinating article exploring these concepts: Ghost in the Shell challenged me to consider the question of what I actually am. What makes me what I am? What am I? That can be answered in many ways. I am a particular human being; I am this body.