My Thoughts on "Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045" Companion Piece
If you have not read my "Thoughts on" review of Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045, then I would highly suggest that you read that first before jumping into this. It'll make a lot more sense that way.
https://jedithescribe.blogspot.com/2023/11/my-thoughts-of-ghost-in-shell-sac2045.html
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What is the Golden Circle 🟡?
(This is the poster for Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045.)
In my review of Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045, I mentioned something called the "Golden Circle" when I was talking about the American Empire 🇺🇸, and I felt it needed an explanation. No, I wasn't referring to the second Kingsman movie, Kingsman: The Golden Circle, though I'm sure that this is where Matthew Vaughn got the inspiration for the title; either that or the Golden Triangle. No, the Golden Circle I was referring to is an old, somewhat obscure idea from the American Civil War era 🇺🇸, from pro-Confederate circles. It was idea conceived by a Confederate secret society that wasn't all that secret called the Knights of the Golden Circle (KGC).
.svg.png "This is the first Confederate flag from 1961 to 1863.")
.svg.png "This is the second Confederate flag from 1863 to 1865.")
(These are the flags of the Confederate States of America, the pro-slavery breakaway state formed by all the slave-owning southern states that seceded from the Union 🇺🇸. The first flag, the one on top, was used from 1861 to 1863, and the second flag, the on on the bottom, was used from 1863 to 1865, at the end of the American Civil War 🇺🇸.)
Basically, they wanted to expand the Confederacy's territory, and expand the institution of slavery further southward, and basically create an empire that they called the "Golden Circle." And what this slave empire would be comprised of is Mexico 🇲🇽, all of the Caribbean, and parts of South America. They advocated for conquering all of these territories (some of which were still European colonies at the time), and turning them into slave states. And I don't just think they would've stopped at having black slaves either. Given how unbelievably racist Confederates were, I wouldn't put it past if they also wanted to enslave the local populations of the places they conquered.
Like, imagine native Mexicans 🇲🇽 being enslaved and being forced to pick cash crops like cotton or sugar alongside the black slaves that the Confederates already had from the southern states, and would've likely continue "breeding" had they won, if you want to use that phrase. It's uncomfortable to think about it that way, that's the way the Confederates saw their slaves. They didn't see them as human beings. They saw them as property, and as livestock in a way, that they had to breed to create more slaves to own and sell.
Speaking of which, their plan for Mexico 🇲🇽 was to basically annex it, and then redraw the borders, redraw the administrative divisions, and create several new slave states out of it. They even wanted to change the Confederacy's capital from Richmond to Havana in Cuba (which was still under Spanish control 🇪🇸 at the time) as a part of this new empire if it ever became a reality. This was a really crazy bonkers idea as you can read, and it never actually gained any real traction in the Confederate leadership, military or civilian. And it probably wouldn't have worked anyway since the Confederacy lost.
But, in the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex sub-continuity, the US breakaway country 🇺🇸 known as the American Empire 🇺🇸 (or Imperial America 🇺🇸 as it's also referred to as) is comprised of all the southern states, all of the same southern states that made up the Confederate States of America. That's why I was joking about the American Empire 🇺🇸 trying to create a new Golden Circle by invading Mexico 🇲🇽 during the Fourth World War; this was apart of the American theater of the war, that I personally refer to as the American War or the War in the Americas. I figured that perhaps they were trying to resurrect this old idea and make it a reality in some form, even if it wasn't an actual colonial empire like the KGC was originally proposed.
In 2nd GiG (the second season of Stand Alone Complex), they say and show that the American Empire 🇺🇸 didn't invade Mexico 🇲🇽 on its own. They did it as apart of a UN task force 🇺🇳 with other countries like the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 and Japan 🇯🇵, under the guise of rooting out drug cartels, and stopping the flow of illegal drugs into their country. It's never explicitly stated in the show, but it's strongly implied that's not what the Americans 🇺🇸 actually wanted to do, and what they really wanted to do was topple the Mexican government 🇲🇽, and replace it with a puppet regime under their direct influence; the drug cartel thing was just a false pretense, a smokescreen to hide their real objective.
This part of the lore was likely inspired by the Iraq War 🇮🇶, which was still going on when the show was originally airing. The original Stand Alone Complex aired from 2002 to 2005, and 2nd GiG specifically aired from January 2004 to January 2005. The Iraq War 🇮🇶 started on March 20, 2003 with the invasion to topple Saddam Hussein's regime simply called Operation Iraqi Freedom 🇮🇶, and it ended on December 15, 2011 with the full withdrawal of American military forces 🇺🇸 from Iraq 🇮🇶. So, it definitely fits. 2003 was really the time when the war was at its most controversial.
Speaking of which, their plan for Mexico 🇲🇽 was to basically annex it, and then redraw the borders, redraw the administrative divisions, and create several new slave states out of it. They even wanted to change the Confederacy's capital from Richmond to Havana in Cuba (which was still under Spanish control 🇪🇸 at the time) as a part of this new empire if it ever became a reality. This was a really crazy bonkers idea as you can read, and it never actually gained any real traction in the Confederate leadership, military or civilian. And it probably wouldn't have worked anyway since the Confederacy lost.
But, in the Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex sub-continuity, the US breakaway country 🇺🇸 known as the American Empire 🇺🇸 (or Imperial America 🇺🇸 as it's also referred to as) is comprised of all the southern states, all of the same southern states that made up the Confederate States of America. That's why I was joking about the American Empire 🇺🇸 trying to create a new Golden Circle by invading Mexico 🇲🇽 during the Fourth World War; this was apart of the American theater of the war, that I personally refer to as the American War or the War in the Americas. I figured that perhaps they were trying to resurrect this old idea and make it a reality in some form, even if it wasn't an actual colonial empire like the KGC was originally proposed.
In 2nd GiG (the second season of Stand Alone Complex), they say and show that the American Empire 🇺🇸 didn't invade Mexico 🇲🇽 on its own. They did it as apart of a UN task force 🇺🇳 with other countries like the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 and Japan 🇯🇵, under the guise of rooting out drug cartels, and stopping the flow of illegal drugs into their country. It's never explicitly stated in the show, but it's strongly implied that's not what the Americans 🇺🇸 actually wanted to do, and what they really wanted to do was topple the Mexican government 🇲🇽, and replace it with a puppet regime under their direct influence; the drug cartel thing was just a false pretense, a smokescreen to hide their real objective.
This part of the lore was likely inspired by the Iraq War 🇮🇶, which was still going on when the show was originally airing. The original Stand Alone Complex aired from 2002 to 2005, and 2nd GiG specifically aired from January 2004 to January 2005. The Iraq War 🇮🇶 started on March 20, 2003 with the invasion to topple Saddam Hussein's regime simply called Operation Iraqi Freedom 🇮🇶, and it ended on December 15, 2011 with the full withdrawal of American military forces 🇺🇸 from Iraq 🇮🇶. So, it definitely fits. 2003 was really the time when the war was at its most controversial.
That's not to say the entire war wasn't controversial, but the invasion itself was the most controversial part of it. It was also the easiest part from the Americans' perspective 🇺🇸. It was the part that people who opposed the war used to morally grandstand, and show how evil America 🇺🇸 was; especially the bombing of Baghdad at the start of the war, that image and footage has been used a lot to show how evil and imperialistic George W. Bush's foreign policy was.
2004 and 2005 were around the times when the war was starting to get worse. When it was shifting from being a conventional war and a nation-building occupation to a counterinsurgency and counterterrorism war where coalition forces were fighting against various Sunni and Shia insurgent and terrorist groups violently opposed to the occupation. One of which was al-Qaeda in Iraq, which eventually morphed into ISIS, or the Islamic State as it's sometimes referred to as. 2004 was the year that the First and Second Battles of Fallujah both happened, with the Second Battle of Fallujah being considered the bloodiest battle of the entire war 🩸.
It was also likely inspired by the UN intervention in Somalia 🇺🇳🇸🇴 in the 1990s during the Somali Civil War 🇸🇴, which the US 🇺🇸 was apart of. The US 🇺🇸 of course was humiliated during that UN mission 🇺🇳 since that's when the Battle of Mogadishu happened, you know, Black Hawk Down. That's kind of the best way look at the invasion of Mexico 🇲🇽 and the American War as a whole as it's presented in 2nd GiG, it's like Iraq 🇮🇶 mixed with Somalia 🇸🇴. The Americans 🇺🇸 just bombed the hell out of Mexico 🇲🇽, like Mexico City is just a bombed out ruined shell of its former self, when we see it in flashbacks.
Motoko, Batou, and Ishikawa were all apart of the UN task force 🇺🇳 set up by the Americans 🇺🇸. They were apart of the Japanese contingent 🇯🇵, and it's through the war in Mexico 🇲🇽 that they meet Saito, who was an enemy sniper working as a mercenary for a PMC (private military company); Motoko shot his left eye out, which is why he has a cybernetic one in the present day. That is of course, if you believe Saito's story in the poker episode ♠️♣️♥️♦️. They kind of try to make it seem like he's an unreliable narrator, and that his story may be not true or it may be highly embellished, but at the end of the episode, they strongly imply that his story is true, and that is actually how he met Motoko, and was recruited into Section 9.
It is pretty ironic though that Saito was a mercenary fighting on the opposite side of the same war when he met Motoko, Batou, and Ishikawa, and was recruited into Section 9, and then decades later, they all become mercenaries again decades later after Section 9 is disbanded for a third time. I mean, it's the first time they've been mercenaries, but it isn't the first time for Saito. He used to be a mercenary prior to being a counterterrorist for the Japanese government 🇯🇵. And he just went back to doing what he used to do prior to working for the government. He's the only one with experience working as a mercenary.
Motoko, Batou, and Ishikawa were all apart of the UN task force 🇺🇳 set up by the Americans 🇺🇸. They were apart of the Japanese contingent 🇯🇵, and it's through the war in Mexico 🇲🇽 that they meet Saito, who was an enemy sniper working as a mercenary for a PMC (private military company); Motoko shot his left eye out, which is why he has a cybernetic one in the present day. That is of course, if you believe Saito's story in the poker episode ♠️♣️♥️♦️. They kind of try to make it seem like he's an unreliable narrator, and that his story may be not true or it may be highly embellished, but at the end of the episode, they strongly imply that his story is true, and that is actually how he met Motoko, and was recruited into Section 9.
It is pretty ironic though that Saito was a mercenary fighting on the opposite side of the same war when he met Motoko, Batou, and Ishikawa, and was recruited into Section 9, and then decades later, they all become mercenaries again decades later after Section 9 is disbanded for a third time. I mean, it's the first time they've been mercenaries, but it isn't the first time for Saito. He used to be a mercenary prior to being a counterterrorist for the Japanese government 🇯🇵. And he just went back to doing what he used to do prior to working for the government. He's the only one with experience working as a mercenary.
Why is Tokyo a Bombed Out and Flooded Wasteland?
I should also explain more about why Tokyo is the way it is in this show and in the Stand Alone Complex continuity as a whole, since I just briefly mentioned the state of Tokyo in the review, and didn't have any actual room to explain it in a way that I personally found satisfying and helped you dear reader understand what happened. Basically, in the Stand Alone Complex continuity, Tokyo was destroyed during World War III, or Nuclear World War III as the characters often refer to it as. It was bombed by a nuclear weapon ☢️ and large parts of the city were flooded, though the flooding is never really explained.
My guess is that had to do with the impact of the bomb(s) in nearby waters 💦 like Tokyo Bay causing massive tidal waves 🌊, or the bomb(s) hit a dam or a sea wall causing massive flooding, or maybe it's because of global warming, who knows? This makes it the first Japanese city 🇯🇵 to be hit by a nuclear bomb ☢️ since World War II, and probably the first time that nuclear weapons ☢️ had been in used in warfare since World War II. Though it's never really explicitly said whether or not Tokyo was the first city in the world to be hit with a nuclear missile ☢️ during World War III.
But symbolically, it's way too good that I doubt the writers of the original Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045 would just pass it up. These are both Japanese productions 🇯🇵, and so far, to this day, Japan 🇯🇵 in the only country in the world to be hit with nuclear weapons ☢️ during wartime. Every nuclear weapon ☢️ that has been detonated since then has just been a test.
So of course, if a bunch of Japanese writers 🇯🇵 are writing a science fiction story in-which a Third World War happens, of course they're going to have their country be the first one to be bombed with nuclear weapons ☢️. The symbolism is way too rich to pass up, like having Japan 🇯🇵 be the first country to be devastated in a nuclear war ☢️, it's just hauntingly poetic and kind of makes sense in some messed up way; it's like fate, even if I'm not a believer in predetermined fate or destiny. They were the first ones in the history to ever face the destructive power of nuclear weapons ☢️ first hand in the Second World War, and they'll be the first ones to face it first hand again in a potential Third World War.
Anyway, because Tokyo was nuked ☢️ and flooded, the Japanese government 🇯🇵 was forced to move the capital of the country to Fukuoka. So, Fukuoka is the capital of Japan 🇯🇵 during the main events of the Stand Alone Complex continuity, not Tokyo. We see Tokyo a lot more in SAC_2045 than we ever did in the original Stand Alone Complex, in fact, the entire finale of Season 2 and the entire series of SAC_2045 is set in Tokyo.
And we can see that, despite the city being rebuilt, it is still in ruins, and is still pretty much uninhabitable. It's not radioactive ☢️ or anything, all the radiation ☢️ from the bomb(s) is long gone. Radiation ☢️ from nuclear weapons ☢️ doesn't stick around for a long time like radiation ☢️ from nuclear reactor meltdowns ☢️ does. It's usually blown away by the winds, and dispersed so far from the blast radius that it pretty much disappears, or something along those lines. If that weren't the case, neither Hiroshima nor Nagasaki would be habitable today, which they are.
But, it also probably helped that, in the wake of the Third World War, the Japanese 🇯🇵 developed this highly advanced and highly effective nuclear scrubbing technology ☢️ that removes nuclear fallout ☢️ from any area affected by nuclear weaponry or nuclear reactor meltdowns ☢️ that was so revolutionary that it was referred to as the "Japanese Miracle 🇯🇵." They likely used this technology on Tokyo, and removed all of the radioactive fallout ☢️ from the city, and that's why it's not radioactive ☢️ anymore. But, even if they didn't develop technology, the radiation ☢️ would've still gone away on its own just like it did in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Anyway, even though Tokyo isn't radioactive ☢️ anymore, the city is still in ruins, a lot of the buildings are still bombed out hallowed out shells of their former selves, or are just piles of rubble, and large parts of the city are still underwater 💦 decades later. Despite Japan 🇯🇵 emerging from the two world wars (World War III and World War IV) as an economic superpower and one of the most dominant and influential global world powers, reconstruction efforts have stalled, due to budgetary reasons among other things. So, Tokyo still remains unsuitable for human life even in the 2040s, which the show takes place; the original Stand Alone Complex took place in the 2030s, and this show takes place 11 years after that show, so it's the mid-2040s, it's in the title, Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045.
The only people that do live there are refugees from the wars, as well as construction workers who are participating in the reconstruction effort. And of course, it becomes the staging ground, the epicenter of Takeshi's project to create a singularity that would unite humans, cyborgs, and post-humans together and allow them to live together in harmony, or allow them all to live in their own little idealized fantasy worlds completely disconnected from reality, or something like that. I still don't really understand Takeshi's plan, or what he really does at the end. Like I said in the review, the ending of SAC_2045 makes very little sense, and I doubt any amount of rewatches would actually help it make more sense. In my opinion, it was confusing just for the sake of being confusing, and I hate endings like that.
My guess is that had to do with the impact of the bomb(s) in nearby waters 💦 like Tokyo Bay causing massive tidal waves 🌊, or the bomb(s) hit a dam or a sea wall causing massive flooding, or maybe it's because of global warming, who knows? This makes it the first Japanese city 🇯🇵 to be hit by a nuclear bomb ☢️ since World War II, and probably the first time that nuclear weapons ☢️ had been in used in warfare since World War II. Though it's never really explicitly said whether or not Tokyo was the first city in the world to be hit with a nuclear missile ☢️ during World War III.
But symbolically, it's way too good that I doubt the writers of the original Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045 would just pass it up. These are both Japanese productions 🇯🇵, and so far, to this day, Japan 🇯🇵 in the only country in the world to be hit with nuclear weapons ☢️ during wartime. Every nuclear weapon ☢️ that has been detonated since then has just been a test.
So of course, if a bunch of Japanese writers 🇯🇵 are writing a science fiction story in-which a Third World War happens, of course they're going to have their country be the first one to be bombed with nuclear weapons ☢️. The symbolism is way too rich to pass up, like having Japan 🇯🇵 be the first country to be devastated in a nuclear war ☢️, it's just hauntingly poetic and kind of makes sense in some messed up way; it's like fate, even if I'm not a believer in predetermined fate or destiny. They were the first ones in the history to ever face the destructive power of nuclear weapons ☢️ first hand in the Second World War, and they'll be the first ones to face it first hand again in a potential Third World War.
Anyway, because Tokyo was nuked ☢️ and flooded, the Japanese government 🇯🇵 was forced to move the capital of the country to Fukuoka. So, Fukuoka is the capital of Japan 🇯🇵 during the main events of the Stand Alone Complex continuity, not Tokyo. We see Tokyo a lot more in SAC_2045 than we ever did in the original Stand Alone Complex, in fact, the entire finale of Season 2 and the entire series of SAC_2045 is set in Tokyo.
And we can see that, despite the city being rebuilt, it is still in ruins, and is still pretty much uninhabitable. It's not radioactive ☢️ or anything, all the radiation ☢️ from the bomb(s) is long gone. Radiation ☢️ from nuclear weapons ☢️ doesn't stick around for a long time like radiation ☢️ from nuclear reactor meltdowns ☢️ does. It's usually blown away by the winds, and dispersed so far from the blast radius that it pretty much disappears, or something along those lines. If that weren't the case, neither Hiroshima nor Nagasaki would be habitable today, which they are.
But, it also probably helped that, in the wake of the Third World War, the Japanese 🇯🇵 developed this highly advanced and highly effective nuclear scrubbing technology ☢️ that removes nuclear fallout ☢️ from any area affected by nuclear weaponry or nuclear reactor meltdowns ☢️ that was so revolutionary that it was referred to as the "Japanese Miracle 🇯🇵." They likely used this technology on Tokyo, and removed all of the radioactive fallout ☢️ from the city, and that's why it's not radioactive ☢️ anymore. But, even if they didn't develop technology, the radiation ☢️ would've still gone away on its own just like it did in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Anyway, even though Tokyo isn't radioactive ☢️ anymore, the city is still in ruins, a lot of the buildings are still bombed out hallowed out shells of their former selves, or are just piles of rubble, and large parts of the city are still underwater 💦 decades later. Despite Japan 🇯🇵 emerging from the two world wars (World War III and World War IV) as an economic superpower and one of the most dominant and influential global world powers, reconstruction efforts have stalled, due to budgetary reasons among other things. So, Tokyo still remains unsuitable for human life even in the 2040s, which the show takes place; the original Stand Alone Complex took place in the 2030s, and this show takes place 11 years after that show, so it's the mid-2040s, it's in the title, Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045.
The only people that do live there are refugees from the wars, as well as construction workers who are participating in the reconstruction effort. And of course, it becomes the staging ground, the epicenter of Takeshi's project to create a singularity that would unite humans, cyborgs, and post-humans together and allow them to live together in harmony, or allow them all to live in their own little idealized fantasy worlds completely disconnected from reality, or something like that. I still don't really understand Takeshi's plan, or what he really does at the end. Like I said in the review, the ending of SAC_2045 makes very little sense, and I doubt any amount of rewatches would actually help it make more sense. In my opinion, it was confusing just for the sake of being confusing, and I hate endings like that.
Is Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045 Anti-American 🚫🇺🇸?
I should probably address whether or not this show and the original show are anti-American 🚫🇺🇸. In the review, I talked about the fictional country known as the American Empire 🇺🇸, which plays a huge role in the main story of SAC_2045. The American Empire 🇺🇸 in both the original Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045 is always presented in a way that makes it seem evil, or at the very least, untrustworthy and unreliable. Like, it's always this antagonistic force that looms over Japan 🇯🇵. I talked about how the American Empire 🇺🇸 is a metaphor or an allegory for the United States 🇺🇸, and was just a way for the writer to air out their frustrations about the US 🇺🇸, and Japan 🇯🇵's relationship with the US 🇺🇸.
Why exactly are they so critical and resentful of the US 🇺🇸's close and friendly relationship with their country, Japan 🇯🇵? Well, from what it seems to me, it's because they see the relationship between Japan 🇯🇵 and the US 🇺🇸 as being unequal, and being one of subservience rather than genuine partnership. They feel that Japan 🇯🇵 is just being subservient to the United States 🇺🇸, and is therefore not a true equal partner. That seems to be the views of the writers and directors of both the original Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045, as it is a recurring theme in both shows, and is a viewpoint pretty held by all the Japanese characters 🇯🇵, at least all of the ones who are good and clean, and aren't evil or corrupt.
Of course, this is not a viewpoint that I personally own or agree with, I disagree with it tremendously. The relationship between Japan 🇯🇵 and the US 🇺🇸 is a lot more equal than people think it is. Sure, it wasn't all the equal in the beginning, but over time, the balance of power between the two has become, and Japan 🇯🇵 is actually contributing to the partnership and benefiting from it, rather than the US 🇺🇸 just being the only beneficiary.
After all, the Japanese 🇯🇵 are the ones who keep pushing for this partnership to continue. They want to be the US 🇺🇸's partner in the Asia-Pacific (or Indo-Pacific as they call it now), and they want the US 🇺🇸's protection. And this isn't even just government bureaucrats want this either, support for America 🇺🇸 is pretty high amongst the majority of the Japanese public 🇯🇵. And that support has only been increasing the threat of China 🇨🇳 is becoming a lot more apparent and a lot more paramount.
China 🇨🇳 in its current form under Xi Jinping's leadership poses a major national security threat to Japan 🇯🇵, even more than North Korea 🇰🇵, and the Japanese government and the Japanese people 🇯🇵 are starting to recognize that. The number of Japanese 🇯🇵 who genuinely dislike the partnership with the US 🇺🇸, and want Japan 🇯🇵 to completely strike out on its own, or have a more equidistant relationship with the US 🇺🇸 and other countries is pretty low.
They're in the minority on this issue, and the majority of Japanese 🇯🇵 are pro-American 🇺🇸. So, the writers (and directors) of Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045 represent a minority opinion within their own country. Especially at this point in time in-which most Japanese 🇯🇵 are more anti-China 🚫🇨🇳 now than they were 20 years ago when the original Stand Alone Complex came onto the scene. But, I'm an American 🇺🇸, so what do I know?
Of course, as I said in the review, we have to keep in mind that the America 🇺🇸 in the Stand Alone Complex continuity is not the same America 🇺🇸 in our world. That America 🇺🇸 is effectively gone, broken up into three different countries, and one of those happens to be a imperialistic, authoritarian monarchy, and that monarchic America 🇺🇸 is the one that Japan 🇯🇵 has to deal with in both series.
Barring in mind of course that Japan 🇯🇵 is also a monarchy, a constitutional monarchy. They never got rid of their emperor after World War II, they were allowed to keep their emperor by the Allies and they still have one to this day, although the emperor doesn't have any political power and is purely symbolic. In fact, the emperor really didn't have that much power, and was mostly just a figurehead during World War II. Any political power the emperor did have prior to the war was silently taken away by the militarists during the war. They invaded Manchuria, and started the war in China 🇹🇼 without the emperor's knowledge or approval, so even the emperor's authority was rendered irrelevant by the military, even though they still made the Japanese people 🇯🇵 and the Japanese troops and service members 🇯🇵 worship the emperor as a god.
I don't even know if they explicitly say in either series whether or not Japan 🇯🇵 still has an emperor by this point in the timeline of this fictional world, or if it became a republic; a republic is any country that does not have a monarchy, and the United States 🇺🇸 in our world, and in the Stand Alone Complex world prior World War III, is and was a republic. I assume that Japan 🇯🇵 still does have a monarchy in the Stand Alone Complex world, there's nothing that indicates that it doesn't.
Another thing to bear in mind too is that the emperor and the Japanese monarchy 🇯🇵 is not really in the public consciousness. You know, it's not like the British monarchy 🇬🇧, where the people think about it all the time, and it's part of the national identity. The vast majority of Japanese people 🇯🇵 don't think about the emperor in their daily lives, and the emperor doesn't contribute to the Japanese national identity 🇯🇵 the way he did during the time of the Empire.
Back then, the emperor was seen and revered as a god, a god-emperor essentially. Granted, part of that was cultivated and amplified by the militarists in power as a way of controlling the masses and controlling the servicemen in the military, and making them support the war and support Japan 🇯🇵's territorial expansion. And making them more willing to throw their lives away in support of that cause.
But in modern Japan 🇯🇵, the emperor is nothing, he means nothing. He doesn't affect anyone's lives. I imagine for a lot of ordinary Japanese 🇯🇵, the imperial family are just a bunch of weird aristocrats that are far away and distant, and don't have any baring on their lives; maybe they aren't as harsh or disparaging as I put it, but that's basically the way the Japanese people 🇯🇵 perceive the monarchy. They can just ignore them, pretend they don't exist, and just carry on with their day; after all, the emperor isn't a god, or even a demigod, but a mere mortal like the rest of them; he just has more money 💴 and wealth, and he and his family are able to live in luxury and complete opulence unlike the rest of the people.
So, it makes some sense why none of the characters in Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045 don't ever talk about the emperor or the monarchy as a whole. But, all the major characters work in government or law enforcement, so you'd think the emperor would've brought up once, but no, he wasn't. But, anyway, enough about World War II and the Empire of Japan 🇯🇵. The point is that the American Empire 🇺🇸 is not the United States 🇺🇸, and their relationship with Japan 🇯🇵 is fundamentally different from that of the United States 🇺🇸.
The politics of the Stand Alone Complex world is fundamentally different from the politics of our world. They aren't dealing with the same issues or same threats that we are. Of course they aren't, the 21st century opened with two world wars in the Stand Alone Complex continuity, and having the new millennium start with two more world wars, decades after the last two is going to result in a completely different geopolitical reality than the one that we had in the real world. Sure, we had 9/11 and the War on Terror, but that's nothing compared to World War III and World War IV, plus Sustainable War, even if Sustainable War doesn't make a whole lot of sense and was poorly explained.
North Korea 🇰🇵 doesn't even exist anymore in the Stand Alone Complex continuity by the time the main events of the original series take place. It was defeated in the Fourth World War, and the Korean Peninsula was reunified under the South Korean government 🇰🇷. So, there's only one Korea in the Stand Alone Complex continuity, and it's the Republic of Korea 🇰🇷. We know this because Korea 🇰🇷 plays a significant role in Kuze's backstory. It's the place where he kind of develops his sort of anti-war and anti-government ideology.
Where he just becomes disillusioned with everything, and he becomes a wannabe revolutionary, and becomes a "man of the people," that everyone he meets looks up to, and latches onto, and wants to be like him. That boy ♂︎ that Motoko meets in Taiwan 🇹🇼 when she's trying to investigate Kuze, and find out more about him and his life before becoming the leader of the Individual Eleven and then the leader of the refugee resistance in Dejima. He was one of the people who was inspired by Kuze after he encountered him while he was living there, and saw what he was doing and heard what he was saying.
Kuze was a soldier in the Japanese Self-Defense Forces 🇯🇵 (JSDF). Yes, it's still called the JSDF in the Stand Alone Complex world, and in pretty much every other iteration of Ghost in the Shell that features the Japanese military 🇯🇵. He was stationed in Korea 🇰🇷, in Sinŭiju, a place that's currently located in North Korea 🇰🇵 in our world, but was taken over by South Korea 🇰🇷 in World War IV in the Stand Alone Complex world, and the entire peninsula was reunified, and South Korea 🇰🇷 just became Korea 🇰🇷. Japan 🇯🇵 is elevated to an higher position in the international order than it is in our world as a result of those two world wars, and the problem of being or not being subservient to America 🇺🇸 is a bigger issue, especially since this is not the USA 🇺🇸, but a new country called the American Empire 🇺🇸.
So, we have to keep that in mind, that the writers were not writing about the US 🇺🇸, but one of its successors after it broke up after losing World War III. But at the same time, it is pretty clear that the writers created the American Empire 🇺🇸 to be an allegory for the United States 🇺🇸, and used it as a means to vent their frustrations and resentments about the United States 🇺🇸 and their foreign policy. Keep in mind, the original Stand Alone Complex was made during the post-9/11 era, and the US 🇺🇸's response to those attacks proved to be contentious.
So, we have to keep that in mind, that the writers were not writing about the US 🇺🇸, but one of its successors after it broke up after losing World War III. But at the same time, it is pretty clear that the writers created the American Empire 🇺🇸 to be an allegory for the United States 🇺🇸, and used it as a means to vent their frustrations and resentments about the United States 🇺🇸 and their foreign policy. Keep in mind, the original Stand Alone Complex was made during the post-9/11 era, and the US 🇺🇸's response to those attacks proved to be contentious.
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(The flag of Iraq 🇮🇶 during the late stages of Saddam Hussein and the Ba'ath Party's rule from 1991 to 2004. It was still used as the official national flag of Iraq 🇮🇶 after the United States 🇺🇸 invaded in 2003, and wasn't abandoned until 2004 during the occupation, when a new interim government was being formed by US bureaucrat 🇺🇸, L. Paul Bremer III, who was the de facto administrator of Iraq 🇮🇶 after the invasion happened.)
There was a huge split between the US 🇺🇸 and many other countries over the Iraq War 🇮🇶, and the decision to invade and occupy Iraq 🇮🇶, despite Iraq 🇮🇶 having nothing to really to do with the 9/11 attacks. Saddam Hussein was not at all implicated in the planning and execution of the 9/11 attacks. There was no actual evidence of his involvement. And there weren't any al-Qaeda terrorists in Iraq 🇮🇶. It wasn't until after the invasion that al-Qaeda gained a foothold into the country. So, if the justification for invading Iraq 🇮🇶 was that al-Qaeda was in the country, and Saddam was giving them safe haven, or it was to prevent al-Qaeda from gaining a foothold, then it failed. There weren't any al-Qaeda terrorists inside Iraq 🇮🇶 prior to the 2003 invasion, and the invasion and occupation gave al-Qaeda an opening that they could exploit, and expand their terrorist activities to.
But, the main justification for the war in Iraq 🇮🇶, the casus belli, was that Saddam still had chemical and biological weapon stockpiles ☣️, that he hadn't fully disarmed, and he was trying to acquire nuclear weapons ☢️. And that was bad because it posed a threat to the United States 🇺🇸, and the Bush administration wasn't willing to let that stand. But, most of the world was not convinced of the WMD (weapons of mass destruction) claim, and thus, didn't go along with the US 🇺🇸's plan to invade Iraq 🇮🇶.
The only countries that did were the United Kingdom 🇬🇧, Australia 🇦🇺, and also Poland 🇵🇱, according to Wikipedia. But, it was mainly the UK 🇬🇧 and Australia 🇦🇺 that believed the US 🇺🇸's claim that Iraq 🇮🇶 still had significant WMD stockpiles, and that Saddam might use them against the West. And they were the ones who participated in the invasion, and played the biggest role in the war besides the US 🇺🇸.
Of course, after the invasion, it was discovered that no, Iraq 🇮🇶 didn't have any WMDs. They had no chemical weapons or biological weapons ☣️, and they didn't have a nuclear weapons program ☢️. Saddam had indeed disarmed, and had lost the ability to develop any more chemical weapons ☣️, even if he wanted to. The intel that the US 🇺🇸 and the UK 🇬🇧 had used to justify going to war with Iraq 🇮🇶 was faulty, and unreliable, and they had misused it to push a war that they and their populations really wanted.
Yes, that's right, we the American people 🇺🇸 are as much to blame for the Iraq War 🇮🇶 as the Bush administration. We wanted revenge for 9/11, we wanted blood 🩸, and we had placed the blame for the attacks on the entire Middle East and on all Muslims ☪️, and we wanted to collectively punish the entire Middle East and Muslim world ☪️. And we chose to make an example out of Iraq 🇮🇶, to show that this is what happens when Islamic terrorists ☪️ attack our country.
We will invade your country, topple your government, and kill lots of your people. That's what our real intention with the war in Iraq 🇮🇶 was, and the Bush administration was just delivering on what the majority of Americans 🇺🇸 wanted after 9/11; liberal and conservative, Democrat and Republican. Iraq 🇮🇶 in some ways, was the perfect target for that sort of thing because it was a totalitarian dictatorship under the control of a ruthless and corrupt despot, who was already hated or distrusted around the world, and who we had gone to war with before, and that we wanted to get rid of anyway before the 9/11 attacks. No one would miss Saddam's regime after we had gone in and toppled it, we'd be doing the world a favor by removing him from power, and no one would oppose us imposing our will on that country, and trying to bring democracy to it, we thought. How wrong we were.
While Japan 🇯🇵 was one of the countries that supported the US 🇺🇸's invasion of Iraq 🇮🇶, there still a lot of people in the country that didn't support it, and highly critical of the invasion and the occupation, and how the Americans 🇺🇸, British 🇬🇧, and Australians 🇦🇺 were prosecuting the war. One of those Japanese people 🇯🇵 was Hayao Miyazaki, the man behind the famed anime studio, Studio Ghibli. He criticized the Iraq War 🇮🇶, and refused to attend the Oscar's and accept the award for Best Animated Picture for Spirited Away in person partially because of that war. Frankly, he used the war as an excuse not to go because he hates award shows.
That wasn't the only reason, but that was one of the reasons, and it was certainly the reason he gave for not going. And if you know anything about Miyazaki and his world view, you'll know that he is a pretty staunch anti-war and pacifist individual. He's even critical of the JSDF, and is against any expansion of it beyond what Article 9 of the post-war constitution says. So, you know he's against the recent JSDF buildup and modernization.
Though, it is important to note that Miyazaki was born during World War II, in 1941, the year the Japanese Empire 🇯🇵 attacked the United States 🇺🇸 at Pearl Harbor, prompting its entry into the war. And he came of age after the war. So, he didn't really live through the war, he didn't experience it first hand because he was far too young at the time to even comprehend what was happening.
I mean, I was alive when 9/11 happened, but I was far too young to comprehend what happened that day (I was born in early December 1998, and I was still 2 years old when 9/11 happened), and don't have any memories of it myself. I didn't experience that day the way my parents, grandparents, aunt, or even sisters did. And I don't have real memories of the Iraq War 🇮🇶 or the War in Afghanistan 🇦🇫, other than that they were things I heard about on the news occasionally. I didn't form any real opinions on those wars until I was much older, in my 20s, after those wars were already over. The War in Afghanistan 🇦🇫 just barely ended two years ago, in 2021.
That wasn't the only reason, but that was one of the reasons, and it was certainly the reason he gave for not going. And if you know anything about Miyazaki and his world view, you'll know that he is a pretty staunch anti-war and pacifist individual. He's even critical of the JSDF, and is against any expansion of it beyond what Article 9 of the post-war constitution says. So, you know he's against the recent JSDF buildup and modernization.
Though, it is important to note that Miyazaki was born during World War II, in 1941, the year the Japanese Empire 🇯🇵 attacked the United States 🇺🇸 at Pearl Harbor, prompting its entry into the war. And he came of age after the war. So, he didn't really live through the war, he didn't experience it first hand because he was far too young at the time to even comprehend what was happening.
I mean, I was alive when 9/11 happened, but I was far too young to comprehend what happened that day (I was born in early December 1998, and I was still 2 years old when 9/11 happened), and don't have any memories of it myself. I didn't experience that day the way my parents, grandparents, aunt, or even sisters did. And I don't have real memories of the Iraq War 🇮🇶 or the War in Afghanistan 🇦🇫, other than that they were things I heard about on the news occasionally. I didn't form any real opinions on those wars until I was much older, in my 20s, after those wars were already over. The War in Afghanistan 🇦🇫 just barely ended two years ago, in 2021.
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(This is the flag of the Empire of Japan 🇯🇵. It was first adopted in 1870, and was used by the Empire until 1947, when the Empire was formally ended. But, the flag was still used by Japan 🇯🇵 even after it adopted a new constitution, and formally ended its empire. It was used up until the year 1999, when a new flag was adopted, which looked pretty much the same except that the flag was a little bit wider, and the red on the sun symbol was a brighter red than the one on this one.)
So, any criticisms that Miyazaki has towards Japan 🇯🇵's actions before and during World War II, were from things he learned later on in life, rather than from things he experienced first hand. You know, he wasn't like Ishirō Honda where he was old enough to serve in the Imperial Japanese military 🇯🇵, and saw what the Imperial Japanese Army 🇯🇵 was doing in China 🇹🇼 for example; and China 🇹🇼 was the place where the Imperial Japanese military 🇯🇵 committed its worst atrocities. And he wasn't old enough to actual view what Japan 🇯🇵 was doing from a far back at home, or read about it in the newspaper 📰, and actually form an opinion on it. The only thing he did experience during the war was the fire bombings of Japan 🇯🇵🔥 by the United States 🇺🇸, which happened later on in the war in 1944 and 1945 when the Allies gained the upper hand against Japan 🇯🇵, and remain controversial to this day. They are the one thing that he does actually have memories of. He would've been like 3 or 4 years old at the time. But, for the most part, he's apart of the post-war generation in Japan 🇯🇵.
(This is the flag of the Republic of China 🇹🇼. It was first adopted in the year 1928 as the official flag of mainland China. And it was used by the Republic of China government under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang Party, up until 1948 when they were defeated by the communists ☭ led by Mao Zedong, and were forced to flee to Taiwan. That's why I used the Taiwan flag emoji 🇹🇼 to represent China when I was talking about the war in China, which is called the Second Sino-Japanese War 🇹🇼🇯🇵 started in 1937 and ended in 1945 at the same time as World War II. The Second Sino-Japanese War 🇹🇼🇯🇵 was apart of World War II, but also kind of its own separate war since it started two years before the mostly agreed upon start year for World War II, which is 1939. That was the flag used by China at the time before Mao and the communists ☭ took over, and established the People's Republic of China 🇨🇳. So, why is this also the flag and flag emoji of Taiwan? Because Taiwan 🇹🇼 is ruled by the Republic of China. It's technically the same government that controlled the mainland during the Interwar Period and during World War II and the Second Sino-Japanese War 🇹🇼🇯🇵. They just reestablished it on Taiwan after they fled the mainland because they had hoped they could regroup, and reconstitute themselves, and then launch a counteroffensive to retake the mainland from Mao. Of course, that never happened, and so the Republic of China 🇹🇼 remains on Taiwan to this day, which is why this 🇹🇼 is the flag emoji for Taiwan, and why China 🇨🇳 so desperately wants to conquer Taiwan 🇹🇼. So, that they can destroy this government that they've wanted to take down for so long. Any war between China 🇨🇳 and Taiwan 🇹🇼 in the future will likely be seen by the Chinese Communist Party 🇨🇳☭ as a continuation of the Chinese Civil War 🇨🇳🇹🇼. They'll certainly frame it that way for their domestic audience, the Chinese people 🇨🇳.)
I obviously don't agree with Miyazaki's beliefs about the JSDF or even his extreme pacifist stance. Obviously, the JSDF is nothing like the Imperial military, and it would be disingenuous to insulate that they are. I think it's pretty naïve and shortsighted, and ignores the current threats that Japan 🇯🇵 faces, the current hostile environment that Japan 🇯🇵 exists in. Japan 🇯🇵 is surrounded by some pretty dangerous potentially hostile neighbors including North Korea 🇰🇵, Russia 🇷🇺, and China 🇨🇳. The only friendly neighbors it really has are South Korea 🇰🇷 and Taiwan 🇹🇼, and also the Philippines 🇵🇭, but the Philippines 🇵🇭 is further away from Japan 🇯🇵's periphery than South Korea 🇰🇷 or Taiwan 🇹🇼 are.
Anyway, so Miyazaki is one anime director who is critical of American foreign policy 🇺🇸, and was critical of post-9/11 American foreign policy 🇺🇸, and it's clear that the writers and directors of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045 were too. I mean, not only did they put a much greater emphasis on terrorism than previous iterations of Ghost in the Shell, but they also included a fictional country that was clearly meant to be a stand-in for the United States 🇺🇸. The American Empire 🇺🇸 was their way of criticizing the US 🇺🇸 without offending any American audiences 🇺🇸.
So, while the American Empire 🇺🇸 is not the US 🇺🇸, and has different lore and history, it is still ultimately an allegory of the US 🇺🇸, and is there to provide a way for the writers to express their own opinions about the US 🇺🇸 in a way that isn't too controversial and won't upset the shows' biggest overseas audience.
So are Stand Alone Complex and SAC_2045 anti-American 🚫🇺🇸? Yes kind of, but they aren't so anti-American 🚫🇺🇸 that an American viewer 🇺🇸 couldn't enjoy either series and would be alienated by them; maybe you won't get any enjoyment out of SAC_2045, but you get my point. They give you enough wiggle room and enough deniability that you don't have to see the American Empire 🇺🇸 as a metaphor for the US 🇺🇸, and instead see it as its own country within this fictional world. Like, "Sure, it's called the American Empire 🇺🇸, and it is an American state 🇺🇸, but it's not the United States of America 🇺🇸. That's not our country, we aren't like that, and we'll never be like that." And to be fair, neither show is pro-Russia 🇷🇺 or pro-China 🇨🇳, like Russia 🇷🇺 is portrayed just as negatively as the American Empire 🇺🇸 is.
Even if Russia 🇷🇺 is portrayed as being more technologically advanced and militarily capable than it actually is in our world. Like, you’re telling me that the same Russian Federation 🇷🇺 that’s struggling in Ukraine 🇺🇦, and can’t actually achieve a military victory on its own because of its bad tactics, bad strategy, bad logistics, and outdated technology, and has to wait and hope that Donald Trump gets re-elected as President of the United States 🇺🇸 in 2024 to achieve some sort of political victory, somehow defeated the United States 🇺🇸 alongside China 🇨🇳 in a Third World War in this fictional cyberpunk alternate history world? Yeah, sure buddy. That’d be about as believable as the United States 🇺🇸 losing to North Korea 🇰🇵 in World War III, or World War IV in the case of Stand Alone Complex.
At least, Stand Alone Complex was a little bit more realistic in how it portrayed North Korea 🇰🇵, and how it would actually perform in a world war if another one ever happened. They lost, and their regime was dissolved, and South Korea 🇰🇷 just rolled in and absorbed the north. That’s what would probably happen to North Korea 🇰🇵 if another Korean War 🇰🇵🇰🇷 happened, or if another world war happened and Korea was caught in the middle. Even if in Stand Alone Complex, they refer to World War IV as "Non-nuclear World War IV," and the idea of North Korea 🇰🇵 being involved in a world war, and it not going nuclear ☢️ is pretty far-fetched. But, it’s even more unrealistic to suggest that Russia 🇷🇺 would win World War III, given what we know about it today.
Russia 🇷🇺 is not an equal to the United States 🇺🇸, or even China 🇨🇳 for that matter. They’re an equal to North Korea 🇰🇵 in more ways than you might think. As the military analyst YouTuber, Lazerpig 🐖 said, they’re both technologically backwards nations that pretend that their capital cities represent the living standards of their entire countries, they both have leaders who their populations pretty much worship as gods, and both have populations who have been deluded into thinking that their country is the best and that everyone else is jealous of them.
They both act like cartoonish supervillains on the world stage, and they embellish their military capabilities with propaganda, expensive military projects only designed to intimidate the United States 🇺🇸 that they can’t actually deliver on and aren’t impressive as their propaganda says, and training exercises that look impressive to people who don’t actually know how war works. All in a desperate attempt to be taken seriously. No wonder Russia 🇷🇺 and North Korea 🇰🇵 are such good friends now.
The only reason we ever thought Russia 🇷🇺 was an equal to the United States 🇺🇸 in terms of military strength is that Russia 🇷🇺 used to be the Soviet Union ☭. The Soviet Union ☭ was a superpower, so obviously the Russian Federation 🇷🇺 must be one too. They have the world's largest nuclear weapon stockpile ☢️ after all. They must be a superpower, the West thought. But, also because we believed the propaganda that the Russians 🇷🇺 themselves were force feeding us, trying to fool us into thinking their military was more powerful and impressive than it actually is. And succeeding at it I might add. You know, at least until they decided to invade Ukraine 🇺🇦, and inadvertently obliterated their own myth.
So, the Russia 🇷🇺 in Stand Alone Complex is basically a cartoon fantasy version of Russia 🇷🇺, what we thought Russia 🇷🇺 was before the invasion of Ukraine 🇺🇦, what the Kremlin still wants us to think Russia 🇷🇺 is, and what the writers wanted Russia 🇷🇺 to be for the sake of lore. But, maybe if Stand Alone Complex had been made now, after the war in Ukraine 🇺🇦 started, they would’ve portrayed Russia 🇷🇺 differently. But, as it stands, SAC_2045 maintains this unrealistic portrayal of Russia 🇷🇺 that Stand Alone Complex started. But to be fair, SAC_2045 did come out before the war in Ukraine 🇺🇦 started, so it’s a bit more excusable.
The only country that you could make the case for that both shows have a positive opinion about, it's China 🇨🇳. But, I still wouldn't say they are pro-China 🇨🇳. Sure, the female Japanese prime minister 🇯🇵♀︎ in 2nd GiG, Yoko Kayabuki is pro-China 🇨🇳, or at least, she's more neutral and dovish about China 🇨🇳 than any of her contemporaries.
She's certainly accused of being pro-China 🇨🇳 throughout the season by her enemies in the government such as Chief Cabinet Secretary, Takakura, who was colluding with Gōda, and tried to depose Kayabuki in a coup. She wants her country to have a friendlier relationship with China 🇨🇳 instead of the American Empire 🇺🇸, or at least have an equidistant relationship with both countries; not picking a side, and instead, maintain good relations with both, and forge their own independent path rather than be subservient to either.
But the shows themselves are not pro-China 🇨🇳. I would say they're more neutral about China 🇨🇳 than anything else, and Kayabuki probably represents the writers' and directors' viewpoint about China 🇨🇳 the most accurately. The original series was made in the 2000s. Japan 🇯🇵 still had a positive relationship with China 🇨🇳, and Japanese people 🇯🇵 still had a pretty positive view of China 🇨🇳.
So, this wasn't as unthinkable of an opinion to have or to express as it is now. Had that show been made now, that might've been different. Perhaps they would've portrayed China 🇨🇳 more negatively. But, SAC_2045 kept this neutral viewpoint of China 🇨🇳 despite it airing from 2020 to 2022, when relations between Japan 🇯🇵 and China 🇨🇳 were really starting to deteriorate.
I mean, they were getting worse before that, especially when Shinzō Abe was prime minister. But, they really went off the deep end around the COVID 🦠 and post-COVID timeframe, when relations between China 🇨🇳 and the US 🇺🇸 were getting worse, China 🇨🇳's economic situation was getting worse, tensions over Taiwan 🇹🇼 were increasing, tensions over the South China Sea were increasing, and more and more countries started decoupling or "derisking" from China 🇨🇳.
Maybe, they just wanted to continue on with the politics of that world, and didn't want the show to reflect the current day politics of our world. But, like I said, the original show was a reflection of the politics of the time it was made, so that doesn't make any sense. Who knows? Maybe, the writers (and directors) are pro-China 🇨🇳 themselves.
The only country that you could make the case for that both shows have a positive opinion about, it's China 🇨🇳. But, I still wouldn't say they are pro-China 🇨🇳. Sure, the female Japanese prime minister 🇯🇵♀︎ in 2nd GiG, Yoko Kayabuki is pro-China 🇨🇳, or at least, she's more neutral and dovish about China 🇨🇳 than any of her contemporaries.
She's certainly accused of being pro-China 🇨🇳 throughout the season by her enemies in the government such as Chief Cabinet Secretary, Takakura, who was colluding with Gōda, and tried to depose Kayabuki in a coup. She wants her country to have a friendlier relationship with China 🇨🇳 instead of the American Empire 🇺🇸, or at least have an equidistant relationship with both countries; not picking a side, and instead, maintain good relations with both, and forge their own independent path rather than be subservient to either.
But the shows themselves are not pro-China 🇨🇳. I would say they're more neutral about China 🇨🇳 than anything else, and Kayabuki probably represents the writers' and directors' viewpoint about China 🇨🇳 the most accurately. The original series was made in the 2000s. Japan 🇯🇵 still had a positive relationship with China 🇨🇳, and Japanese people 🇯🇵 still had a pretty positive view of China 🇨🇳.
So, this wasn't as unthinkable of an opinion to have or to express as it is now. Had that show been made now, that might've been different. Perhaps they would've portrayed China 🇨🇳 more negatively. But, SAC_2045 kept this neutral viewpoint of China 🇨🇳 despite it airing from 2020 to 2022, when relations between Japan 🇯🇵 and China 🇨🇳 were really starting to deteriorate.
I mean, they were getting worse before that, especially when Shinzō Abe was prime minister. But, they really went off the deep end around the COVID 🦠 and post-COVID timeframe, when relations between China 🇨🇳 and the US 🇺🇸 were getting worse, China 🇨🇳's economic situation was getting worse, tensions over Taiwan 🇹🇼 were increasing, tensions over the South China Sea were increasing, and more and more countries started decoupling or "derisking" from China 🇨🇳.
Maybe, they just wanted to continue on with the politics of that world, and didn't want the show to reflect the current day politics of our world. But, like I said, the original show was a reflection of the politics of the time it was made, so that doesn't make any sense. Who knows? Maybe, the writers (and directors) are pro-China 🇨🇳 themselves.
Why is there a character in SAC_2045 named Agent Smith?
I should also briefly touch on the whole Agent Smith thing. The reason why I rolled my eyes 🙄 at the writers naming a character in the show Agent Smith is because there is a character named Agent Smith in The Matrix tetralogy. For those unaware, the Matrix films were heavily inspired by Ghost in the Shell, specifically the 1995 movie by Mamoru Oshii, the one I don't really like 😒. So, the writers of SAC_2045 naming a character John Smith, and making him an NSA agent, and thus making him Agent Smith was clearly meant to be a nod to The Matrix, tipping your hat to a franchise that took inspiration from you.
But, they didn't just stop at simply naming him Smith, they also made him look like Agent Smith, right down to the suit, tie, his slicked back hair, and of course, those black sunglasses, that he wears even indoors. The only thing that separates John Smith from Agent Smith is his voice. The English voice actor for John Smith, Roger Craig Smith (oh man, the layers of Smith go even deeper) didn't try to replicate Hugo Weaving's voice for Agent Smith, that very monotone and intimidating voice. Instead, he sounds like a more monotone and serious Chris Redfield from the Resident Evil franchise, like if Chris Redfield chose to become a spy (or spook as they call in the business) instead of a soldier.
Now, a lot of people hated this character, and thought that it was ill-advised from the start. They especially took issue with them simply naming him Smith and making him such an obvious Matrix reference. One reviewer said that if he had just been background character or just a one-off cameo role, then they wouldn't have had a problem with him, but the fact that they made him such an important character made them dislike him. Now, I do think the reference is a little too on the nose, and it does kind of take you out of the show to have a character who is so clearly modeled after Agent Smith from The Matrix. Despite The Matrix being inspired by Ghost in the Shell, these two franchises really aren't all that like. In all honesty, The Matrix has a lot more in common with things like Terminator, Akira, and Serial Experiment Lain than it does Ghost in the Shell.
The Matrix mostly just took basic aesthetics and some basic mechanics from Ghost in the Shell like the idea of plugging stuff in the back of your head or neck in the case of Ghost in the Shell, or the idea of a virtual self transcending the physical body, or the idea of being able to learn skills instantaneously thanks to cybernetics and digital technology, and of course, the green text that's in the original unaltered version of the 95 movie; the extremely unpopular remastered and re-animated version of the movie called Ghost in the Shell 2.0 removed all of the green text and green coloring from the film and replaced it with oranges, reds, and yellows to match the colors and aesthetic of Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, which also directed by Mamoru Oshii, and released around the same time as Ghost in the Shell 2.0.
(This is a poster wallpaper for Ghost in the Shell 2.0, the remastered and reanimated version of the 1995 Ghost in the Shell movie by Mamoru Oshii. A lot of Ghost in the Shell fans hate it because it replaced a lot of the traditional hand-drawn animation with 3D CGI animation. It's sort of like what the Special Editions of the Original Trilogy of Star Wars are to the Star Wars franchise and the Star Wars fan community, or that equally unpopular 20th anniversary re-release of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial that also had CGI effects added to certain scenes. That's the only version of E.T. I've seen by the way. I haven't seen the unaltered version that everyone likes better than 2002 version, including Steven Spielberg himself. The 2002 re-edited version of E.T. is sort of lost media now since you can't really find it anyway, unless you still have your copy of the DVD release 📀 back in the early-to-mid 2000s. Even though, for a while, it was the only version you could find, until all the fan backlash forced them to restore the unaltered 1982 version, and bury this maligned 2002 version. Kind of like what also happened to Ghost in the Shell 2.0 honestly. 2.0 was the only version of the film you could find for a while. The backlash against the additional CGI animation forced the distributors and filmmakers to go back and restore the unaltered 1995 movie, and bury 2.0, and pretend it doesn't exist. No one, not even Oshii himself acknowledges 2.0's existence, even though he was the one who signed off on all the changes, and was the one who wanted to make the changes in the first place. It's a version of the movie that everyone just agreed to never mention again. But, not me, I'll still remember it, and still mention. Just like I'll keep remembering and mention the 2002 version of E.T.. So, now, the only place you can find 2.0 is Best Buy, at least, until they finally gut their physical media section, and stop selling Blu-Rays 💿 all together.)
Ghost in the Shell in all honesty has a lot more in common with things like Blade Runner and Johnny Mnemonic than it does The Matrix, and Blade Runner also served as a primary inspiration for The Matrix as well. Stand Alone Complex in particular is a lot closer to a Tom Clancy novel than The Matrix. I'll put it like this, Stand Alone Complex is like a mixture of the show, 24, the action drama show with Kiefer Sutherland, and Blade Runner. It's basically a sci-fi version of 24. Parts of SAC_2045 feel like Call of Duty mixed with The Expendables mixed with Mad Max.
One scene in the fifth episode of Season 1 reminded me a lot of Independence Day, particularly the parts in that movie set in Area 51. The characters go to Area 51 in the first season, escorted there by Smith, and that's where they're introduced to the idea of post-humans; that billionaire post-human guy that they fought and killed in that mansion in Palm Springs doesn't count as an introduction. They see that one post-human guy that the Imperial American military 🇺🇸 and the NSA managed to capture, the one that used to be a Navy SEAL or a Green Beret or whatever.
Even the part where the military post-human hacks into the facility's computer system and takes control of the robot security guards, and uses them to try to break himself out while Batou and Motoko try to hold them back is sort of like that scene in Independence Day where Dr. Okun (the guy played by Brent Spiner) and those other Area 51 doctors are trying to dissect that alien that Steven Hiller (Will Smith's character in that movie) brought over, and the alien tries breaking out by telepathically taking over Okun's mind.
It's a lot like saying Dune inspired Star Wars. Yes, Star Wars took a lot of inspiration from Dune, a lot of concepts, imagery, and iconography from Dune, but fundamentally, they are completely different things and don't really have that much in common besides superficial surface level stuff. Dune is a political drama set in space, and is essentially an allegory and satire of the West's exploitation of the Middle East, particularly their extraction of oil 🛢️ (the spice is literally just a stand-in for oil 🛢️), whereas Star Wars is a space opera adventure series, that does have politics yes, but it isn't purely a political drama in the way Dune is.
The Star Wars Prequel Trilogy sort of tried to dabble into political drama, so did Andor and The Clone Wars series a little bit, but the franchise never lost sight of the fact that it was a space adventure series at the end of the day; whether it was under George Lucas or under Disney. Star Wars is simply way more pulpy than Dune ever was.
Anyway, going back to Smith, my biggest issue with the character besides the on-nose reference and nod and wink at the audience 😉, is that he was ultimately a superfluous character. They want you to believe that he's this big important character when he's introduced and whenever he shows up in Season 1, and will perhaps even be the main antagonist. But, in the end, he proves to a completely useless and pointless character that the writers might as well not have even bothered with.
Like I said in the review, he gets tossed aside in the first half of Season 2 and is cryogenically frozen 🥶 for most of it. And when Motoko decides to thaw him out in the final episode to prove if she's actually in the real world or not, he just throws up 🤮, and freaks out at seeing Motoko again because she's the one who put him there in the first place, and then Motoko just leaves that prison, and then we never see Smith ever again. That to me is so frustrating. If you're going to introduce a character like that in a show or movie or video game, you better deliver on that character and make them actually matter to the story, otherwise you're just wasting everybody's time, and that's exactly what the writers of this show did with John Smith.
One scene in the fifth episode of Season 1 reminded me a lot of Independence Day, particularly the parts in that movie set in Area 51. The characters go to Area 51 in the first season, escorted there by Smith, and that's where they're introduced to the idea of post-humans; that billionaire post-human guy that they fought and killed in that mansion in Palm Springs doesn't count as an introduction. They see that one post-human guy that the Imperial American military 🇺🇸 and the NSA managed to capture, the one that used to be a Navy SEAL or a Green Beret or whatever.
Even the part where the military post-human hacks into the facility's computer system and takes control of the robot security guards, and uses them to try to break himself out while Batou and Motoko try to hold them back is sort of like that scene in Independence Day where Dr. Okun (the guy played by Brent Spiner) and those other Area 51 doctors are trying to dissect that alien that Steven Hiller (Will Smith's character in that movie) brought over, and the alien tries breaking out by telepathically taking over Okun's mind.
It's a lot like saying Dune inspired Star Wars. Yes, Star Wars took a lot of inspiration from Dune, a lot of concepts, imagery, and iconography from Dune, but fundamentally, they are completely different things and don't really have that much in common besides superficial surface level stuff. Dune is a political drama set in space, and is essentially an allegory and satire of the West's exploitation of the Middle East, particularly their extraction of oil 🛢️ (the spice is literally just a stand-in for oil 🛢️), whereas Star Wars is a space opera adventure series, that does have politics yes, but it isn't purely a political drama in the way Dune is.
The Star Wars Prequel Trilogy sort of tried to dabble into political drama, so did Andor and The Clone Wars series a little bit, but the franchise never lost sight of the fact that it was a space adventure series at the end of the day; whether it was under George Lucas or under Disney. Star Wars is simply way more pulpy than Dune ever was.
Anyway, going back to Smith, my biggest issue with the character besides the on-nose reference and nod and wink at the audience 😉, is that he was ultimately a superfluous character. They want you to believe that he's this big important character when he's introduced and whenever he shows up in Season 1, and will perhaps even be the main antagonist. But, in the end, he proves to a completely useless and pointless character that the writers might as well not have even bothered with.
Like I said in the review, he gets tossed aside in the first half of Season 2 and is cryogenically frozen 🥶 for most of it. And when Motoko decides to thaw him out in the final episode to prove if she's actually in the real world or not, he just throws up 🤮, and freaks out at seeing Motoko again because she's the one who put him there in the first place, and then Motoko just leaves that prison, and then we never see Smith ever again. That to me is so frustrating. If you're going to introduce a character like that in a show or movie or video game, you better deliver on that character and make them actually matter to the story, otherwise you're just wasting everybody's time, and that's exactly what the writers of this show did with John Smith.
What's the deal with the Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷?
In the review, I mentioned the Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷, and kind of went off on a tangent and talked about them in length, I'll link some videos that go into those wars a little bit more in-depth than I was able to do without disrupting the flow of the review too much. The first one is a PBS Frontline documentary talking about the tire company 🛞, Firestone and their role in Liberian politics 🇱🇷 and their role in the Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷.
Basically, Firestone has this long-standing business relationship with the Liberian government 🇱🇷, where the Liberians 🇱🇷 would give Firestone unfettered access to their land to use to plant rubber trees in massive plantations to extract natural latex from to make natural rubber to make tires 🛞. They ended up playing a crucial role in the First Liberian Civil War 🇱🇷, aiding and giving comfort to Charles Taylor and his rebel forces, and providing him the financial and material means 💵🌾⛽️ to defeat the interim government in Monrovia (the capital), and take over the country.
It's very fascinating and shocking stuff, and it kind of makes you hate Firestone, and not want to buy tires 🛞 from them, knowing they aided and abetted a ruthless warlord who had no qualms about recruiting and using child soldiers, and helped him get into power, and helped him wage war in Liberia 🇱🇷, and outside Liberia 🇱🇷 in neighboring countries like Sierra Leone 🇸🇱 and Guinea 🇬🇳. All while they themselves profited from it all 🤑, profiting from the death and suffering of ordinary Liberians 🇱🇷, Sierra Leoneans 🇸🇱, and Guineans 🇬🇳 that they were complicit in by enabling Taylor and his fake self-declared government. So, that documentary is worth a watch.
Some other videos that are worth checking out about this topic are by the YouTube channel, The Front, which is a history channel focuses on war and military history. They do a lot of videos about World War II, the most popular war in history, but do branch out and talk about other wars too, including many African wars. So, their two-part video about the Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷 focuses a lot more on the wars themselves than the Frontline documentary does, and it mentions some of the infamous generals who had bizarre and outlandish names like General Butt Naked 🍑, General Mosquito 🦟, and General Mosquito Spray 🦟💨. All of whom were involved in the Second Liberian Civil War 🇱🇷, the one that was a rebellion against Charles Taylor himself.
He started out as a rebel leader, and once he won the first civil war, he became a dictator, supporting the rebel side in the Sierra Leone Civil War 🇸🇱, and committing several war crimes along the way. The Liberian military 🇱🇷 was directly involved in the Sierra Leone Civil War 🇸🇱 once Taylor took control, and his support for the RUF (Revolutionary United Front), the main rebel faction went beyond just funding and material support. But, even before he got into power, Taylor was still supporting the RUF. His rebel group, the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) 🇱🇷 heavily supported the RUF during the first few years of the Sierra Leone Civil War 🇸🇱 and the First Liberian Civil War 🇱🇷.
And if you know anything about the civil war in Sierra Leone 🇸🇱, you'll know that RUF was pretty synonymous with war crimes and crimes against humanity, including raping and dismembering civilians, using child soldiers, and practicing cannibalism. The NPFL did many of the same things, rape, maim, torture, and kill civilians, use child soldiers, and engage in cannibalism; pretty much all sides in both Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷 engaged in cannibalism. But, they also engaged in sexual slavery and committed acts of genocide, as they targeted and killed civilians based on ethnic considerations. So, basically crimes against humanity. That's why Taylor was ultimately arrested by the UN 🇺🇳 and convicted by the ICC ⚖️ in The Hague for his involvement in the Sierra Leone Civil War 🇸🇱. He is currently serving a 50 year prison sentence.
Then several Liberians 🇱🇷 formed rebel groups to oppose him and his regime, and attacked from Guinea 🇬🇳. The Guinean government 🇬🇳 supported the anti-Taylor rebels—many of whom were exiled to Guinea 🇬🇳 or fled there after Taylor took control of Liberia 🇱🇷—and let them use their country as a staging ground to launch an invasion of Liberia 🇱🇷 against Taylor's regime. It's all very convoluted and complicated, but you'll learn about it from the videos I have linked below. And you know what? I'll even include a clip from that poker episode ♠️♣️♥️♦️ of 2nd GiG where Saito tells his backstory so you can see what I was talking about earlier.
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Link to the Wikipedia talking about the KGC and the Golden Circle 🟡:
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Link to the PBS Frontline documentary on Firestone's role in the Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷:
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Links to the Front's multi-part video talking about the Liberian Civil Wars 🇱🇷:
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A clip from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex – 2nd GiG showing Saito's flashback from Mexico 🇲🇽:
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Update (Monday December 11, 2023):
🇷🇺🇯🇵
(These are maps of the Kuril Islands. The one on top shows the islands with their Russian names, and also has red lines that divide the islands and show how many of them that Japan 🇯🇵 gained control over after each agreement or territorial change. The first treaty, the Shimoda Treaty in 1855 ceded control of the southernmost islands, the same islands that they claim to this day. The second treaty, the Treaty of Saint Petersburg in 1875 gave Japan 🇯🇵 all of the Kuril Islands, which they would have until 1945. That brings us to the third and final red line, the 1945 line, which shows the de facto situation. Russia 🇷🇺 has full control over these islands, a carryover from the Soviet Union ☭, but Japan 🇯🇵 claims the southernmost islands, the ones they first gained in the Shimoda Treaty. The second map shows the four islands that Japan 🇯🇵 claims and Russia 🇷🇺 has de facto control over more closely. It gives us a closer look at these islands. The biggest of these islands is Iturup or Etorofu, and the smallest islands are the Habomai Islands. Japan 🇯🇵 claims them as part of Hokkaido Prefecture, and Russia 🇷🇺 claims and administers them as part of the Sakhalin Oblast.)
Another thing I forgot to mention about Russia 🇷🇺 is that in the Stand Alone Complex continuity, Russia 🇷🇺 actually gave back the four Kuril Islands that Japan 🇯🇵 claims, Iturup or Etorofu as the Japanese 🇯🇵 call it, Kunashir or Kunashiri as the Japanese 🇯🇵 call it, Shikotan, and Habomai. This is a territorial dispute that has persisted since the Second World War, when the Soviet Union ☭ officially gained control of the Kuril Islands from the Japanese Empire 🇯🇵.
Russia 🇷🇺 still has de facto control of all the islands to this day in our timeline (in our world), but Japan 🇯🇵 claims those four islands that I just named, which are in the southern part of the Kuril Islands archipelago. But in the world and timeline that was created for Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045, Russia 🇷🇺 actually gave those islands back to Japan 🇯🇵.
Like, that territorial dispute is resolved, and Japan 🇯🇵 has full control of those islands, both de facto and de jure. However, in the show, there is still a small Russian population 🇷🇺 that remains on the islands, particularly Etorofu AKA Iturup (that's the Russian name 🇷🇺 BTW if you hadn't noticed), which is the largest island. Even as the islands (mostly Etorofu) were repopulated with a Japanese majority 🇯🇵 that migrated to them, particularly Etorofu since it's the largest and most hospitable of the four islands.
In the show, Etorofu was portrayed as this sort of industrial area, like the city, Shana (known in Russian as Kurilsk) is super industrialized city with some brutalist architecture to boot; likely to show the Russian influence 🇷🇺 on the island. It's never really shown to be a particularly pleasant or desirable place to live, which begs the question how the Japanese government 🇯🇵 got people to live there in the first place after getting it back from the Russians 🇷🇺.
This was especially the case when Etorofu was shown in Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, one of the truly visually stunning parts of that movie.And the islands are often treated as this nexus between Russia 🇷🇺 and Japan 🇯🇵, where Japanese 🇯🇵 and Russians 🇷🇺 can meet, like that dead Russian mafia guy 🇷🇺 who was being puppeteered by Gōda and his men who gave that case to Kuze that he thought had weapon grades plutonium inside of it, but was actually completely empty.
Now, this part of the lore is also pretty unrealistic. Like, it makes Russia 🇷🇺 seem more generous and more understanding than they really are. Like, the Russians 🇷🇺 were just willing to hear the Japanese 🇯🇵 out, and were willing to concede these territories to them. That would never happen. There's no way that the Russians 🇷🇺 would just sign an agreement with the Japanese 🇯🇵, and then just hand those islands to them.
The Russians 🇷🇺 wanted to keep as much territory as they could, and they were willing to fight tooth and nail to keep the territory they had, and fight tooth and nail to get back the territory. I mean, they literally fought a war to keep Chechnya inside of Russia 🇷🇺, and then they annexed Crimea and invaded Ukraine 🇺🇦 because they used to be apart of their empire. That should tell how much the Russians 🇷🇺 carry about their territory, and how unwilling they are to give even a single inch of it.
If the Russians 🇷🇺 gave up those four islands in the Kuril Islands archipelago to the Japanese 🇯🇵, then it would sort of show weakness. It would make other countries think that Russia 🇷🇺 isn't that committed keeping their territories, and that are willing to concede on territorial disputes. Then, those other countries would try to get their territories back from Russia 🇷🇺 that Russia 🇷🇺 took from them, and has de facto control over. So, that's another way that Stand Alone Complex's depiction of Russia 🇷🇺 is pretty inaccurate.
As I said, this is a cartoon fantasy version of Russia 🇷🇺 that has no barring on reality, and is not reflective of reality. You might say, "Well, Japan 🇯🇵 is in a stronger negotiating position that they could strong arm Russia 🇷🇺 into giving back those islands to them. Or, maybe they retook the islands from the Russians 🇷🇺 through military force during the Third World War, just like the Soviets ☭ took the islands from the Japanese 🇯🇵 during the Second World War." But, it's strongly implied that Russia 🇷🇺 gave those islands back to Japan 🇯🇵 willingly before World War III broke out.
Like, this was like during the 1990s when Russia 🇷🇺 was trying to be a democracy, and was trying to be more open and friendly with the rest of the world. It was also when Russia 🇷🇺 was at its weakest, at least until the war in Ukraine 🇺🇦. So, if there was any time that Japan 🇯🇵 could have gotten back those islands from Russia 🇷🇺 through peaceful negotiations, it was then. That's what's strongly implied in the Stand Alone Complex lore. But, that still wouldn't happen because even in the 90s under Boris Yeltsin, Russia 🇷🇺 was already launching wars of aggression, and threatening their neighbors with military force. Even when they were at their weakest, when they were at their lowest low, they were still doing that. That's how much they wanted to keep their empire.
So, they could have made this a bit more plausible by having Japan 🇯🇵 get those islands back during the war, or get them back through some post-war negotiations, like a ceasefire or a surrender. Like, if Japan 🇯🇵 defeated Russia 🇷🇺 made them capitulate and sign a peace treaty in-which they were forced to give those island back, or if Japan 🇯🇵 was on the same side as Russia 🇷🇺, and they got a deal in-which they give those four islands back to them after the war. They don't ever actually say which side Japan 🇯🇵 was on in World War III.
I'm guessing that it was probably the United States 🇺🇸's side, given that they were an ally of theirs, and still have a close, but tense relationship with the US 🇺🇸's main successor state, the American Empire 🇺🇸. But, if the US 🇺🇸 lost, then how could Japan 🇯🇵 have gotten a favorable deal from Russia 🇷🇺 in-which they got those four Kuril Islands back? So, maybe Japan 🇯🇵 could have fought on Russia 🇷🇺's side, or maybe they could've started out on the US 🇺🇸's side, and then switched to China 🇨🇳 and Russia 🇷🇺's side during the war when the tide decisively turned against the US 🇺🇸.
Or maybe, Japan 🇯🇵 could've won its own victory against Russia 🇷🇺, separate from the US 🇺🇸's defeat, and made the Russians 🇷🇺 sign a peace treaty in-which they gave up those the southernmost islands of the Kuril Islands. I'm just throwing things out there on how they could have made this idea of Japan 🇯🇵 and Russia 🇷🇺 settling the Kuril Islands dispute, and Russia 🇷🇺 returning the four islands that Japan 🇯🇵 wants back to them a little bit more realistic. After all, the only thing Russia 🇷🇺 truly seems to understand is force, or to put it a different way, you'll only get territory back from the Russians 🇷🇺 if you pry it from their cold dead hands.
But, to be fair, to the writers, they made this show and came up with the lore in the 2000s, when we really didn't have a good understanding Russia 🇷🇺, and we still had this misplaced optimism about the Russian Federation 🇷🇺 that they were better than the Soviet Union ☭ and the Russian Empire 🇷🇺 before them, and that we could negotiate and reason with them. But, there were already clear signs that Russia 🇷🇺 hadn't really changed after the fall of the Soviet Union ☭, and that it was just bad, if not worse, even in the 90s and especially in the 2000s.
So, the writers could've perhaps have done more research and fact checking to base their lore off of so that their Russia 🇷🇺 is a lot closer to the real thing, and so that they aren't perpetuating myths or misconceptions of the Russian Federation 🇷🇺. Many of which the Russians 🇷🇺 themselves promulgated with their propaganda so that other countries would be more impressed and intimidated by them.
Even if the writers didn't intend it, even if they did ultimately portray Russia 🇷🇺 in a negative light, what they ultimately wrote in their lore for Stand Alone Complex was Russian propaganda 🇷🇺. Whether it's Russia 🇷🇺 willingly giving up the four Kuril Islands to Japan 🇯🇵, or whether it's Russia 🇷🇺 being technologically and militarily capable enough to double team with China 🇨🇳 and defeat the United States 🇺🇸 in a world war, or whether it's Russia 🇷🇺 still being a superpower on equal basis with China 🇨🇳, the European Union countries 🇪🇺, and of course, the successor to the US 🇺🇸, the American Empire 🇺🇸.
The reality is that Russia 🇷🇺 is a declining power that is in denial that it's a declining power, is actually pretty technologically backwards, and militarily incompetent. As Sarcasmitron said in his latest video about Russia 🇷🇺, "the Russians 🇷🇺 are stupid, they're inept imperialists." But, it's okay because this is a made-up science fiction world. The fact that they have these inaccuracies or implausibilities baked into their lore makes it easier to separate this world from our reality, and just view as a form of escapism.
(This is a map showing the Japanese island of Hokkaido 🇯🇵, along with the four Kuril Islands that Japan 🇯🇵 claims as part of Hokkaido Prefecture.)
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Update (Monday August 5, 2024):
Update (Monday August 5, 2024):
Remember in the review how I said that Ilya Kuvshinov did the character designs in the show? Well, as it turns out, I left out a bit of information regarding his role on the show. Yes, he did provide the character designs, but some of his art is used in the show itself. Most of the time, whenever you see a photograph or a portrait of somebody, it is fully his art. Like, all of photographs of characters in the show were drawn by him. It's sort of like how in The Fairly OddParents: A New Wish, when you see a photograph or a portrait of somebody, it's in the old 2D art style of the original Fairly OddParents.
In addition to this, his artwork was utilized in the end credits sequence of Season 2. Like, they show the characters posing next to the credits, sometimes moving, but mostly standing still. The reason why I didn't comment on it until now was that I never watched the end credits of the show. I was skipped it, like I do on most shows I watch on streaming. But it wasn't until today when I finally watched the full end credits sequence because I listened to the song they used for it, "No Time to Cast Anchor" by Millennium Parade (oh, I'm sorry, I meant ꉈꀧ꒒꒒ꁄꍈꍈꀧ꒦ꉈ ꉣꅔꎡꅔꁕꁄ, silly me) which is a kick ass song BTW.
All of Millennium Parade's song contributions to this show are pretty great, even the controversial opening song for the Season 1 intro sequence, "Fly with me," but "No Time to Cast Anchor" is on a whole other level. It really slaps as the kids would say. I'm technically one of the "kids," but I don't keep up with my generation's slang or lingo. I'm pretty much out of the loop 🤷♂️.
Anyway, so, Ilya's work on the show wasn't just limited to designing the characters, they did utilize him in a few select places. I still think that the show should've had 2D animation instead of 3D animation, and that the whole show should've been in Ilya's art style though. I think a lot more people would've liked this show or wouldn't have been as hard on it if it wasn't 3D CG animated.
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Here's the end credits sequence for Season 2 featuring Ilya Kuvshinov's artwork and Millennium Parade's song "No Time to Cast Anchor":
Here's the end credits sequence for Season 2 featuring Ilya Kuvshinov's artwork and Millennium Parade's song "No Time to Cast Anchor":
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