Innocence is a sequel to the popular anime Ghost in the Shell
. And it’s a sequel that gives the lie to sequelitis: Innocence may even surpass it’s predecessor.
Fans of Ghost in the Shell will recognize Batou, who returns in the sequel as the solemn, philosophical cyborg cop. Since the disappearance of the Major, his partner, he has withdrawn further and further into himself. He’s assigned a new partner and put on a case involving robots that are killing their human owners and committing suicide.
As you might expect, this is used as an opportunity to explore some of the same themes as before. When we learn to manipulate the senses and memories of other human beings, how can you really know what’s real? What is it that makes a person human, if their body is merely a biological machine? What happens when the machines stop acting like machines, and start acting like humans?
Firefly is a TV series that ran for a single short season (12 episodes) before being canceled. The driving force behind it’s creation was Joss Whedon, and it’s received rave reviews from lots of libertarian types. As such, I thought I’d give it a try.
The series is set in the far future, focusing on the Firefly-class spacecraft Serenity and it’s crew of criminals, smugglers, and generally ornery types. One of the recurring villians is the Alliance, which did some conquering in the backstory and in the series present plays the role of overbearing, aggressive government. If that wasn’t enough to ensure a boycott from the politically-correct crowd, one of the recurring characters is a prostitute and the leading character casually shoots a cop during one of the early episodes.
Kindred: The Embraced is something I think was fairly unique in its time… a television series (or, arguably, soap opera) based on a roleplaying game. Specifically, based on White Wolf’s Storyteller system, the first game in which was Vampire: The Masquerade. As you might expect from such a humble beginning, this series wasn’t exactly the best thing on TV. Even so, it wasn’t awful.
The series lasted for 6 episodes and was not renewed. It did well enough to be issued on tape, and then reissued on DVD a few years later. I suspect most people buying the tapes and DVDs are people who like the roleplaying game, rather than people who watched the show.
Fans of the vampire genre and anime have both embraced Vampire Hunter D, the tale of a conflicted vampire hunter in a far-future world where a nobility made up of vampires rule a distinctly more supernatural and dangerous earth. A bizarre mix of magic and technology allows humans to hold their own against the monsters, but when especially powerful monsters are involved, they must turn to the specialists. Want to know about vampires? Ask a vampire hunter.
If Vampire Hunter D
was an excuse for a high “cool factor”, Bloodlust turns the cool factor up to 11 and adds moral ambiguity, a much longer runtime, better art, and much improved dialog. Perhaps the best way to describe this sequel is simply this: everything you liked about the first one is present in the sequel, and there are a lot of really good additions that bring depth and quality to the sequel. What the original could be understood to have if you read between the lines is made explicit here.
Hellsing is a fairly unique take on the vampire mythos in anime. The art is done in an unusual style, more abstract than I would normally prefer, and somewhat repetitive. The characters are intriguing if occasionally hackneyed. Although it’s hard to pack much plot into individual episodes, due to time constraints and the need for cool visuals, there is a metaplot that develops throughout the episodes that looks to be going somewhere interesting.
Ultraviolet is one of those interesting experiments that occasionally show up on British television. Mostly, I’m a fan of British Comedy; for some reason the really good britcom just hits my funnybone when a lot of more American comedy falls flat. (If you’re looking for recommendations, you can’t go wrong with BlackAdder or Red Dwarf). But sometimes something that’s not a comedy comes along and nevertheless works.
I heard about Ultraviolet by word of mouth. Friends of friends had seen it and declared it wonderful. Nobody had it, but they knew someone who knew someone who had once borrowed it. Eventually, I bought the whole set, sight-unseen, just to see what all the fuss was about. It helps that I got a basic scenario from friends, since I’m a mild vampire junkie, and while Ultraviolet never actually says “vampire”, it’s definitely about vampires.
If Kindred: The Embraced
is the Storyteller universe transferred to television, Underworld is the Storyteller universe transferred to the big screen with the serial numbers filed off. Vampires and werewolves at war with a extra helping of melodrama, all taking place under the veneer of the modern world. Unfortunately, taking that universe to the silver screen didn’t work out much better than the small screen.
This movie was portrayed as an action-adventure with “romance” as the plot motivator. It has enough action to qualify without a doubt, but it’s relatively uninspired action. The romance angle is so thin as to be meaningless; the characters supposedly “in love” are willing to buck their entire supernatural society after spending little more than a few hours together. Watching it, I struggled to retain my suspension of disbelief and ultimately failed.
Ghost in the Shell is an anime that has already attained classic status. It merges the potential for beautiful visualization with a powerful storyline exploring philosophical questions. The resulting mix is a very impressive experience, and undoubtedly one of the best examples of the anime art form.
The original dialog is, of course, in Japanese. The translation has some awkardness and occasionally renders the details of the plot hard to follow, but not in a manner that detracts from the really interesting element: exploring the idea of the soul in a world where humans are gradually replacing more and more of their bodies with machines, and even brains can be hacked and reprogrammed.