Don’t Write Off Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045 Just Yet
My expectations for Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045, the newest series in the long-running Ghost in the Shell manga and anime series, were near rock bottom after seeing one crucial caveat in the initial details. Yes, the name implied how this would be at least a sort of sequel to the superlative Ghost in the Shell: Stand-Alone Complex series, which sounded exciting despite how it wouldn’t be the 3rd Gig that was hoped for. But this being a 3DCG animated series was enough to induce panic attacks given how most previous anime examples have looked iffy at best. Land of the Lustrous is sadly still an exception to this trend.
It wasn’t illogical for me to think this could actually be on par with Land of the Lustrous. It was, after all, going to be a new installment in a long-running franchise that’s popular worldwide, which implied that its team would have a higher budget and be given more resources than those for the likes of Knights of Sidonia and especially the newest Berserk series. Those hopes were quickly dashed with the release of the first teaser, which previewed a series that will have a more, let’s say, generic style compared to some GitS predecessors, CG characters with iffy animation, and all-too-noticeably sparse backdrops. It resembled everything everyone who was taken aback at the term “3DCG” feared it would be.
Fortunately, the series looks a little better as of the first real trailer, which shows off more characters, battles, and clarifies several details regarding the staff involved. But it still no looker. The character animations and special effects leave much to be desired, and look jarringly unpolished. There’s potential for this to improve between now and the airing of the first episode, but it’s still tough not to imagine how much better the results would be with 2D animation.
The art style is also a mixed bag. Russian artist Ilya Kuvshinov’s character designs aren’t bad (despite many of his faces looking too similar, especially on his older artwork), but they weren’t the kind that could transfer over to CG smoothly; notice how they look much better in the promotional artworks. The style is closer to Arise rather than the GitS animated movies and the old SAC series, the latter of which are preferred by westerners thanks to being atypical for modern anime.
There are reasons why CG was chosen over 2D animation, which will start happening more with anime over the next several years. Production of animation driven by computer graphics is more expensive, but it’s easier to produce for overworked animators compared to hand-drawn work. There’s also a larger talent pool for CG these days, the consequence of most animation schools no longer teaching students how to hand-draw animation. It’s why most animation produced in western territories is CG, and this will start happening more and more in Japan. The country’s proficiency at creating CG animation should improve along with the rise in its prominence.
The aesthetic aspects of the series look iffy, all we’ve seen thus far. But there’s hope that the series will be good thanks to the staff involved. Both Shinji Aramaki and Kenji Kamiyama are on board as directors, both of whom have been involved with prior GitS works. Aramaki has proven to be a better mechanical designer than a director over the years, given the inconsistent results of the most recent Appleseed works. (He wasn’t involved with the extremely-contested XIII series, thankfully.) SAC director Kamiyama’s efforts are more worth looking forward to, who puts out more consistent quality. It was originally stated that the series would be split into two 12-episode seasons, with Aramaki directing one and Kamiyama the other; whether that’s still the case is anyone’s guess at the moment.
Also neat is how the old voice talent has returned for the main cast, including Atsuko Tanaka, Akio Otsuka, and Koichi Yamadera for Motoko Kusanagi, Batou and Togusa, respectively. It’s a noticeable contrast to Arise, which replaced the entire cast. Whether they’ll do the same for the English dub cast remains to be seen, which I assume it will receive.
The biggest name missing from the returning staff? Yoko Kanno, whose compositions for the SAC seasons were part of what made them memorable. In her place will be Nobuko Toda and Kazuma Jinnouchi, both of whom have contributed to other anime, but are mainly known outside anime circles for their contributions to the later Metal Gear games while at Konami (Toda especially), and their work for the recent Halo games. It hurts that the first theme song previewed in the trailer, “Fly with me” from millennium parade, has already provided an unfortunate impression of the music. The song might fit in with this series, but it’s a hell of a departure from previous GitS tracks.
There’s no guarantee that SAC_2045 will turn out well, but the staff is enough to make me believe that it could. My advice is to not write the series off before the worldwide premier date in April on Netflix for that reason. Keep your fingers crossed.
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Geoff
News Editor | Geoff is some nerd who writes for a blog and thinks he's knowledgeable. He write a lot about video games, but is capable of writing about other subjects, too. Twitter
