HERO OF THE WEEK: MAJOR KUSANAGI (Kodansha)Real Name: Maj. Motoko Kusanagi
First Appearance: Young Magazine (April, 1989)
Fight Club Ranking: #DNR
Featured Fights:
- Yet to be featured on Secret Wars on Infinite Earths.
It probably shouldn't come as a surprise that a site called Secret Wars on Infinite Earths hasn't had a lot of time to talk about Japanese manga and anime. Street Fighter's always had a relatively natural presence on "The Comic Book Fight Club", but with Marvel and DC owning the lion's share of our time, these other obsessions are the exception to the rule.
Earlier this year I broke ground in Hero of the Week talking about Dragon Ball and Chinese Hero. For one reason or another, it seems like 2017 is destined to be the year for opening doors to other interests. One of my all-time favourite things in the world: Ghost in the Shell!
By now you've probably heard about a little Hollywood shindig with the same name. Opening in US theatres this week (March 31st); the live-action movie has been extensively discussed for its controversial casting of American and European actors.
Not everyone has bought into criticism of Scarlett Johansson playing a Japanese creation. Director of the landmark 1995 animated feature, Mamoru Oshii, expressed dismissive bemusement to IGN, describing Johansson as "the best possible casting for this movie" in lead role, and our Hero of the Week: Major Motoko Kusanagi.
Like a lot of Western fans, I owe a lot of my love for Ghost in the Shell to Oshii's movie, and greatly respect his opinion. I can see interesting arguments in favour of Johansson based specifically on Oshii's unique adaptation of the manga, originally by series creator Masamune Shirow.
Oshii's version of the action-packed, raunchy comic took a more meditative approach to a cyberpunk future of high-tech human/machine integration. His film contemplates the significance of identity, and the soul (ghost), in a world where the human body can readily be supplanted by manufactured replacement (the shell). This threat of mass production, and exploitation through operation of technology, challenges the reality of "self" in ways that reflect universal tenets of class systems, and arguably predicted many of our modern predicaments, such as the intrusion of "social media".
Concepts of identity inform much of the film, including changes in character design, where Major Kusanagi's appearance emphasizes the wide-eyed, vacant gaze of an artificial human body.
The emotional absence of Oshii's Kusanagi strikes me as something that plays very much to the stoic performances of Scarlett Johansson. It's difficult to envision many humans who so naturally embody this quality of vacancy, let alone bankable stars. For a film that should aspire to slightly esoteric subject matter - a bankable star is a logical choice. That aesthetics are a concern of this adaptation at all arguably puts it ahead of most Hollywood adaptations, as well, but I'd leave my praise there.
While Scarlett Johansson has been a high-profile target for critics who feel the production should've sought a Japanese alternative for the ambiguously constructed heroine; it's the rest of the film that's been more obviously disappointing. If Johansson is an approximation in service of an idea, the rest of the cast appears to be ill fitted set dressing. Pretenders of unconvincing artifice.
The film clearly borrows heavily from Oshii's 1995 animated film, working hard to re-create iconic scenes like the famous "Making of a Cyborg" opening title. There are liberal references to the television anime Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex patched in, as well. These aren't inherently incompatible references, but every indication suggests an in-ironic exercise in soulless facsimile.
Like a photocopy, there's obvious degradation in the fidelity of the image. Though the upcoming live-action Ghost in the Shell promises a visual flair unique in today's feature film landscape -- it pales in comparison to the source material it adapts. It's difficult to gauge how much of the new movie is created by digital animation, but it's surprising that its palette relies so heavily on obscuring dark. The images are cast in the shadow of Mamoru Oshii's masterpiece, and context is unlikely to help them.
Trailers suggest a film with preoccupations found common in Hollywood cinema. Arbitrary robot conspiracies and plot details that don't seem congruent with the film their pictures are taken from. For all intents and purposes this appears to be Ghost in the Shell in name only. Like so many other poor live-action adaptations, the concepts that drive the machinery seem to have been removed, or not well understood. How thoroughly the futurist map has been ripped up is hard to say, but it seems impossible that this film can please existing fans of either Oshii's film, or the other iterations.
The movie will almost certainly tank in the United States thanks to the furor of its casting, regardless of whether or not its actually a mistake. Presumptions of Japanese origin are too strong, and vestigial ambitions of the source too rare to grant the film the pass of success Doctor Strange received.
I would've loved to be anticipating something new from the Ghost in the Shell franchise, to say nothing of another stone in the reconstruction of cyberpunk cinema that will continue later this year with the sequel to Blade Runner. I only hope its failure doesn't do too much damage, and inspires men like Mamoru Oshii to create something worthy of the property, which already veered away from highs with its most recent adaptations: Arise.
I hoped we might be able to balance things out with a more positive look at the Ghost in the Shell manga, but it looks like that isn't to be. March is martial arts mayhem month on Secret Wars on Infinite Earths! In a curious twist of fate, we will finish with another manga I'm quite fond of - be here in four days to see what went down!
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