Nov 18, 2016
(Caution: This entire review is a spoiler and is less a review and more of my thoughts on some of the deeper themes in Ghost In Shell shown near the end of the film)
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I almost cried near the end during the conversation between Motoko and Project 2501.
What Project 2501 said to Motoko, was intensely thought provoking. I felt deep empathy for Project 2501, to be born into the world, but not truly able to die or replicate, the only of its kind. All it wanted was to be granted what not just everyone desires, but what every living organism innately desires. The function is
...
so intrinsic, that its drive even exists in individual cells.
How lonely and isolating it must feel to be the only one of its kind, and to not be able to bring more of its kind into existence. To be the first and last. I can see why Project 2501 did everything in its power to reach Motoko.
It was not trying to preserve itself, it was trying to preserve its species.
It was willing to die, as long as it was able to give offspring, to make another of its kind.
It's quite religious if you think about it, Motoko, the mother of a new species of intelligence.
Another thing that i simply loved about Project 2501, was its utmost honesty and transparency with Motoko. When Motoko asked, "Will i still be me?". It could have simply told her that yes of course you will still be you. But no, it showed nothing but honesty, even in the face of the possibility of denial of its only true goal. Such honesty you only find in beings truly seeking their purpose. Motoko saw its honesty, its drive, its pain, and its fear. Motoko saw that Project 2501 was still in some sense very much a child, in the fact that this world still seemed so distant to it. It knew and had access to so much information, to literally everything. Yet it felt so distant, so disconnected from the world. As if it didn't belong and there was nothing it could do to become apart of it.
Project 2501 looked out into the world, and it thought about its existence and its place in this world. Then from those observations and thoughts, the only thing that it could desire..was to have a child of its own.
Motoko also felt a deep connection with Project 2501, because she was experiencing the same feelings as it had. She was questioning her place in this world, who was she? What was she? Her realization that she too couldn't even produce offspring was probably the deepest connection she had with Project 2501.
Whether she would still be herself or not, i think deep down, she was willing to give up everything to have a child she could call her own, even if it meant death right then and there.
As even if they plucked her neurons for genetic information and used that to grow a child with similar DNA as her. A human child would still not be her own though, because in many ways she does not identify as human. The technology that makes up her body, is very much apart of who she is, her consciousness. She felt just as Project 2501 felt, that she was a separate species, deprived of the most intrinsic property of all life, the ability to make offspring, to multiply into a never ending tree with seemingly infinite branches of diversity.
On another note, I also love the relationship between Batou and Motoko, there is something so genuine about their relationship. They clearly have some romantic pull towards each other yet, Motoko could have any body she want's. It truly shows that Batou is in love with her mind, not her body.
I hope you enjoyed reading this just as much if not more than i enjoyed writing it, thank you.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
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