Once again we have another interesting and complex case, along with some background story and this bad guy called the Firestarter who is implanting false memories in people. In that regard, we can see a lot of Stand Alone Complex‘s influence wherein a main thread is weaved in with individual cases. It’s interesting and keeps you watching and waiting for the next one. This episode also gives us a deeper glimpse into some of the characters, especially Motoko, and is also dabbling with the idea of cybernetic bodies becoming real human bodies; that “What is human?” question that is central theme of the series. Despite that, there’s still the problems that pervaded the first two episodes. The animation is pretty bad (see the above picture) and the music isn’t all that great either.
I can look past these few problems though and see that this is an enjoyable return to the Tokyo of GitS. It’s still accessible enough that newcomers will enjoy it and still complex enough to interest old fans.
There’s one more episode to go and the previews are shaping it up to be pretty awesome (in fact, it looks a lot like Stand Alone Complex). There’s still a little more than a month to catch up before it ends, and I’d definitely suggest doing so.
