Masamune Shirow’s Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Error Processor Manga Review
Although my recent coverage of the vastness of the Ghost in the Shell (GitS) franchise lately has been nothing short of exhaustive (and somewhat exhausting), I’ve been reluctant to go back to the source and finish writing about creator Masamune Shirow’s original manga. While I reviewed the first (and by far the best) volume months ago, I’ve foregone writing about the other two volumes in the series mainly because, comparatively, they’re not very good.
The original 11-chapter Ghost in the Shell ran quarterly in Kodansha’s Young Magazine between May 1989 and November 1990, before its eventual collection as a tankobon with some bonus chapters in October 1991. Shirow’s first chapter of his planned sequel, Man-Machine Interface (MMI), was published in September 1991, with the second arriving in June of 1992. The third and fourth chapters didn’t appear until November 1995 and June 1996 respectively. By November 1995, Mamoru Oshii’s Ghost in the Shell movie had been released in Japanese theatres to relatively muted reception, however it became enormously successful upon international release shortly afterwards.
Come 1997, Shirow abandoned the storyline he’d been pursuing with the first four chapters of MMI and started again from scratch with chapter 5, the 6-part MMI: Dual Device. Here’s where things start to get a little bit complicated. In 2000, Shirow published the Solid Box, which contained a CD-sized art booklet, a Fuchikoma figure, a poster, a hardback edition of the first GitS volume, along with a hardback MMI collection. The Solid Box edition of this (also referred to as the “short cut version”) collected Dual Device, plus a further 140 pages of previously unseen material, including an extremely explicit and upsetting rape scene. To the surprise of fans, the first four chapters from 1991–1996 were not included.
2001 saw yet another revision of MMI, with the tankobon format release adding a further 24 colour pages in the form of an epilogue, and including 20 major revisions to existing pages. The rape scene was removed, and has not appeared in any subsequent editions, Japanese or international since. For the eventual US publication of MMI by Dark Horse Comics, over 11 monthly floppy comic issues in 2003, rather than simply “flipping” the art for western readers, Shirow manually retouched many panels of his manga so it would read better in left-to-right format.
So what happened to the original four MMI chapters? They were eventually collected together and re-named Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Error Processor (HEP), and published in Japan by Kodansha in tankobon format along with an “e-manga” edition on PC CD-ROM that added music and a screensaver. Suffice to say this version never made it to the English-speaking market. Dark Horse eventually published HEP over eight floppy comic issues between November 2006 and June 2007, splitting each chapter in half. In a first for the franchise, these issues weren’t “flipped”, and the art was preserved in right-to-left reading fashion.
I attempted to collect all of Dark Horse’s monthly issues, and this wasn’t a problem at all for the original Ghost in the Shell’s eight issues, or for MMI’s eleven issues. Unfortunately, with HEP, it came at a bad time for international manga publication. Due to some kind of complicated rights or distribution disagreements, Diamond Comics (Boo! Hiss!) refused to supply the UK with either Viz or Dark Horse-published manga. This disrupted not only my ability to collect HEP past the first four issues, but also wrecked my Blade of the Immortal and Animerica Extra collections, along with basically ending my monthly floppy manga comic collecting. (At that point, Viz and Dark Horse hadn’t quite fully transitioned to publishing manga in purely tankobon format.) It took a long time to track down Animerica Extra’s remaining issues via overpriced ebay auctions, and I gave up with the others. I ended up waiting many years to pick up HEP’s collected edition, courtesy of Kodansha USA.
When I did eventually get around to reading the entirety of HEP… I was distinctly underwhelmed. This is the volume that writer/director Kenji Kamiyama took as inspiration when planning out what 2002 TV show Stand Alone Complex (SAC) would be — although at that point it hadn’t even been collected, so all his staff had to refer to were photocopies of the magazine-published chapters! While I love SAC, it’s my favourite GitS thing, the detailed police procedural storytelling style of HEP isn’t as interesting as it could be. It’s easy to see how its episodic, investigative style would fit a TV format, but there’s not much of an overarching story in the background, nor a whole lot of character development either. While SAC was GitS without the Puppeteer, HEP is GitS (mostly) without the Major, and it’s weaker for it.
HEP is set some unspecified period not that long after Major Kusanagi merged her consciousness with the Puppeteer, and she has left Public Security Section 9 behind in order to explore the vastness of the net. Everyone else is still around, though. Old man Aramaki remains in charge, while Togusa and Batou continue to investigate cybercrimes. If anyone seems like they’re the main character in this ensemble piece, it’s probably the bouffant-mulletted Togusa, who gets a lot more scenes in this than he did in the preceding volume. He’s paired up with newbie Section 9 investigator Azuma, a fairly bulky fellow with a flat-top haircut who’s characterised as slapdash, mainly providing comic relief. Azuma does appear in a small capacity in SAC 2nd GIG and also in Oshii’s Innocence movie.
While HEP is probably the least bombastic and least visually interesting of the three collected GitS volumes, at least some of its material has had an effect on the wider franchise. In addition to Azuma, HEP also introduces long-haired Fuchikoma attendant and investigative assistant Proto. We don’t learn a whole lot about him in the manga, but in 2nd GIG we discover he’s a precursor to Appleseed’s bioroids. Shirow himself notes in the text of his Pieces GEM 01 art book that he doesn’t recall deciding himself that Proto was a bioroid, that may have been invented by SAC’s writers. That concept doesn’t interfere with his appearance in HEP though.
Oshii’s Innocence, while it adapted a couple of story chapters from the first manga volume, takes its setting from HEP, with Batou and Togusa paired up, investigating cybercrimes in Major Kusanagi’s absence. There is a chapter in which the Major appears, or at least her physical avatar does, remote-controlled like her equivalent at the conclusion of Innocence. The famous scene in the original GitS movie where Kusanagi wrecks her arms as she rips open the canopy of a spider tank originates here too. Variants of that scene play across multiple entries of the GitS franchise now. The chapter it appears in was published in 1992, so it’s accurate to say that Oshii used both the first volume and the first half of HEP when constructing his first film.
Like the movies, the Fuchikomas have a reduced presence in HEP, Batou explains they’ve been taken away to the lab because of aberrant behaviour. In the one chapter that a Fuchikoma appears, it’s particularly mischievous, much like its Tachikoma cousins in SAC. While HEP isn’t as frequently humorous as the first volume, there are lots of little light touches here and there that help to keep the tone from being too businesslike, as it threatens to become on multiple occasions. Without the Major, this is a much more grounded iteration of GitS, and sometimes comes across basically as CSI: New Port City.
Let’s take it chapter by chapter, first with the 40-page Fat Cat, intially published in two 20-page chunks in 1991. Immediately we see that Shirow’s detailed, scratchy pen-and-ink art is even more detailed than before. His characters have taken on a more mature appearance, there’s much less of a playful cartoonishness about them (though that’s still apparent at times). As will be standard for each of the four chapters, there’s a four-page colour section at the beginning, while every other page is in black and white.
Azuma doesn’t exactly endear himself in his first appearance, making rude and sexist remarks to a female character — though she’s pretty grumpy herself! The case this time involves a rich businessman whose body appears to have been remotely-controlled, and he’s made massive donations to various political organisations. He’s described as a “dead man walking”, and a “zombie”. This will deveopl as a theme across all four chapters. Togusa and Azuma end up involved in a high-speed shootout that causes the destruction of several vehicles in a really cool action scene. The perpetrator turns out to have had his memories erased in a fashion that reminds Togusa of The Puppeteer’s modus operandi. Hmmm…
The second half of the chapter introduces an un-named bearded politician who also shows up in a few SAC episodes, and there’s also a mention of “Pandora”, which is an enormous online repository of military and political secrets, which plays a major part in the second episode of the Arise OVA series. This is a reasonable sci-fi/police mystery, but as usual, Shirow appears to be operating several levels above the reader, and doesn’t think to share important background information or context, making the plot incoherent. Although the story comes to an end, I couldn’t possibly explain what happened and why. This was an issue with the first volume, but it’s worse when it’s a detective story, when finding out who did what and why is the entire point of the thing. These frustrations unfortunately will recur throughout the volume.
Drive Slave is the second chapter, comprising 44 pages split into two 22-page parts. Once again it starts with four coloured pages, one of which introduces a suspiciously familiar female character — the Major is back, sporting some cool mirror shades! Yes, this chapter is likely the best reason for picking up this collection, as it gives us an idea of what the Major has been up to since her merger with the Puppeteer. It seems she’s gone freelance, and is going by several aliases including “Chroma” and “Ms Aramaki of Eastern Cybernetics Co. Inc.” Interestingly, all of these aliases show up later in MMI proper. Shirow clearly had an idea of where he wanted to go with this version of the Major, but as she only shows up in this one chapter of HEP, it’s hard to know what his plan for her was at this point.
Batou makes his return in this chapter, looking not much different to before, and Ishikawa is mentioned as being undercover. There’s another remote-controlled perp, this time hiding explosives in his belly — and he’s got no frontal lobes. Seems like someone’s been messing with human brains. The Major and Togusa/Batou’s paths cross as their respective missions complement one another, but I get the impression she prioritises her interests far above those of her former colleagues. Batou isn’t at all mopey here like he is in Innocence. When Major re-introduces herself, Azuma hilariously has no idea who she is or what’s going on, plus it seems she’s been tracking Togusa the entire time without his knowledge. That sounds like the Major.
Major uses some creepy/cool remote controlled insect drones in this chapter, though she’s rather brutal, if not even murderous with them. She seems to be acting above the law now, which is odd, considering previously she was essentially a cyber police officer. Batour and the Major jump into action together “like the old days”, which is kind of sweet and nostalgic, though Batou also pouts over how she “always takes over”. The Major isn’t indestructable though — not only does she get half her head blown off (showing that she’s remotely operating this shell), but she also ends up ripping her arms off.
Towards the end of the chapter, the Major muses that their mysterious antagonist with the incredible people-hacking and remote-controlling skills could possibly be a copy of her, which will become a huge concept later in MMI, but is barely explored here. It’s interesting to note that the entire plot of the SAC: Solid State Society movie hinges on such a concept. Ditching her damaged body, the Major absconds by hijacking the body of the woman she’s been hired to rescue, and mentions how she now uses comm satellites and relay cars to shift her consciousness around the world. We never discover what happened to her “original” body. Perhaps she outgrew it, and no longer needs a physical shell to continue to exist. This is a really great, thought-provoking, and fun chapter, which stands head and shoulders above the other three. Turns out that Ghost in the Shell without the Major just isn’t good Ghost in the Shell.
Chapter three, the 48-page (split over two 24-page parts) Mines of Mind, was published a full three years and five months after the second chapter. I wonder if this was at least partially due to the aftermath of the 1994 Kobe earthquake, during which Shirow lost a huge quantity of his work, suffering a damaged hard drive and loss of other materials? In-story time seems to have passed too — although none of these chapters are given dates (unlike in the first volume and MMI). HEP Batou now sports tied-back long hair like his Innocence and SAC counterparts. It makes him look older. In the opening four colour pages we’re re-acquainted with one of the Fuchikomas, in very shiny red form, plus we meet Proto for the first time, as he’s propositioned to consent to direct data transfer by the mischevious think tank!
Batou seems to have a new cyber-girlfriend, but it seems everyone but him knows the real reason his girlfriend won’t meet him in real life is because “she” is a 95-year-old man. Poor Batou… Anyway, Batou, Togusa, and Azuma end up investigating a spate of extremely bloody murders and wind up in a shootout with a super-cute android girl. The way she is drawn (with a focus on underwear and crotch shots) provides one of the few examples of Shirow’s typical female body objectification in this volume.
Weirdly for Shirow, the majority of HEP’s cast are serious, well-built men. The Major appears in only one chapter, and any other female characters are bit-part side or guest characters. This marks a real departure from Shirow. His other famous manga prominently feature female characters — Dominion has Leona Ozaki and the Puma Twins, Appleseed has Deunan and Hitomi, and the other Ghost in the Shell volumes have the Major in her various forms. His later non-manga work almost exlusively features scantily-clad women. I guess he used this volume to get all of the male characters out of his system? Even the volume’s cover features only male characters. I’m not complaining, it’s merely an observation.
Sadly, poor android girl doesn’t last long as she’s also murdered. This chapter does read like a prototype SAC episode, with Batou even impersonating a welfare committee member in order to infiltrate someone’s home. He discovers a brainwashing program that’s been used to remotely control people, but the body he tracks it too has been dead for a long time, and even has mushrooms growing out of it, in a particularly horrific scene. Batou also cyberhacks the e-brain of a military enemy, making him see Batou’s apparently severed head emerging through the floor. Batou asks “that’s how I appear to you?” in a scene identical to a part of SAC season 1’s climax.
We learn here that Batou is ex-military, (as is Aramaki,) but he would never consider returning to the service because he wants to be “more than a killing machine.” It’s a decent enough chapter, but once again, Shirow completely fails to give any decent conclusion, we’re left with more questions than answers, none of which will ever be resolved. I don’t know if this is because Shirow planned to follow these up later and never bothered, or if it’s because of poor storytelling and communication. Shirow often gets bogged down in minutiae, especially with his often spectacularly irrelevant footnotes, and forgets to include actual important plot context. It can make his work unnecessarily challenging to follow. It’s not necessarily because the reader needs to be “smart”. The reader isn’t given adequate building blocks to begin with.
Finally, chapter four Lost Past was published in one 40-page chunk almost five years after the first chapter. This one begins in striking fashion, with a terrified woman running through full-colour city streets, losing her shoes, and getting kidnapped, before dying in a horrible traffic accident. The forensic examination of her body shows her neck access ports were destroyed, or ripped out… For some reason Section 9’s long-time rivals Section 6 want her body, because she was associated with a political group called the Okinawa Association. We get a little background information about the sociopolitical state of East Asia as it appears that North and South Korea are now unified, which is interesting. I don’t remember that being mentioned in any other version of the franchise.
The single Fuchikoma makes a further brief appearance (the poor little thing is barely used at all in these chapters), playing cards with Saito, much like their equivalents the Tachikomas do in SAC. This chapter is most notable for Saito engaging in battle with another sniper who uses an identical “Hawk Eye” prosthetic. Saito doesn’t get much of a focus in the manga, except for this chapter. Ishikawa appears in a few scenes here or there but mainly looks older and more tired now. Borma cameos here and there, and I don’t think I saw Pazu at all in this volume. It’s mostly been Togusa, Azuma, and Batou’s story. While there’s some high-level politicking going on in the background of this chapter, with Aramaki scoring a win against a corrupt official, the story ends kind of abruptly, without tying anything together at all — not in terms of plot, and not in terms of themes. It’s like Shirow just sort of lost interest and stopped.
The only thing tying any of these stories together is the creeping dread that someone out there is puppeteering human beings for their own ends. It’s heavily implied that this could be a copy/offshoot/offspring of the Major/Puppeteer gestalt entity. Unfortunately, this iteration of the storyline and Section 9’s investigation of it is completely dropped, because Section 9 barely feature outside of cameos in the “true” GitS 2: MMI. That leaves this a frustratingly unsatisfying collection, with some decent parts (especially the excellent chapter 2), some truly accomplished black and white line art, but a lack of coherence or conclusion.
HEP is valuable to the GitS fan because it became a template for the much better-constructed SAC in 2002. It’s useful as a primer for some of the heavier, more complex themes that will show up in MMI, and it’s interesting to see Shirow’s thought processes evolve with time. HEP isn’t a patch on the first volume in terms of interesting stories, though. It’s a much more pedestrian affair, and perhaps that was deliberate — Shirow himself says he set out to write more of a standard police story. I guess he felt he’d written himself into a corner, or lost interest in this type of storytelling, because the rebooted MMI couldn’t be more different. He goes from a story without the Major, to one that basically only focuses on her, to the detriment of every other character. I can’t help thinking that some kind of happy medium between the two would have been for the best.
I’ll be back again soon to take a crack at deciphering the truly esoteric and baffling Man-Machine Interface. I’ve read that thing through multiple times now and I’ve no bloody idea what the hell’s going on. Perhaps one more read through and it will all click for me? I’ll see you again once I’ve managed to spew some semi-coherent thoughts about it onto the page. Once again, thanks for reading!
Ghost in the Shell 1.5: Human Error Processor
Author: Masamune Shirow
JP publisher: Kodansha
JP publication: 2003
US publisher: Dark Horse Comics
US publication: 18th October 2006 (eight monthly flipped left-right issues), 10th October 2007 (trade paperback)
US publisher: Kodansha USA
US publication: 7th March 2017 (unflipped trade paperback)
Pages: 176
Language: English
ISBN-13: 978–1593078157 (Dark Horse)
ISBN-13: 978–1935429968 (Kodansha USA)
