bsu legato Posted October 10, 2003 Author Share Posted October 10, 2003 Little to no articulation, you guys say? Meh, I think I'll pass. Maybe I'd get one if the default poses were a little more...inspired....but they're stuck in such boring poses. I do like the upper half of the landmate, but those legs just look weird. It's still a far cry from the Guges-D that I've always wanted. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EXO Posted October 10, 2003 Share Posted October 10, 2003 Yeah, almost no articulation even though it would have been easy for them to put the joints on these toys. I mean they're wearing armor and their limbs are already segmented. I ran out and bought them full price too. I'm going to inspect that Guges before I even think about buying it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Talking about articulation, i just did a little custom job on the mini-fuchikoma figure that came with the SOLID BOX set or Motoko 'Hard Disk' action figure... Check out these little dudes on TBDX! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lynx7725 Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Landmate... never seen this one before... old news??? If you are asking where this Landmate is from, I believe it's the Landmate from the first Appleseed book -- Denuan's first Guges, and coincidentally, the first Guges she would trash... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bsu legato Posted October 28, 2003 Author Share Posted October 28, 2003 Awesome little Fuchikoma! Again I have to ask...why hasn't some enterprising toy company given us a cool lil' Fuchikoma figure yet? I say we spam Toycom until they get the message! And while I'm at it, does anybody know why we have Tachikomas in Stand Alone Complex, instead of Fuchikomas? Is there some kind of legal issue? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EXO Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 Landmate... never seen this one before... old news??? If you are asking where this Landmate is from, I believe it's the Landmate from the first Appleseed book -- Denuan's first Guges, and coincidentally, the first Guges she would trash... LOL, I was talking about the toy... I believe the Guges represented by the toy is from the CG movie... but I haven't seen anything about the toy except for this picture. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yellowlightman Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 I just finished reading Ghost in the Shell for the first time (Thanks Alex). Is GiTS2 worth picking up? I'm thinking I'll probably wait for the trade paperback if I do get it.. are issues still being released? I'm so out of the loop... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 GITS2 starts out pretty confusing, and gets lots better by the time you hit issue 5. Currently up to issue 7, there's 4 more to go, usually 1 book a month. That means GITS2 should be completed by Feb '04. The TPB will probably only come out in June '04 earliest, and it's more likely to be later than earlier. So it's up to you if you want to wait almost another year to read the story... Right now, I'm almost dreading the concluding issues when the full color CG artwork will be coming back with a vengence. I'm gonna miss the more focused B/W hand-drawn art from issues 6 & 7... :-/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrDisco Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 i have been collecting GITS:MM and I have no clue whats going on :| Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warmaker Posted October 28, 2003 Share Posted October 28, 2003 lol! You're not the only one! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 I'm actually thinking of writing an issue-by-issue summary of MMI... mostly to help myself figure out the massive number of plot lines, organisations and characters. Anyone interested? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lynx7725 Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 I'm actually thinking of writing an issue-by-issue summary of MMI... mostly to help myself figure out the massive number of plot lines, organisations and characters. Anyone interested? In reading your summaries, yes. To help you in it... well.... :P (actually I'm simply waiting for the Graphical Novel to release.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EXO Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 I vote yes... not that I don't understand it... I just barely get to the comic book store nowadays and by the time I get the next one I forget the last issue I read... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 (edited) OK, here goes nothin'! Bear in mind, I've basically stripped away all the rubbish cyber-talk. GITS2: MMI Issue 01 Chapter 01: Prologue Motoko is (re)introduced as an advanced cyborg to whom physical and virtual realities are experienced equally. A high level meeting involving "ape-face" Aramaki from Section 9 reveals that some people in the govt. seriously believe in the influence of spirits/psychic energies and actually have an official ‘Channelling Agency’ to deal with such matters. A young woman called Tamaki Tamai is introduced as a psychic investigator from the agency. It is implied that she has been observing the complex evolution of Motoko’s ‘ghost’ and other significant spirits. A certain Prof Rahampol is also mentioned as a creator of such spirits, but he has been killed at sea. Tamaki is about to embark on an important mission... Meanwhile, Motoko is onboard her hi-tech boat in the open sea. Several of her midget drones are introduced. These might be considered the MMI equivalent of the various bubbly Fuchikoma AI constructs. A cartoony manifestation of a racoon appears on deck, visible only to Motoko (because she has a ‘ghost’?) - which she suspects to be a spy from the top-secret Channelling Agency. The reason she’s at sea is to rendezvous with a mysterious submersible stealth ship. The two parties connect via a comms cable shot over from the stealth ship. In the virtual setting, the other party known as ‘The Doctor’, is represented by a trio of goggled monks & a huge nubile, tiger-striped sphinx. The conversation reveals that The Doctor has been doing business with Motoko for some time, trading centimetre-class robots (CEBOTs) and other personal cybernetic weaponry in return for Motoko’s infiltration and informational warfare services. Her latest mission is to investigate a bloody attack on Hanava, an industrial city. She is to stop a group of rogue Special Forces troops from slaughtering the locals and stirring up a civil war. Motoko accepts the ‘dirty’ mission a little reluctantly and The Doctor drops off a payment package before departing the area. Despite the friendly tone of the meeting, Motoko runs evasive counter measures before leaving too. Now it is revealed that Motoko’s boat is only a surface ‘terminal’ linked to a stealth sub underneath. The ‘Motoko’ we have just seen is but a decoy robot (Decot Unit M1), who ‘goes to sleep’ in a capsule and revives in another body (P.I. Unit) inside the sub. We can’t be sure this is the ‘real’ Motoko either, but she is on the way back to the city of Poseidon. She receives a briefing call from Grace, her secretary in Poseidon. What follows is a funny sequence of both parties conversing with their ‘office faces’, but because of Motoko’s superior tunnelling abilities, we are treated to the tardy reality of Grace still in pyjamas and going thru her morning routine. The most important news is of an attack by the Human Liberation front (HLF) on Poseidon’s Meditech Plant #2 in East Monnabia. Apparently, Motoko has had run-ins with the HLF before and has already initiated a counter response program. The briefing ends and the sub continues on its way to Poseidon. Chapter 02: Underwater 11 minutes away from dock, Motoko’s AI drones spot a suspicious ship. One of them is despatched to attach a data line to the new ship, from which Motoko infiltrates very easily and takes over a guy at his terminal. The new ship commits an act of sabotage, replacing a dock float with, I suppose, an explosive device. Meanwhile, the hacked guy is discovered and the captain realizes someone is close by. Too late, Motoko has left a virus. The motley crew panic and escape in life pods and the ship self-destructs. From the debris, Motoko recovers a tiny manuscript by Prof Rahampol, which she keeps for future study. End of Issue 01 P.S. The original Japanese edition showed Motoko's drones on the boat as a couple of sexy nubile chicks, who later shed their human form to reveal the rotund little midgets inside. I guess this has been excised in the interest of general worldwide publication. Edited October 29, 2003 by drifand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 (edited) GITS2: MMI Issue 02 Chapter 03: Circuit Weapon At Poseidon, Motoko appears in her third guise, as Poseidon Industrial Group's Chief of I.P. Security Aramaki (Her title is not mentioned and can only be inferred from later issues). From a remote drone, images of the destroyed Meditech clone-organ farm in East Monnabia are shown to the board of directors. A lot of the pigs at the organ farm have been slaughtered. Motoko suggests to the Chairman that the facility be moved to a more secure location on Pegasus, a floating city still under construction. Lebris, the security-lax superintendent of Meditech escapes being fired after Motoko vouches for his abilities. Apparently Lebris doesn’t see eye to eye with Motoko concerning security matters, and now feels he is forcibly ‘indebted’ to Motoko. Motoko brushes off his complaints and returns virtually to the scene at Meditech. A cebot drone has discovered one more unexploded booby-trap at the plant. Motoko deems this important though it isn’t explained why. She makes plans to totally destroy the plant with satellite bombing before the local police arrive and start looting its precious equipment. Surveillance records from the plant show the attackers in military fatigues, who are not worried at all about obscuring their identities. Motoko focuses on the leader, a woman, gets her dossier and attempts to infiltrate her brain... Only to discover it was a trap. The ‘leader’ has been heavily drugged to present a brain maze to infiltrators, while a reverse probe is sent out. Motoko is shocked by the savage intent of the attackers, who are obviously willing to sacrifice the ‘leader’ to get at her. She manages to send a report to Andrew, her British security counterpart, and pulls out before being personally compromised, but discovers that the attackers have simultaneously launched a major virus attack on Poseidon while she was fighting off the drug maze. The attack doesn’t get very far, and soon she manages to get things under control. A confusing mishmash of cyber speak ensues, no doubt an attempt to highlight Motoko’s highly efficient ability to multitask while distinguishing and prioritising several matters at once. The main point is that the virii unleashed by the attackers have evolved and are now targeting some underwater cleaning robots. Motoko activates yet another decot, Clarice. M (a reference to Silence of the Lambs?) who is the nearest to the suspected infection. ‘Clarice’ dashes thru the streets towards a canal and dives into the water in pursuit of the suspect cleaning robot. Some talk from the AI drones about Clarice’s clothes and water resistance provide a little sleazy humor. The robots rapidly approach the same area where Motoko had ambushed the mystery ship earlier, then begin attaching links to an exposed data cable. Motoko flashes a warning to Lebris, but he doesn’t act in time and soon the robots unleash more virii into the system. Back in her office, Motoko assesses the damage and is forced to begin inoculation measures to affected cyborgs and robots. Clarice surfaces at a dock, only to face a scene of chaos as some cyborgs are already running amok. End of Issue 02 P.S. For those who have the earlier Japanese version of MMI, the scene where the female 'leader' is drugged and confuses the infiltrating Motoko - this scene was originally the XXX rated scene where Motoko drops into the leader's mind while she's engaged in a hard core threesome. Shirow has since decided not to include that scene in any future edition. Edited October 29, 2003 by drifand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 (edited) GITS2: MMI Issue 03 Chapter 03: Circuit Weapon continues... Decot Clarice drops right into a big fight with the infected cyborg dockworkers. After tying up the most troublesome cyborg, Clarice leaves the scene and proceeds to check on the hapless Lebris and figures he is already being hacked by the first wave of attackers. Motoko employs a virtual ‘mask’ to prevent the surrounding staff from seeing or recognizing Clarice as she makes her way to Lebris. Connecting directly with the unknowing Lebris, Clarice/Motoko launches the attacker’s own virus back at them, plus a potent virii cocktail of her own. During this virtual dive, Motoko attempts to analyze and trace the attackers. The cyber-speak reaches a frenzy as counter measures from both sides go into action. Crossing Lebris’ Level-6 ghost line, Motoko encounters a strange data matrix and a mirror-type decoy. Further checks and traces finally reveal that the enemy is hijacking the highly intelligent brains (almost human-level) of the surviving pigs at the organ farm #1 (#2 was attacked) as a distributed computing network to facilitate the attack. Motoko now makes the intuitive leap that there may be more than one enemy involved - one group (unknown) that is hijacking the pigs’ brains, and another (HLF) that attacked the farm for different reasons. As she sorts out the steps to be taken in her investigation, the biggest question is “Why do they want to link so many human-type brains instead of neuro-net AIs?”. Motoko decides to delve deeper into analysing the structure of the pig brains and the genetic design behind them. End of Issue 03 P.S. This issue seems particularly SHORT because a good part of it is all about Motoko in a virus 'battle' with nothing but unintelligible cyber-speak for dialogue. Much, much worse than the Architect's spiel in Matrix Reloaded... Edited October 29, 2003 by drifand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 (edited) GITS2: MMI Issue 04 Chapter 04: Flyby Orbit We are in Motoko’s secret base inside a floating dock at Poseidon. She has manipulated the construction info so that it seems to officially belong to Cuba. Her submarine is docked here and the decot (P.I. Unit) steps ashore. Inside the more comfortable living quarters of her base, the AI drones take on a vastly different appearance - as ditzy looking French maids! Motoko preps for a heli flight to a meeting between Poseidon’s President and govt. reps from Monnabia, regarding the Meditech incident. The security staff, led by Chief of Security Lee, are not too pleased to see Motoko. They think she is here to ‘test’ their abilities and show them up if they fail. Motoko is accompanied by 2 huge bodyguards that easily put good old Batou to shame. Motoko tells Lee that she is here because she detected illegal e-brain transmissions at the location, with the possibility of a delay-action virus. However, when she says she’s only here to observe, not to intervene - Lee ‘wakes up’ from his presumptuous laxity and galvanizes his team into action. Almost too late, the Monnabia Head Military Attache has been infected and attacks the President. Just as the man is subdued, Habu, a member of the security team is also infected and makes a move... only to be stopped by one of Motoko’s bodyguards. As the remaining security detail attempt to move the President to safety, an innocent looking Monnabian girl with a bouquet of flowers steps right up and stabs the President in the head. Quick thinking bodyguard No. 2 immediately hooks up to the girl and starts a trace. Motoko ‘leaves’ her body behind under the control of the bodyguard’s inbuilt ‘directive program’, and dives into hot pursuit of the attackers. She locates the attack terminal but her nearest decot is 50 miles away. Instead, she takes over the body of a policewoman in a nearby patrol car driven by her partner. She also takes over the driving and heads for the attack terminal, located in a slum. Exiting the car, the all-human partner protests that without back up, the area is too dangerous even for cyborgs, but ‘Motoko’ has already gone ahead. She locates the terminal, shorts it out and prepares to dive in, when suddenly she finds herself surrounded by a group of industrial robots. It’s a trap! ‘Motoko’ fights off a couple of them but when she tries to use her gun, discovers that the policewoman has been sloppy in software management - too many installed versions of fire-control software cause her arm to lock-up instead of engaging targets. While fighting off more of the robots, Motoko quickly erases the redundant software and finally manages to blast one of the two remaining robots. She wanted to ‘keep’ one for analysis and further tracing, but is hampered when her ‘partner’ arrives with the calvary and blows away the last robot as well. The partner sweats a little when faced with ‘Motoko’s withering look... Of course it also turns out the robots were remotely controlled. End of Issue 04 P.S. This issue features a lot of Shirow's old-style black & white hand drawn art. This is EXCELLENT for the fighting scenes in the slum. Shirow seems to better focus on how to depict a fight rather than what computer filters to use. Some of the old humor found in Appleseed is also back. This chapter is also one of the longest and will stretch across Issues 05 and 06. Edited October 29, 2003 by drifand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yellowlightman Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 Thanks for the summaries Drifand, I'm probably gonna go ahead and pick up the issues available now. I'd probably forget to look for the TPB next summer anyways. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 Thanks for the summaries Drifand, I'm probably gonna go ahead and pick up the issues available now. I'd probably forget to look for the TPB next summer anyways. No problem. Like I said, it's as much for my own understanding of the complex story that I'm doing this. I've just about finished with Issue 07 and will be posting the rest soon. If anyone one else spots any errors or has better insight to any of the scenes, do let me know. :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 GITS2: MMI Issue 05 Chapter 04: Flyby Orbit continues We are taken back to Motoko’s body, left in the care of her bodyguard. They are now onboard her stealth heli, and Lee, the Chief of Security is tagging along. Motoko and Lee trash out their differences. She assures him she isn't playing any ‘games’, and Lee reveals that the ‘President’ that was killed is only a decot. Motoko concludes that the enemy has excellent skills but poor execution. It’s also implied that the two burly bodyguards are yet another disguise for Motoko’s AI drones. Lee presses her to accept his investigative help, but she just leaves him bewildered by saying she has to “go to sleep” – and promptly drops out again! :-) Back in his office, Lee is determined to find out more info about Motoko, whom he considers a threat and a rival. All he finds out is garbage: Totally normal prosthetic body, no military or police experience, Age 18 etc… A good laugh, that. Lee comes across as a competent fellow, but is definitely out of his political depth in dealing with such intrigues. Meanwhile, Motoko and gang have switched to a company jet. The only other passenger onboard is a hooded and veiled woman named Antares. She has an interesting conversation with Motoko about how she has successfully woven her multiple consciousness into one. They also talk about the company President, whom no one has actually seen. Antares seems to be a psychic, and says that the President is like Motoko, whose ‘form’ is not visible to her. They are interrupted by one of Motoko’s bodyguards, who informs her that they have completed a satellite trace and located an object on a Nankai Express plane over the skies of Manila. Motoko leaves instructions for taking care of her body and drops into the nearest decot, Chroma. ‘Chroma’ awakes and rents a big bike with a sidecar (complete with a dummy passenger) from an auto mechanic who seems to know her. She drives to a meeting point and soon two bike dispatchers from Nankai Express arrive with a delivery for her. All this is quite mysterious until it is revealed that the object is a circuit board from one of the attacking robots, recovered by the policewoman and shipped out to Motoko without her recalling a thing. All ‘she’ knows is that when she regained consciousness, her “body control software has been cleaned up and she felt much better” On the road, Chroma tells the AI drones to prepare 2 armed back-ups and goes into action… At an innocuous looking apartment, a couple of security thugs get agitated when they discover 6 of their armed cebots have been taken out even though their system shows nothing is wrong. The bigger-brained guy figures out ‘Chroma’ is behind it and tries to tell the boss’s secretary, only to find out Chroma has already disabled their cameras 20 minutes ago and already talking to their boss, the master hacker Algren. Turns out ‘Chroma’ has had run-ins with Algren before. He is in fact an old man almost totally enclosed in a cybernetic tank. In virtual view though, his avatar is a muscular hunk. Remembering the dire consequences of saying “No” to Chroma, he agrees to analyze the piece of robot circuitry, which appears to be a single-brain AI made for GAMES. Leaving Algren to his task, Chroma returns outside to find the security thugs fiddling with her bike and ‘passenger’. She is annoyed by their lack of manners and one of them challenges her to a ‘game’. The overconfident trio open fire on her only to find out ‘she’ is just an image. Turns out Chroma’s physical body is actually the ‘passenger’ in the sidecar. She has already penetrated 4 barriers and taken over their optics! Back in her virtual experience, she has been brought to a game world. She enters a saloon, and gets a drink at the bar. The drink is in fact the key to a game level. She steps thru a portal and out onto a mountain top where 2 flying barges are having a shooting war. Finding this unappealing, Chroma/Motoko decides to cheat and skip to another stage… The 3 thugs have followed her into the game and are trying to locate her with their own cheats. She goes thru a couple of typical fantasy RPG scenes before skipping to a circular platform with 3 exit portals. As a monstrous worm rears up to attack, Motoko throws 3 distinctively shaped pieces of rock into one of each portal. She notes that one of them is a loop, as a conical rock drops back onto the platform, leaving her with 2 alternatives… and a wicked plan. End of Issue 05 P.S. This issue continues totally in black & white art. Some of the arcs in this issue's story are explained retro-actively, like why Motoko rides out to the middle of nowhere to accept a mysterious package from the delivery company. The virtual game scenes are a little tedious, but the action will pick up in the next issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 (edited) GITS2: MMI Issue 06 Chapter 04: Flyby Orbit concludes Chroma/Motoko skips out of the game world at the last moment, avoiding the monster’s attack. She seems to have returned to reality in one piece. The 3 thugs meanwhile, have just arrived at the platform, only to see 3 Chromas diving into the 3 exit portals. They jump into the portal they believe is the right one, but are mauled by another monster in the tunnel, and then dumped back onto the platform. As the worm rears up again, they try to split up, each taking one portal, but are caught in a loop trap set by Motoko. She can be a cruel one! Back in reality, Chroma is stunned by a huge explosion from Algren’s building. Things get confusing real fast as a boy appears to tell her that her investigation has been rejected, followed by the appearance of a squad of black-clad cyborgs. Chroma/Motoko starts to wonder if she is really back in reality or still stuck in the game world. Fortunately, her trusty AI drones inform her that the 4 baddies are bouncers from a nearby dance club, who have probably been hijacked by the enemy. Chroma gets into a big fight with the four of them and ultimately knocks 2 out, leaving 2 behind. She figures that since they didn’t get firearms, their goal must be to tail her. She decides to abandon the Chroma body and lets out a bee-type cebot from her mouth. The bee flies a deceptive route back to Motoko’s ‘office’ decot (last seen on the jet) at her suite in a hotel. Upon retrieving the bee, Motoko immediately notices it has been bugged with a transmitter. Which means she is definitely being tailed. (How the bee was bugged, I couldn’t figure out – but the enemy must have been really GOOD.) Motoko instructs the bee to find a garbage truck and dispose of itself. Motoko makes plans to depart when suddenly a DRAGON appears to confront her. It turns out to be Tamaki from the Channelling Agency, who had previously appeared as a raccoon. Motoko wants nothing to do with the Channelling Agency, but Tamaki is very persistent and mentions the ‘Cyberdome Stabat Mater’ case, which Motoko is supposedly investigating. She denies it, saying she dislikes the idea of spectators fusing their e-brains to experience the same hero-story. Tamaki hints that folks from Stabat Mater were responsible for hijacking the 4 bouncers, but Motoko won’t take the bait. Motoko refuses to divulge any other info to Tamaki and boards her tilt-rotor Osprey craft. Onboard, Motoko ‘laser syncs’ the data from her recent fight to Max, the bodyguard and makes plans to use another decot (Jennifer). The plane makes way for Poseidon. On the ground, the enemy tailers hit a wall. The one on a bike (Fracto) following Motoko can’t track her stealth Osprey; the one in a car (Kiri) following the bee doesn’t know if it’s a decoy or not. Deciding to give up for now, the biker says he’ll report to “Mother”, then apparently ‘wakes up’ in the middle of traffic. The rider was just another innocent person, hijacked by the enemy. Above a city (not named) floats an airship. It’s passenger deck houses a series of occupied virtual consoles. One of them revives and it’s apparent he is Fracto, the one who had used the biker to tail Motoko. He is extra cautious now about how to communicate with “Mother”. He orders the airship pilot to move into position for direct laser comms. In a strange building resembling a mosque or kremlin, a woman in cyber-gear is ‘crucified’ to a cross structure in the middle of a circular room, surrounded by other jacked-in folks also in full cyber-gear. The ‘crucified’ woman is obviously the mysterious “Mother”, and she has received the report from Fracto. She orders “an interruption to the roll-call for lambs”, and sets out some “poison sheep to lure the wolf.” (Whatever that means…) End of Issue 06 P.S. The plot is finally revealing the enemy. The strange building housing the drugged-out and jacked-in collective is probably the Cyber-Dome Stabat Mater, as mentioned by Tamaki. The long-running Chapter 04 is finally concluded. Edited October 29, 2003 by drifand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 (edited) GITS2: MMI Issue 07 Chapter 05: Mold Of Life Back in Motoko’s Osprey plane, one of her huge bodyguards is opened up like an Appleseed landmate to reveal a compartment for one of her decots. She does some checks on Tamaki and soon the plane lands on Poseidon. She is met by the psychic Antares, who informs her that Lee’s Security Section has sealed off access to Decatoncale (a supercomputer) and Aracnosat (a multiple-redundant optical satellite system), both of which she presumably wants to make use of. Motoko is tweaked enough to comment that she might reconsider Tamaki’s earlier offer of psychic help. She then contacts Lee, attempting to sweet talk him into letting her access Decatoncale. Denied access, she claims she will just have to “take a vacation instead” and signs off. Lee’s subordinates report that Motoko is totally clean, which only makes her an even more suspicious person in their eyes. Worried that Motoko will attempt illegal access to the supercomputer, Lee instructs Habu to make sure 2/3’s of the dedicated security teams are non e-brain personnel. He also contacts Yoshu, apparently a Decatoncale chief, to make a complete back-up of all systems. Yoshu informs Lee that among the projects running on Decatoncale, one is a top secret research for a special group outside the firm. Meanwhile inside an elevator, a bunch of civilian staff are knocked out by a sleeping gas, and one of them is kidnapped by a cyborg girl out of the ceiling hatch, just before the doors open. We don’t see what happens to the kidnapped guy, but the girl soon emerges in Motoko’s room via an air vent and climbs into the chest compartment of one of her bodyguards. The previously ‘sleeping’ Motoko now revives just as Lee knocks on the door and announces that one of the supervising techs for Decatoncale is missing. Lee wants to keep Motoko from leaving, but she pulls clearance on him and leaves for her ‘vacation’. Lee now plans to stop her at the gates with a pass check. Meanwhile one of his guys has found a ‘secret’ tunnel connecting the elevator shaft to the air vents. Lee wants to deploy a robot spider but is told that “all of their spiders and support equipment have gone missing.” In the lobby, ‘vacation Motoko’ is stopped by Lee’s people, but they miss out on another Motoko decot who is on her way elsewhere. The second Motoko goes right up to a Decatoncale gateway, immobilizes the guards and steps right in. Lee’s staff are now confused as to which Motoko is the ‘real’ one. As a precautionary measure, Lee had switched over the access keys to emergency hardware versions. Apparently Motoko anticipated this and already had a spare emergency key. The kidnapped tech was a move to force them to switch to the emergency keys. Once inside, Motoko wastes no time in hooking up to a Decatoncale terminal. Desperate, Lee tries to contact the company President, but is told he is un-reachable. Motoko prepares her cyber-war files, then makes connections to all available satellites in an effort to trace the attackers. After much cyber-speak, she observes that the enemy transmission patterns shift over time, indicating a moving platform. The extrapolated course doesn’t follow any landforms, thus it must be airborne. Reaching into air traffic networks, she finally pins down the airship Eryops – the same one from which Fracto reported to “Mother”. The cyber defences are quite strong but Motoko manages to breach them and infiltrate Fracto. She is once again faced with a mind that has been pumped full of drugs – almost to the point where it no longer functions as a human mind. Back tracing even further, Motoko emerges in one of the drugged-out cyber-geared people sitting around the ‘crucified’ Mother. Motoko starts to feel faint, even as her drones attempt to correct the drug suppression and narrow down the possible locations for the building… Is this a trap she can't get out of? End of Issue 07 P.S. The continued use of decots sometimes confuses the reader as much as the characters in the story. However, the pace is really starting to pick up as Motoko is about to confront 'Mother'. As usual, the hacking sequence via Decatoncale is full of techno-babble. I hope the next issue has more plot revelations and less cyber-speak... P.P.S. looking back over the summary of Issue 06, I noticed that Motoko was going to use a decot called Jennifer. Perhaps that's the name of the decot cyborg girl used to kidnap the technician in the elevator? Edited October 29, 2003 by drifand Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bsu legato Posted October 29, 2003 Author Share Posted October 29, 2003 I hope the next issue has more plot revelations and less cyber-speak... I hope you're prepared for disappointment. The next issue is nearly incomprehensible. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Capt Hungry Posted October 29, 2003 Share Posted October 29, 2003 Thanks so much for these write ups! Things make more sense to me now. Haven't gotten issue #8 yet...........might just wait and get that when #9 is available. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 I hope the next issue has more plot revelations and less cyber-speak... I hope you're prepared for disappointment. The next issue is nearly incomprehensible. Ahhh what the heck, I didn't know Issue 8 was already out. Gotta head down and grab my copy now... From the description on Darkhorse, it sounds like a digital cat fight. :-P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 BTW, apart from the manga, has anyone else bought the 12" Motoko dolls (I said it! DOLLS!) from the first series and later the MMI ones as well? I was disappointed with the limited articulation on the first 2 releases but they were easily corrected with better bodies made by Dragon Models or bbi. The latest 3 however are really hard to modify - the costumes simply leave no room except for the original wispy barbie-doll figures... anything else is just too well developed or endowed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isamu Atreides 86 Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 i had started buying those MMI comics, but i think i'll wait for the inevitable trade to get them...... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yellowlightman Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 Anyone know of any good Masamune Shirow websites? The Masamune Shirow Hyperpage and Puto's Masamune Shirow site are both good sites but haven't been updated in 2-3 years, so they're not very up to date. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EXO Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 Hehe... like all other fan pages (like this one) all the action transferred to the message boards. Try PMing physioguy. He gave me the URLs for them a while back. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Capt Hungry Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 (edited) These are two decent Shirow sites that I have found recently: Shirow site, seems it was last updated February of last year..........it's a decent site. Motorballer's site - this is also a good site with some pics and he seems to be keeping it UTD. Last update was 10/18/03. Edited October 30, 2003 by Capt Hungry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 Ah, what the heck! Here's a pic of the black cyber-suit Motoko Aramaki with a bbi Perfect Body stuffed into her costume: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drifand Posted October 30, 2003 Share Posted October 30, 2003 More sassy, don't you think? The stock bodies had really crappy articulation. Now Motoko can take on Trinity! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GobotFool Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 thinking of Shirow how many eps are in Stand alone complex? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EXO Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 More sassy, don't you think? The stock bodies had really crappy articulation. Now Motoko can take on Trinity! Drifand, the perfect bodies look way better than the stock ones. I wish they would do more armor and less skin tight 12" figures because they look too much like dolls for me to even think about buying. A 12" Appleseed Orc figure would rock. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bsu legato Posted October 31, 2003 Author Share Posted October 31, 2003 A 12" Appleseed Orc figure would rock. Yep. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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