The Ghost in the Shell #03 — AI Revolution
July 21st, 2026
I'm not sure astroturfing is the answer.
Impressions:
This episode definitely lost the thread. Also, I feel like things definitely would've worked out better had they structured stuff so that the whole Puppet Master thing was warpped up at the end of an episode, not like eight minutes in, giving way to what appears to be a whole bunch of filler. Add another chase scene or shootout to pad it out to two episodes, or cut out all that pointless babble and garbage man comic relief to make it a single episode. Having all the excitement be in the first two minutes leaves the rest of the episode feeling boring. It wasn't even really wrapped up, as everybody was hacked.
The start wasn't bad at least, and is the only thing I think really worth talking about, as on the nose as the Fuchikoma robot revolution discussion was. For it being the exciting part of the episode, I still think they could be doing a better job with the animation and especially the direction. I'm not sure why certain things happened, like the abrupt tech overlay filter. It looked like they just didn't finish the animation on time. Simultaneously, other things really needed some kind of extra effect rather than technobabble, such as when he apparently mass hacked the crowd to jump Kusanagi. At least, I assume that's what was intended since she yelled something on those lines… but all they showed was him panic yelling. Did he just hack a bunch of people, or are they just a bunch of idiots? You've not made much of a case for the former.
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24 pages adapted. Half an episode is dedicated to 8 pages of “gags” and out-of-date technobabble grafted on like 3rd leg. Pacing, what is it? No human alive can process information in the way this anime is structured. Shirow at least clearly structured his mess (same for Vol 1.5 but not 2.0) and this is a web anime. No 24-minute structure is needed and JJK or Demon Slayer had extra-length episodes despite a TV slot.
The next 3 fully standalone cases are 41 (Innocence used the premise), 45 and 41 pages long. Then comes a fairly complete 45-page Puppeteer story, a 45 semi-standalone story and a 20-page resolution that bleeds out of the previous chapter’s twist ending and brings back the Puppeteer. If Saru can´t make three fully complete episodes and then close it with a three-part finale, then I will consider this showrunner a hack. How is a GitS show with an Amazon deal their first direction gig?