Breotan wrote:
The only thing close to a tachikoma in the original movie was the tank at the end and since this seems to be a frame-by-frame translation of the first movie, I don't expect to see anything from the TV show.

Ghost In The Shell Is Everything Wrong With Hollywood Remakes

This is hands down Asian erasure.

It’s not just that Major was renamed the white-coded “Mira Killian” instead of the original Japanese name Motoko Kusanagi, “Ghost In the Shell” is set in Tokyo. The film is dripping in elements of Japanese culture, from the anime iconography to geishas, and koi fish to traditional sushi restaurants with low tables and visitors in elaborate robes and obis. And yet most of the main characters are white; not just Major, but also her best friend Batou (Pilou Asbæk), her mother-figure Dr. Ouelet (Juliette Binoche), her antagonizing boss (Peter Ferdinando), and the aforementioned terrorist she’s charged to track down (Pitt).

So even if anybody could have theoretically been cast to play the fully robo-figured Major, Paramount chose to cast a movie set in Japan, telling a Japanese story, and steeped in Japanese culture using primarily white actors. That sends a message about who is valued and not, and it’s a pretty insulting one that only gets more clear and offensive as the movie goes on. There are people of color in the film, filling out Major’s team. But aside from her handler (Takeshi Kitano), they barely get five lines to share between the three of them. I couldn’t tell you any of their names, because the movie only cares about them in the rare instances where Major and Batou need back-up. They’re not characters as much as conveniences.

Another shocking scene involves Major hiring a sex worker so she might touch human flesh. Instead of the short-circuiting lesbian scene from the anime, Major — who absolutely reads as a White woman — hires a Black woman so she can poke her and experiment. The optics are bad, especially in the wake of such a successful and woke film as “Get Out.”

And then things get worse!

I rarely get into third act reveals. But as was the case with “Passengers,” it’s necessary to discuss the vile story lurking beneath the slick ad campaign. When Major discovers her past, she finds out she’s actually Japanese. Her name was Motoko Kusanagi. She has a living mother who speaks English with a heavy Japanese accent. Her childhood bedroom is decked out with Japanese knickknacks, as if it’s a souvenir shop for tourists. Major is secretly Asian! And still, the filmmakers felt totally comfortable casting her as white. This reveal hits in waves of “no they didn’t” that don’t peak when Kuze discovers he’s also actually Japanese (“Your name is Hideko!”), but when Major visits her own grave, then embraces her mother as if to say, “It’s cool. I’m your rebooted white daughter! I test better globally.”

 Pacific wrote:
I think she can do vacant/distant look really well....

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Pacific wrote:
I think she can do vacant/distant look really well....

Sadly I think that is the only facial expression she actually has and "vacant" is not an expression that I (personally, of course) have ever seen in Kusanagi's face except when her body is literally shut down.

 jmurph wrote:
Did you like the original movie?

Ghost in the Shell film might be the most disappointing live-action reboot ever
This average action film looks so much worse through the lens of its original form.

But this pedestrian action movie looks nigh unbearable through the lens of the original series. Every bit of social commentary and science-fiction mystique that made the Japanese film and books so stunning has been wrung dry. Respect for the viewer goes into the garbage, replaced by an obnoxious, paint-by-numbers plot of good versus evil. And while I went into my screening ready to laugh off rumors of cast white-washing, I left the theater aghast at how blatantly that issue figured in the final product.

 Breotan wrote:
I don't think Batou is Japanese. He's Caucasian but I don't know which nationality. It was mentioned in one of the S.A.C. series, I think, but I don't remember.

 AduroT wrote:
Without taking the time to stop and look it up, I'm pretty sure Batou is US Special Forces of some sort. You meet his unit at one point in the series and they all have the same eyes.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 AduroT wrote:
Without taking the time to stop and look it up, I'm pretty sure Batou is US Special Forces of some sort. You meet his unit at one point in the series and they all have the same eyes.

I don't think they are US special forces, as they are deployed by the Japanese government at the end of season 2. A GITS wiki says the Rangers are part of the JSDF.