Agent Smith brings Section 9 to his bunker to see a captured “post-human” like Patrick Huge.
ep 06 – “DISCLOSURE – Quantized Gospel”
Hmm.
SAC_2045’s episode titles for Patrick Huge’s and Gary Harts’s stories had religious references in them. These two are what Smith calls “post-humans,” so the religious tone suggests a spiritual explanation for what’s happening. There’s nothing supernatural in the Ghost in the Shell universe, but many of the things we’ve seen in earlier seasons appear to be about ghosts or angels at first glance. We’re in classic Stand Alone Complex plot development where we can expect unknown persons have turned a mundane technological invention into something very clever. Patrick Huge was the benefactor of radical anarchists and he had god-like powers, so “Gift from God” was a nice reference for him.
Gary Harts escape attempt gave us a memorable SAC_2045 action episode too. It was such a great idea to use bits of gibberish code to leap an airgap and turn it into malware. There’s the “Quantized Gospel” the techs needed to interpret and decipher. The post-human played on assumptions about his medical condition and turned it to his advantage. Smith mentioned they knew enough of the code to believe the latest scrawl had something to do with Section 9’s visit. Did Harts pull the trigger on assembling the last bit of his malware because he saw outsiders come in to look at him? Did he recognize their group? It’s fun to guess whether the Major’s reputation preceded her.
Heh.
The President told Smith to sit down, by old-fashioned sealed letter! SAC_2045 honoring old tech. Ha. Aramaki says GHOST has been working for the U.S. government this whole time. That’s news to Batou! But it’s not news to Smith. Interesting. “Fancy meeting you here.” I swear it’s a coincidence I used that blog title last episode. Aramaki has a new job for the Major. She seems excited, no matter how much she complains.
Say goodbye to Stan. Har. Motoko rewrote all his memories of his time in GHOST. He’ll get them back if Batou needs him and says the password. That guarantees SAC_2045 will see Standard Deluxe again.
It’s time for Smith to explain what happened to Huge. SAC_2045 enters exposition mode. He knew that Huge suppled the Nomads with his company’s weapons. Their operations’ intentions were to stoke class resentment. Section 9 doesn’t care about that. They want to know about his cyberbrain and its strange abilities. Smith needed to use private operators to keep the government’s involvement secret, because if the target’s existence became public knowledge, the world would plunge into chaos. Sounds like the standard excuse for any Man in Black. Smith isn’t talking about aliens, though.
Smith claims Huge and others like him triggered the Global Simultaneous Default, and the G4 only devised Sustainable War in its aftermath. It wasn’t a debt bubble collapsing on its own. That’s nice and all, but Motoko gets SAC_2045 back on track on how inhuman Huge’s cyberbrain processes were. Smith calls him a “post-human.” Their cyberbrains are vastly superior to any supercomputers in existence.
Field trip. Batou welcomes Togusa back to the team. SAC_2045 puts Smith’s show-and-tell in a big bunker. Nuclear ICBM silo? Ooh. Smith already captured one, but part of its brain is missing, so it’s not a good subject for testing. Flashing Matrix code at us. Trying to communicate? These NSA guys aren’t paranoid enough. Happy to see the Major? Who wouldn’t be? This guy is air gapped and his nurse doesn’t have a cyberbrain. Seems like proper precautions, but that flashing code stuff is bothersome.
This post-human was Gary Harts, a master sergeant, and he became like this after he retired, suffered a fever, and then his personality changed. That was two months ago, which is how long Patrick Huge’s wife has been dead. Harts shot his wife dead, walked into a nuclear missile site, and tried to launch one at Moscow. His injuries happened during that incident. All the same abilities Patrick Huge had, plus the scenarios Smith created for GHOST’s training, came from the captured video feed. I like how SAC_2045 switches camera modes where you can tell it’s from a person’s “lifelog” or doorbell cams, like what Togusa showed us earlier.
Half a SAC_2045 episode without the Tachikomas? Let’s fix that. They’re so nosy, and pushy! But in a cute way. Ha! They call themselves ride-share tech just waiting for their passengers. They also just pointed out that Smith is keeping Harts close to another missile silo. Maybe the comatose guy never stopped trying to complete his mission.
Things are about to get crazy in SAC_2045. Motoko noticed that Harts kept catching his paper airplane by predicting ambient air conditions. When that changes, watch out! Here it comes! And there it goes! Harts took control of the facility! Hacked robots incoming. They look like fast walker zombies. Huge’s combat maids were much easier on the eyes.
The SAC_2045 video game just entered brawl mode. The Tachikomas are going to learn they shouldn’t plug into any port just because they can. That’s not Tachikoma’s voice… This is a key scene for future reference. Oh man. His brother is freaking out and the other Tachikoma wants a turn at the strange jack. Disaster averted, but was it really? “What just happened?” asks Tachikoma. I wonder too.
Oh boy. Harts just refocused after the Tachikoma unplugged. Did he change his objective? Can’t SAC_2045 ever make Motoko fight in optimal lighting conditions? How am I supposed to admire that CGI posterior? These security robots pop out of the ceiling like The Flood in Halo. Post-humans sure are creepy. This is the worst looking bar brawl ever. Aramaki and Smith need a whiskey bottle and a beer mug to smash a bot’s head. Maybe Harts decided to commit suicide since he already saved himself in Tachikoma’s memory?
Section 9’s work is done. Look at the carnage! The Major’s team is 2-0 against these post-humans. That should worry those other post-humans out there.
SAC_2045 Tachikoma “Roger!” Count — 0. Maybe we’ll drink again next episode.
Ghost in the Shell: SAC_2045 streams on Netflix.
