Ghost In The Shell - Stand Alone Complex - Episodes 5-8 (DVD 2005)

Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone complex Vol. 2 contains episodes 5-8, Decoy, Meme, Idolater and Missing Hearts.

The episodes Decoy and Meme follow the events of The Laughing Man hacker with people's minds being hacked, Section 9 believe that the police may be intentionally scapegoating a man so they can close The Laughing Man case.

Idolater is about a man that has copies of himself and Section 9 has to try to trace the real man, there are some good fight scenes with Motoko actually getting hurt.

Missing Hearts is about a young girl who is having a heart transplant, Motoko's close friend is a nurse and she tells her about the girl, Section 9 then investigates illegal trafficking of human organs.

Two of the episodes on this volume give hints as to Motoko's sexuality and personal life and give an insight on how she lives when she's not working.

The extras on the DVD include, English and Japanese language options, subtitles, interview with Osamu Saka (voice of Aramaki), interview with Yoko Kanno (composer), episode decriptions, character profiles, image gallery and trailers. There is also a second disc that contains the same but with DTS audio.

This is quite annoying as this is a very superior show but I just can't really discribe it. This show is kind of like Morse for a high tech computer age. The protagonist is Major Kusanagi, a female cybrog, who works for section nine. the stories are complex and completely impossible to desribe beyond very basic plots. The laughing man episodes are very good and are correctly complex as this the storyarc of the series. The other two episodes are good solid detective episodes with unusual crimes the future might bring. An extreamly complex, but entertaining series.