Koukaku Kidoutai: Stand Alone Complex – The Laughing Man

Synopsis:

Characters:

• Aramaki, Daisuke (Main) - Voice Actors: Roberts, Russell, de Moraes, Luiz Carlos, Cerdal, Frédéric, Coria, Guillermo
• Batou (Main) - Voice Actors: Kaye, David, Ootsuka, Akio, Júnior, Francisco, Beretta, Daniel, Solo, Raúl
• Kusanagi, Motoko (Main) - Voice Actors: Tanaka, Atsuko, Matthews, Alison, Fernandes, Samira, Bizot, Hélène, Willer, Gaby
• Togusa (Main) - Voice Actors: Devall, Trevor, Pichon, Yann, Marconato, Alexandre, Lezama, Ernesto
• Aoi (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Magne, Bruno, Viana, William, Fortuny, Enzo
• Borma (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Gibbon, Mark, Yamaguchi, Tarou, Béthune, Patrick, Mendes, Vanderlan
• Imakurusu, Hisashi (Supporting) - Voice Actors: José, Leonardo, Fonseca, Eduardo
• Ishikawa (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Payne, John, Tomé, Antoine, Nakano, Yutaka, Vasconcelos, Ricardo
• Matsuoka (Supporting)
• Operator (Supporting)
• Pazu (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Murphy, John, Onozuka, Takashi, Araújo, Rodrigo, Gradi, Emmanuel, Rodríguez, Ignacio
• Saito (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Drummond, Brian, Monge, Cyrille, Mazzei, Wilken, Ornelas, Jorge, Weigert, Jacob
• Serano, Ernest (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Siegel, Howard
• Tachikoma (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Bouma, Nicole, Tamagawa, Sakiko, Jaud, Janyse, St. Germain, Tabitha, Weseluck, Cathy, Metzger, Kelly, Guilen, Nathalia, Zink, Ma, Zadra, Rebeca, Marçal, Thayná, Legrand, Patricia, Robles, Jocelyn
• The Laughing Man (Supporting) - Voice Actors: Viana, William

Staff:

• Kunisaki, Hisanori (Producer)
• Matsuya, Yuuichirou (Producer)
• Kamiyama, Kenji (Director, Script, Storyboard, Series Production Director)
• Wakabayashi, Kazuhiro (Sound Director)
• Fuseki, Kazunobu (Episode Director, Storyboard)
• Kouno, Toshiyuki (Episode Director, Storyboard, Key Animation)
• Yamamoto, Hideyo (Episode Director)
• Fujisaku, Junichi (Script, Screenplay)
• Sakurai, Yoshiki (Script)
• Satou, Dai (Script)
• Abiko, Eiji (Key Animation)
• Albaret, Jacques (ADR Director)
• Alcântara, Pedro (ADR Director)
• Arai, Ken (Background Art)
• Asano, Kyouji (Animation Director, Key Animation)
• Douge, Shintarou (In-Between Animation)
• Emori, Mariko (Key Animation)
• Fukuyo, Takaaki (Key Animation)
• Furukawa, Hisaki (Key Animation, Layout)
• Genma, Nobuhiko (Key Animation, Animation Director)
• Gotou, Takayuki (Animation Director, Character Design, Key Animation)
• Hamatsu, Takehiro (Key Animation)
• Hamaura, Shinsuke (Key Animation)
• Hanamura, Yaso (In-Between Animation)
• Higashiji, Kazuki (Background Art, Art Director)
• Higuchi, Kaori (Key Animation)
• Higuchi, Kazunori (In-Between Animation)
• Hiramatsu, Tadashi (Key Animation)
• Hirasawa, Akihiro (Background Art)
• Honda, Emi (Key Animation)
• Honda, Akiko (Production Manager)
• Horiuchi, Hiroyuki (Key Animation)
• Hoshi, Kazunobu (Key Animation)
• Hosoda, Naoto (Key Animation)
• Iida, Hiroyoshi (Key Animation)
• Ishikawa, Mariko (In-Between Animation)
• Ishikawa, Mitsuhisa (Executive Producer)
• Ishino, Hirokazu (Key Animation)
• Itou, Hiroki (Key Animation)
• Jinbo, Daisuke (Sound Effects)
• Kanno, Yoko (Music)
• Katayama, Yumiko (Color Design)
• Katou, Hiroshi (Background Art)
• Katou, K (In-Between Animation)
• Komatsu, Eiji (Key Animation)
• Komurakata, Kouji (Key Animation)
• Kondou, Genichirou (Key Animation)
• Kubota, Yasutaka (Key Animation)
• Kumada, Akiko (Animation Check)
• Kumagai, Tetsuya (Key Animation)
• ... and 52 more staff

Reviews:

• User DarksideLuke (Score: 9/10):
  Story: Koukaku Kidoutai STAND ALONE COMPLEX: The Laughing Man OVA is taken directly from Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex ~1st Gig~ story arc of the same name. It is mostly a retelling of the TV series (Think Cowboy Beebop TV episode 1 Vs. Cowboy Beebop: The Movie). Even though the animation was completed prior (in the first season of the TV series), it is not necessarily a cut and paste job. There is some additional material (not included in the TV series) and dialogue. It's not a lot, or easily noticable - if you haven't seen the TV series recently, youmay miss it, but most of the additions portray the scene more completely and provide some necessary background information taken from the TV series' context. This OVA can stand on its own as the concept seems to be that this OVA could have been a full fledged theatrical release (Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex: The Laughing Man - the 3rd movie in the GITS universe).nnThe Section 9 crew has to solve a 6 year old case that has resurfaced; perpetrated by a talented (almost autistic) class A super-hacker. The group must use all of its' resources to solve a case that at first seems to lead to many dead-ends. Motoko, Togusa, Batou and Aramaki use all of their talents to outsmart politicians, expose government cover-ups, and track down the real reason(s) behind recent events of corporate terrorism.nnArt: nThe animation in Koukaku Kidoutai STAND ALONE COMPLEX: The Laughing Man is exactly what one would expect from Production I.G.. The color, movement and visuals are all consistent with what one would expect from the GITS universe. The action sequences are crisp and the timing is perfect (not too fast). The ideas, concepts and portrayal of the Net has always amazed me.nnSound: nFrom the begining, with the original Ghost in the Shell movie, I have fallen in love with Yokko Kanno. He work with Origa and Gabriel Robin has produced wonderfully smooth, jazzy, electronic, and trance-like (the list goes on and on) OSTs. Her ability to evoke emotion and empathy with the action on the screen is second to none.nnCharacters & Voice Actors: nThe R1 Voice acting is, by far, the most controversial aspect of Koukaku Kidoutai STAND ALONE COMPLEX: The Laughing Man OVA. I do not care to speculate on the reasons for different voice actors in this OVA versus the rest of the GITS & GITS-SAC universe. All of the primary and secondary characters' voice actors are different than the Movies and TV series (I doubt that the background characters were re-dubbed). For the die-hard GITS fan, it is sacrilegious to replace Mary Beth McGlynn (Motoko), Richard Epcar (Batou), Crispin Freeman (Togusa), etc. from their respective roles. Alison Matthews, David Kaye, and Trevor Devall must have had an uphill battle to compare to their counterparts. They all have a decent track record in other anime roles, and I imagine that even they thought it tough to fill…
• User kurzweil1024 (Score: 10/10):
  Stand Alone Complex was based on Yoshiki Sakurai’s 2001 Media Ecology dissertation “The Whereabouts of the Other in the Future of Human-Robot Interaction” (「他我を宿す条件 ～人間・ロボット間コミュニケーションの行方～」). It is about how the phenomenon of THE LAUGHING MAN — unique minds becoming individual components of a complex system acting as one collective consciousness (memes), and the phenomenon of THE TACHIKOMA — perfect machine copies of each other evolving individual differences, are the two inevitable consequences of data synchronization. The interaction between these antithetical phenomena is explored on a literary level in Stand Alone Complex, and political in 2nd GiG. Stand Alone Complex is the most cerebral anything anywhere, and it hasprophesied most contemporary Internet phenomena such as Anonymous and Asange with perfect precision several years ahead.
• User Jeff_J5Films (Score: 5/10):
  it used clips from the show but all of the voice acting was redone, most of the time with different actors, for example in the show the laughing man sounds like a kid but in this he sounds like an adult with a deep voice, and alot of the words were changed completely form what they said in the show and you don't learn anything new from this it's just a 3-Hour recap of the first season of the show. As for disk 2 THERES NOTHING ON IT! the best they hav is a 2min episode of tachicomic days and an awesome trailer to one ofmy fav animes Eureka seven. but both of those I'm sure you can find on you tube or something.nnI found this a compleat WASTE of $30(Canadian).

Forum Topics:

• Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex - The Laughing Man Episode 1 Discussion
• Order to watch Arise? Which version is best? Few other questions about GiTS anime, please help if you have the time

External Links:

• Official Site
• AniDB
• ANN

Related Anime/Manga:

• Koukaku Kidoutai: Stand Alone Complex 2nd GIG - Individual Eleven (anime - Sequel)
• Koukaku Kidoutai: Stand Alone Complex - The Laughing Man (manga - Adaptation)
• Koukaku Kidoutai: Stand Alone Complex - The Laughing Man - Tachikoma na Hibi (anime - Side Story)
• Koukaku Kidoutai: Stand Alone Complex (anime - Full Story)