Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Volume 07 (Episodes 24-26)
Politics and cyber-espionage collide as the first season of the broadcast series based on Mamoru Oshii'sGhost in the Shellcomes to a suitably violent conclusion. The filmmakers manage to gather up most of the threads of the complicated narrative: the super-hacker known as The Laughing Man, the scandal surrounding bogus cures for "cyberbrain sclerosis," the corrupt government ministers implicated in those scandals, and the growing cognizance of the crab-like Tachikoma robots. Nothing is simple in the world of Shirow Masamune and Mamoru Oshii, and some questions are left unanswered. Not surprisingly, the season ends with the officers of Public Security Section 9 hot on a new case, leading into the "2nd Gig" series. The  two discs contain the same material, but one features Dolby Digital audio, the other DTS 5.1: which sounds better is largely a question of individual taste and the configuration of the viewer's sound system. (Rated 13 and older: violence, violence against women, grotesque imagery, tobacco use)--Charles Solomon