I'm not really feeling the new season as much. It seems like they're just upping the body count and recycling the same kind of plot.
Mystery unenforceable person manipulates people to evade SIBYL & do crime stuff.
I was really hoping that they'd build on the fucked up politics of season 1 instead. The universe is ripe for all kinds of different stories; it's practically Ghost In the Shell: The Even More Dystopian Version
I'll repeat myself:
Mikishima's endgame was to destroy the citizenry's trust in Sybil by 1) proving that its analysis systems were fallible, and 2) demonstrating that the fundamental premise didn't even work, because the first thing people did when you took Sybil's judgment away was turn violent and start murdering each other.
Kamui's endgame seems to be different in that he's trying to get Sybil to destroy the very people it protects (and, in particular, to destroy its own enforcement arm).
That they both have the power to evade Sybil is basically a requirement given the premise, but their philosophies and goals are fairly distinct. I wouldn't say they're rehashing season 1. Especially not with well more than half of the season still to go.
My favorite musical instrument is the air-raid siren.
I'm not really feeling the new season as much. It seems like they're just upping the body count and recycling the same kind of plot.
Mystery unenforceable person manipulates people to evade SIBYL & do crime stuff.
I was really hoping that they'd build on the fucked up politics of season 1 instead. The universe is ripe for all kinds of different stories; it's practically Ghost In the Shell: The Even More Dystopian Version
I'll repeat myself:
Mikishima's endgame was to destroy the citizenry's trust in Sybil by 1) proving that its analysis systems were fallible, and 2) demonstrating that the fundamental premise didn't even work, because the first thing people did when you took Sybil's judgment away was turn violent and start murdering each other.
Kamui's endgame seems to be different in that he's trying to get Sybil to destroy the very people it protects (and, in particular, to destroy its own enforcement arm).
That they both have the power to evade Sybil is basically a requirement given the premise, but their philosophies and goals are fairly distinct. I wouldn't say they're rehashing season 1. Especially not with well more than half of the season still to go.
Sure, okay. I'm not saying that
Kamui = Makishima or that their motivations are similar,
but the kind of story the show is telling is very much the same, at least from the episodes we've seen so far. Maybe updating the structure of the show isn't what audiences want, but I, personally, don't see the value of remaining the same, when they could be exploiting the politics of the setting or spinning off in another direction.
Having this season be more centered on the manhunt for Kogami, or Akane working within the system to thwart SIBYL, or even throwing back to Yayoi's musician anarchist friends would suit me more.
There's one thing that's also bothering me about this season's psycho-pass readings.
It seems much easier to get people into the Lethal Eliminator range this season than it did last season. All those clinic victims... unless Kamui dosed them with meds that clouded their hues (which we have not seen evidence of yet), just stripping people to their undies and terrorizing them for a couple hours really put them all over 300? The poor woman in the pilot episode had to be raped and threatened repeatedly to get to that point. The other option is that SIBYL is helping Kamui for some reason, which would admittedly rationalize why Kamui's dominators still work. But if that's the case, then we're just back to season 1 territory where SIBYL is specifically helping the villain.
so they made it specifically set up to show that he took her eye to get the dominator to work. I really thought they were just going to clone dominators and just hand them to the public to do their own enforcing which would raise PP's even further publicly causing chaos.
Really what would shut everything right now realistically would just be removing the permissions for that enforcer in their database. Then he cant use the dominator anymore, or anyone he plans on handing those 3-5 to. But I dont know how much tv science they are going to go into for this.
A season and a half in is kind of nonsense to put in the rule about 'oh, we only get 3 anti material shots'. But I'll get over it
so they made it specifically set up to show that he took her eye to get the dominator to work. I really thought they were just going to clone dominators and just hand them to the public to do their own enforcing which would raise PP's even further publicly causing chaos.
Really what would shut everything right now realistically would just be removing the permissions for that enforcer in their database. Then he cant use the dominator anymore, or anyone he plans on handing those 3-5 to. But I dont know how much tv science they are going to go into for this.
A season and a half in is kind of nonsense to put in the rule about 'oh, we only get 3 anti material shots'. But I'll get over it
Yeah.
Also, SIBYL is run by fucking real brains. They can literally override any dominator result. Are they saying that they don't have cameras, so SIBYL has no idea what their dominators are being pointed at? The idea that was floated of the compromised inspector just going into deep cover and therefore needing to keep her dominator (and those of like four dead enforcers) active is starting to get problematic. The fucking things have always-online DRM.
Like I said before, the only thing that makes any sense to me at this point is that SIBYL is helping Kamui for some reason. I mean, that's quite possible, because SIBYL is a bunch of assholes, but doesn't really explain why Akane doesn't go over to the chief and start demanding answers.
They did stop to point out how bullshit the season has been so far, but they didn't change the fact that it is, indeed, bullshit. They better have another trick up their sleeve.
They did stop to point out how bullshit the season has been so far, but they didn't change the fact that it is, indeed, bullshit. They better have another trick up their sleeve.
Judging by Episode 8, they have chosen the path of "Make up a bunch of confusing shit that already happened and may or may not contradict the first season entirely and the dates don't even make sense."
Maybe it's the translation I'm watching but when Akane goes "He's been right alongside us the whole time!" and then we see a shady figure meeting with Kamui (with Kogami's bike in the corner...!) as the cliffhanger, one would expect the next episode would at least reveal who they were talking about.
Just in case the series decides to reverse the dump it's taking on itself, they released the trailer for the upcoming movie: (may contain spoilers, shows characters that apparently survived this season) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1mMt1RUP8s
Transcript:
Woman: A foreign terrorist group that illegally entered the country. There appears to be remnants of the deputy sheriff who escaped three years ago within their brains. Request for permission to investigate outside of the country.
Akane: Yes.
Woman: You intend to handle this yourself?
Akane: I'm more than prepared.
Text: The stage moves to the globe
Woman: The top of management of Shanbura Furoto are part of the Sibyl System.
Nicholas: I am Nicholas Wong.
Akane: There's no way a Psycho Pass measured in this situation will give a proper reading!
Nicholas: If we don't get them, they'll get us.
Man: Return fire!
Soldier: Target found! Identified!
Man: Either be tamed, or give yourself up to the law out of my reach. This was once a choice given to Shogo Makishima, and it caught up to him. The same thing happened with Kōgami.
See, I could totally buy the idea that Kamui gained a freaksih immunity to all things Sibyl from his accident. I can also buy that his knowledge of medicine and meditation also led to his discovery on how to clear peoples' Psycho-Passes.
But the reveal that he gained all this by some sci-fi...no....sci-fantasy procedure that mixed a bunch of brain pieces together that....SOMEHOW gave him his anti-Sibyl powers.....it would have been much better if they just kept his abilities ambiguous, like they did with Makishima.
Oh and now we know that the Chief is Togane's mother or some robot version of his mother and he's like the guy from Resident Evil Code Veronica and I don't even....
On the bright side, at least Mika actually fucking did something this episode, even if it was once more in pursuit of implicating Akane (and not even bothering to warn her about Togane). I have no idea what they have planned for her now, but as I said before, it's hard to feel anything about her incoming Bad End when they've spent little time making her even halfway likeable.
This is becoming the biggest Anime disappointment of the year for me. I know there's already a bunch of Urobuchi snobs who will insist how he is irreplaceable and that no one could take over his writing duties....but so far the proof is in the pudding.
Season 2 feels like the 24 version of Psycho-Pass: it's louder, dumber, more action and more dumb. I deeply miss all the intriguing talky parts and multiple cases of the first season. I don't know if they confirmed yet if Urobuchi is writing the movie, but if he is it would be really great if nothing of note happens this season so we can pretend that the movie is the real sequel.
which is a shame because there's was a lot of interesting stuff that they just drove off a cliff in ep 8
Kamui wasn't particularly interesting, because he felt a lot like Makishima - can't be judged by Sibyl, wants to take down Sibyl, manipulates others, etc. But whatever.
The composition of Section 1 could have led to a lot of interesting stuff - in particular, I was thinking of having Mika being slowly corrupted by Saiga (unintentionally) and Togane (intentionally, as a way to get at Akane, presumably), as a sort of long term consequence of Akane's risky way of running Section 1. But instead things got stupid. Togane's origin is stupid, just have him be a weird psycho (which Sibyl keeps around and keeps throwing inspectors to because Sibyl is collecting data or whatever who cares its not terribly important). And they revealed Togane's outward criminality too early, I feel. It should have been a slow burn instead of laying it all out so clearly so early.
It's also really weird to have Sibyl having a stated goal of taking down Akane, considering it could do so incredibly easily and could have done so incredibly easily in S1.
My expectations were that they were going to fuck everything up so I was alright with where the show was going for the first 7 episodes but this seems like it could be the start of a nosedive
A bunch of people being propped up like animals and then set on fire...shit was pretty chilling. I had no idea who they were, so the effect was only half as effective.
Fucking with Akane's grandmother was a much more personal reveal, but I have a feeling that's going to lead to a mean-spirited resolution with no real closure.
I did find it funny seeing Mika being shocked into embracing the truth behind Sibyl, but I still have no idea what they're planning to do with her. I'd like to think the shocked glances she's throwing Akane's way means she's finally realizing that she was wrong and will attempt to make up for her actions....but at this point it's simply too late to redeem the character
From what I've read, the Kamui arc only takes up half the season and is possibly wrapping up next week. I want to hold out hope the second half will be a course correction (and hopefully with a new writer), but it's hard to say at this point.
A bunch of people being propped up like animals and then set on fire...shit was pretty chilling. I had no idea who they were, so the effect was only half as effective.
Fucking with Akane's grandmother was a much more personal reveal, but I have a feeling that's going to lead to a mean-spirited resolution with no real closure.
I did find it funny seeing Mika being shocked into embracing the truth behind Sibyl, but I still have no idea what they're planning to do with her. I'd like to think the shocked glances she's throwing Akane's way means she's finally realizing that she was wrong and will attempt to make up for her actions....but at this point it's simply too late to redeem the character
From what I've read, the Kamui arc only takes up half the season and is possibly wrapping up next week. I want to hold out hope the second half will be a course correction (and hopefully with a new writer), but it's hard to say at this point.
If only Urobutcher were here.
I believe it's only an 11-episode season, as opposed to the first's 22-episode season.
A bunch of people being propped up like animals and then set on fire...shit was pretty chilling. I had no idea who they were, so the effect was only half as effective.
Fucking with Akane's grandmother was a much more personal reveal, but I have a feeling that's going to lead to a mean-spirited resolution with no real closure.
I did find it funny seeing Mika being shocked into embracing the truth behind Sibyl, but I still have no idea what they're planning to do with her. I'd like to think the shocked glances she's throwing Akane's way means she's finally realizing that she was wrong and will attempt to make up for her actions....but at this point it's simply too late to redeem the character
From what I've read, the Kamui arc only takes up half the season and is possibly wrapping up next week. I want to hold out hope the second half will be a course correction (and hopefully with a new writer), but it's hard to say at this point.
If only Urobutcher were here.
I believe it's only an 11-episode season, as opposed to the first's 22-episode season.
The sooner this one is over, the better, honestly. This season feels like the characters from Metalocalypse saw season 1 and wrote a song about it, and the producers inexplicably made it canonical.
Yeah the reveal at the fire was writers going "whats the most fucked up thing we can include about all this" which was dumb. I feel like that's been a thing to do in the media I have been interested in lately, wanton shock value additions.
ep 9.
The killing of those men over the blood they spilled by causing an alternate system to sybil to fail, is more than enough narratively to justifies that revenge. They have established that their society doesn't give two shits about illegal immigrants, or the outside world. It pretty much says things like illegal immigrants don't exist with how their surveillance works.
Also, what kind of fucked up world exists outside if people trying to get into the sybil system? Maybe they were trafficked in I guess.
Also, so the mother is one of the asymptomatic people inserted it seems. It feels like they really want sybil to be a mustache twirling villain with a personality this season instead of the ultimate uncaring/feeling judge of season 1. If the inserted can still do "evil", then it kind of breaks the rules set in season 1, why would a bunch of psycho paths care about society having its rules enforced? If you had inserted the antagonists brain from season 1 in, why wouldnt his first action to be to shut the whole fucking thing down, if they retain parts of themselves? And why would they want to still take him in knowing thats what his goal is?
That movie trailer makes me go 'meh',
pushing the scenery outside of the country? Why do they care about anyone outside the country enough to leave their isolationalist state?
Okay, so I want to preface this by saying that I am legitimately enjoying this season. It's not as good as S1, but it's still been pretty fun so far.
But I am getting the feeling that the writers are basically approaching the lack of Urobuchi by trying to emulate him as much as possible. Not even the first season was as blatantly and constantly brutal as this season has been so far. It had more... Careful placement of the brutality, rather than applying it where ever possible. It's as if in the process of trying to live up to the expectations of Urobuchi's writing, they've ended up trying far too hard.
Okay, so I want to preface this by saying that I am legitimately enjoying this season. It's not as good as S1, but it's still been pretty fun so far.
But I am getting the feeling that the writers are basically approaching the lack of Urobuchi by trying to emulate him as much as possible. Not even the first season was as blatantly and constantly brutal as this season has been so far. It had more... Careful placement of the brutality, rather than applying it where ever possible. It's as if in the process of trying to live up to the expectations of Urobuchi's writing, they've ended up trying far too hard.
Season 1 had precision-guided brutality designed just to screw with the audience.
Akane's personal acquaintances, the schoolgirls, the redheaded enforcer guy who learned the truth, etc. They were all pretty personal, either Makishima's direct fucking with the cops, the serial killers' subjects, or SIBYL defending itself.
Season 2 is, "fuck it, let's just murder tons of people indiscriminately."
Well, on one hand I think the huge levels of brutal murder has had a pretty strong effect. I've been left a bit stunned by the sheer level of it at the end of some episodes, and it's certainly resulted in a serious amping up of just how horrifying everything is.
But on the other hand it also feels a bit... Too excessive. Like they're just throwing out such carnage rather than surgically inserting these occurrences for maximum effect. Which is what makes me feel like they're trying to hard to emulate Urobuchi and are doing it without his usual precision.
Well, on one hand I think the huge levels of brutal murder has had a pretty strong effect. I've been left a bit stunned by the sheer level of it at the end of some episodes, and it's certainly resulted in a serious amping up of just how horrifying everything is.
But on the other hand it also feels a bit... Too excessive. Like they're just throwing out such carnage rather than surgically inserting these occurrences for maximum effect. Which is what makes me feel like they're trying to hard to emulate Urobuchi and are doing it without his usual precision.
Urobuchi knows how to restrain himself in order to make a shocking scene come across effectively. This is mostly thanks to how he tends to conceptualize the most fucked up scenarios first and then scales them down appropriately (you should read the stuff he had planned for Madoka that didn't get used). In season 1, someone gets a pair of scissors jammed right down their throat, but they don't show that play out in gory detail; it was a quick cut that was enough to startle you and have your mind play out the nastiness, which is how it should be.
Season 2 ignores this approach wholesale. The copious amounts of extra violence pretty much details what's wrong with the season as a whole.
I think, in its own way, the scenes of very graphic violence have a different, but not invalid, effect. Contrast it with, for a bit of a distant example, the open scenes of Saving Private Ryan. Huge amounts of very graphic violence, but there for a very specific and very powerful effect. So I don't think showing us this sort of level of violence is inherently a bad thing. Urobuchi's approach has worked very well for him because that's how he writes stuff and he uses it with great care and precision.
The problem for this season arises in that the level of violence hasn't really been applied with the level of care that I feel it needs to fully justify its presence. That doesn't, however, mean it hasn't been effective at all. I for one have found it to be quite a powerful, if overly direct, method.
But yeah, I am still enjoying this season quite a bit. Despite its flaws, truly.
I think, in its own way, the scenes of very graphic violence have a different, but not invalid, effect. Contrast it with, for a bit of a distant example, the open scenes of Saving Private Ryan. Huge amounts of very graphic violence, but there for a very specific and very powerful effect. So I don't think showing us this sort of level of violence is inherently a bad thing. Urobuchi's approach has worked very well for him because that's how he writes stuff and he uses it with great care and precision.
The problem for this season arises in that the level of violence hasn't really been applied with the level of care that I feel it needs to fully justify its presence. That doesn't, however, mean it hasn't been effective at all. I for one have found it to be quite a powerful, if overly direct, method.
But yeah, I am still enjoying this season quite a bit. Despite its flaws, truly.
It's the difference between a juicy, tender filet mignon and a McDonald's quarter pounder. They can both satisfy you, but one is a refined, exquisite taste and the other is lowest common denominator.
It seems like the inserted brains have all been brainwashed, including the chief, to be fanatics about the system. They can act independently and have personality, but they are like a cult, using it only for the continuation of the system. Akane is a threat to them, but she is judged as blue, so she must be turned red before they can act.
This may be the reason they do not apply individual reasoning to some cases of what the dominators see, they believe whole heatedly in their hive mind approach.
The more I look at the last episode the more it seems like Sibyl is a cult lead by fanatics that worship the system.
He's a shy overambitious dog-catcher on the wrong side of the law. She's an orphaned psychic mercenary with the power to bend men's minds. They fight crime!
Altogether, I found it to be 'Good'. Not great, but good. One of the main reasons Season 1 was great was that it worked in real-life psychological constructs and philosophy to pose some interesting 'what if' scenarios.
Season 2 was playing a game with us where nothing seemed to make any sense, and actually heavily contradicted the rules of the show until Episode ~7 basically said "You know how none of this is making any sense..?" with a shit-eating grin. That's allright, PP-2, you've had no problem disappointing us thus far, we'll wait to see how all the pieces fit together, but remember, you promised.
Episodes 10 and 11 were what kind of sealed the deal for me. The episodes were coherent enough where they not only revealed how everything fit together, but suddenly it all made sense. I actually think that what they were trying to do was an interesting concept, and I wouldn't change the plot of this season if it had to be done over again.
I would however COMPLETELY REARRANGE the way viewers were let in on the plot and overall themes. Season 1 worked because we were let in on Makishima's plans while the game of cat and mouse played out. Season 2 is completely ambiguous up until the end.
It will never happen, but a better 'redux' of this season would introduce Panopticon and a collective psycho pass MUCH earlier, I'm talking episodes 1-2.
All in all, a very sloppy season, but one that ended a hell of a lot better than it began.
I'm not appreciating how much arbitrary implausible sci-fi is being dumped in my sober, speculative science fiction. Kamui's whole deal is completely bogus.
Somehow being reconstructed from 183 other people would not result in some sort of completely unreadable-to-bioscans situation, it would possibly read as wildly erratic... but probably not, if the result were stable enough to keep him alive. Just... no. They're suggesting that all these transfusions left him without a pulse, breath rate, brainwaves, etc.
And then SIBYL knows all about the whole deal because of the brains did the procedure in the first place, and they're completely unwilling to fudge the system to let the Dominators kill Kamui because they don't want people to know that there's someone that SIBYL can't judge. But the only reason that anyone would know that SIBYL can't judge Kamui is because they're unwilling to just manually set the Dominator to Lethal Eliminator (or, heck, Decomposer, just treat Kamui like a dangerous robot... that's the kind of determination that has to be made on-the-fly anyway), so he's still running around causing havoc. This would suggest that there is a factional split within SIBYL, but why would this supposedly impartial group with a factional disagreement put Mrs. Togane in charge of dealing with the situation, when she's clearly not unbiased on the matter?
Yeah, I get that the villains need to be able to move around without being seen by Big Brother, but they've already offered options for this to work; they didn't have to make it into the plot of a heavy metal video. Also this season is suggesting that being a hostage pretty much immediately. makes people irrevocably criminally insane.
Season 1 ep 1. Hostages tend to clear 100, and society just gives up on anyone who goes over.
Its worse when someone with psych skills is trying. Innocents being condemned is a theme of the series really.
100, sure, but
the hostage in episode 1 had to go through basically hours of torment to go over 300. Kamui is doing it to large groups in a fraction of the time. It just stretches my belief past the breaking point, is all.
I asked for one motherfucking thing (Mika's removal from the series one way or the other) and I didn't even get that.
So not only does she get away with being an accessory to murder with Akane's grandmother, she somehow manages to mentally convince herself that she was manipulated and thus rendered guiltless while also aware of what she has done....and still keeps her Psycho-Pass from increasing???
The mere idea that she's going to continue being around makes me not want to even think about giving the movie a chance. Her character is beyond salvaging, in my opinion, even if they just decide to completely ignore her actions in this season and use it as an excuse to "rewrite" her shitty personality.
It never even made any goddamn sense why she was so devoted to the Sibyl System, considering her best friend was killed because the system couldn't locate the serial killer living in her school. Her inclusion in the end of season 1 led to a lot of interesting potential and they just went the complete opposite with her portrayal.
And if you're going to say that she was a character that was intentionally set up to reach a downfall, then they handled that shittily as well. If you want to see a series that does a terrific job of steadily making a character worse, watch Kamen Rider Gaim (guess who wrote it).
From what I'm reading, it sounds like season 2 is going to be wholeheartedly ignored in every single way with the movie, as if the staff knew it was going to be inconsequential filler from the start. Even so, it's really hard to just whitewash a black stain in a series' storyline, especially when certain remnants are still lingering around. I don't know if they plan to continue the story beyond the movie, and I also don't know if I'll be interested to see what they plan. I don't think even Urobuchi could course-correct the level of dumb that went on here.
I asked for one motherfucking thing (Mika's removal from the series one way or the other) and I didn't even get that.
So not only does she get away with being an accessory to murder with Akane's grandmother, she somehow manages to mentally convince herself that she was manipulated and thus rendered guiltless while also aware of what she has done....and still keeps her Psycho-Pass from increasing???
The mere idea that she's going to continue being around makes me not want to even think about giving the movie a chance. Her character is beyond salvaging, in my opinion, even if they just decide to completely ignore her actions in this season and use it as an excuse to "rewrite" her shitty personality.
It never even made any goddamn sense why she was so devoted to the Sibyl System, considering her best friend was killed because the system couldn't locate the serial killer living in her school. Her inclusion in the end of season 1 led to a lot of interesting potential and they just went the complete opposite with her portrayal.
And if you're going to say that she was a character that was intentionally set up to reach a downfall, then they handled that shittily as well. If you want to see a series that does a terrific job of steadily making a character worse, watch Kamen Rider Gaim (guess who wrote it).
From what I'm reading, it sounds like season 2 is going to be wholeheartedly ignored in every single way with the movie, as if the staff knew it was going to be inconsequential filler from the start. Even so, it's really hard to just whitewash a black stain in a series' storyline, especially when certain remnants are still lingering around. I don't know if they plan to continue the story beyond the movie, and I also don't know if I'll be interested to see what they plan. I don't think even Urobuchi could course-correct the level of dumb that went on here.
I totally agree about mika, but in a slightly different way
This wasn't a character being set up for a downfall. It was a character being setup for REDEMPTION. She was this awful misguided child, and the writers had a chance to have her, as the straight man, learn new things that cause her viewpoint to be changed. Not a single character experienced change in season 2. They all pretty much ended the way they started. That's why it feels like a writing failure to me.
I asked for one motherfucking thing (Mika's removal from the series one way or the other) and I didn't even get that.
So not only does she get away with being an accessory to murder with Akane's grandmother, she somehow manages to mentally convince herself that she was manipulated and thus rendered guiltless while also aware of what she has done....and still keeps her Psycho-Pass from increasing???
The mere idea that she's going to continue being around makes me not want to even think about giving the movie a chance. Her character is beyond salvaging, in my opinion, even if they just decide to completely ignore her actions in this season and use it as an excuse to "rewrite" her shitty personality.
It never even made any goddamn sense why she was so devoted to the Sibyl System, considering her best friend was killed because the system couldn't locate the serial killer living in her school. Her inclusion in the end of season 1 led to a lot of interesting potential and they just went the complete opposite with her portrayal.
And if you're going to say that she was a character that was intentionally set up to reach a downfall, then they handled that shittily as well. If you want to see a series that does a terrific job of steadily making a character worse, watch Kamen Rider Gaim (guess who wrote it).
From what I'm reading, it sounds like season 2 is going to be wholeheartedly ignored in every single way with the movie, as if the staff knew it was going to be inconsequential filler from the start. Even so, it's really hard to just whitewash a black stain in a series' storyline, especially when certain remnants are still lingering around. I don't know if they plan to continue the story beyond the movie, and I also don't know if I'll be interested to see what they plan. I don't think even Urobuchi could course-correct the level of dumb that went on here.
I totally agree about mika, but in a slightly different way
This wasn't a character being set up for a downfall. It was a character being setup for REDEMPTION. She was this awful misguided child, and the writers had a chance to have her, as the straight man, learn new things that cause her viewpoint to be changed. Not a single character experienced change in season 2. They all pretty much ended the way they started. That's why it feels like a writing failure to me.
If they wanted her to have a tense relationship with Akane, they could have hinged on her thinking that her crew didn't work fast enough in exposing the killer at her school, motivating her to be a more efficient Enforcer. I could buy that.
I could not buy her being so pig-headedly devoted to the Sibyl System to the point that she mentally "fools" herself into thinking she's a model citizen at the end. This was not the vibe I got from her character in season 1, who was in fact the only girl in her class who wasn't head-over-heels over the killer that charmed so many other girls. It made me think of her as perceptive, which is the polar opposite of what she ended up being.
If they actually do manage to write her better in the movie, it will most likely be under the notion that they will just completely ignore and never acknowledge the shit she pulled in this season, which I just can't overlook. If she's never going to acknowledge or pay for her involvement in the murder of Akane's grandmother, then the negative effects from season 2 will just continue onward.
She's pretty much the Ana Lucia of Psycho-Pass at this point.
Togane was also a wasted character. He had a real interesting premise as someone with the highest Psycho-Pass on record. Instead of doing anything unique with that, they just turn him into the Freeza of Latent Criminals (this isn't even my final hue!).
The end result of this season makes even less sense considering that
didn't Sibyl already do collective scans with their area-wide readings? It even happened a few times in this season to dramatic effect.
I really don't get what this collective judgment thing is supposed to do, and I once again have a feeling it will never be brought up.
I asked for one motherfucking thing (Mika's removal from the series one way or the other) and I didn't even get that.
So not only does she get away with being an accessory to murder with Akane's grandmother, she somehow manages to mentally convince herself that she was manipulated and thus rendered guiltless while also aware of what she has done....and still keeps her Psycho-Pass from increasing???
The mere idea that she's going to continue being around makes me not want to even think about giving the movie a chance. Her character is beyond salvaging, in my opinion, even if they just decide to completely ignore her actions in this season and use it as an excuse to "rewrite" her shitty personality.
It never even made any goddamn sense why she was so devoted to the Sibyl System, considering her best friend was killed because the system couldn't locate the serial killer living in her school. Her inclusion in the end of season 1 led to a lot of interesting potential and they just went the complete opposite with her portrayal.
And if you're going to say that she was a character that was intentionally set up to reach a downfall, then they handled that shittily as well. If you want to see a series that does a terrific job of steadily making a character worse, watch Kamen Rider Gaim (guess who wrote it).
From what I'm reading, it sounds like season 2 is going to be wholeheartedly ignored in every single way with the movie, as if the staff knew it was going to be inconsequential filler from the start. Even so, it's really hard to just whitewash a black stain in a series' storyline, especially when certain remnants are still lingering around. I don't know if they plan to continue the story beyond the movie, and I also don't know if I'll be interested to see what they plan. I don't think even Urobuchi could course-correct the level of dumb that went on here.
I totally agree about mika, but in a slightly different way
This wasn't a character being set up for a downfall. It was a character being setup for REDEMPTION. She was this awful misguided child, and the writers had a chance to have her, as the straight man, learn new things that cause her viewpoint to be changed. Not a single character experienced change in season 2. They all pretty much ended the way they started. That's why it feels like a writing failure to me.
If they wanted her to have a tense relationship with Akane, they could have hinged on her thinking that her crew didn't work fast enough in exposing the killer at her school, motivating her to be a more efficient Enforcer. I could buy that.
I could not buy her being so pig-headedly devoted to the Sibyl System to the point that she mentally "fools" herself into thinking she's a model citizen at the end. This was not the vibe I got from her character in season 1, who was in fact the only girl in her class who wasn't head-over-heels over the killer that charmed so many other girls. It made me think of her as perceptive, which is the polar opposite of what she ended up being.
If they actually do manage to write her better in the movie, it will most likely be under the notion that they will just completely ignore and never acknowledge the shit she pulled in this season, which I just can't overlook. If she's never going to acknowledge or pay for her involvement in the murder of Akane's grandmother, then the negative effects from season 2 will just continue onward.
She's pretty much the Ana Lucia of Psycho-Pass at this point.
Togane was also a wasted character. He had a real interesting premise as someone with the highest Psycho-Pass on record. Instead of doing anything unique with that, they just turn him into the Freeza of Latent Criminals (this isn't even my final hue!).
The end result of this season makes even less sense considering that
didn't Sibyl already do collective scans with their area-wide readings? It even happened a few times in this season to dramatic effect.
I really don't get what this collective judgment thing is supposed to do, and I once again have a feeling it will never be brought up.
It made sense to me. But to preface my explanation, I don't believe sibyl judges mental health, so much as she judges the ability to serve society. Or maybe the lack of ability to fuck up society.
I think the idea of the collective judgement is that Sibyl can look at a group of 100 people, and even if all of those people are good sane individuals, if that group is working against the interests of society and doing harm, they can all be executed. The way a country might be filled with good people, but that country keeps starting wars, and is bad for the world, so execute the country.
I asked for one motherfucking thing (Mika's removal from the series one way or the other) and I didn't even get that.
So not only does she get away with being an accessory to murder with Akane's grandmother, she somehow manages to mentally convince herself that she was manipulated and thus rendered guiltless while also aware of what she has done....and still keeps her Psycho-Pass from increasing???
The mere idea that she's going to continue being around makes me not want to even think about giving the movie a chance. Her character is beyond salvaging, in my opinion, even if they just decide to completely ignore her actions in this season and use it as an excuse to "rewrite" her shitty personality.
It never even made any goddamn sense why she was so devoted to the Sibyl System, considering her best friend was killed because the system couldn't locate the serial killer living in her school. Her inclusion in the end of season 1 led to a lot of interesting potential and they just went the complete opposite with her portrayal.
And if you're going to say that she was a character that was intentionally set up to reach a downfall, then they handled that shittily as well. If you want to see a series that does a terrific job of steadily making a character worse, watch Kamen Rider Gaim (guess who wrote it).
From what I'm reading, it sounds like season 2 is going to be wholeheartedly ignored in every single way with the movie, as if the staff knew it was going to be inconsequential filler from the start. Even so, it's really hard to just whitewash a black stain in a series' storyline, especially when certain remnants are still lingering around. I don't know if they plan to continue the story beyond the movie, and I also don't know if I'll be interested to see what they plan. I don't think even Urobuchi could course-correct the level of dumb that went on here.
I totally agree about mika, but in a slightly different way
This wasn't a character being set up for a downfall. It was a character being setup for REDEMPTION. She was this awful misguided child, and the writers had a chance to have her, as the straight man, learn new things that cause her viewpoint to be changed. Not a single character experienced change in season 2. They all pretty much ended the way they started. That's why it feels like a writing failure to me.
If they wanted her to have a tense relationship with Akane, they could have hinged on her thinking that her crew didn't work fast enough in exposing the killer at her school, motivating her to be a more efficient Enforcer. I could buy that.
I could not buy her being so pig-headedly devoted to the Sibyl System to the point that she mentally "fools" herself into thinking she's a model citizen at the end. This was not the vibe I got from her character in season 1, who was in fact the only girl in her class who wasn't head-over-heels over the killer that charmed so many other girls. It made me think of her as perceptive, which is the polar opposite of what she ended up being.
If they actually do manage to write her better in the movie, it will most likely be under the notion that they will just completely ignore and never acknowledge the shit she pulled in this season, which I just can't overlook. If she's never going to acknowledge or pay for her involvement in the murder of Akane's grandmother, then the negative effects from season 2 will just continue onward.
She's pretty much the Ana Lucia of Psycho-Pass at this point.
Togane was also a wasted character. He had a real interesting premise as someone with the highest Psycho-Pass on record. Instead of doing anything unique with that, they just turn him into the Freeza of Latent Criminals (this isn't even my final hue!).
The end result of this season makes even less sense considering that
didn't Sibyl already do collective scans with their area-wide readings? It even happened a few times in this season to dramatic effect.
I really don't get what this collective judgment thing is supposed to do, and I once again have a feeling it will never be brought up.
It made sense to me. But to preface my explanation, I don't believe sibyl judges mental health, so much as she judges the ability to serve society. Or maybe the lack of ability to fuck up society.
I think the idea of the collective judgement is that Sibyl can look at a group of 100 people, and even if all of those people are good sane individuals, if that group is working against the interests of society and doing harm, they can all be executed. The way a country might be filled with good people, but that country keeps starting wars, and is bad for the world, so execute the country.
Why didn't Akane just fucking shoot the guy.
Ironic considering I defended her lack of action in season one when Makashima had her friend dead to rights.
She's been pretty consistent in the regard of pulling the trigger. However the result in this episode was such a dumb cop out.
My angriest moment was
revoking akanes rights after saying the system has to do it automatically (presumably based on PP).
That, and nothing really came from it, except the group using them to administer justice themselves. Which then the enforcer gets a crossbow, so why the fuck do they need dominators?
At it's base its a problem of why does your tool for administering justice have to give all witnesses ptsd that makes it then able to use on them? If you killed people by putting them into restful sleep, you could hand dominators out on the corner to anyone, there completely safe to use in their society. I kind of have to let this point go for the show to just work I guess.
I agree with the article, why does sybil need to judge groups? We didn't get one example of a group of clear people acting tainted, except his execution squad. Which he handcrafted on purpose using medication and technology, because he himself was such a group. Like, if he just decided not to be an asshole, there's no reason for sybil to consider this a weakness.
The reset on the professor was really strange. They really took his "he has a cloudy aura, stay away!" as a literal thing, who cares if hes just hanging out with the IT lady? Who did he hurt this season that he feels he has to seclude himself.
The final scene, was akane smoking in her apartment?
After seeing the last episode, I'm still at a loss as to what the fuck was going on. Passes just changed arbitrarily to where they could kill the people the plot wanted dead. SIBYL changing its algorithm to judge groups, then destroying a bunch of brains in its own group that was raising its collective psycho-pass, was just baffling. Like, every brain in SIBYL was criminally asymptomatic, right? So its collective psycho pass is still, like, 32. Unless you judge a group by a different set of... no, fuck it. It didn't make any sense, and I'm not going to try anymore.
Nothing of any import happened with any of the Season 1 cast, with the exception of Akane losing a relative. I suppose that they tacitly admitted that she is also criminally asymptomatic with their suggestion that she join the SIBYL collective. But, seriously, everyone guessed that already. There was no advancement with the surviving Enforcers from Season 1 and Mika never redeemed herself in any capacity.
So, so disappointed in Season 2. The movie better be good.
Also, we've done collective judgments before, it's called tribal warfare. Before we developed non-shitty morals, you burned a city to the ground if it defied you just because you could, and fuck all the people who never raised a hand in resistance. It wasn't very useful.
Plus this ultimately never fails to sufficiently answer Makashima's point in the first season that the idea of a psycho pass is inherently flawed, because you can only judge a person based on their actions, not some speculative voodoo. Him executing a person while holding a 0.0 psycho-pass while the professor (among many) went to prison for trying to save the country is a perfect example of that. But the reason it was brilliant sci-fi was because it worked well enough, leading to a pleasant dystopia. Omelas, not 1984.
The sad thing is this season had a couple interesting ideas, like individual motivation with Sibyl itself, an enforcer trying to corrupt inspectors, and the like, but they were implemented horribly. But "LOL 185 bodies made into one," is just inane. A less stupid version of the same idea would be that the psycho pass relies on both current biometrics and actions compared with past ones, along Sibyl's judgement, so even an actually plausible organ transplant, combined with years without a scan, would give misleading results. A single survivor of a crash with believable organ transplants who registers 'Error', which is thrown out by data validation code, would still be able to tell the same story.
Also, not enough philosophy in this season.
They dropped the ball like crazy here. Hopefully the movie does better.
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Hey I got a question.
How often do we see from Sybil's point of view in this series?
How often do we see from Sybil's point of view in this series?
In theory, whenever someone looks down the barrel of a dominator, because
the brains are making a judgment. The point of the brains is that they had the sort of processing power which could render such decisions quickly enough. Which is why the Chief could change Dominator results on the fly in the first season. They don't change the results of the criminally asymptomatic because they want to incorporate those people into their collective. This season throws a wrench at that, because it implies that the process is entirely automated; they can't judge Kamui even though they want him dead.
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How often do we see from Sybil's point of view in this series?
In theory, whenever someone looks down the barrel of a dominator, because
the brains are making a judgment. The point of the brains is that they had the sort of processing power which could render such decisions quickly enough. Which is why the Chief could change Dominator results on the fly in the first season. They don't change the results of the criminally asymptomatic because they want to incorporate those people into their collective. This season throws a wrench at that, because it implies that the process is entirely automated; they can't judge Kamui even though they want him dead.
Perhaps there's a big boss brain in the whole system that's wired itself in. So to speak. Or maybe even the computer is going sentient and is burning off unneeded and potentially dangerous/unhealthy brains.
Anyways I'm more specifically asking if the SYBIL system is itself a character or a plot device?
Anyways I'm more specifically asking if the SYBIL system is itself a character or a plot device?
Yes. It is both.
Or rather, it is a plot device and a group of characters. Each brain in SIBYL is an individual character; we've seen two very distinct personalities over the course of the series. This is only evident when they're embodied, however; the Chief in Season 1 basically says that being put into the robot body is a way for the individual brains to experience occasional autonomy & individuality (typically when needing to deal with people they knew in their former lives). Then the brains have a collective personality, which is what makes Dominator judgments and decisions for society.
Does that answer your question?
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Ssssort've. I've been putting this off because I know what to look forward to with some characters and guts and blood and stuff. I'm honestly more interested in SYBIL than in any other character in the series so far so I'm just wondering if we get enough PoV scenes from a SYBIL controlled camera or something so I have something to chew on regarding the system itself.
Ssssort've. I've been putting this off because I know what to look forward to with some characters and guts and blood and stuff. I'm honestly more interested in SYBIL than in any other character in the series so far so I'm just wondering if we get enough PoV scenes from a SYBIL controlled camera or something so I have something to chew on regarding the system itself.
If that's your interest, don't watch Season 2. Seriously.
This takes a LOT of agency away from SIBYL and makes it a slave to its own system. It goes from intelligent mastermind in Season 1 to just letting dozens, if not hundreds, of people die because it is unable to pass judgment on one guy in Season 2.
In Season 1, you never got the impression that Makishima was ever considered a real threat to SIBYL; they basically could've killed him whenever they wanted, but it was worth the price to hold off if they could get their hands on his sweet, sweet brainmeats. Then they drastically underestimated him, because Makishima is awesome.
Season 2, they desperately want Kamui erased before he could make drastic changes to the system, but then systematically hold the Inspectors and Enforcers back... not because of ulterior motives, but because the rules, as written, say they have to. They've never heard of the exception that proves the rule; when Kamui finally corners them (by pointing a Dominator at a SIBYL brain, of all bullshit things that shouldn't ever work), they have to change their rules (so it's boring heavy metal song subject Kamui, not awesome Makishima, who ends up "winning") to judge a collective (and thus themselves).
There's also a lot of mustache-twirling with the Chief and Togane, which is beneath SIBYL, if you ask me.
If SIBYL is your interest, I would definitely skip this season. It constantly gets chumped and loses a lot of agency and threat.
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I'll repeat myself:
Kamui's endgame seems to be different in that he's trying to get Sybil to destroy the very people it protects (and, in particular, to destroy its own enforcement arm).
That they both have the power to evade Sybil is basically a requirement given the premise, but their philosophies and goals are fairly distinct. I wouldn't say they're rehashing season 1. Especially not with well more than half of the season still to go.
Sure, okay. I'm not saying that
There's one thing that's also bothering me about this season's psycho-pass readings.
Really what would shut everything right now realistically would just be removing the permissions for that enforcer in their database. Then he cant use the dominator anymore, or anyone he plans on handing those 3-5 to. But I dont know how much tv science they are going to go into for this.
A season and a half in is kind of nonsense to put in the rule about 'oh, we only get 3 anti material shots'. But I'll get over it
Yeah.
Like I said before, the only thing that makes any sense to me at this point is that SIBYL is helping Kamui for some reason. I mean, that's quite possible, because SIBYL is a bunch of assholes, but doesn't really explain why Akane doesn't go over to the chief and start demanding answers.
Mika better have a chat with Akane ASAP about Togane being a creep.
I think my faith was just renewed in this show.
They did stop to point out how bullshit the season has been so far, but they didn't change the fact that it is, indeed, bullshit. They better have another trick up their sleeve.
Judging by Episode 8, they have chosen the path of "Make up a bunch of confusing shit that already happened and may or may not contradict the first season entirely and the dates don't even make sense."
Maybe it's the translation I'm watching but when Akane goes "He's been right alongside us the whole time!" and then we see a shady figure meeting with Kamui (with Kogami's bike in the corner...!) as the cliffhanger, one would expect the next episode would at least reveal who they were talking about.
Just in case the series decides to reverse the dump it's taking on itself, they released the trailer for the upcoming movie: (may contain spoilers, shows characters that apparently survived this season)
Transcript:
Akane: Yes.
Woman: You intend to handle this yourself?
Akane: I'm more than prepared.
Text: The stage moves to the globe
Woman: The top of management of Shanbura Furoto are part of the Sibyl System.
Nicholas: I am Nicholas Wong.
Akane: There's no way a Psycho Pass measured in this situation will give a proper reading!
Nicholas: If we don't get them, they'll get us.
Man: Return fire!
Soldier: Target found! Identified!
Man: Either be tamed, or give yourself up to the law out of my reach. This was once a choice given to Shogo Makishima, and it caught up to him. The same thing happened with Kōgami.
Yeah.......
But the reveal that he gained all this by some sci-fi...no....sci-fantasy procedure that mixed a bunch of brain pieces together that....SOMEHOW gave him his anti-Sibyl powers.....it would have been much better if they just kept his abilities ambiguous, like they did with Makishima.
Oh and now we know that the Chief is Togane's mother or some robot version of his mother and he's like the guy from Resident Evil Code Veronica and I don't even....
On the bright side, at least Mika actually fucking did something this episode, even if it was once more in pursuit of implicating Akane (and not even bothering to warn her about Togane). I have no idea what they have planned for her now, but as I said before, it's hard to feel anything about her incoming Bad End when they've spent little time making her even halfway likeable.
This is becoming the biggest Anime disappointment of the year for me. I know there's already a bunch of Urobuchi snobs who will insist how he is irreplaceable and that no one could take over his writing duties....but so far the proof is in the pudding.
Season 2 feels like the 24 version of Psycho-Pass: it's louder, dumber, more action and more dumb. I deeply miss all the intriguing talky parts and multiple cases of the first season. I don't know if they confirmed yet if Urobuchi is writing the movie, but if he is it would be really great if nothing of note happens this season so we can pretend that the movie is the real sequel.
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which is a shame because there's was a lot of interesting stuff that they just drove off a cliff in ep 8
The composition of Section 1 could have led to a lot of interesting stuff - in particular, I was thinking of having Mika being slowly corrupted by Saiga (unintentionally) and Togane (intentionally, as a way to get at Akane, presumably), as a sort of long term consequence of Akane's risky way of running Section 1. But instead things got stupid. Togane's origin is stupid, just have him be a weird psycho (which Sibyl keeps around and keeps throwing inspectors to because Sibyl is collecting data or whatever who cares its not terribly important). And they revealed Togane's outward criminality too early, I feel. It should have been a slow burn instead of laying it all out so clearly so early.
It's also really weird to have Sibyl having a stated goal of taking down Akane, considering it could do so incredibly easily and could have done so incredibly easily in S1.
My expectations were that they were going to fuck everything up so I was alright with where the show was going for the first 7 episodes but this seems like it could be the start of a nosedive
Ep 9:
Fucking with Akane's grandmother was a much more personal reveal, but I have a feeling that's going to lead to a mean-spirited resolution with no real closure.
I did find it funny seeing Mika being shocked into embracing the truth behind Sibyl, but I still have no idea what they're planning to do with her. I'd like to think the shocked glances she's throwing Akane's way means she's finally realizing that she was wrong and will attempt to make up for her actions....but at this point it's simply too late to redeem the character
From what I've read, the Kamui arc only takes up half the season and is possibly wrapping up next week. I want to hold out hope the second half will be a course correction (and hopefully with a new writer), but it's hard to say at this point.
If only Urobutcher were here.
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I believe it's only an 11-episode season, as opposed to the first's 22-episode season.
The sooner this one is over, the better, honestly. This season feels like the characters from Metalocalypse saw season 1 and wrote a song about it, and the producers inexplicably made it canonical.
ep 9.
Also, what kind of fucked up world exists outside if people trying to get into the sybil system? Maybe they were trafficked in I guess.
Also, so the mother is one of the asymptomatic people inserted it seems. It feels like they really want sybil to be a mustache twirling villain with a personality this season instead of the ultimate uncaring/feeling judge of season 1. If the inserted can still do "evil", then it kind of breaks the rules set in season 1, why would a bunch of psycho paths care about society having its rules enforced? If you had inserted the antagonists brain from season 1 in, why wouldnt his first action to be to shut the whole fucking thing down, if they retain parts of themselves? And why would they want to still take him in knowing thats what his goal is?
That movie trailer makes me go 'meh',
But I am getting the feeling that the writers are basically approaching the lack of Urobuchi by trying to emulate him as much as possible. Not even the first season was as blatantly and constantly brutal as this season has been so far. It had more... Careful placement of the brutality, rather than applying it where ever possible. It's as if in the process of trying to live up to the expectations of Urobuchi's writing, they've ended up trying far too hard.
Season 1 had precision-guided brutality designed just to screw with the audience.
Season 2 is, "fuck it, let's just murder tons of people indiscriminately."
Also, this season has no
But on the other hand it also feels a bit... Too excessive. Like they're just throwing out such carnage rather than surgically inserting these occurrences for maximum effect. Which is what makes me feel like they're trying to hard to emulate Urobuchi and are doing it without his usual precision.
Urobuchi knows how to restrain himself in order to make a shocking scene come across effectively. This is mostly thanks to how he tends to conceptualize the most fucked up scenarios first and then scales them down appropriately (you should read the stuff he had planned for Madoka that didn't get used). In season 1, someone gets a pair of scissors jammed right down their throat, but they don't show that play out in gory detail; it was a quick cut that was enough to startle you and have your mind play out the nastiness, which is how it should be.
Season 2 ignores this approach wholesale. The copious amounts of extra violence pretty much details what's wrong with the season as a whole.
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The problem for this season arises in that the level of violence hasn't really been applied with the level of care that I feel it needs to fully justify its presence. That doesn't, however, mean it hasn't been effective at all. I for one have found it to be quite a powerful, if overly direct, method.
But yeah, I am still enjoying this season quite a bit. Despite its flaws, truly.
It's the difference between a juicy, tender filet mignon and a McDonald's quarter pounder. They can both satisfy you, but one is a refined, exquisite taste and the other is lowest common denominator.
This may be the reason they do not apply individual reasoning to some cases of what the dominators see, they believe whole heatedly in their hive mind approach.
The more I look at the last episode the more it seems like Sibyl is a cult lead by fanatics that worship the system.
Altogether, I found it to be 'Good'. Not great, but good. One of the main reasons Season 1 was great was that it worked in real-life psychological constructs and philosophy to pose some interesting 'what if' scenarios.
Season 2 was playing a game with us where nothing seemed to make any sense, and actually heavily contradicted the rules of the show until Episode ~7 basically said "You know how none of this is making any sense..?" with a shit-eating grin. That's allright, PP-2, you've had no problem disappointing us thus far, we'll wait to see how all the pieces fit together, but remember, you promised.
Episodes 10 and 11 were what kind of sealed the deal for me. The episodes were coherent enough where they not only revealed how everything fit together, but suddenly it all made sense. I actually think that what they were trying to do was an interesting concept, and I wouldn't change the plot of this season if it had to be done over again.
I would however COMPLETELY REARRANGE the way viewers were let in on the plot and overall themes. Season 1 worked because we were let in on Makishima's plans while the game of cat and mouse played out. Season 2 is completely ambiguous up until the end.
It will never happen, but a better 'redux' of this season would introduce Panopticon and a collective psycho pass MUCH earlier, I'm talking episodes 1-2.
All in all, a very sloppy season, but one that ended a hell of a lot better than it began.
And then SIBYL knows all about the whole deal because of the brains did the procedure in the first place, and they're completely unwilling to fudge the system to let the Dominators kill Kamui because they don't want people to know that there's someone that SIBYL can't judge. But the only reason that anyone would know that SIBYL can't judge Kamui is because they're unwilling to just manually set the Dominator to Lethal Eliminator (or, heck, Decomposer, just treat Kamui like a dangerous robot... that's the kind of determination that has to be made on-the-fly anyway), so he's still running around causing havoc. This would suggest that there is a factional split within SIBYL, but why would this supposedly impartial group with a factional disagreement put Mrs. Togane in charge of dealing with the situation, when she's clearly not unbiased on the matter?
Yeah, I get that the villains need to be able to move around without being seen by Big Brother, but they've already offered options for this to work; they didn't have to make it into the plot of a heavy metal video. Also this season is suggesting that being a hostage pretty much immediately. makes people irrevocably criminally insane.
Its worse when someone with psych skills is trying. Innocents being condemned is a theme of the series really.
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100, sure, but
So not only does she get away with being an accessory to murder with Akane's grandmother, she somehow manages to mentally convince herself that she was manipulated and thus rendered guiltless while also aware of what she has done....and still keeps her Psycho-Pass from increasing???
The mere idea that she's going to continue being around makes me not want to even think about giving the movie a chance. Her character is beyond salvaging, in my opinion, even if they just decide to completely ignore her actions in this season and use it as an excuse to "rewrite" her shitty personality.
It never even made any goddamn sense why she was so devoted to the Sibyl System, considering her best friend was killed because the system couldn't locate the serial killer living in her school. Her inclusion in the end of season 1 led to a lot of interesting potential and they just went the complete opposite with her portrayal.
And if you're going to say that she was a character that was intentionally set up to reach a downfall, then they handled that shittily as well. If you want to see a series that does a terrific job of steadily making a character worse, watch Kamen Rider Gaim (guess who wrote it).
Here's a good recap of the season that mirrors pretty much how I felt (and introduces even more plot holes I overlooked): http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/review/psycho-pass-2/episode-11/.82404
From what I'm reading, it sounds like season 2 is going to be wholeheartedly ignored in every single way with the movie, as if the staff knew it was going to be inconsequential filler from the start. Even so, it's really hard to just whitewash a black stain in a series' storyline, especially when certain remnants are still lingering around. I don't know if they plan to continue the story beyond the movie, and I also don't know if I'll be interested to see what they plan. I don't think even Urobuchi could course-correct the level of dumb that went on here.
At least I know to avoid whatever else this guy writes.
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I totally agree about mika, but in a slightly different way
I could not buy her being so pig-headedly devoted to the Sibyl System to the point that she mentally "fools" herself into thinking she's a model citizen at the end. This was not the vibe I got from her character in season 1, who was in fact the only girl in her class who wasn't head-over-heels over the killer that charmed so many other girls. It made me think of her as perceptive, which is the polar opposite of what she ended up being.
If they actually do manage to write her better in the movie, it will most likely be under the notion that they will just completely ignore and never acknowledge the shit she pulled in this season, which I just can't overlook. If she's never going to acknowledge or pay for her involvement in the murder of Akane's grandmother, then the negative effects from season 2 will just continue onward.
She's pretty much the Ana Lucia of Psycho-Pass at this point.
Togane was also a wasted character. He had a real interesting premise as someone with the highest Psycho-Pass on record. Instead of doing anything unique with that, they just turn him into the Freeza of Latent Criminals (this isn't even my final hue!).
The end result of this season makes even less sense considering that
I really don't get what this collective judgment thing is supposed to do, and I once again have a feeling it will never be brought up.
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I think the idea of the collective judgement is that Sibyl can look at a group of 100 people, and even if all of those people are good sane individuals, if that group is working against the interests of society and doing harm, they can all be executed. The way a country might be filled with good people, but that country keeps starting wars, and is bad for the world, so execute the country.
Ironic considering I defended her lack of action in season one when Makashima had her friend dead to rights.
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My angriest moment was
That, and nothing really came from it, except the group using them to administer justice themselves. Which then the enforcer gets a crossbow, so why the fuck do they need dominators?
At it's base its a problem of why does your tool for administering justice have to give all witnesses ptsd that makes it then able to use on them? If you killed people by putting them into restful sleep, you could hand dominators out on the corner to anyone, there completely safe to use in their society. I kind of have to let this point go for the show to just work I guess.
I agree with the article, why does sybil need to judge groups? We didn't get one example of a group of clear people acting tainted, except his execution squad. Which he handcrafted on purpose using medication and technology, because he himself was such a group. Like, if he just decided not to be an asshole, there's no reason for sybil to consider this a weakness.
The reset on the professor was really strange. They really took his "he has a cloudy aura, stay away!" as a literal thing, who cares if hes just hanging out with the IT lady? Who did he hurt this season that he feels he has to seclude himself.
The final scene, was akane smoking in her apartment?
Nothing of any import happened with any of the Season 1 cast, with the exception of Akane losing a relative. I suppose that they tacitly admitted that she is also criminally asymptomatic with their suggestion that she join the SIBYL collective. But, seriously, everyone guessed that already. There was no advancement with the surviving Enforcers from Season 1 and Mika never redeemed herself in any capacity.
So, so disappointed in Season 2. The movie better be good.
Plus this ultimately never fails to sufficiently answer Makashima's point in the first season that the idea of a psycho pass is inherently flawed, because you can only judge a person based on their actions, not some speculative voodoo. Him executing a person while holding a 0.0 psycho-pass while the professor (among many) went to prison for trying to save the country is a perfect example of that. But the reason it was brilliant sci-fi was because it worked well enough, leading to a pleasant dystopia. Omelas, not 1984.
The sad thing is this season had a couple interesting ideas, like individual motivation with Sibyl itself, an enforcer trying to corrupt inspectors, and the like, but they were implemented horribly. But "LOL 185 bodies made into one," is just inane. A less stupid version of the same idea would be that the psycho pass relies on both current biometrics and actions compared with past ones, along Sibyl's judgement, so even an actually plausible organ transplant, combined with years without a scan, would give misleading results. A single survivor of a crash with believable organ transplants who registers 'Error', which is thrown out by data validation code, would still be able to tell the same story.
Also, not enough philosophy in this season.
They dropped the ball like crazy here. Hopefully the movie does better.
How often do we see from Sybil's point of view in this series?
In theory, whenever someone looks down the barrel of a dominator, because
Anyways I'm more specifically asking if the SYBIL system is itself a character or a plot device?
Yes. It is both.
Does that answer your question?
If that's your interest, don't watch Season 2. Seriously.
In Season 1, you never got the impression that Makishima was ever considered a real threat to SIBYL; they basically could've killed him whenever they wanted, but it was worth the price to hold off if they could get their hands on his sweet, sweet brainmeats. Then they drastically underestimated him, because Makishima is awesome.
Season 2, they desperately want Kamui erased before he could make drastic changes to the system, but then systematically hold the Inspectors and Enforcers back... not because of ulterior motives, but because the rules, as written, say they have to. They've never heard of the exception that proves the rule; when Kamui finally corners them (by pointing a Dominator at a SIBYL brain, of all bullshit things that shouldn't ever work), they have to change their rules (so it's boring heavy metal song subject Kamui, not awesome Makishima, who ends up "winning") to judge a collective (and thus themselves).
There's also a lot of mustache-twirling with the Chief and Togane, which is beneath SIBYL, if you ask me.
If SIBYL is your interest, I would definitely skip this season. It constantly gets chumped and loses a lot of agency and threat.