Scarlett Johansson will give life to the sci-fi anime classic Ghost In The Shell through The Major, the series’ protagonist. The Mayor appears to be a character reminiscing of Marvel’s Black Widow: A femme fatale that does not hesitate to enter a shootout and kick her way out of trouble.

The series first started as a manga in 1989, and to date, it has four movies in its name.

Scarlett Johansson will impersonate The Major in the sci-fi anime classic Ghost In The Shell. Photo credit: Screen Rant
Scarlett Johansson will impersonate The Major in the sci-fi anime classic Ghost In The Shell. Photo credit: Screen Rant

One for sci-fi manga fans

Produced by Dreamworks, Ghost In The Shell will tell the tale of The Major, the cyborg leader of Section 9, as they take down cyber criminal organizations. Featuring Michael Pitt, Juliette Binoche, and Pilou Asbæk, it has been revealed that the film will focus on The Major’s introspective quest.

The series, created by Masamune Shirow, focuses on Major Motoko Kusanagi, but there are many incarnations of the character, which leads to different states of mind and storylines. Her appearance and attitude are different in the manga and in the movies. In the first film, Kusanagi wonders about her soul or ghost, and about if she has any humanity in her or if she is entirely artificial. She even asks herself if she has artificially-generated memories to make her think that she was once human.

But the villain in the first movie is the Puppet Master, an AI that also seeks an answer to the questions posed by Kusanagi. According to the film’s producer, the villain in Ghost In The Shell’s 2017 rendition will be Kuze.

Hideo Kuze is a full cyborg and one of the members of the Individual Eleven, a terrorist group that tried to commit mass suicide but Kuze made it as the sole survivor. When Kuze was younger, he survived a plane crash in which Kusanagi was also present. Kuze ended up paralyzed, and his left arm was the only limb that could move.

In the hospital, there was a girl next to Kuze, and he was sad that she would not be able to recover. In Japan, the tradition says that if you fold a thousand paper cranes, then your wish will come true, which led Kuze to fold cranes with his only working limb to try and save the girl.

The girl was submitted to surgery, and her body was replaced with a cybernetic one. Kuze believed that she died. Later, he undergoes the same procedure, becoming a full cyborg.

In Ghost In The Shell episodes, it is revealed that the girl was none other than Major Kusanagi. She was aware of Kuze, and in the last episodes of Ghost In The Shell: 2nd GIG, both Kuze and The Major become trapped underneath rubble, to which she asks him if he is still able to make paper cranes only with his left hand. Producer Avi Arad suggested that in the upcoming film there would be many elements from 2nd GIG.

The film is directed by Rupert Sanders and will be hitting the theaters on March 29, 2017.

Source: Gamespot