About the series of works by Mamoru Oshii: Talking about the abstract concepts of human beings related to consciousness, reality, and birth, there are probably the earliest lucky star boy, the egg of the angel, the ancestor of the royal ancestor, and there are also some, Ghost in the Shell, and now AVALON. Among them, Angel's Egg is about birth, Ghost in the Shell is about the soul, and AVALON is about confusion (loss of soul). Perhaps these three volumes can be called Oshii Mamoru's trilogy on the concept of human beings.
In the angel's egg, life is born from sacrifice, and many lives are born from the sacrifice of the mysterious little girl. (It seems that the little girl of Angel's Egg can also be related to the little girl of GUOST in AVALON, one is the key to the birth of life, and the other is the entrance similar to the real, reborn through the entrance of this little girl) In the Angel's Egg , when the mysterious girl is sacrificed, she returns to the mythical spaceship; it can also be said that the sacred earth (God) sent the mysterious girl (the Virgin) down to the earth to sacrifice to give birth to the life of the earth.
Sacrifice and birth can be said to be the theme of Angel's Egg.
When it comes to Ghost in the Shell, the mother of life is no longer the sacred earth and the mysterious girl, but an artificial machine. If it is said that the value of human life is due to the gift of the holy earth and the sacrifice of the Virgin Mary, what is the value of life from artificial machinery? Is it because they also have a soul? What is a soul? Is it because of the ability to think or because of the physical body that has the natural gift of the earth? Does the soul still exist when naturally born people replace all natural flesh with mechanical ones? Does the soul exist when the thinking consciousness is freed from all forms (whether artificial or natural)?
This can be said: Ghost in the Shell first denied the sanctity born in the angel's egg, and further negated the sanctity of the body with all artificiality, to ask a pure question:
What exactly does the soul and consciousness refer to? (Why wouldn't artificiality be sacred? Why silently deny artificiality?)
When the body and birth are negated by artificiality, AVALON enters into a negation of the autonomy of consciousness, that is, when everything is virtual, consciousness and thinking are also virtualized, that is, artificial. The soul is also denied. It can be said that in AVALON, consciousness is manipulated and negated by artificial virtual, which further negates the natural soul, and the soul is artificial. From birth, life, consciousness, and soul, everything has been artificialized. In AVALON, artificialization reaches the highest level and becomes the only existence and holiness.
As mentioned earlier, "Angel's Egg" should be regarded as a post-biography of Noah's Ark, so first inherit the symbols and meanings of Noah's Ark, that is, water, Noah's Ark, dove, olive leaf and crime, punishment, termination of life, Life goes on and so on. Then examine how these symbols and meanings change in "Angel's Egg".
As a symbol of the meaning of criminals---human beings; in "Angel's Egg", there are not many human beings, only little girls and male warriors, and people who hunt for fish, so it is very intuitive to ask that human beings are still guilty. ? What is the crime?
After quickly identifying human crimes relative to the story of Noah's Ark, the focus is on the journey of life extension after punishment. In the cryptic plot and simple characters of "Angel's Egg," crime becomes a vague concept rather than a definite antecedent, or even an obvious verdict.
Or to put it conversely, in Noah's Ark, the concept of crime was established because of the obvious judgment and punishment (the Great Flood). In Angel's Egg, the notion of crime is hidden because there is no apparent verdict.
With this hidden concept of crime, look at the group of symbols still preserved in Angel's Egg: water, Noah's Ark, dove, olive leaf. Obviously, the three symbols of Noah's Ark, dove, and olive leaf all appear in the form of "relics, fossils". "in the past tense, all represent the disappearance of the original meaning and function. If, in the story of Noah's Ark, Noah's Ark, doves, and olive leaves represent the hope of life continuation; then, in "Angel's Egg", Noah's Ark, doves, and olive leaves represent the disappearance of the hope of life continuation.
Regarding water, in the story of Noah's Ark, the water that represents punishment is no longer a demonic punishment tool like the Great Flood, but an environment that cannot go around; whether it is the water that the little girl keeps collecting, or the The non-existent water set off by the fish floating on the wall, or the omnipresent water in the ruins, all construct a wet environment, an existence that can never be escaped.
Let us now examine the meaning of the role of man. In "Angel's Egg", people have only a small number of roles, and only a small number of behaviors, remove the unknown male nomad with a weapon; the hunter who fishes just uses a shotgun to round up the shadow of the fish swimming on the wall. , the meaning of this passage is almost obvious and direct. If the floating fish shadow represents illusion, then these fishermen are obsessed with illusion.
The center of meaning: The little girl has three meanings:
one is a narrator, who narrates all things and understands the male nomads and moviegoers. Second, the little girl herself is also obsessed with certain things, obsessed with the white egg that is not the content, and keeps putting water in a transparent glass bottle and decorating around her. Last but not least, the little girl committed suicide by spitting out bubbles and achieving real life. The three meanings of the little girl can be linked together by the male nomads who do not know where they come from.
From the above brief description, "Angel's Egg" has three groups of meaning symbols: one is Noah's Ark, dove, and olive leaf, which has been transformed into the past tense and its meaning has disappeared. The second is to become the water around not going to the environment. The third is people caught in obsessions (fishing hunters and little girls); connecting these three groups of meanings may be interpreted as follows: the crime that makes life hope disappear lies in obsession with illusion and refusal to face and clarify , so the punishment (water) is like a wet environment that can't go around, so real life can never begin. In this way, the concept of the crime of "Angel's Egg" still exists, only more vaguely. And the solution to crime is not the destruction of the Flood, but the smashing of obsessions.
The obsessional crime that breaks this cycle is the male nomad: smashing the eggs of obsession. The breaking of the egg starts a series of life operations: the little girl dives and becomes a mature woman; the bubbles spit out by the little girl become the real egg, and life begins to grow.
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