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A teenaged prostitute is resurrected by a government agency that wants her to testify against her killer, but with their own options running out they supercharge her into a fighting machine—and the consequences may be both physically and psychologically devastating. This striking adaptation—the first of three planned—derived from Tow Ubukata’s cycle of novels of the same name is equal parts “Neuromancer” and “La Femme Nikita,” and is at least as much about the weather of its beleaguered heroine’s soul than her ass-kicking potential.

The fact this is only part one of three and ends on a cliffhanger shouldn’t stop you.

Pros

• Top-notch animation worthy of a theatrical release.
• Compelling, deeply human story.

Cons

• Violence and some of the subject matter -- including the sexual abuse of minors -- may be difficult for some to handle.

• Director: Susumu Kudo
• Animation Studio: GoHands
• Released By: Aniplex
• Released Domestically By: Sentai Filmworks
• Audio: English / Japanese w/English subtitles
• Age Rating: TV-MA (violence, blood, sexuality, language, nudity, thematic material)
• List Price: $29.98 (DVD)

Anime Genres:

• Action/Adventure
• Drama
• Cyberpunk
• Thriller
• Romance

Related Titles:

• Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
• Armitage III

[The director's cut version adds some explicit footage that was not in the original theatrical release.]

Back from the dead and rebuilt for revenge

Good science fiction is about gadgets, but great SF—like all the best stories are generally—is about people. Mardock Scramble has some great gadgets, but more than anything else it’s about the minds and attitudes of characters surrounded by things that bring them that much closer to being gods.

The problem, of course, is that humans have enough problems just being humans. Granting them godhood often just makes things worse.

Mardock is set in a glittering but grim metropolis some indeterminate point in the future, with technology a whole order of magnitude more powerful than what we have now. That said, most people don’t have access to it: it’s illegal, solely for emergency government use. One such application is the protection of victims of violent crimes—like Rune Balot, the teenaged prostitute who’s murdered by her own john within the first few minutes.

Balot is rescued from the brink of death by Dr. Easter, a slightly-mad scientist (albeit with a good heart) who offers the girl a second chance at life in a kind of witness protection program -- the “Mardock Scramble” of the title. If she accepts, they will supply her with a new body—one capable of taking control of machinery and electronics, and with greatly enhanced strength and endurance. In return, she agrees to aid in the prosecution of her attempted murderer.

Balot’s a damage case—being raped by her own father wasn’t the worst thing that happened to her—but her would-be killer, Shell, may be even worse. He’s behind a massive money-laundering operation involving his casino, with the revolting things he does to women as a hobby on the side. He’s also brain-damaged, and needs to have his memory routinely dumped and refreshed (which makes for a convenient plausible-deniability ploy). He also has a hulking enforcer, Dimsdale Boiled, a former cop who seems to have feet on both sides of the law—and who wielded Oeufcoque himself before, and would very much like to do that again even if it kills both of them.

The bare outlines for Mardock Scramble make it sound a good deal like La Femme Nikita crossbred with one of William Gibson’s cyberpunk novels, a comparison I made myself in a discussion of the novel it was based on. What made Nikita most interesting, though, was not the plot itself but how the characters responded to and were in turn shaped by what went on.

Powered by human emotion, not just circuitry and bullets

Scramble is equally good at paying attention to the characters, to showing them with the kind of psychological acuity and attention to human detail that you almost never see in a story like this. Balot, for instance: she’s mature for her age, but in ways that inspire heartbreak instead of pride. On being told how she had subconsciously consented to the procedures that saved her life, she doesn’t bother disguising her bitterness: “I’ve heard that excuse before. Men are always saying ‘You know you wanted it too’ to me.” What’s one more violation on top of all the others she’s experienced? But she gradually realizes these folks do care about her—something which inspires her to swing to the other extreme, and despair of a life that doesn’t include them.

Oeufcoque senses almost immediately that Balot needs special handling. There is a scene where she goes driving with him, and discovers to her delight she can change the traffic signals in her favor. Too bad about the other drivers, though. When Balot points out that Oeufcoque didn’t stop her the first time, he replies “I was observing your self-control. I want you to decide for yourself which rules to obey.” Unfortunately, she’s torn between two extremes: the complete lack of control that she had in the past, or the godlike power that this new technology gives her. This comes most brutally to the fore when Boiled and his gang of assassins come gunning for the three of them, and Balot becomes a death machine on two legs in a shootout vicious enough to dislocate the viewers' eyes.