The 80s Cyberpunk Anime That Helped Launch Ghost In The Shell, Stream Without Netflix

The two anime films share the same creator, Masamune Shirow, and from there, you can see the similarities between the two, both good and bad. Appleseed came first in 1988, and to say it adapted his award-winning manga would be, well, wrong, as it essentially took the names of characters and the loose setting but told its own story. There’s a saying that you learn more from failure, and for Shirow, this first OVA outing was a failure. Sort of.

Appleseed takes place in a dystopian cyberpunk future within the utopian city of Olympus, which is controlled by a central computer called Gaia. Naturally, it’s not a true utopia, and there are rebels who plan to take it down, including Charon, a jaded police officer, and Sebastian, deemed a “terrorist” by Olympus City. The plan involves retrieving a weapon, the powerful Multi-ped cannon, and a cyborg that is unknowingly the key to the system, and if you think none of this matches the philosophical feeling of the original Ghost in the Shell, well, you’re right.

Opposing them are Hecatonchires and Knute, ESWAT officers dedicated to keeping the peace in Olympus. This makes Appleseed the strange cyberpunk story that has you siding with the authority figures, but again, if we got to see the characterization of this pair from the manga, we’d know a lot is going on under the surface.

I have found that most anime of the 80s, through a sense of style and strong characterization, still holds up today, which is why I was so pleasantly surprised upon watching City Hunter, but Appleseed lacks both style, and characterization. Charon and Sebastian are not defined beyond their initial personalities, and it’s hard to care for them or their situation when even Olympus isn’t made out to be that truly horrible.

As for the sense of style, this was the first OVA made by Gainax, a now legendary studio that would go on to produce Neon Genesis Evangelion. That was, of course, much later, and in 1988, Gainax was struggling to keep the lights on, and Appleseed didn’t help.

This is a shame, as Appleseed, the manga, is an award-winning series that went deep into what it means to live in a utopian society and, unlike the film, includes such things as character development. Reading the source material makes it clear that, yes, this is the guy who could create something as influential as Ghost in the Shell, but the 1988 film instead leaves you wondering why you wasted that hour.

I have to clarify and say the 1988 film because Appleseed was remade in 2004, and the second time around is much, much better. Hewing closer to the manga, the second film is an existential tale of cyborgs, humanlike bioroids, and the right to live how one chooses. The CGI animation style is a little off-putting and aged worse than the 1988 animation, but everything else is far superior. In fact, I think it’s better than the last Ghost in the Shell series.

REVIEW SCORE

The 1988 Appleseed may have helped pave the way for future cyberpunk anime films, and while it has some good ideas, it’s not, on its own, a good anime. You can watch it for free on Tubi, Pluto TV, and even Peacock. Outside of its historical importance, however, you might better spend your time finding the manga, as the difference between the two is similar to that of Wanted, the graphic novel, and Wanted the movie.