Critics Assail 'Ghost in the Shell'

LOS ANGELES – The votes are in – so to speak – and the critics are assailing the new Scarlett Johansson cyberpunk film based on Masamune Shirow's classic manga series “Ghost in a Shell.”

The Wrap’s Ben Croll wrote “Indeed, Ghost in the Shell makes the most sense if you look at it as a cosplay movie, one that forgoes trying anything new and instead wows you with the assured and accomplished manner with which it recreates in live-action what had only existed in animated cels."

Indiewire’s Mike McCahill wrote "Blown up to this magnitude, ideas already threadbare through 20 years of recycling start to look doubly thin."

While Lisa Nesselson wrote “One can hardly blame cyborgs for not coming across like flesh-and-blood characters but it’s not easy to care what happens to any of the protagonists since they so rarely generate moments of human emotion.”

And that’s just a few. Not a good start for a much-anticipated live action remake of the 1995 animated film. “Ghost in the Shell” is set for release on March 31.