Far superior to the first film but will never be as popular because there’s no female nudity. You lose a huge percentage of the market when you take the breasts and gore out in favour of character and story. There are moments where Oshii blows your mind with how he constructs scenes. A prime example would be the festival: silent, with music, the images create a poetic interlude before going back to the plot. Batou’s scenes with his dog are heartwarmingly cute and deeply sad. Slips once into babbling sill images, but that’s forgivable since the rest is a cinematic joy to behold.