“You’ve finally been identified. You’re at the end of your rope, Shougo-kun.”
Summary
Gino meets with his superior from the Ministry of Welfare to discuss the recent incident involving Makishima; after some assurance of the perfection that is the Sibyl System Gino’s superior ends up revealing her awareness of Makishima’s criminally asymptomatic situation, asking that he be brought in so the Ministry can deal with him. In order to begin the search, Akane offers to undergo a Memory Scoop to relive her memories at the time of Yuki’s death in order to obtain a clear image of Makishima.
Impression
Another fairly slow offering from Psycho-Pass in terms of pacing, but along with the ride we’re offered more perspectives on the system their modern society runs on, as well as a few revelations that we may (or may not) have seen coming for some time! First, the Sibyl System as seen from the perspective of the top brass lady member of the MWPSB whose name sadly escapes me – and she does raise a few good points. While Gino has been defending Akane’s aptitude and lack of error through using Sibyl’s good name, the report handed in by Gino also questions Sibyl’s judgement in the first place, which gave off the impression that this lady wasn’t really willing to tarnish Sibyl’s reputation. However, she does know a lot more than she lets on – notably over events surrounding Touma Kouzaburou, who was the guy behind the first Specimen Case. He ended up having the same criminally asymptomatic condition that Makishima does, and ended up being taken in without his Crime Coefficient measured. To the Ministry of Welfare, Touma went “missing” – and on the surface, that’s all their willing to admit to protect the interests of society.
And to be fair, I can’t really blame her for targeting that – even if it means withholding info from the public, ignorance can be bliss sometimes if it means that society functions in a peaceful, efficient way. The safety net that is the CID is responsible for making people believe the authority of Sibyl, as the CID are the clearest form of judgement cast down by Sibyl in the eyes of the general public. If the CID themselves doubt the Dominator, then even society will start questioning the way things are being run. This lady is willing to turn a blind eye to the various issues the Sibyl System has as long as it can fulfil her utilitarianism – the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Sure, the MWPSB will isolate and capture Makishima, but they won’t cause a huge public uproar over it. It was eerily ambiguous over what was done to Touma in the end, and similarly eerie was the revelation right at the very end that the Ministry of Welfare lady has known about Makishima’s situation for a long time and has a personal relationship with him – is it possible she’s his estranged mother of some sort?
You denied Sibyl…and Sibyl denied you. A new order was born and the country moved on without you.
Speaking of estranged family members, we finally have confirmation that Masaoka is in fact Gino’s dad – and I did call it, some episodes ago xD Masaoka turned out to have been an Inspector in the past as well, but had values over the role of, and what it meant to be a detective. In his eyes, being given a fancy gun and being told whom to shoot and at what time doesn’t define the role of a detective to him, and by rejecting the system his Crime Coefficient went up – and thus he was denied by Sibyl, and became an Enforcer as a result. While this may not necessarily happen to his son Gino in the same way, it’s pretty dark foreshadowing to find out that he’s been using devices to manage his stress, as his Crime Coefficient is going up with pent-up stress. I can foresee a suitably sadistic twist in which Gino’s descent into an Enforcer’s mindset is accompanied with many feels and shock events.
In comparison with Gino’s rising Crime Coefficient, we have Akane’s surprisingly manageable one, along with her malleable mental state – which isn’t as surprising once I thought about it. She’s always had a Psycho-Pass that was easily managed and she seemed to be mentally stable even after the funeral – and was strong enough to be concentrating on capturing Makishima instead of wallowing in despair. She even ended up using some dodgy methods that put her at risk as well – the Memory Scoop, which visualises memories through the reading of brain waves to bring up an image of Makishima. Being willing to go through the memory which saw your friend killed in front of you…wow. Akane might not have been a terribly exciting main character, but you can’t deny that she’s got the guts to help her succeed in her profession. Forgiving, acknowledging and accepting society – even if she ends up becoming an Enforcer, she will corner Makishima Shougo.
If Akane ends up being criminally asymptomantic, this show will end up being a little like Dollhouse. Maybe Shogo will show some interest in Akane if he catches wind on omg Akane’s amazing healing invulnerable psycho-pass.
And yes, the ending was very WTF. At first, I was half-expecting Shogo to sitting in front of the Ministry of Welfare lady but then I forgot that this was THE FUTURE. (I wish I had a mental mouse) I agree that she might be his estranged mother and I also think that Shogo is probably a fake name and he might be a government experiment gone horribly wrong.
One more thing: memory scoop? How very Fringe of them. Not as sexy as being in a deprivation bucket in your skivvies but effective. Fringe, Dollhouse. I’m guessing Gen Urobuchi watches a lot of FOX.
For a fairly slow episode the ending was definitely a jolt. Your idea of Makishima being a govt experiment gone wrong is very interesting – I’m sure the govt in a dystopian society like that has to be conducting some underground experiments, and perhaps Makishima might have been a failure of a test subject.
Whatever Urobuchi Gen is watching, he should be encouraged to watch more of it if he produces stuff like this xD Suisei no Gargantia next season, anyone?
Aw man, someone beat me to it; I was going to say that I think that Akane could be criminally asymptomatic too. I would totally buy it if it turned out that she could kill people without it effecting her hue. We’ve already seen that she recovers quickly from even the most psychologically damaging situations. She and Makishima seem to be very similar to each other, like if something different had happened in their lives their roles could have been reversed. I’m also thinking that Akane and the rest of them might soon become targets for government disposal (SSY style haha), if they keep questioning how well (or not well) the system is working.
As for Suisei no Gargantia, I’ve got my eye on it. It looks really happy and colorful, which is…different? Although, the same could be said for Madoka, and we all know how that turned out.
Maybe Makishima’s interest will extend to investigating Akane too, if when they next meet he sees that she’s perfectly fine. Though I don’t know whether I’d prefer that over extending the animosity between Shinya and Makishima.
I can actually see the government trying to dispose them for continually doubting Sibyl’s judgement, as the cost to society would be greater than the cost the govt incurs by losing the CID. Gino might end up telling the rest of them in order to save their lives.