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TOGUSA
Woman at MLHW: “I thought you’d give up after the first few days, but you’re pretty tenacious.”
Togusa: “Well, it’s part of the job, right?”
Togusa is the 27-year-old rookie on the crack anti-terrorist/anti-cybercrime government agency called Public Security Section 9. His GitS manga incarnation is an emotionally-wrought bundle of feelings of inferiority and failure, even aware that he may not belong with this group of experienced professionals and that he could let the whole team down. His GitS films incarnation is a lot smarter, but in the first film, he suffers the same rookie syndrome. In Innocence, he is a bit more self-assured and detached with an older feel to his character, perhaps because of how he is rendered in Oshii’s GitS, rather somber.
From Innocence.
Aramaki: "Your job includes monitering your partner's emotional states."
Togusa: "I know, but I'm not a cyborg or an electronic neurologist."
Aramaki: "One need not be Caesar in order to understand Caesar. You're a family man, right?" Do you consider yourself to be happy?"
Togusa: "Well, sure."
Aramaki: "Must of us are neither so happy nor so miserable as we think. The key is to stay engaged with your life and your hopes."
Togusa: "I don't understand."
Aramaki: "Lately, Batou's reminding me of the Major before she disappeared. You know, 'Let one walks alone, committing no sin, with few wishes, like an elephant in the forest'."
Togusa: ""Chiefm why did you pick me for the job?"
Aramaki: "Because it was the Major who plucked you off your local beat."
The Many Incarnations of Togusa
But the Togusa I identify with and adore is Kenji Kamauyama’s GitS:SAC incarnation of the young man with the young family, who balances rookie naïveté with a seasoned police detective’s professionalism, patience, and knowledge.
And he’s really charming, clever, and cute – ah, the three C’s!!
From Innocence
Batou [of Haraway]: “She your type?”
Togusa: “Actually, I like older women.”
It says a lot about his investigative skills that he is often paired with the oldest member of the tactical squad and a class-A hacker, Ishikawa, when the team needs to figure out the bad guy’s modus operandi.
Ishikawa: “This [Individual Eleven] emblem never appeared among the refugees in the past.”
Togusa: “Is there any meaning behind the emblem? …Is it possible that someone copied it?”
Ishikawa: “For instance?”
Togusa: “From an old movie, an organization from the past, or a personal emblem.”
Ishikawa: “Right.” [Studies the files on the Net] “I found it. They seem to be calling themselves the Individual Eleven. They once issued a note regarding some rebellion.”Togusa was chosen for Section 9 because he was an honest cop, a detective with exceptional investigative skills, and because he was unaltered. In a world dominated by the cybernetically enhanced and the ubiquitous Net, Togusa’s lack of cybernetics offers Section 9 a fresh perspective on cases and an element of unpredictability. Nowhere is that unpredictability more visible than in Togusa’s preference for the six-shot revolver over automatic weapons. He carries a Mateba Model 207 Handgun, which gets him into trouble with Kusanagi, too.
Togusa at the firing range within Section 9’s Headquarters. He shoots five times, four to the center circle and one just outside.
Kusanagi: “What a waste of money. If you need to rush down here for target practice whenever there’s a mission, I’d recommend getting a prosthetic body.”
Togusa: “You’re telling me I should become a cyborg, too?”
Kusanagi: “I’m not dumb enough to order you to mix official matter with private ones. I think your marksmanship was excellent today. But if you think your shots might go through your target and hit the hostage, make a quick on-site judgment call. You had that 9mm with you right? Geez, what do you think we hired you away from police HQ for? If you’ve got the time to be depressed, why not grace us with your special talents?”
The Mateba M207 is known for its accuracy, which doesn’t count all that much when the rest of the Section 9 operatives have cybernetic implants to allow for aiming and accuracy of their weapon of choice. Togusa, who is a crack shot, still has to think about taking aim and firing.
Togusa’s insight is incredible. When the Laughing Man turns up after six years of silence, Togusa says that he always believed the Laughing Man would have a Peter Pan look to him. He’s intuitive and tenacious, which would not seem to be a likely combination. When he has a hunch about the Laughing Man, he is impassioned with his pitch to the team, but his reasons it out and presents it as if it were a tried and true mathematical equation, when it’s just his theory.
Togusa: “ ‘Art imitates life.’ The opposite should also be true. I can’t help but think that the young man I me at the aid center was the real Laughing Man.”
Kusanagi: “There have been countless suspects who seemed to be the real Laughing Man. In spite of that, what’s your basis for thinking that this young man is the real deal?”
Togusa: “You know what the words around the Laughing Man logo mean, right, Major?”
Kusanagi: “ ‘I thought what I’d do was, I’d become one of those deaf-mutes.’ Word has it that it’s a quote from Chapter 25 of the Catcher In The Rye.”
Togusa: “Right. Like I wrote in my report, I found part of that quote at the aid center. At first I had convinced myself that it was taken verbatim from the books. But in the sentence I found, there was something written after ‘one of those deaf-mutes,’ ‘Or should I?’ as in or maybe I shouldn’t. That had been added. Do you suppose that was a dialogue he was having with himself? Asking himself if he should break his silence and go back out into the world…”
Kusanagi: “That theory is awfully dependent on your personal views, isn’t it? You realize that it’s far too weak to base anything on, don’t you?”
Togusa: “Despite the fact that the Laughing Man possessed super class-A hacking techniques, he personally kidnapped the CEO of Serano and pulled a gun on him. He’s a criminal whose anachronistic actions don’t jive at all with his technical skills. Couldn’t that mean that the Laughing Man, despite the fact that he’s so good at hacking, or on the contrary, because he’s so good, he didn’t place any value at all on electronic media, something that can be rewritten? When you think about it that way, maybe what he was after was information that’s stored physically.” [He holds up a copy of Catcher In The Rye.] In other words, documents stored in a paper medium.”
Kusanagi: “And you want to find this out for yourself? …If you were doing this out of emotional revenge for the aid center fiasco, I was going to stop you. But maybe your Ghost has finally started whispering to you, too.”He is the lynchpin in getting to the truth behind the Laughing Man Incident. It was his friend from the Metropolitan PD who contacted him about a problem with the Special Investigations Unit still allocated to the Laughing Man Incident, which had occurred six years earlier. Togusa’s friend died before he could tell him what was going on, but from the photographs left for him, he was able to figure out that Interceptors, audiovisual devices secretly implanted in the brain, were being used on the SIU.
The revelation of the Interceptors awakened the person, who was dubbed the Laughing Man, to take up the quixotic cause to take down corruption in government and the mega-corporations. Then Togusa was sent to a vocational aid center, where he gathered more clues about the Laughing Man, including the hunch that the young man, Aoi, was the Laughing Man. This led Togusa from the Nanao=A case to deduce that the real meaning of the Laughing Man was in the use the quote from Catcher in the Rye, which led him to information on the Murai Vaccine and the Sunflower Society. At first, he thinks he’s jumping to conclusions wanting to see connections between the Laughing Man and the Sunflower Society when there weren’t any, until he leans back in his chair in front of his computer at home and the Sunflower Society logo.
He’s detailed, resourceful, and willing to go the extra mile for the sake of Section 9 and his sense of justice.
Ishikawa: “What’s with Togusa? Was he here all night?”
Saito: “Yeah, something about waiting for somebody.”
Mostly, he works along side Batou or Kusanagi on missions; his callowness and humanity shows more than usual beside his more experienced, more cold-blooded partners. The juxtaposition of Togusa and his regular partners brings to light the issue of the regular Joe versus the cyborg in this futuristic world -- who has the advantage in society, what is human? In many ways, Togusa is at a substantial disadvantage.
In the Full-Auto Capitalism episode, Section 9 busts up a meeting of what they take to be small-time thugs based on the intel given them. Unlucky Togusa has the detail of closing off the plugs to the thugs’ cyberbrains. He reaches for the collar of one guy and he instinctively pauses. The guy transforms into a Pioneer Model cyborg and slams him into a wall. Then it grabs the major by the face and hurls her through a window into a pile of rubbish. Batou, powerful cyborg that he is, punches the Pioneer Model in the mouth and basically knock it’s head off. Togusa and Batou run to the broken window to find the major.
Batou [laughing]: “Looks like you’re in one piece, more or less.”
Kusanagi: “This isn’t the least bit funny. Togusa, bring the car around!”
Batou to Togusa: “Good luck.”Similarly, going undercover at the vocational aid center, Togusa picks lock of the door to Maruta’s office, the director of the facility and logs on to her computer. Maruta is expecting this. She pushes the wheelchair, where Aoi sits, seemingly disengaged.
Maruta: “You’ve abandoned your charge to do some spying? Look all you want, you won’t find any clues about the Chief in there.”[A big freaking deal called a heavy-loadout cyborg follows her inside.]
Togusa: “I guess excuses are out of the question at this point, huh? [He palms a tool for painting.]
Maruta to heavy-loadout cyborg: “Hurt him, but don’t kill him.”
Cyborg: “Yes, ma’am.”
Togusa: “Hey, wait a minute. If we fight in here, these paintings might be—.”
Cyborg: “You’re going to fight with that?”
[Grabs Togusa and slings him about like a ragdoll.]
Togusa: “Like I said, you can’t be rough with paintings.” [Spits up blood] “Unlike electronic data, they can’t be duplicated.” [Togusa draws his revolver and shoots the cyborg, taking it down.] “You didn’t think I’d be unarmed, did you?”
He rubs his throat and looks around. Spots Aoi, who looks up. Togusa turns in time to get knocked in the head by Murata.There is the feeling that if he were any of the other guys, but for Aramaki, he wouldn’t get into such situations and if he did, he’d be able to extricate himself with physical ease. As it is, he gets through on his keen intelligence, guts, and dogged tenacity. Oh, let's not forget his sense of justice. He's like a fire and brimstone preacher of yesteryear when it comes to his almost naive belief in justice.
On his way home from work, Togusa stops to help a woman who has been beaten up and will be killed by a full-bodied cyborg. He tells the guy to stop and warns him repeatedly, but the man wants the woman dead for some reason. Togusa shoots the man and knocks him down, but being a cyborg, he can still move and tries to shoot the woman still. Togusa shoots him in all his prosthetic limbs and he thinks that’s enough to stop him. When Togusa puts out his hand to help the woman to her feet, the cyborg shoots her dead. Togusa, angry, shoots again, but does not kill him.
Because of the dicey situation Section 9 is in, Togusa is immediately arrested and sent to trial to defend his actions. The cyborg is from a affluent family and has hired a skilled lawyer with much too much information of Togusa and Section 9. At one point, Togusa’s wife asks him why bother to work for Section 9 if he can’t use his gun to help people. Togusa tries to be reasonable about the case against him and the trial, saying he has to be arrested because he fired his gun while off duty. Aramaki, Kusanagi, and Batou go to visit him in jail and sit in on his trial. Kusanagi also talks with his wife.
But soon enough he, like the other members of Section 9, realize that the trial is only to punish Section 9. Even his gun choice is questioned as well as his marksmanship. Togusa knows that he is being set up for a fall, so he stands up in court and resigns from Section 9 and promises to expose the real culprits behind this kangaroo court.
But Chief Aramaki and Major Kusanagi do some evidence tampering and political wrangling far behind the scenes. They knew Togusa was smart enough to understand what was going on, but that his keen sense of justice would make
him choose to wrong path for the right reasons.
Togusa: “Where’s the justice in the court system?”
Kusanagi: “I’m sorry, but I won’t allow you your plea for justice.”
Togusa: “Then how can the dead ever be able to rest in peace?”
Aramaki: “We’ll let Heaven decide your punishment.”
Togusa: “Punishment?”While Togusa takes flowers to the place where the girl was killed and his family anxiously awaits his return home, Borma goes on assignment and punishes the murderer.
The nastiness of his trial is a direct result of his little encounter with Gouda. In summation, Togusa doesn't mind saying when something seems wrong to him, but for his own sake, the major must wish he'd keep his righteous indignation to himself.
Goda flies with Section 9 to the refugee area and explains his reasons for not telling them what the mission is about.
Goda: “On the battlefield, the fewer who know, the better.”
Togusa: “Then wouldn’t it be better if you were to take charge of your own fight?”
Kusanagi: “Togusa.” [She shakes her head at the young man, as if he cannot win a match against this opponent.]
Goda [to Togusa]: “This is the first time that we’ve met, but I think I’ve seen you somewhere recently as well.”
To draw the Internal Affairs Officer’s attention away from Togusa, Kusanagi asks Ishikawa for recon information.He’s the one usually chosen to do the undercover work. It’s a double-edged sword, because he is often sent in because on his brain has been cybernetically altered, but this also makes him extremely vulnerable in situations where Kusanagi or Batou would be relatively safe from harm. When he gets punched, takes a blow to the head, or gets shot, he bleeds.
He goes to the Sunflower Society posing as a journalist whose father has died because of Cyberbrain Sclerosis and convince the director that he’s passionate about the cause. But when baddies from the Narcotics Suppression Squad, who work for the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare raid the NGO and start killing everyone in sight, Togusa tries to get the director to safety and locks himself inside the room to take on the hired killers. He’s shot in the chest just ducking behind a desk by a maniac spraying fire from a sem-automatic weapon. But Togusa stand up and tries to take down the leader first with a semi-automatic weapon stripped off one of the downed bad guys. That’s when he learns the big bad is a cyborg and he pulls out his handy Mateba, shoots the cyborg a few times, and bails out the window.
Commander Gayle Yasuoka: “Now things are getting interesting. We’ve got a survivor.” [He looks down on Togusa, who is barely hanging on to a metal cross beam hanging between two buildings.] “Hey, if you don’t start running, I’m gonna shoot ya!”
Gayle shoots anyway and Togusa drops, falls onto the roof of the thugs’ van.
Togusa [staggering away] “Crap. Maybe I should’ve gone full-cyborg, too.” [He collapses in the middle of a busy sidewalk.] “Major…Chief…I’ve been shot.”You know how you know this future is based on the present, no one stops to help him. But even on the emergency room operating table, he does his job.
Togusa: “Major, look through my memories…It was Health and Welfare, all right.” [He points to his head.] “I didn’t…get hit in the head.”
And he has this emotional quotient that the others lack. He’s not hardened enough or cold enough or experienced enough not to wince when he sees a video of a woman being skinned alive. Only he covers his eyes, Batou and his other teammates watch without visible feeling.
Togusa retches over a street railing. No one else reacts.
Togusa: “Son of a bitch! Why in hell is he passing around a file like this?!”
Batou: “Because that’s his objective, as far as he’s concerned.” [Togusa swallows.] “Isn’t that right, Mr. Sato?”
Sato: “Why, whatever do you mean?”
Batou: “Before I came to Section 9, I was in the Rangers. I even spent some time in the jungles of South America.”
Sato: “You don’t say. So, what connection does that have with this file?”
Batou: “Don’t play dumb with me! [Yelling] “It kept in happening, even after you American Empire guys pulled out! And now that nightmare has reared its ugly head again.”
Togusa: “Nightmare?”But Togusa’s emotional quotient is no better displayed than when he is in the hospital and Section 9 must work from his memories of going up against Gayle and getting shot.
Kusanagi: “We’ll be getting everything, right down to his emotional fluctuations, so it might even affect our own perceptions.”
Aramaki: “It can’t be helped. Play it.”
Section 9 is jacked in to the last 16 hours taken from Togusa’s cyberbrain.
Kusanagi: “His heart rate is unusually high.”
Ishikawa jerks. Batou winces. Aramaki is sweating heavily. Only Kusanagi not visibly affected.
Batou: “That dumb bastard. If he goes around playing the hero like this, of course he’s gonna get nailed.”Above all, Togusa is the family man, which means he believes in human ties, human relations whether at home or at work.
In Full-Auto Capitalism, Togusa is left to tie up the loose ends when the “Hermit Wizard of Wall Street” is found three-months dead in his bead. Just as the coroner is bagging the body, Togusa places a gold 500-yen coin on the desiccated chest, for the ferryman. He returns home to find his wife at the computer and their infant son asleep in the bassinet.
Wife: “Look, look! I made 100,000 yen off our Meditech stocks today!”
Togusa: “You actually bought theses? I totally forgot about that!”
Wife: “Of course! E-trading is how housewives pass the time…. Dinner’s ready.”
He may be a husband and the father of two on his off hours, but he is just as devoted to the job as his co-workers. He brings his work home with him, ignoring his wife to figure out tricky details until it hits him that he’s at home and there’s his patient and loving wife right there in front of him.
Togusa: “What’s all this? What did Yamaguchi want to show me? ...My wife does stuff like this sometimes, too. Right, I’d better call home.” [While he’s on the phone with his wife, Kusanagi smiles and watches from the corridor.] “Hi, it’s me. Looks like I won’t be coming home tonight either. Yeah. Sure. Oh, okay. Make sure the doors are closed tight, okay? Sure. I’ll do my best. Jaa, oyasumi.”
At work, he has the position of younger brother to everyone on the squad. They respect his mind, but they still think of him as the kid or the rookie.
Batou and Kusanagi wait in the armored van outside of the Vocational Aid Center for people suffering from Cyberbrain Closed Shell Syndrome.
Batou: “He sure is late.”
Kusanagi: “Oh, are you worried?”
Batou [smoking a cigarette, Bailey’s cigarettes]: “Like hell. He’s a hump, so I though he might have blown his cover or something”.
Togusa on link: “Who are you calling a hump?!”
Kusanagi: “You’re late! What kept you?”
Batou smiling at her reaction, knowingly, as if she was the one who was worried.
Togusa: “Uh, well, it was tricky to establish a link that wouldn’t leave any tracks. After all, this is the only place with a line to the outside.”
Kusanagi: “Well?”The big brother/little brother element is strongest between Togusa and Batou – they joke around with each other, pretend they don’t care about the other’s welfare, question each other’s sanity, and they jump headlong into danger to help the other.
Batou: "You get all the fun jobs, don't ya?"
Togusa: "Don't come crying to me if you get blown away."
Or
In Missing Hearts, Batou pulls his gun on the freaked out medical student.
Batou: “Hey! You guys are gonna answer to me.”
Freaked Med Student: “S-spare me! Please, just don’t take my organs!”
Batou: “Huh?”
Togusa: “That face of yours has ‘Mafioso’ written all over it.” [The Calm Med student curls up at the sound of Togusa’s voice.] “What’s this? You think I’m one, too.”
Batou chuckles.When Togusa is shot, Batou visits him at the hospital and is the only one deeply influenced by Togusa’s emotions after experiencing his memories of being shot and having to run for his life.
Kusanagi: “Paz and Saito, you come with me to Imakurusu’s place. Batou, you’re on memory analysis with Ishikawa and Borma.”
Batou: “Screw that! You gotta put me on the DEA investigation.”
Kusanagi: “And what do you intend to do there with that look on your face? I’ll call you when I need you.”
Batou [deep scowl deepens] “How do you expect me to look, then?”
Ishikawa: “She’s just saying that you need to cool off some.”
Batou: “How cool am I supposed to be after seeing that?”
Ishikawa: “You’re under the influence of Togusa’s memories right now. It was a good call.”Not a bad deal to have Batou as an older brother and Major Kusanagi as a big sister – they are likely to become impatient and admonish him for the slightest thing, but they will always be there to back him up.
Solid State Society
The dynamic changes somewhat in Solid State Society. It is 2034. Togusa is about 30 and has gained real cybernetic implants in order to keep up with the expanded Section 9. Major Kusanagi leaves Section 9 and Togusa becomes the head of field operations. He works hard at it, but he doesn't quite have everyone's full confidence, especially not Batou's. He confronts Batou a few times about Batou's not being a teamplayer.
He even replaces his Metaba with the Section 9 standard-issued Seburo M-10 -- although he still carries his revolver in a back holster.
The extent of his cybernetic implants is not mentioned, but he had the ability to take out an exoskeleton and to act as the bodyguard for Aramaki -- not that Togusa did not have pretty extreme fighting abilities for someone who was all natural back in his first few years at Section 9.
He remains the family man, although he has told his family that he actually works for Section 9, and he has far less time to spend with his wife and children. In SSS, there is a plot to kidnap his daughter (the older of his two children). His cyberbrain is hacked while trying to get her safely to school. The brain-hack tries to compel him to take his daughter in for a cyberbrain and then to sign her away to some octagenerian and never see her again. To save his daughter, he chooses to kill himself. Just as he is about to shoot himself in the head with his revolver the Major intervenes -- almsot too late as far as Batou (and I) is concerned.
Besides all this, Togusa also bears the very super sexy voice of seiyuu, Kouichi Yamadera. Yay!
