thankfully the vibes are good, and i'm a sucker for seeing a thriller where the cops are arguing with the suits and have to go on a boat ride in the fog, because in the monologue-y bits i just kept going "uhuh, yep. that's true. yep, that's true. peace in the imperial core IS propped up by violence elsewhere that will inevitably blow back on the core somehow. the fall of the soviet union DID leave the imperial core thinking it was the end of history when that was obviously bullshit. i KNOW japan is a client state of america and i have a good idea of the jsdf's complex role there where it's a "self defense force" but is still effectively a major military and contributes to global hegemony. yep. uhuh. going to say anything new to me before before we get back to the plot? are you going to do anything involving the characters or themes or tone of the show/movie patlabor? no?"

still good, though the first one was way better. imagine if a patlabor movie that included noa izumi, main character of patlabor, as a character! that'd be so crazy