My Ghost in the Shell SAC 2nd GIG dvd box, US version. The Japanese boxset costs a whopping 500 Singapore dollars and comes without english subtitles;  so a big thanks to Manga entertainment for releasing this affordable boxset.

I’ve been hooked on the series ever since getting the boxset for the first season. 2nd GIG had a couple of interesting episodes, I particularly enjoyed the ones that gave back stories to the members of section 9. That said, I still feel season 1 is the better of the two. Individual Eleven was a little too chatty for me and I never really felt that Section 9’s survival was truly threatened, nor had an adversary as intriguing and formidable as The Laughing Man.

The Laughing Man’s background story was based on a deeply shocking, true event known as the Glico Morinaga case, which took place in Japan in 1984.

Citing Wikipedia,
“The Glico-Morinaga case, also known by its official designation Metropolitan Designated Case 114, was a famous extortion case in Japan, primarily directed at the Japanese industrial confectionaries Ezaki Glico and Morinaga.The entire case spanned 17 months from the initial kidnapping of the president of Glico to the last known communication from the prime suspect, a person or group known only as the “The Monster with 21 Faces.” The case captured the Japanese public’s imagination and many commentators refer to this incident as a turning point in Japanese society, in which the image of a crime-free and safe Japan was dispelled.”

Get this – The true perpetrators have never been caught.

Wikipedia entry on the Glico Morinaga case.
Wikipedia entry on the Monster with 21 Faces.