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There're some Mamoru Oshii book lists on the Internet, but they don't have detailed explanations about the contents. My Mamoru Oshii book collection is far from complete, but I'd like to write some short summaries for each of those books.
I apologize in advance for grammatical errors and misinformation.
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title: 機動警察パトレイバー TOKYO WAR
(Mobile Police Patlabor Tokyo War)
release: 04/25/1994, 05/25/1994 (reprinted on 06/30/2005)
publisher: Fujimi Shobo (reprinted by Enterbrain)
[contents]
*original version
vol.1
Martial Law
Contact
Revolt
Summon
Counterattack
Battle
afterword by Mamoru Oshii
vol.2
Surprise Attack
Search Operation
Feint Operation
City of Birds
Confrontation
afterword by Kazunori Ito
[review]
This is a novelized version of Patlabor 2 the Movie written by Oshii himself. Since it is Oshii's first novel, it is pretty different from other Oshii's novels. It feels more like a normal light novel.
The basic plot and scenes are the same as the film version. Oshii had to cut non-plot-related scenes in the film due to a screen time issue. He brought back some of those scenes into the novel. It's like a "director's cut" in the novel form.
For example, Asuma was gambling at Noa's performance in the labor tests. That scene was deleted in the film.
Masami Yuki's idea was brought back as well. SV2 members talk about their changes and worries about the future in a restaurant. (It is shown in the illustration above) In that scene, Shinshi explains that Kaiho is trying to utilize patrol labor units as a tool for his political maneuver against JSDF. Noa regrets that she has never considered the social meaning of her job. It is a really good scene, and it truly feels like Yuki's Patlabor rather than Oshii. It also builds up to Noa's iconic line in the car.
Oshii also added a scene where Goto and Arakawa eat soba at a small soba joint. It is Oshii's signature joke, but Arakawa talks about a serious issue in this scene. He explains JSDF's budget and food problem in the martial law situation. Mobilized troops consume tons of food and fuel every day, but they don't have specific targets nor missions in the current situation. They have to just consume resources in the cold without any purpose. Arakawa says, "They will doubt what they're protecting from whom. Purposeless armies always self-destruct." That was probably inspired by a discussion about JSDF from a book called "Wordmap: War". The political theme of P2 is shown in that scene. Japanese people have to give purposes and vision to JSDF. We should consider why we have armed forces. The discussion about food budget was probably inspired by Masaki Yamada’s novel called “Kyoei no Toshi”.
There're two versions of this book. The first edition is a two-volume set of bunko format books. The new edition is a one-volume collected book. The later version doesn't include the illustration by Jun Sumie.
