You really don't want to get on the opposite side of Motoko in a fight. Not in immediate combat, nor in a prolonged cat and mouse chess match where she can get back to base and formulate a plan. Staying on her good side is staying on the right side of history (Maybe quite literally so).

Motoko is an unparalleled soldier in the Ghost in the Shell Universe, and she has so many skills with which she can come at anyone. She's a great shot, she's a tough hand to hand fighter, she's resourceful and opportunistic even in engagements where she's heavily outgunned. But more than just a great fighter, she's a great thinker too, which makes her all the more dangerous.

Going into Ghost in the Shell I knew Motoko was about kicking ass, taking names and looking great while doing it but I didn't expect her to be so forward about her own sexuality. But one of the things I found great and pretty mature about her is how she's pretty open with the whole thing as opposed to the somewhat chaste approach that a lot of anime takes to sex.

She's canonically Bi-sexual, which is cool. But the most awesome fact is that just lounging around her own home she has her own harem of girls. I mean, if SAC is the cocksure, boss, 'ara, ara' Kusanagi, this is definitely the icing on the cake of that whole characterization. She's a cyborg super-soldier with her own all-girl harem. Cheers, Major, you're truly living your life correctly.

One of the cooler things about the many iterations of Ghost in the Shell is that Motoko shifts as a character in different parts of the franchise. In the original film, she's introspective and searching for an identity. In the first season of SAC she's more cocksure, and seems like more of an action hero. And then in the second season, she's conflicted over her past, and more unsure of herself.

It's one of the reasons why she's such a great character and why Ghost in the Shell is such a great work, she never feels like exactly the same person she was before. We really see her travel along a full emotional spectrum.

I mean let's be real, Purple Hair is reserved for the elite. You can only get purple hair and not look a little out of sorts if you're one of the best female characters have to offer. I don't know why or how, but it's become sort of a market of characters just being the best.

This is definitely one of the areas I prefer SAC over the original film, which makes her hair almost totally black. She just looks best with purple hair, swaying in the wind, about to kick some guys teeth in... at least if you ask me.

One of the things that makes GITS so influential is one of the same reasons why Motoko is such a great character. Her whole character arc swells under the fundamental question of whether or not Motoko is truly human. This is most fundamental in the first film, but it's a question that comes up throughout the franchise.

The way that Motoko relates to herself and the world around her as a full-cyborg, and specifically as a full-cyborg working for Section 9, an important group in the Japanese State Security Apparatus, is one of the best things about the show.