I disagree, although they created a beautiful vision of the future it just doesn't resonate with what GITS is to me.

The world of GITS never felt like a neon billboard strewn "Neo Tokyo", felt like it has always had a wider visual language than just that one note. Feels like the city is trying to demand presence as an entity in the remake while in the originals the city was mostly just an anonymous sea of sky scrapers that was then experience though more intimate close moments.

I realise Ash is a huge fan of Akira and I can't help but think how Neo-Tokyo plays almost as a larger than life character in that film has influenced his work in this.

Compare this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB-ik-Bpl0c to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixAHUWgBKsw&t=0m35s