If you haven't checked this series out before, please do. Then check out Last Order (it's a decent read, just a bit more skewed and detached from the Alita universe).
I can only assume that a great majority of people reading this consider themselves intellectuals, the kinds of people who point out scientific implausibilities in sloppy sci-fi flicks (looking at you, "new" Star Trek) and HATE being forced to suspend their critical-thought to accept story elements that are just laughable.
I have a problem with media that patronizes my intelligence. "Battle Angel Alita" does not. If something extraordinary happens in story, GREAT EFFORT is put into explaining the science behind it, so much in fact that you will likely be inspired to learn more about the principles behind them. Examples of scientific principles and fields used as plot devices:
[spoilers]
- Special relativity (time dilation due to interplanetary travel)
- Quantum computing (basis for much of the technology in the Alita universe)
- Quantum physics (weaponized gas consisting of sub-atomic "potentials" that have no trouble dissolving the matter hey come into contact with, and a GOOD explanation to why it conforms to...)
- Laws of Thermodynamics
/Conservation of Energy/Information
- Quantum reality (to the point that the technology takes on an almost "magical" aspect, all of which is explained).
- Doppler effect (noticing a red/blue shift to things around her after engaging a new "thruster" of some sort I can't recall) and ...
- Human psychology (...realizing she shouldn't be able to perceive this shift, or survive through it, unless...I won't spoil it).
- Genetics, cloning, splicing, gene reprogramming.
- Artificial Intelligence (and how the social elite react to realizing they aren't "real").
- Nanotechnology (particularly the "Grey-Goo" anomaly, and it's disturbing, projected interpretation of what it feels humans fear the most).
[/spoilers]
All of the above, with the brutality of robot-rape then having your brain eaten by a junkie.
This series has everything you could want as an intellectual reader, and most of what everyone else is looking for in a casual read.
