Anime

The original Ghost in the Shell movie by Mamoru Oshii is iconic and gives you a great taste of what the characters and world are all about. It also looks fantastic and was extremely influential. I'd argue that's the one to watch first.

After that you can go two ways, I think:

• If you want direct story continuity, Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence is a direct sequel by the same director. It's dark and trippy (if a little slow at times), and I like it more every time I see it. It's a good sequel to the original movie, and it's a good movie to watch in our modern world of unethical technological exploitation of humanity for profit.

• The other option is to start watching the amazing tv series directed by Kenji Kamiyama, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, as well as the sequel series, Second Gig. These are both fantastic anime series that tell a lot of interesting episodic stories while maintaining an interesting through-line that gradually unravels a mysterious and nuanced criminal conspiracy. These series do so much to develop the world and characters beyond what they are in the films and the manga, and are a big part of why GitS is so beloved. There is also a pretty good SAC movie that you can watch after that.

And then, from that point, I think the other attempts at continuing GitS haven't been that great and probably aren't too worth watching unless you really want more.

This new show looks to be a radically new and fresh take on the franchise, much more cartoony and in line with the original manga style. This trailer references the Puppet Master, a charger in the original movie. I can only hope that it delivers in the complex and interesting cyberpunk dystopian storytelling that brings out the best of GitS. I'm cautiously optimistic about it.

Just go by release date.

It doesn't fundamentally matter as each production is more or less stand alone (ha!).

But I didn't do that and was a little disappointed when I didn't like the original movie as much as I liked SAC.