Shell Bound : Masamune Shirow – “Black Magic”

A fully-decked warrior points out to his comrades in arms, who are about to be deployed from a military helicopter: "We're soldiers, not philosophers." That's from Masamune Shirow's  1983 debut,"Black Magic." It's the standard intro to any number of action scenes  in movies, novels, and graphic novels: assorted mercenaries bantering and bonding over the noise of the chopper's rotors. But it …