DangerousK said:
It seems like there is significance with Kaneda seeing I guess "ghosts" if you will appear of Yamagata and Tetsuo riding next to him.
My guess is that the reappearance of Yamagata and Tetsuo bring a sense of closure to the story. Given the fantastic events that have already happened, it's not difficult to believe that the spirits of Kaneda's two friends really do appear, and Kaneda isn't just imagining them. The gang is reunited (if only for a brief second) and the power of their original friendship once again trancends everything else.
DangerousK said:
Also...Otomo draws the ruins of Neo-Tokyo suddenly forming back into the skyscrapers that were standing before the city was destroyed, so was that to say that there is a new beginning again with Kaneda leading the way?
I think it doesn't necessarily have to be Kaneda leading the way, (although he's probably the only leader left in Neo-Tokyo at that point), but yeah, the vision of the skyscrapers is also a sign that life endures no matter what happens.
Course, this is just my take on things. Maybe Otomo meant for this ending to represent something else. I'm guessing that he made the ending vague enough for the reader (you) to take whatever meaning you want from the final pages of the comic.
One thing I've always hated about English classes in High School (I stopped taking them in University, heh...) was how books were presented in black and white. "The author of XXX meant YYY when he wrote ZZZ". Sometimes it's true- an author will use an allegory or metaphor to mean something in particular, but I think that most authors are content to write in shades of gray.
