Cyberpunk: Edgerunners (2022) Series Thoughts

It has been over 24 hours and I’m still processing what has happened here. Upon the announcement over a year back that anime anarchist Hiroyuki Imaishi, Yoh Yoshinari and the rest of the visionaries at the one and only STUDIO TRIGGER would step beyond the bounds of their more in-house brand of brash and colorful works to take on the Gibson/Stephenson/Pondsmith nightmare mishmash tabletop and video game universe of Cyberpunk 2077, a part of me internally leapt with the kind of childish glee reserved for my younger self as few subgenres have flirted over the decades with sincere reverence in fusion as anime has over the years. And while many a creator in that realm have made references and nods to these works of post-PKD/Reagan-era nightmare fuel, few have gone whole hog into the more grit and grime of the original “high tech/low life” concerns of these visions. Where we have seen features and shows tinker with the “mind-body problem” (Ghost In The Shell) or the ramifications of the state going full pre-crime mad (Psycho Pass), this announcement to me felt like the long-awaited bolt from the blue expression of some of the nastier, more compelling aspects of what it means to be a true chromehead.

And good universe, has TRIGGER delivered.

In a mind-shattering 10 episodes, not only do we get a reverent slice of life in the game’s central overpopulated, hyper-transaction suffocated, morally broken Night City, but we also get one of the most viscerally powerful and perhaps even politically potent fables using decades of literacy of the cyber-fiction movement that somehow never loses sight of its humanity.

Edgerunners centers on the tale of teenager David Martinez, a half-attentive student of a pricey academy for ARASAKA, a tech giant who’s become one if not the only game left in society for a better life. Paid for by his mom, working nights as a trauma team worker, David’s life outside of school sees him dealing in porn and shady videos often bordering on snuff as sort of a junior delinquent. And it is in the latest incident out in town involving a bloody confrontation between a psychotic armed with wildly advanced body augmentation, local police, and a hard military strike force that David’s life takes on a series of horrific turns. Not that his life was faring much better prior. But now he finds himself possibly kicked out of school, out of home, and with no family to return to.

The only ember of light throughout this grand series of ruptures is his receiving of a mysterious military grade body implant. And as it turns out, David is surprisingly handy with it. So much so that it garners the attention of the enigmatic Lucy, a hyper-talented runner who’s thieving and hacking skills seem wildly at odds with the company she keeps. Even stranger, is her immediate kinship with the very wet behind the ears David who’s earnestness and lack of cynicism perhaps make for a refreshing voice in an otherwise unforgiving world. But who she runs jobs with, and their stock in trade as black market mercs for a shady fixer known only as Farady, hurls David into an odyssey of self-discovery, and a reckoning with the all-too-seductive nature of power through material means.

That’s right. What Edgerunners explores quite beautifully in its striking presentation and character work is a pulsating, meth-addled take on the Icarus tale where in this completely pulverized hellscape, it isn’t hard to find onesself addicted to the power of cybernetic upgrades, immunosuppressants, and the street cred that can often follow you once you cast away the shackles of already deeply rigged system. What ensues veers away from previous Imaishi works that often play like the most absurd creative arms races imaginable, often ending on a galactic scale. For once, based on a story by Bartosz Sztybor, Jan Bartkowicz, and Lukasz Ludkowski, the story centers on how this youthful drive has little value in practice in a world that thrives on citizens swallowing the fiction of assumed power hook, line, and sinker. This isn’t a story of console cowboys, and globally connected net experts with no hands on the goods, this is about the low end, hard luck, often collateral bodies merely scraping to survive..or obtain even more body mods along the way.

But there is a price to be paid. As the show establishes from the start, the melding of flesh and technology hasn’t evolved into a seamless process just yet, and an inevitable consequence to such dependence tends to be the same for all who buy in. It’s either insanity or death, often both for those who choose this life. Even the best underground cybernetic surgeons will deem this life a sucker’s bargain. And yet, David and his unusual second nature with the Sandievistan makes him feel unusually invulnerable. And therein lies the large central question of the series; is he?

Without going into further detail, I will share here again that the entire spirit and aesthetic of CP77 is beautifully and wildly expressed throughout the entire ten episode run, often with truly spectacular visual poetry and texture that informs far more than the dialogue does which is a thrill since the scripts by Yoshiki Usa and Masahiko Otsuka retain a great love for the game/genre’s worldbuilding and lingo. Even dialogue expressed in net comms are beautifully integrated into each shot making the viewing experience just disorienting enough to bring viewers into this often overwhelming universe of information and bulk that threatens to permeate beyond the borders of the screen. Virtually every image of the series is dense with visual information to the point I wish this were a theatrical experience. The show truly takes full advantage of the Netflix backing, making it into something that at once feels aggressively arthouse, yet somehow palatable on the pop art side.

The music and soundscape of the series is a unique mix of songs established in the video game, along with new music by Akira Yamaoka (Silent Hill) that offers a bit of rock to counter the often overabundant techno infused claustrophobia of the visual presentation. Songs in several languages sneak into the soundscape again informing us of the world beyond the characters, creating an emotional landscape that both surprises and creates sneaky emotional hints of what is to come. Needless to say I will be listening to this stuff for a good few weeks. Hell, any show that makes me wild about Franz Ferdinand again is certainly doing something amazing.

Aside from David and Lucy, I remain fascinated by the cast of supporting characters. All with just enough backstory, or hints of depth in spite of all the crazy around them is potent. My favorites being small bodies, but endlessly energetic Rebekka who is all heart, merc daddy Maine who himself has sacrificed much of his life for almost full body prosthesis, the imposing and loyal Dorio who serves as Maine’s conscience, and the ambiguous as hell Kiwi who spends the series masked and tends to know far more than anyone else. It could be argued that at ten episodes, we could have easily gone for another several to flesh these characters out. And come episode five, it’s clear this is where the bulk of the compression takes place, and yet its this choice that allows Edgerunners to be a model of peerless efficiency. We get more than enough to feel this cast as a rabble of outsiders doing these often desperate jobs in order to seek out what lies beyond the city limits. Its a series that could have gone a full 26 episodes a few decades ago, but would we be able to experience this stunning animation had we done that?

As such, Edgerunners is unusually pretty complete by the finale with little to no dangling threads to annoy, or incomplete thoughts. Just a straightforward tale of life in a universe that’s gotta play louder than ever that it’s a warning of things to come, not an advertisement. The best dystopian fiction should never be aspirational. And with David’s story, it’s again made quite clear to the youth of today that no matter how badly we wish otherwise, there is no buying a way out of the clutches of capitalism run amok. There’s no special ones outside or corpo legacies, or those lured by them into service to keep the machine running.

The only true escape is to unplug.

Because when you bet against the city, the city will always win.

Always.

RIP Cowboy Bebop #Netflix

I mean honestly, could we have expected more than this?

I suppose I need to stay fair in thinking about the just released, just canceled live action adaptation of Cowboy Bebop. But more than the ever consistent dilemmas that come with translating japanese animation into live action for western audiences, there seemed to be something immediately missing as the clearly reverent nods to classic iconography and episodes unspooled before my eyes a few weeks ago. I needed the extra time to collate thoughts about what didn’t work, and the main element that keeps coming back to mind is..heart. To put it mildly, for all the clever casting, the occasional dead on visualization of famous moments, the ever present sound of Seatbelts wafting through scenes, the biggest problem for me was that the final product seems far more interested in the language of “cool” rather than of tactile emotionality. One of the most vital underpinnings of the anime is the use of blues, jazz, and other genres to often convey feelings that our spacefaring characters find themselves unable to verbalize. This sense of sad sack persists in the often run down, rust covered space colony system of the show. Illustrative of the romance of outer space becoming nothing more than a junked out, overpopulated, spiritually worn out shell of itself. The blue collar world of ALIEN is taken to its logical conclusion as we see that capitalism has indeed turned space into just another network of dusty freeways, casinos, and shopping malls.

And while the show tries its damndest to present the world as it was in the original, there is a clear lack of real consideration for the way the world looks and how it affects the people. For a project whose episodes run two to three times as long as a 22 minute animated one, it really feels like so much emptiness is exposed. Considering this specifically, it’s a losing strategy to not only forget that this is a consistent theme throughout Bebop ‘98, but that a huge amount of why our characters behave the way they do is in response to it.  

It truly is a gaping hole in the writing. For all the Easter Eggs, and various nods they provided it was missing this ever present sadness that drives everyone throughout. And this is from someone who doesn’t mind making someone else’s mythology yours. It didn't have to follow the story. But Bebop is a particular brand of melancholy that makes the characters sing. And without it, it’s an endurance test to be around anyone. This is especially true of Faye Valentine, who for me sports one of the more moving arcs of the original. By swapping out a woman who knew endless misfortune only to create an often effective facade of coolness into an abrasive, loud girlboss type feels like a profound misreading. Or how about when we give Jet a daughter in hopes of instantly delivering us his future role as the ship’s “dad” figure? Or maybe let’s needlessly keep having Spike and Jet killing willy-nilly for no reason because of comedy, or because “COOL”?  It’s hard to grasp what was going on at the screenwriting level as a lot of it plays like producers saw little value in patiently granting viewers subtle character moments that could culminate in the finale. There’s a definite drive in the live action to front load everything, and that’s the problem. Like the jazz cliche, a huge amount of what makes the late, great Nobumoto Keiko’s character writing so impactful, is its deliberate patience in what it doesn’t say, even as the anime mostly uses an episodic format. 

So much stealth character building in those scripts, often told in behaviors and mannerisms.

Good casting can't overcome shallow writing. But the fact that no one at the top tried to keep it more on-board with making the characters relatable flawed saddens me most. What we get is a lot of surface level posture.

It could also be that with anime, everything is about efficiency. These LA  episodes go on way longer than they should, making it harder to work through. And yeah, Vicious and Julia do not need backstories. They only represent inability to let go, which is powerful because they are such elusive ideas. We can't know. That to me was a big part of the original, that Spike was eternally incapable of escaping his past. It's a shadow. Not something we are privy to. There's a deliberate line between the Spike we know, and the Spike that is supposedly dead. We're not meant to know dead Spike. Another shadow. Heck, Vicious is merely an illustration of Spike’s past as a hollowed out angel of death. And while I can see the writer’s temptation to humanize the character, but a huge part of what makes such a deliberate abstraction of Vicious is that in what little he says in the anime, it’s clear that he is the end result for Spike should he abandon all forms of attachment, Julia included. The tragedy of the original series lies in how we absorb the often unspoken lingering pain of our scrappy leads, only to see that there was a glimpse of connection in this often cruel galaxy. And while it may not have turned out all roses in the end, the central lesson being conveyed is that those seemingly insignificant encounters we make are opportunities to turn the past into something akin to redemption.  

What we do get a glimpse of throughout Watanabe’s anime, is another possible life. For everyone. A possibility that is fleeting and just out of reach for our central leads. And that's really hard to write when “cool” is the goal. It just seemed like they needed a real top down rewrite from a character perspective. And that begins by regarding everyone in that universe as tattered by a persistent capitalistic cruelty at the heart of everything and everyone in the series. Because the Netflix series seemingly forgot this, what we got was hard to get invested in. Hard for me anyway..

I really wanted to feel this take on the journey. It simply wasn't there for me on that much needed human level. Something the original does almost supernaturally well.

The only plus for me here was more Kanno/Seatbelts. 

But that’s always a win.

The Lingering Promise Of Carole & Tuesday

At last, completed Motonobu Hori & Shinichiro Watanabe's musical anime series, Carole & Tuesday, and truly enjoyed most of it. Particularly its world, characters, and overall lighthearted tone regarding the role of the artist, even in the colonized space of Cowboy Bebop. The show's greatest strengths being its appealing leads, and the often incredible soundtrack spinning a tale of a pair of starcrossed musicians who create a unique analog musical bond in a world where pop music tends to be enhanced via technological means. It isn’t hard to see where this affection for popular music through the ages sits within the heart of Watanabe, who’s classic 1998 series was nothing if not in itself a gargantuan solar system spanning poem regarding art’s influence upon our often ephemeral relationships with one another.

Where the show does stumble, is of course toward the final stretch with too many overbearing plot threads introduced far too late, and a finale that feels far too pat for the show's length. In truncating the end, the show never figures out how to properly address some awkwardly inserted timely elements, taking the teeth out of what could have been an emotionally powerful closing. Come episode 21, it had become alarmingly clear that every subplot that had been introduced in the wake of C & T’s overnight success, was about to get the compression treatment, and it wasn’t more evident than in the pacing of their musical rival, the talented and feisty Angela. A choice that only further hurts the more political themes the show was bravely hewing close to as the story pits artists versus the changing, and often manipulated sentiment of a public on the brink of an anti-immigrant platform on the coming election. An election that features a candidate closely related to a member of our duo.

Another reminder of the importance of knowing that your producers have your back to make good on these themes before, and during production. Because from the looks of how the show plays out, it seems like something happened resulting in a season shortened from the classic 26 episode order to 24. What we get, is a sorely missed opportunity for anime to spin a potent allegory for the current moment, and more a sweet-intentioned , and occasionally rousing ode to music set amidst a compelling sci-fi backdrop.

Still, I would have loved to have followed these characters through more adventures, making new friends and allies between planets alike. They are a charming, cheerworthy pair that the show almost forgets to explore further. In a way, C & T, for all their charms fall into the background as the meaty complications around them begin to pile up. Their spirit and music shine for sure, but we really deserved that beautiful seven minute miracle, and everything it purportedly changed.

But in order for that to happen, we probably needed those last two episodes.

Flattening The Curve PRESENTS: Ghost In The Shell SAC_2045

Now, as some friends have known that after completing the impressively mounted-if overlong fantasy prequel, The Dark Crystal: Age Of Resistance, the goal for me was to cut off the Netflix behemonth completely, as the service had become less and less a home for interesting cinema, and more a receptacle for mid-level long form stories with an often samey visual sheen. And despite my best efforts to cut that cord for myself, since friends and loved ones continue to subscribe, the months long announcement that my personal favorite anime and manga franchise would indeed be returning in a twelve episode event, well the current Stay At Home situation, felt like a stage was set for a brief return. Original Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex television series director and his team collaborating with mecha design legend, and prolific mocap CG fest director, Shinji Aramaki stoked me with both curiosity and nervousness. It’s a high wire risk that could surely sink a series beloved for its unusual levels of visual grit. So my coming back to the streaming service could be seen as a morbid move, especially sporting more youthful designs via longtime Behance and DeviantArt icon-turned character designer, Ilya Kuvshinov. This unique combination of elements reeked of risk for a multimedia franchise that has seen a number of them over the last decade.

Surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, Ghost In The Shell SAC_2045 is at best an interesting experiment featuring the further adventures of the Japan’s once legendary/notorious anti-cybercrime unit, Public Security Section 9; a team of heavily augmented and skilled agents tasked with the detective and military prowess to save the nation numerous times over, led by the fully prosthetic, Motoko Kusanagi, whom the team has long dubbed, The Major. Where the risks emerge on the story front, is in the opening crawl which describes the world falling into chaos mere years after the events of the 2006 SAC film, Solid State Society. Everything from governments collapsing, creating what is known as Sustainable War, or rather a global scavenger campaign for whatever remains as economies have all but completely dissolved. Our once very busy heroes, now unmoored by government oversight, is working overseas as a group of mercenaries, taking on patches of raiders throughout the Americas. Currently, their trip to my childhood background of PALM SPRINGS (jarring) pits them against teams of amateurs claiming to be fighting malevolent one-percenters. It is in these first five minutes that despite the sunny, clear skied backdrop reminiscent of Aramaki’s APPLESEED films, that my worry collided with a genuine curiosity at the series’ dramatic break from SAC’s twilight landscape often complimented by hard greys, and intense LEDs. It’d almost seem like a poor fit if this scenario didn’t feel like an inevitable consequence of the previous installments’ overload of unmanaged interconnectedness. It’s all been blown to hell, and Section 9 is still out there torn between attempting to pick up the pieces, and simple nostalgia for the wartime life.

While the team finds itself stalled in a barricaded part of the city, former member and still the mostly human detective, Togusa in Japan receives a call from the still kicking and now working for the Minister of the Interior, Daisuke Aramaki, who’s work with a new and very caucasian prime minister, seeks to locate and get the old band back together in the name of a new potential alliance with the American Empire. Togusa, since last we saw him is now divorced, the casualty of his workaholic ways as he attempts to find out what has happened to his former colleagues. All of this while The Major, Batou, Saito, and newly joined member, the appropriately named, Standard find themselves tumbling into a plot involving PMCs, fabled “good one percenters”, and a suited man in dark shades that feels like a far too late nod to Aramaki’s past. I say Aramaki’s past, and not the Wachowskis since this shady man-in-black character is much closer to the shadowy B.D. of Megazone 23 than to a certain Agent Smith., so it’s more of a cycle back..to the beginni- YEAH YOU GET IT.

And this is pretty much the deal throughout this initial season. I say initial since the ink has dried on a planned two-parter, with Aramaki taking over fully next time. Which still leaves me mildly nervous. Saying this as a longtime fan who is more than happy with the material that has come before. Particularly prior to Kazuchika Kise’s ARISE, which felt like a muddled overture to a mainstream viewership. SAC_2045, feels more authentic to the classic Stand Alone Complex experience, while wearing this occasionally awkward outfit that makes every character not a think tank doll-like and lifeless. Oh, and did we mention the return of the irrepressible, and hopelessly cool tachikomas? The cute cadre of badass tanks make a splash here as the medium change suits them perfectly, which was probably one of the biggest reasons for the transition. It’s just too bad they don’t really find much to do here except provide backup and comic relief from time to time.

A lot of SAC_2045, finds itself so mired in plot mechanics that it often neglects the more personal sides to our heroes, making this a more detached affair than is usual for the franchise. And even as the GiTS world is suddenly paying off almost two decades of story implying that human evolution has taken a dramatic turn, which is causing the strife at the center of things, the new series has a hard time pausing long enough to let us take it in. Perhaps where the Aramaki stuff hinders matters. His action is fantastic, but a huge part of what made the original Stand Alone Complex and 2nd Gig so powerful to me, was its ability to humanize the stakes of such technological advancement. Where upon the original manga by the one and only Masamune Shirow, presented a world that was at once overwhelming to the point of humorous, the Oshii helmed feature films rendered the world haunted and contemplative, while SAC television series fashioned the mythological landscape into one that is at once enthralling, thought-provoking, and ultimately wholly relatable.

With SAC_2045, the best we get is an action gamer’s playground version, which might work better as a one-off feature. But like most Netflix projects, continuously threatens to wear itself thin. so while it isn’t ARISE levels of flat, there is a lack of humanity on display that renders this incarnation a little lacking. And as giddy as I am to hear the old voice cast from the best incarnations back in fighting shape, the mask only leaves me longing for something more literate and thoughtful.

And as a finale note, while I still lament the loss of one Yoko Kanno as music composer powerhouse, the current Soundtrack via Nobuko Toda, is pretty engaging and is as musically diverse. Again, the problem being that the direction here despite the return of master scribes like Kamiyama and Dai Sato, there is a decided lack of depth to the proceedings, which is ironic considering the whole affair is attempting a three-dimensional approach. Again, as an experiment it’s an occasionally fun diversion, albeit a wildly unnecessary one.

It really is summer isn’t it?

Blockbuster it up, I guess.

And yes, despite all this I prefer it to the 2017 Hollywood film.

Lastly; If Purin Ezaki is what the future of Koukaku Kidotai holds, check please. .

Life Post Netflix

It’s almost like a long delayed breakup..

And yet, this was a choice that has probably been on the block since 2017. My only excuses being the piling on of originally produced content ( that reached almost crushing pressures come 2018 ), the will to cut the red cord has been a dear friend for some time. So when I was finally out from beneath the thumb of not only the streaming debut of Neon Genesis Evangelion, as well as The Irishman, and yes, even The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, coupled with the reality that with such a ubiquitous service in the hands of loved ones, there was a diminished passion on my part to continue. Especially in a Disney +, Amazon, Hulu, etc. landscape. (As for my latest leap back into the D pool, we can discuss soon, promise.)

To be completely honest, this feels right. Feels a solid ten pounds lighter. Especially true when my weekly Netflix diet largely consisted in background noise choices rather than actual sit down and watches. I’ve since joked that a large portion of the service’s content now sports a specific aesthetic, and almost lackadaisical attitude for works initially meant to function like your classic serialized material. It’s to the point that the riches often undercut a certain dramatic effectiveness. Much like the Marvel model, “just good enough” is baseline, rendering much of it disposable. It feels like qualitative purgatory.

And yet, Louis Leterrier’s long-awaited collaboration with the Hensons could not be a better sendoff.

Worth the wait in every respect, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, is the streaming service’s equivalent to legacy sequels/prequels that stand alone as shining examples of merging the familiar with the urgent. And grandeur to boot. Throughout, I have been repeatedly kicking myself for putting it off for so long. It’s also that rare prequel where despite what we know is to become of these characters, it remains impossible to wander away from. Nothing short of a visual and thematic feast that loses none of the strange charm of Jim Henson’s hopelessly radical 1982 piece. (My memories of seeing for the first time that opening weekend remain vital ones to this day.)

So sure, there’s a part of me that will miss being able to finish Carole & Tuesday’s second half at home. But the possibilities that have opened up in its stead remain hopeful. There’s still a ton of material to explore with my remaining options, including oodles in my years-old queue. There’s just something liberating about knowing what lies ahead, without the additional baggage of what remains online, and what could just as easily be removed tomorrow.

And then there’s my ever lingering physical media watch list that never seems to end.

See? We should be fine.

That said, oh my goddess this rules.