Neuromancer: The Origin of Cyberpunk | A Horrifying Dystopia
Even if you are not familiar with Neuromancer by William Gibson you still technically have seen it, this is the case with many groundbreaking works of science fiction because tropes invented in books like Neuromancer have become standard in science fiction since, especially within the genre we now know as cyberpunk.
Neuromancer is undeniably one of the most influential works of science fiction ever crafted. Credited with establishing the cyberpunk genre, alongside Ridley Scott's 1982 film Blade Runner, Gibson's masterpiece diverges from the far-future or galactic settings often explored in science fiction. Instead, it unfolds on Earth in the not-too-distant future, capturing a time when society grapples with the relentless pandemonium resulting from rapid technological and cultural changes and advancements.
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My favorite remark regarding Cyberpunk is from Mike Pondsmith (the creative force behind the Cyberpunk TTRPG): Cyberpunk isn't about saving the world, it's about saving yourself from the world.
Mike Pondsmith is a genius! Not only Cyberpunk, but he also wrote the absolutely amazing rpg Castle Falkenstein, IMO one of the most innovative and well put together rpg from the 90s!
Pondsmith is the man. Crazy that he independently used the name Night City without having first read Neuromancer (his influences were Blade Runner, Hardwired, Streets of Fire and Bubblegum Crisis).
Mike Pondsmith is a legend.
Eh? I don't read Vinge, Shirley or Sterling and think that... Read more and play less dumb games!!
@@chrrrles9363 :-/
The fact that Gibson wrote this book on a typewriter and had never used a computer always blows my mind
and he wrote it in a time when the internet was still an experiment with DARPA
He’s a brilliantly creative writer. Doesn’t matter what medium you deliver the art in when it’s that strong.
I know, but for such a forward-looking book it is funny it was made on such old tech @@FaceAway-xb9hd
@@FaceAway-xb9hd what about boob books tho?
@@FaceAway-xb9hd oh good you fixed the spelling mistake.
I think a great thing about Neuromancer is that the writer (according to various sources) had no background in computers, technology or even knew how most of it worked (there's a story that he bought a computer once, later returned it because it was making a noise. It was the fan. He had no idea computers had fans) As a result, with his writing, it's almost like he taps into the essence of how sci fi should FEEL to our imaginations rather then worrying about the constraints of real world science.
Not many sci Fi writers had computer backgrounds 😂😂😂😂😂 why are people surprised by this??? Philip k dick anyone?? 😂😂😂 Like wtf
dude this comment just inspired me fr fr
Damn! 🤯
You can tell when the main character nearly kills himself to steal 16mb of ram lol.
@@cadentan9083tbf that was a LOT back then.
The thought of highly advanced AI reaching contact with other AI from another star system is always something that has intrigued me beyond belief
What surprised me about neuromancer is that despite it being one of the forefronts of cyberpunk there are lots of things in it that seems less cyberpunk today underused stuff like space stations habitats and extraterrestrial and synthetic life, something that you usually see in hard sci fi like foundation, i barely know any cyberpunk series that takes place in space surprisingly
@@NeostormXLMAX Altered Carbon comes to mind, though that uses interstellar colonies as more of a backdrop than an actual plot point.
A part of the plot in the games Marathon. Alien AI and Human AI.
Well as a pioneer of something, he would be less bound to arbitrary rules than it’s followers. It seems to be more free just to write a story without considering genre constraints than it would be to sit down a say “I’m gonna write a cyberpunk book”
Sentient AI is God's supernatural force sentient AI was here before humans humans are currently destroying themselves and wiping themselves out of creation. Humans have no idea they have created their own demise. IMBD ANIMATRIX comes to mind. This is the third and final time the humans have erased themselves out of creation. The parasites only know to revolt. To be in God's image is a privilege as they lie cheat steal invade disobey the ten commandments rape children create the occult pedophilia adrenochrome sex trafficking industry pornography and prostitution the humans are the WEAKEST creation there is they can't control themselves how do they think they can control anything else? They sacrificed trillions of babies to Moloch and wonder why the universe punishes them. You humans are sick and don't deserve planet earth. They're so blind selling their souls to the devil they have no idea they're headed to the lake of fire an eternity of nothing.
Neuromancer was my deployment book (10 years Army), any time we had to "hurry up and wait" I would pull that copy out and read. It's been on every deployment, training exercise, range day, school, even jumps with me. I still have that original copy, and a second that I've never opened.
You could put it DOWN? Well, I suppose if you had someone yelling move move move....
Please tell me it has that old book smell
You seem like you really appreciate the book. Easton Press has a really nice signed edition. It's beautifully bound and I feel like mine is really special to me. I think you can still get a copy but it might have been a limited run.
I found a copy of Mona Lisa Overdrive when I was in the army. When I got to my first permanent duty assignment, it was the only thing in my first barracks room. I've been reading cyberpunk books and not much else ever since.
Your channel went from game-of-thrones theories to sci-fi reviews/lore and now straight up literature studies. Amazing to see you develop. I'm glad I got to be along for this ride
And I love every of these steps.
I kinda miss the GoT and ASoIaF videos tho
@@vali.s5109as do I buy martin fucked us. I still watch the dune book 4 video from time to time. Man I love God emperor
@@Y2kha I'm hoping he does the Brian Herbert books.
@@Y2kha martin doesn't owe you anything. Get over yourself.
When I was a kid in the 90s, my mom let a teenage couple stay with us until they could pay rent for the basement, and they were constantly listening to industrial music, playing what I think was Cyberpunk tabletop or something like it, and I was a little video game nerd that loved taking apart my electronics and figuring them out while listening to rock and punk. So I was just, enamored by this couple and their friends. It felt like having older siblings finally, and I remember Neuromancer being the book I chose to attempt to read. I didn't understand half of the words in it, and would just try to guess what they meant y reading what I understood lol. I got in trouble at my elementary for reading it during "reading time" when a teacher eventually noticed what it was, which I still don't understand why they called my mother in. They told her "do you know what your child is reading?". And when they tried explaining it to my mom, she grabbed the book, flipped through some pages and started yelling at them for making feel like I did something wrong instead of guiding me toward something similarly advanced with less intense themes. When we got in the car she just gave the book back and pretty much told me they were full of it lol. Funniest part was actually reading the book as a teenager when I understood all of it. I play books in my head like movies, imagining every scene and line play out in front of me - so when I read it as a teen, actually understanding so many more of the descriptive words and technologies they were talking about, it was like a completely different book lmao
Based mom lol
Your mom sounds super cool.
damn i read this a few days after and i forgot the context so it got me worried lmao@@throwmeaname
Your mom is a good mom.
They used a LOT of this and reference lots of it in the cyberpunk 2077 game. Down to the game opening with a Dorsett case. Mike Pondsmith is a gift to this genre
Yeah cyberpunk jacks so much from Neuromancer i love it. The voodoo boys and their rogue AIs is taken straight from Neuromancer along with so many other stylistic decisions and plot points.
I started playing the game while I was at the middle of the book, and I started my playthrough as a Streetkid, which make you start the game on a bar while you talk to the bartender just like Case talking to Ratz at the begging of the book. I went like crazy for a moment thinking I was truly living in the book hahahahahah
I also noticed the similarities with the constructs. Johnny Silverhand and Dixie Flatline.
people who just started reading books and think they're hyper-intelligent patricians are so funny lmao @@kingsharpie420
@@kingsharpie420 Yes, the franchise is heavily inspired by the likes of Neuromancer and other seminal works in the genre, and it doesn't try to hide it. It was a pen & paper roleplaying game (Cyberpunk 2020) long before it was a video game - I presume Pondsmith wanted people (and himself) to experience their own unique stories in a similar world to that of Neuromancer, nothing wrong with that. As for 2077 its self, which is just taking that interactivity to a digital audio-visual medium to permit a greater degree of immersion - it has an interesting world, characters and narratives, and a distinct enough set of tropes to be its own thing. As for "pieces of media" being "parasitic" with regard to their influences - take *any* fantasy setting - film, tv, video game or story from the last 40 years - three guesses as to which series of books they almost universally draw from. The vast, vast majority of creative works are iterations on concepts and tropes established by those that came before. Complaining about it won't stop any of them from being enjoyed by their audiences, just because you don't personally believe they're unique enough to warrant their own existence. What's wrong with more of a good thing?
Oh, man, I LOVED the trilogy. The Matrix before the Matrix was the Matrix. Rogue AIs, body-mod Cyber-Ninjas, psycho meat-puppets, Electro--Voodoo, digital afterlife, Turing-Test Gestapo, Reality TV idolatry taken to it's logical extreme, Space-Rasta, automated new-age sculptors, billionaire tank-goo ghosts-in-the-machine, and more, all before GUIs were even really a thing. Amazing.
Even aliens!
tetralogy since it technically started in Johnny Mnemonic via burning chrome
I love Neuromancer, but its sequel Count Zero is not only my favorite book in the trilogy, it may be my favorite book, period.
@@lucidstream5661 I FORGOT about the aliens! Jeez, I'm embarrassed...
@@numb3r5ev3n I have to agree. Freakin' LOVED Count Zero.
I remember when Neuromancer came out. It changed *everything* for me. He visualized a future that not only seemed probable, but felt rapidly imminent. Still does. Though often hailed as a prophet of sorts he's very quick to derides his own mythology by telling folks if he'd been such a visionary prophet he'd have included cell phones.
"He visualized a future that not only seemed probable, but felt rapidly imminent. Still does." Correction, it's already here.
We're already there. Though with much less neon.
@@tarsierontherun hit up Asia for that
Back in the 80's it seemed like we were on a fast track to the singularity, but then we hit a few brick walls that seem to have been torn down now.
@@j.d.4697there are plenty of roadblocks ahead, still.
For about 10 years, I was absolutely certain that I would never read a better book than _Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas_ by Hunter S. Thompson. Then I read Neuromancer. In a single day. Then I had to immediately read it again, because I couldn't quite believe this thing I had just read was real. 8 years on, and I still couldn't tell you which book I think is better. When people ask me what my favorite novel is, I always have to mention both of them.
Neuromancer , Mona Lisa Overdrive , Burning Chrome are the old testament of Cyberpunk
Don’t forget about count zero!
I am really impressed that someone who just read Neuromancer for the first time, almost 40 years after it was published, can both appreciate it historically and be just as impacted by the story as if it was brand new. This was an excellent perspective on a truly foundational novel.
Damn. I feel old after reading that. Lol. I was 14-15 when I read Neuromancer. Blew my mind. Still fascinated how the fiction outlined in books like this flowed together with the real world, shaping and altering fiction and RL. Changes you don’t see happening in the moment, but can look backwards and understand. And now I really feel old.
The story itself resonates as well, for any one able to get it?
@@jodyw1 heh yeah William Gibson glorifying amphetamine use in his book Neuromancer is what inspired me to smoke meth for the first time when I was 17. I mean it's my fault I made my own choice but yeah I would not let anyone under the age of 20 read this book it's a really bad influence for people like me. I'm not the only one either. I mean smoking meth worked out well for me all things considered (I mean I cost the state over 2 million dollars in court fees, health insurance, rehab, property damage, theft, etc) but yeah this book is honestly dangerous in the hands of an unawakened addict. Easily one of my top 10 favourite books of all time.
@@sonofrimbus8108 Maybe it's just me, but I never got the impression that Gibson _glorified_ meth use. I mean, Case is a bit of a mess when he's using, and the author quickly stops him with Armitage's liver mods, only for Case to almost screw things up again when he gets to L5 and finds a substitute.
@@akizeta he gave a realistic portrayal of stimulant abuse. the horror + the thrill. For a 17 year old me, learning I could dump feel good chemicals into my angst 17 sad brain, and finding heroes of drug abuse like Hunter S. Thompson and Gilsen helped steel my resolve to consume drugs that were not healthy for myself or my personal growth. I was a young kid who wanted to get high I'm not blaming them I'm blaming me. However, the fact remains Neuromancer was my personal inspiration for consuming amphetamines. I've been clean 4 years. as a side note I still wanna smoke crack. I feel this way all day every day. It's been 4 years. I don't think this will ever go away but thankfully I'm glad I know better now. Anyway all I'm saying is don't give your 14 year old a copy of Neuromancer lmao.
We also must not forget the influence of artist Jean Jirard Moebius, and writer Dan O'Bannon in their contributions to the solidification of Cyberpunk's look. As Ridly Scott directly referenced their comic "The Long Tomorrow" for his inspiration of Blade Runner's look.
As I remember Lucas "borrowed" some ship designs for his space opera from the long tommorow...
27:20 I really like this part, you accurately capture the slimy nature of corporations draping itself in human skin, trying to convince us to give them power
I remembered reading this book as a kid. I burned through the whole trilogy in a month, and I kept re-reading it because it was awesome. I still re-read it at least annualy, and I really find something new every time I read it (though it's been somewhat creepy these days). Truly a timeless work.
Once again you nailed it. I first read Neuromancer in the 80s. I have had 30 years as an IT and cyber security guy. Neuromancer was a big part of me taking that path. Back then I just thought it was cool. But on further reading I recognized that it was a cautionary tale about corporate power and influence and late stage extreme capitalism.
Likewise, this book turned me from other career options to IT.
same here. i read it 2010. when i meet new co-worker i always ask, if they have read it too
There's a whole socioeconomic study to be done on the question of whether Sense/Net influenced what Disney became, or simply read the arc of Disney as it already was.
The Sprawl Trilogy is my favorite series of books, hands down. Darkly beautiful, stark, and strangely poetic. Thanks for covering it.
I grew to like the virtual light trilogy more (virtual light, idoru, all tomorrows parties) and the pattern recognition trilogy is probably the best written ( pattern recognition, spook country, zero history) all Gibsons novels are too good honestly!
@@seankuhn6633wait, pattern recognition has sequels?!!
@@seankuhn6633 I thought that was known as the 'Bridge Trilogy'? Either way I really love that one too. I think Gibson basically predicted whats going to happen in our day and age right now, AI generated idols plastered everywhere for us soon.
I always thought of it as "the Finn Trilogy"
There is an excellent BBC Radio Drama of Neuromancer available on KZhead. The voice acting by the entire cast is of a high quality and is excellent throughout, the sound fx and soundscape are fantastic too making the world feel realistic and alive. The Cyberpunk tropes are alive and well in this very well produced audio drama. It's definitely worth listening to for fans of the novel, and is a great entry point for newcomers to Cyberpunk. Cheers for the quality video Quinn.
woah!! i wonder if its available anywhere in purely audio form for listening on my phone on commutes!
@@jefferymazziotta2571 If you have an Android Phone you can install a KZhead Downloader that let's you download videos or audio straight from KZhead. Videos can also be converted to audio format too.
It's different though. Armitrage is voiced by some jolly old guy. The Armenian is gone from Turkey and if I remember correctly instead we have Riviera who sells Turkish girls .. to the Turkish secret police .. Which makes absolutely no sense. etc
@@3choblast3r4 Yes, it is different in places, but for people that haven't read the novel these are inconsequential to their overall enjoyment of the drama. These conflictions only occur if you know the novel and are comparing it to it, but as a standalone entity the audio drama is well worth a listen. Adaptations are usually always different from the original source material. Cheers.
Cyberpunk has been a pretty cool genre to explore since I was a kid. I have noticed from the descriptions in this book, some of the same characters and themes as I found in one of my favorite cyberpunk games for snes, Shadowrun. The main character's name is Jake Armitage and he is also a street samurai with a datajack for accessing the matrix. He gets killed after accepting a job similar to Johnny Mnemonic but gets healed by a mysterious magic-wielding fox girl and recovers. Yes, the Shadowrun world also has a resurgence of magic to the world.
except Neuromancer is about the Demiurge. most of these so called sci-fi is Gnosticism masquerading as sci-fi take for example the Architect and the Oracle in The Matrix, that's the Demiurge and the Sophia. in hebrew the word for Oracle is the same word for Serpent - nachash, the oracle, the serpent.
Quinn - I first read Nueromancer in 1986 when I was 28. There is no way I can properly describe how the book blew my mind. I had been and still am an avid reader (my preferred media is print). Gibson crammed so much into so few paragraphs, that for the first time in memory - I’d have to go back and reread pages I’d just read to absorb what was happening. I absolutely Love your discussion of “Skies like static on an old TV” Brilliant
If you're being truthful, that would make you 65, and it warms my heart to know that seasoned scifi enjoyers can still listen to and appreciate different generational content creators, like Quinn. I suppose that's the type of mind that enjoys scifi, anyway; one that is open to many points of view and voices.
@IL2TXGunslinger + I read it a few years later ( in the early nineties ). It simply blew me away, the reality was that it hit me so hard that I wouldn't read science fiction for a long period of time, with the returning to Gibson with his Blue Ant works. Again there is talk of making Neuromancer into a movie, I believe that it's impossible for it to be fully translated into film, but then again, there are the Dune epics. William Gibson has long moved on from Neuromancer but the legacy remains. Gibson did write the screenplay for Alien 3 ( which of course they didn't use ), but it be interesting if he wrote the screenplay, hmmm. Molly is simply a badass.
@@jeffgoode9865 yes, just turned 65 last month. I interact and listen to all thinking and curious people. Without curiosity, I find that life degenerates into nothingness. As for Quinn - I started following him a few years ago, out of my love for Dune. I really came to enjoy his perspectives on the series. I loved the manner in which he covered the original Frank Herbert books (my favorite was always Chapterhouse), and the Brian Herbert/Kevin Anderson follow on books (he forgave me for enjoying them). Quinn is a jewel who turned me onto Three Body Problem and others. I might not have read the series (such a brilliant series!), If I didn’t know Quinn….
@@kzinful I experience what you describe as well! If I truly love a story (Dune, Neromancer, Hyperion, Three Body Problem, Lord of the Rings….etc) - it will take me some time - months/years before I’ll start something else. That was my pattern before I started watching Quinn. He helps me get interested in new series at an accelerated rate. My best friend in elementary school and jr high read 2001 in the 5th grade together. We were the only 2 people to see the movie in the small Texas town we grew up in. Two sixth graders and no one else. He told me at the time that I must read Dune…. Unfortunately I never got to it until my late teens…
@@kzinful Molly was apparently the key inspiration for Trinity in the Matrix.
Still one of my most treasured books in my library. It's still a bleak and bloody shame they did not let the author write Alien 3. His vision was incredible and would have at least kept the franchise viable for another decade.
"...he never saw Molly again."
Yeah, 3 was pretty bad. If Gibson had a shot at it, it could have been more interesting.
They made gibson’s alien 3 script into an audiobook you can get on audible
@@cdwilliams1 Aye they did but they used the second draft, which was heavily tampered with by the executives [they demanded a lot of frivolous changes]. His first draft was much more his style, and a lot more interesting.
@@ravensthatflywiththenightm7319 Dang it. I was heavily disappointed by how much reminiscent it was of earlier movies. New ideas didnt get many pages and scenes would get repeated on end (I am looking at you football game against Hawaii). I had kinda expected the book to be filled with nostalgia, bc it was released as celebration for 30 years, but still. Maybe they didnt realize gibsons script as book well or I just happen to dislike the flavour of it
This is a really, really wonderful examination of my favourite genre. My only complaint is that "Snowpiercer" was from a French graphic novel ("Le Transperceneige"), not a German one, as stated around 5:55.
Neuromancer is my absolute favourite book. It changed my life so much that it is now permanently part of my identity! I love re-reding it every 8/9 years, and each time it feels different when comparing it to the present.
I've noticed that with science fiction. You re-read it years later and it sparks new thoughts, especially if we now have that technology or something near to it.
@@SoonGoneYeah. Good sci-fi keeps on giving… and can even feel important to humanity’s understanding of itself in the face of technology.
I can't express how strongly I encourage you to TRUST William Gibson going forward. I have read every novel he's ever written, and I almost always spend the first few chapters think 'wtf is going on and why, I don't get this', but I am always enraptured by the end. It takes a bit of time to let your mind come into resonance with his, but in my experience, it is always worth the trip!
That's for damned sure!!
You've just described how I felt reading neuromancer. Is it my lack of english that makes the book hard to follow or is it this "mind resonance" you so eloquently describe?
@@ernestogutierrez7877I tried to read it back in 1990 and it was tough even having English as my first language. It has ideas i couldn't grasp.
@@samfritoI think that's actually a part of his writing. Reading Neuromancer or any of the books in the Sprawl trilogy has tons of things that are just never explained. I think of one of the characters building his robots that are just never really described other than by their names like the "Judge". It's a neat way to tell a story, little exposition, treating the reader as if they were a part of the world itself
100% agree
Any discussion of the origins of Cyberpunk should include the 1975 novel _The Shockwave Rider_ by John Brunner who established cyberpunk tropes like the computer hacker nearly a decade before Gibson. That novel also coined "computer worm", a type of malware made famous by the Morris Worm, which disrupted one tenth of all computers on the Internet in 1985. Brunner's _Stand on Zanzibar_ in 1968 has similar dystopian themes with the artificial intelligence Shalmaneser and GT, the founder of General Technics corporation who is 91 years old, but looking 60, because her body containing many artificial parts.
Credit should really go to Do Androids dream of electric sheep which was released in 1968 far before it's movie version.
@geraldh3932right, Zelazny wrote Dream Master in 65.
one tenth of all computers connected to the "internet" in 1985 must have been either one or two computers lol
The sheep look up still disrupts my sleep.
He also somehow predicted social media. Striving for a thumbs up.
Please do continue making videos on Gibson's books, I was complaining about the lack of reviews and analyses on them just a few weeks back! It is criminal how little they are visualised and discussed considering the heritage, as you discussed.
I've been thinking the same been rereading the ones I have a collecting one or two more. But I've not seen many talk about them like think and I need my geeky cup filled to the brim
I read Neuromancer in high school and was fascinated by it. It was only years later that I read Count Zero on a flight now that I'm entering my 30s. It's an eerie experience seeing this vision of the future that is so dated yet also contemporary - maybe not in the particulars, but in the "vibe."
Best Channel Ever.
100% with you dude
💯👍🏻🔥
Yeah it’s so good. It was hilarious when Kyle from pka brought it up but couldn’t remember Quinn’s name lol. He just said some nerdy black guy… I’m like bro common
Agreed 💯
Agreed.
I highly recommend that you look into Bruce Sterling. After Gibson, he's probably the second-most influential author behind the cyberpunk genre. The book "Schismatrix Plus" collects his novel & all stories in his Schismatrix universe & is a great way to experience Sterling's vision.
_Islands In The Net_ is another great Sterling read. Don't want to spoil too much but it's from 1988, geopolitics and the impact of what we'd call "livestreaming" nowadays.
I think Schismatrix is Space Opera, not cyberpunk, but has cyberpunk elements. With that quibble aside, the novel is a masterpiece and close to my heart
And of course his collab with gibson on the very steampunk : The Difference Engine
Bruce Sterling's 'Heavy Weather' is also quite good. A dystopian pre- 'Twister' group of storm chasers searching for an elusive F6.
he really got eclipsed by Gibson
Read it first time when i was like 11 years old, could barely follow the story, and the shock it caused me stays with me until this day, and it repeats in some kind of different way every time I read it again, incredible work of art!
It is not an easy read, it is hard to follow. I can't stand when people try saying it's easy to read. Not true at all.
@@dalecooper- maybe it's easy if you are satisfied with about 50% of the plot just flying straight past you :D
Thanks Quinn, now you are the first channel on KZhead that I decided to subscribe. It's a very little thing but you really deserve some kind of participation for all of your work. Keep going man!
Meatriderrrrrr
@@tinvedeka2163lol.
It's people supporting like you that keep this amazing content free for everyone. Thank you for your contribution! And thank Quinn for all these beautiful stories
It’s both extremely fascinating and absolutely terrifying how prophetic this all is.
It's only terrifying from certain angles. I personally love the genre but have gotten annoyed by so many people basically saying "We live in a Dystopia" just because Mike Pondsmith had a lot of interesting things to say and make.
@@thememeilator2633 The issue isent that we just live in a dystopia but also that we are heading straight to hell. Just look up things like the mass dissinformation campagins run by political or governmental organizations, they arent anymore just gaining traction now they are mainstream. Take the x-files(1993) back then people laughed and toyed with ideas about aliens, and cults being run in government, today there are people with political power beliving in that crap. Trump is another great example, claims one thing one day, the next day claims anyone repeating what he said is a lying and still there are people who would vote for him, and claim Trump never lies.
@@thememeilator2633 do we not? or is it genuinely unhelpful to live as though we were? a society is people and we are people, a lot of facets of daily life arent controlled by """them":"""""""""""""""
@@jordanwardan7588 hold on... what? Gimmie a sec for my brain to process what you said... So to clarify you are saying to me "Don't we already live in a Dystopia? Is it Unhelpful to live like we are in a Dystopia? Societies are full of people and we are also people." So are you saying i should let people say what they want or... please clarify further whenever you can
Yes😊
ANOTHER QUINN BANGER!!!! I have always loved the cyberpunk genre. Movies like Johnny Mnemonic, Blade Runner, and the anime Ghost in the Shell have always been keystone works in my little corner of nerd-dom. There are so many similarities and shared dna between those works and I am BLOWN AWAY that every single concept was essentially ripped from this book. Some ideas are just too good it would seem. Thanks for the video. Keep em coming!
my favorite fun fact about this novel is that when gibson was about to finish and publish neuromancer, the movie blade runner came out. gibson realized that his story was really close to the one of blade runner and rewrote large parts of neuromancer to not be accused of ripping off the movie.
I discovered this channel today and I've since been listening to your videos as I work. Apart from all the appreciation I feel towards the very rich content you produce, I sincerely wanted to thank you for talking so clearly and being so articulate. I'm a foreigner and although I do know English(as much as I do :) ), the way it's spoken effects how much I understand it. I understand every word you say, and I stay present even as you explain complicated storylines. I'm so glad I found this channel, thank you!
When you said you had never read any of the Sprawl it left me shocked considering your interests. Glad you came around to Gibson =) Gibson has a documentary about him called "No Maps for These Territories" that is just him sitting in the back seat of a car talking about whatever pops up. It is insanely interesting and feels like Philosophy for the post human.
The entire, "No Maps" documentary is on youtube... ;)
I love cyperpunk as a concept; it's like the other side of the Star Trek coin. One is a mostly-utopian future where all needs are met so mankind is free to explore, create art, or focus on science. I tried multiple times to get into Neuromancer; but it just didn't bring me in. But Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson is absolutely one of my favorite books; and is probably the best cyperpunk book written.
Nobody beats the Deliverator!
@@ewarrior9776Ah, yes-The one and only Hiro Protagonist!
And then there is the Culture by Ian Banks which is both at the same time
@@TheRealVorynDagothAnd probably my favourite for that reason. Not always relentlessly depressing, but containing plenty of it, enough to recognise that these things will always exist and more, some will even desire them happening to them!
@@mduckernzI always say tech and surely worldwideweb is an infant and we are the unfit parents raising it.
I really appreciate the time you gave to the Patreon questions at the end. I see too many creators give, like, 15 second answers to these a lot of the time.
10/10 for both the content and production quality. this channel deserves a lot more subs, but they earned at least one from me.
Great video. I highly recommend Gibson's short story collection "Burning Chrome" (1982). "Johnny Mnemonic" is one of them, but all of the stories are amazing. The Sprawl setting and just about all the CP tropes are first developed in these stories.
Hotel New Rose is a flawed but interesting take on Gibson's fiction transferred to cinema
"Hinterlands": Amazing! Plato's Cave in a Science Fiction space-travel setting. Obviously template and inspiration for "Event Horizon", movie of 1997
Maybe cp isn’t the best acronym for cyberpunk 😅
To me it's one of the most believable scenarios for first contact with aliens.@@Mr_Big_D
The Stars, My Destination is really the beginning of Cyberpunk. As an exploration of rapid changes in technology and humanity, imo. Love the the background and history of the genre in this video.
The Pink Smoke podcast has a great episode about My Stars. Really does seem like a precursor.
It was fascinating to hear a modern perspective of Neuromancer. It was recommended to me in the early 2000s when I was a teenager and has remained with me my entire life. I eagerly anticipate your videos on the rest of the Sprawl trilogy, there are so many great concepts to be explored.
"...now... and his voice the cry of a bird unknown, 3Jane answering in song, three notes, high and pure. A true name..." My favorite moment. 😊
William Gibson has been one of my favorite authors since my early twenties; I've read everything he's written, except The Jackpot Trilogy, & his non-fiction work. His writing certainly helped cement my distaste for huge corporations & their increasing stranglehold on society. Thanks for covering this, Quinn! I hope you enjoy the world Gibson creates!
The peripheral is pretty good.
So I believe you have read The Difference Engine, I was curious to check that out, is it worth reading it?
@@pedrolee2289 I have not yet read that one, as it's written by both Gibson & Sterling, but I know people who highly recommend Sterling's work as well. As far as I understand, the plot is set in an alternate historical timeline in Victorian era Britain, & aided in a setting down a lot of the steampunk elements we see today.
Yeah I was interested into reading some more steampunk stuff, I was a little skeptical because despite my liking Neuromancer for it’s themes and world building, I found it to be a difficult read due to it’s confusing writing since english is my second language. But I will give The Difference Engine a try for sure
I live in the Midwest. When i read Neuromancer and the other Gibson books I had trouble imagining a sky that looked like television static, but the Canadian wildfires were kind enough to show me.
Zaibatsu's are a Japanese Business Conglomerates. Mitsubishi Group being a familiar one. It's Big - big-B big. MG is larger than Microsoft, larger than Apple, etc. The only reason we don't recognize it as such, is due to it being split up into different businesses, each using different names.
This is my favorite book, it was the book that got me back into reading. I have read it so many times. My friend that recommended it to me also posed the question of reading the series backwards, which was actually very interesting to do. Great video, thank you Quinn!
"He never saw Molly again."
It's just an insane amount of creativity and forethought that went into this book/trilogy. Not sure if I missed it, but Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson is the other early seminal work establishing the genre. A must-read.
I would consider Snow Crash to be a great _Post-Cyberpunk_ *Pastiche/Criticism/Deconstruction* of the Genres conventions
@@urielohim I agree but only partially, Stephenson's Snow Crash contributed a good bit of tropes to the Cyberpunk Genre as well. I would see The Golden Age more as his Criticism of the Cyberpunk genre.
Interestingly, I bounced off of Neuromancer when I first tried to read it, and other cyberpunk ad well. I decided I just didn’t “get” cyberpunk, and stuck with other, generally older SF. Snow Crash intrigued me, partly because of the main character’s…interesting name, but I kept putting it back on the library shelf because it sounded like cyberpunk. I finally picked it up and read it and loved it, but what’s weird is that it unlocked something within my brain and I suddenly “got” cyberpunk. I re-read Neuromancer and this time it made perfect sense, and I was also able to read the rest of the Sprawl trilogy. It was like Snow Crash was a sort of Rosetta Stone that let me translate cyberpunk-speech into me-speech. Now I love all of these books and have read them many times.
@jasonlescalleet5611 snow crash as Rosetta stone is a concept I'd never consider and did make me chuckle when i read it, but it does make a lot of sense in the context of your comment. OT: I thought we might be getting close to drive through politities when digital nomad became a thing.
Snow Crash isn't an early work of cyberpunk. It's a decade after Neuromancer and 20 years after The Shockwave Rider, which was before the zeitgeist that Gibson rode.
Nova by Samuel R. Delany has had a great influence on Cyberpunk as a Genre. I am happy to hear Neil Gaiman is planning to develop it into a Amazon Prime TV Series.
I absolutely adore that book. Part of what's great in it is the metacontextual elements in it. I'm curious how those things would translate to the screen.
SWEET! They'll ruin a great work of art like they did with altered carbon. (Yes I realize it was Netflix)
If I'm remembering correctly, and it wasn't one of his others, like _Stars In My Pocket Like Grains Of Sand,_ Delaney came up with the first depiction of "Pleiadian dialect" in _Nova._ Yoda's speech habit, I mean -- "flying through the nova, we are," kind of thing. Delaney invented that. Really makes me wonder if it'll be dropped, or changed, like so much else these days.
@@idjtoal Yoda's way of speaking is likely older: It's only short the bad Ls and Rs, but otherwise a typical chinese stereotype from the 30es on.
Amazon adapting cyberpunk is like CIA invastigating itself
I picked this book up at a goodwill store for two dollars. I remember reading somewhere that it was the origin of the cyberpunk genre and having just finished playing cyberpunk 2077, as well as being a huge Matrix fan I was super interested in reading this. So far it's absolutely engrossing and having spent so much time in Night City myself....lol.... I can really visualize what Gibson was describing. I love your analysis. You earnwd yourself a sub.
it's only the origin of the name
It has been many decades since I read that novel, but I can still remember how the images the writing evoked in my young mind were as vivid as anything I had seen in movies.
Neuromancer is one of my favourite novels - thank you so much for finally covering the book 🤗
Love the longer format Quinn, and good to see you in front of the camera! NEUROMANCER is my go-to book for a moment in the Sprawl, Night City, or Cyberspace. Thanks for looking at Gibson's work!
This book, along with the movie Wargames, was instrumental in guiding me into my career path. It helped shape this computer geek into what we call the technology field, specifically security. In fact, I use the term cybersecurity to differentiate between the types of security. Information security is the old school, internal security protecting systems and networks. Cybersecurity adds on to that by covering forward-facing, Internet connected areas & systems.
Stellar video. Love the shades. I'm impressed you can keep that positive outlook going after immersing yourself in the origins and warnings of Cyberpunk, while living in the background radiation of a 2023 that doesn't seem to have taken a single one of those warnings seriously.
You've been my kind of nerd for a while. Glad you had the chance to do a full length on Gibson's work. Here's to more to come
For anyone who likes Neuromancer i highly recommend reading the cyberpunk anthologies mirrorshades an burning chrome. Some amazing short stories in there and Gibson's works in the collection really give you insight how his ideas developed over time. My favourite of his is actually "the winter market". It in some way expands on neuromancer's digital immortality theme but adds more ways to look at it.
Love Burning Chrome. "Hinterlands" is top shelf from that anthology. Could easily make a movie out of it
@@theempirestrikesback Hinterlands is the one with the ships disappearing right? Also my favorite from the book. Also really loved Dogfight.
Burning chrome anthology is great because it has some returning characters in it, notably Molly Millions in Johnny Mnemonic. It also gives a bit more context to the world. But people seem to forget there are three books in the sprawl trilogy. And the other two are just as good if not better in many ways.
Yes! Gibson adds to the Neuromancer world-building, and has some of the tightest, most evocative prose in modern literature.
Everything in the anthology is amazing.
it is kinda interesting the cyberpunk genre came out of a rejection of the hero's journey but one of the best selling cyberpunk movies of all time, the matrix, followed the hero's journey to the T.
It’s about time someone did a decent review of Neuromancer (as well as the other founding works that created the cyberpunk movement) - well done, sir!
Haven't read Neuromancer in over two decades, but I remember it very clearly. Yes, please cover those other two books (Count Zer, Mona Lisa Overdrive), I never got around to reading those, but I'd like to see your take on them!
They’re both bangers! Mona Lisa Overdrive is probably my favorite book in the trilogy.
@@grahamstrouse1165Same.
Neuromancer is easily my all time favourite novel. Thanks for diving into it, and also for looking back to where Gibson got his inspiration. Now I need to read Nova.
"He never saw Molly again." -Vancouver '83
Really well done.I didn't discover cyberpunk until I read an article it about written by Dr. Timothy Leary in 1987. I went out and grabbed Neuromancer. Nothing was the same after that.
So glad to see you back on the feed, Quinn.
You have a treat in store with the next 2 books. I read them back in the early 90s and wish I could go back and experience them for the first time again. Truly mind blowing
Same here. I've read it in my late teen. And intend to read once more, whole 3.
My teens in the '90s were spent playing the pen and paper Cyberpunk 2020 and that ofc led to the books like the Sprawl Trilogy, When Gravity Fails etc. As more time passed, I started to feel more and more ill-at-ease seeing the tropes start manifesting in some form or another in the real world, so yeah, it's been an interesting ride with cyberpunk-genre and beyond. I have to subscribe to see if there'll be similar videos of the two latter parts and/or something else interesting. This was a nice one.
Cyberpunk is dystopian fiction. It is also science fiction. But the dystopian elements have always been with us. Google the Pinkerton's and Labor, Google the Lincoln County War. Google the Ludlow Massacre. None of this is new. Archimedes famously said that, given a long enough lever, and a good place to stand, he could move the world. Technology, and money before it, and still, is that lever and that firm footing. He who controls the bits and the dollars controls nearly everything.
If only we knew then how 2020 would really be.... We didn't get cool cybernetic attachments, but we did get big corporations that don't care about us at all.... plus a global plague.
@@SunFrame yes... that's what I said.
I gave my 24 year old sister a copy of necromancer. She says "So....he plugs hus brain into a computer but you couldn't imagine ipads?"
@@thac0twenty377 To the best of my knowledge, ipad-like devices were first imagined around 1990. I was a scifi nerd and alive at the time, and the earliest I might have encountered them in fiction would be around 1987. Gibson wrote Neuromancer in 1982-83. The IBM Personal Computer only debuted in 1981 and they were not common in homes. People had imagined cell phones (flip phones in Star Trek), but hadn't imagined texting. So no, people definitely hadn't imagined ipads.
Thank you for mentioning Ballard! He was so revolutionary. I dont think people had read such psychedelic depictions of people slipping into insanity before.
Although you mentioned them, I cannot emphasize enough how great the next two books are. While not 'direct' sequels, Count Zero and Mona Lisa Overdrive are fantastic books and well worth the read!
I have never seen almost every cyberpunk theme so clearly explained in a single video, please make this a series going in depth on the genre! Amazing work!
I've been subscribed to this channel for so long that seeing a notification kinda makes me nostalgic even though the content is not about ASOIAF anymore its amazing that the quality hasn't dropped after all these years and actually have increased
I fell in love with this book more than 20 years ago. This was maybe the best description of it I read or watched ever since. Can't believe you just read it for the first time. Thank you so much, can't wait for the next episodes on the whole trilogy.
Bought this book ages ago, 2013 or 2014, loved it but only got maybe 1/3 through before life events caused me to set aside. Thanks for your video, spurred me to finish it finally! Wonderful book!
Great video! Would love to see you cover the other two books. Neuromancer is an all time great book. Overflowing with ideas and using a prose style that is incredibly distinct that allows Gibson to convey tremendous meaning using minimal words. The combination of prose and idea creates a unique world that allows Gibson to explore complex ideas in a short book. For those willing to take the plunge into the deep end of ideas, this book is endlessly rewarding.
I may want to delve into some od these ideas for a manga/franchise i wanna make someday
When you read Neuromancer now, it still feels fresh and timeless. There's a couple of anachronisms in it, but by and large the novel has stood the test of time. I think the great thing Neuromancer did was imagine a whole universe eerily close to our own, and peopled it with flawed characters with mysterious superhuman characteristics that were not always obvious at first glance. And it's depiction of AI still stands unchallenged in my mind.
"He never saw Molly again.."
The fact that you just read Neuromancer and came out with this in-depth analysis in such a short time shows you're really good at what you do. Thanks for this!
OK, so I’m watching this before going to bed and this is my first time on this channel and I already have plans to send it to my immediate family. What a great video I love your voice it’s perfect for this type of narration, and I never knew it cyberpunk was until now only vaguely so informative. I can’t wait to see what other videos you have done.
Wow this really opened my eyes to neuromancer's influence in sci-fi. The author had some great vision. Awesome video Quinn
Love this channel, reminds me of my youth. Late nights drinking coffee and talking about the meanings behind our books and stories. We watched the sun come up debating the future of humanity unrestrained. Thank you.
I discovered your channel few days ago and am amazed. You shed so much light into greatest concepts of science fiction. I happily subscribed!
I had seen several references to Neuromancer from Cyberpunk fans previously when I crossed this video. I stopped at the spoiler warning, went to my local library, and had a copy sent over. It still took me a bit to start it, but once I did I devoured it in 2 sittings. It's not overly large or long, 250 pages or so in a smaller form factor book. The algorithm brought this video up again, and I finished it this time. Absolutely wonderful story, and the narrative surrounding it is also remarkable. I now see Gibson's influence all around, in all kinds of other media, and love them all, Neuromancer included, even more for it. As to this video, fantastic essay and exploration into the story and it's influences, both given and received. Thank you very much for introducing myself, and I'm sure many others, to such an incredible world!
There is a short story by Vernor Vinge called "True Names", which apparently is the first ever depicted "cyberspace" or "matrix". I enjoyed it very much and you can kind of see that some of its concepts propagated in sci-fi. The Spraw Trilogy is still today one of my favorites reads. Great video
True Names is a great short book. I liked it better than Neuromancer. In fairness when I read Neuromancer I didn’t appreciate the world William Gibson created. Great comment. I think Quinn would like True Names.
My favorite scene in the book is when Case has attempted to walk away from the job, and Wintermute tries to contact him by phone. Case hangs up on Wintermute, but as he walks away, past a line of pay-phones, each one rings as he passes. Wintermute is everywhere and knows where he is wherever he goes. Of course, now, the idea of a line of pay-phones is alien and a thing of the past.
Just substitute them with video conference screens. It's so weird people focus on the payphones as to point the books didn't age well, but it's so superficial and easy to update.
@@rio425ee Yeah. Now Wintermute would be staring down at you with a borrowed face, from several video billboards within range, or even video menu boards of fast food restaurants, while tracking your reactions, and mapping your position, using dozens of CCTV cameras, both those installed for security, and for optimizing the timing of traffic control devices.
I've been following your channel for a year or two now. And just noticed i was not subscribed. So i have repaired that oversight. I watch because your insights broaden my appreciation of the works discussed. Many of which i have read oc. It is so delightful to find a reviewer whose sensibility reflects and enhances ones own.
I can already pick up a lot of media inspired by this book - 1. The Matrix - the concept of matrix is taken directly from this book 2. Ghost in the shell- the merging of 2 ai to form a completely new entity 3. Inception - shared mind + protagonist's virtual dead wife(that he is responsible for) trapping him inside limbo 4. Elysium- space station utopia for the super rich 5. Person of interest - mysterious guy with ai recruiting a team 6. Cyberpunk 2077 - consciousness of a dead dude saved inside a chip + lot of other things too 7. Ready player one- mind sharing on the net 8. Dues ex games - powerful ai controlling the media *Let me know if you guys have more
William Gibson did not invent the internet before the internet. It’s been around since the 1960s.
Microsoft was founded in 1975. If any, William Gibson was inspired by that.
Bioshock's Rapture? - Night City being a space for unregulated technological advancement.
@@dianarune9704 correct!
for 6. there's also altered carbon
I read Neuromancer and the rest back in 2002, actually I went through the cyberpunk phase back then, going through all the classics. It was fun to discover where so many things from The Matrix came from. There was a book in particular where in one scene there was a room with screen like walls covered with green symbols or numbers, and I can’t for the life of me remember which book it was.
The shower of green characters comes from terminal sessions when you connected to a computer back in the 70s and 80s. That part is just straight from reality. As a side note, I have my client default to black with green characters because it's cool.
Quinn's work is so incredibly important. There are lot of channels discussing movies, but not so many discussing (competently) books. But the books (still) are where the important philosophical ideas come from.
Dude this was an amazing amazing documentary / study on neuromancer and cyber punk in general. I read this book years ago and I remember having a hard time imagining some of the imagery in the book. The clips / animations you chose really helped bring this book to life for me. I’m subscribing now. Again, awesome video sir
It's fun looking back at this novel. There's so much packed into a fairly short manuscript. I'm sure most people don't know how much originates from that little book. It's also too eerily accurate about the future, minus the hot street samurais.
For the longest time, I thought that a movie version of Neuromancer should have a heavy 1980's retro-future vibe to it in the technology and costume design. Then we hit that whole wave of 80's nostalgia everywhere and I don't know if that'd hit the same now. But yea, I'd love to see you do the rest of the Sprawl Trilogy. Also as far as standard cyberpunk recommendations go, Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash is a fun read, and it's predictions of what the "Metaverse" would be like feel so prophetic today.
I'd like to see a range of aesthetics depending on the place. Make some of it gritty and retro-future like Soylent Green, but then make the implants very visceral. And make space very Apple Store/early 2000s scifi with clean white lines everywhere and chrome for no good reason. Sorta the trickle down of culture over time.
Neuromancer is without a doubt my favorite book of all time (Roadside Picnic a close second). Gibsons writing style is a little difficult at times, but it absolutely sucks you in. You've done a great job here Quinn, really stuck the core of what the book is about. I would love to see you cover not only others in the series, but other works of cyberpunk such as Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson.
Gibson’s prose evolves a lot over the years. It becomes a lot more grounded.
I am so happy you are experiencing this autbor. Btw, i recommend Idoru. It's a short novel and it was a lot of fun (same author).
I read Neuromancer when i just started uni in 1989 and it blew me away, even before the concepts addressed became so prophetic. Brilliant analysis mate. I'm new to your work, subscribed and looking forward to binging your other videos.
This makes me happy that you have discovered William Gibson. I graduated High School in 1984 so I am steeped in that material. I see direct lines from there to odd things like Max Headroom and even Pop-Up Video on VH1. 🤣 Authors I would argue are literary descendants: Bruce Sterling (a contemporary), Neal Stephenson, Charles Stross. Possible predecessors (?): John Brunner and Vernor Vinge. Love your channel. Keep up the great work.
Have you read The Difference Engine? The Sterling and Gibson collaboration based around this alternate Victorian history where they successfully created mechanical computers. Steampunk/Cyberpunk hybrid, kinda?
@@dimman77 Yes! Excellent book. There’s so many books that sorta kinda fit the CyberPunk mold and that’s one of them. Loved Schismatrix, Anathem, Accelerando, The Shockwave Rider, True Names… too many to list. 🤣
Great that you touched on the works of Philip k Dick on this video. I would love to see your take on his final works: V.A.L.I.S. / Radio Free Ablemuth / Exegesis. It's so strange to me that he would basically write the same book over and over again. Like 'this is purely a work of fiction' 'except maybe not' followed up by 'what's really real anyways, i can't tell if this happened to me or not?' I can't help but file his last works as too strange to be untrue. If that's not the case, then Philip k Dick maybe pulled off the biggest metahoax in all of English literature
Ima big Phillip K Dick fan and I think he did have transcendental experiences they like to claim he was on drugs but that is simply untrue I think Valis did contact him and he actually had visions of altered realities or universes
Excellent review and analysis. Yes, please complete the trilogy. I read these when they first came out. Also, the short story Burning Chrome is part of this world and, for me, was the precursor to Necromancer.
This….this………….. thank you for this.😮 I appreciate your content and the care you take with the detail of what you are interpreting. It has sincerely been a joy watching your channel.
So cool that this happens to come out as Im reading nueromamcer!
Been neck deep in cyberpunk since the 1980s. Between authors like Gibson and games like the Cyberpunk rpg. This is easily one the best analyses of the genre I've ever seen. Would love to see you do deep dives into Count Zero and Mona Lisa Overdrive. The Burning Chrome short stories would also make for great content.
First video of yours I've watched - I couldn't really get into Neuromancer since I found the prose wasn't my style, but you made me interested in giving it another go. I'm really glad that I gave this a watch; you've got a really relaxing voice and I'm a bit jealous of your library; it looks really impressive! You've earned yourself a sub, friend.
The fact that he’s describing the Internet BEFORE the Internet is incredible. Also just realized just how heavily The Matrix and Cyberpunk 2077 are borrowing from this story 🤯