Cyberpunk is my favorite genre of sci-fi, and I definitely found it via movies and TV, so I’m wondering what everyone’s favorite pieces of media out there?
Some of my tops are of course the classics like Blade Runner, Akira, Robocop, and Dredd
I think one of the earliest reasons I fell in love with Cyberpunk was Batman Beyond. That theme song also totally deeply influenced my music taste.
What about yall?
Blade Runner hits those themes, but it pushes the discussion around Replicants, which are stand-ins for The Others in society. Those movies don’t hit the POV of street level, which is different than most cyberpunk works.
I was going to say. All the cyberpunk stuff exists in Blade Runner, but because the pov characters are a Cop hunting replicants and the Replicants themselves we only see it in the periphery.
Right, like I said, it exists as a backdrop
But the “What it means to be human” is only a problem because of the corps, and their destruction of everything they touch. If the corps hadn’t ruined society, the environment, and designed replicants to be slaves and have short lives, then none of the events of the film would have happened. The entire film is a condemnation of that capitalist mindset of milking everything you can for the most amount of money possible. Why did the corps ruin the environment? Because doing so made money. Why do they use replicants for slave labor? Because doing so is cheaper than having well-compensated or even poorly-compensated workers. Why do replicants die young? Because it prevents them from properly organizing a revolt against their masters.
What do they care if they only live 4 years? Once it’s been r&d’d it’s cheap to just plop out a new one. The corps’ inherent cruelty is the reason the replicants are hiding amongst the populace. It’s the reason they lash out against humans. It’s the reason that Blade Runners are “necessary” to hunt them down and kill them. IMO it’s a very punk movie.
Fair enough, I see your point. But like I said, that’s background worldbuilding, instead of being dealt with directly by the narrative.