Cyberpunk Genre Research Articles

Myth and Cyber: A Study of the Narrative and Visual Language of Chinese Cyberpunk Anime Films

Abstract The cyberpunk genre started a new trend in Chinese anime movies after 2020, represented by the hugely commercially successful New Gods: Nezha Reborn (2021). Unlike Western cyberpunk, which focuses on portraying the future as a subcategory of science fiction, Chinese cyberpunk anime chooses to look back, fusing ancient myths with cyborgs, which is called myth-cyberpunk, reconstructing traditional Chinese culture, and broadening the boundaries of cyberpunk. This paper focuses on spatial construction and characterization in Chinese cyberpunk anime films. It traces the influence of Western cyberculture on Chinese animation and the uniqueness and local innovation of the Chinese side. Importantly, it examines the role of audience participation in the processes of cultural encoding and decoding, as proposed by Stuart Hall, to understand the dynamics behind the growing popularity of cyber animation in China. This paper aims to interpret the evolution of the cyberpunk style in Chinese animations, its reception, and its deeper societal motivations, offering insights into the unique allure of Chinese cyberpunk anime within the contemporary socio-cultural context.

Transhumanizm w uniwersum „Wiedźmina”

In the 21st century, concepts of human modification and improvement increasingly appear in scientific literature, extending beyond the realm of fantasy. Influenced by successful, advanced technological experiments, these concepts are transitioning from literary fiction to more serious philosophical discourse. This ancient quest first found literary expression in the 19th century, notably in the works of Jules Verne. Transhumanism in fantasy is primarily associated with science fiction, featuring human enhancement through advanced technology in narratives about distant futures, space travel, other planets, and the cyberpunk genre. However, the presence of transhumanist themes in fantasy literature receives less attention. In these cases, modifications are typically achieved through spells or the magical properties of potions and plants. In Poland, the most notable example is Andrzej Sapkowski’s The Witcher universe, further developed by CD Projekt Red’s video games. The most literal example is the witchers, monster slayers created through magical mutations. Wizards represent a less obvious group of enhanced characters. Similarly, Princess Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon embodies transhumanist aspirations. These examples collectively illustrate the diverse manifestations of transhumanism in fantasy literature.

THE CONCEPT OF CYBERPUNK AS A VISION OF THE FUTURE WORLD IN SCIENCE FICTION GENRE

The fast-paced advancement of technology in recent times has made it an indispensable part of our everyday routine. Almost all spheres of our life are connected with technology, starting with our smartphones, which we use in our daily lives, until supercomputers, which aid people in researching the universe around our planet. This trend shows no signs of slowing down. Cyberpunk, a science fiction subgenre, delves into the potential consequences of technological progress on individuals in the future. This genre describes the future where technology will be intertwined with people's daily routines and even affect their external appearance. Cyberpunk delineates the future where the assimilation of humans and technology will be inevitable. Although technology has the potential to enhance society, it also threatens our liberty. Due to the rapid formation of technology, some people even argue that artificial intelligence will dominate the world soon. This article explores the origins and development of cyberpunk literature, which is a subset of science fiction. It delves into the distinctive features of cyberpunk as a literary subgenre and examines previous research on the topic. Additionally, the article analyzes the perspectives of scholars on the cyberpunk genre.

US-Cyberpunk und Cyber-Japan. Zwischen Blade Runner, Neuromancer und Die Hard

The paper explores why US authors of the cyberpunk genre imagined a future rich in Japanoid imagery in their fiction. By tracing the zeitgeist of the 1980s, which was characterized by the prevalence of affordable Japanese technology in everyday US life – often associated with fears of an economic threat from Japan – it is possible to explain why cyberpunk fictions explicitly depict Japanese technology. Furthermore, mechanisms of techno-orientalism that link high-tech to images of premodern Japan and thus diminish this specific cultural environment as subordinate to modern Western societies are evident within cyberpunk fiction. Analyzing Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982) as a founding text of cyberpunk and the recent computer game Cyberpunk 2077 (2020) as well as the subsequent anime series Cyberpunk Edgerunners (2022) as examples of contemporary fiction, I argue that Japanoid images continue to be employed in a condescending manner within the cyberpunk genre, affirming an inherently Western perspective.

Literary Visions in Gibson's Neuromancer and Cyberspace

This paper discusses the development of the cultural transformation in the reception of AI and how the conception of the killer machines has changed into a more optimistic human view on science fiction and the way in which cyber effect overcomes the boundaries between the real and the virtual worlds. The Neuromancer by William Gibson is a novel published in 1984 and its popularity has been very much associated in the cultural change of our human conceptions of AI. As a result by 2007 it had sold more than 6.5 million copies worldwide in addition to receiving many esteemed awards. This paper examines the novel literary and cultural influences in evolving the cyberpunk genre.

Mobilities in Anglophone Science Fiction History: Time Travel, Cyclical Temporality, and Virtual Mobility

This paper explores the development of the concept of mobility within the Anglophone tradition of the science fiction genre, specifically within three critical periods of the twentieth century. It begins by analyzing the genre’s initial development, observing the shift from spatial mobility in earlier travel narratives to temporal travel depicted by foundational science fiction writers, such as H. G. Wells and Jules Verne. It then examines the New Wave of science fiction during the 1960s and 70s, a period characterized by introspective exploration of the human psyche and a departure from linear temporality, favoring instead an antiprogressive, circular concept of time. Key authors of this era, including William S. Burroughs, Thomas M. Disch, Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Samuel R. Delany, are broadly studied. The paper subsequently probes into the cyberpunk genre and its development of virtual mobility within cyberspace, along with a critical analysis of the socio-political issues emanating from the dominance of white normativism and ableism within these virtual environments. In conclusion, this paper emphasizes the necessity to consider a more inclusive depiction of mobility in science fiction, as well as the co-futuristic socio-political ideologies that the genre upholds. It advocates for the genre to foster diverse representations of mobility, thereby challenging the normalization of an abled, white American presence within cyber and virtual spaces.

한국 비디오게임의 문화신학적 해석 ‘원더포션’의‘산나비’를 중심으로

In order to discover Korean culture and identity in modern society, this paper tries to analyze the game ‘SANABI’ of ‘Wonder Portion’ which was awarded the Indie Game Award in 2022, borrowing many traditional Korean images among Korean video games using the cultural and artistic analysis method shown in Paul Tillich's ‘Theology of Culture.’
 ‘SANABI’ is a pixel-art type side-view flatformer action adventure game set in the Korean cyberpunk genre, which represents modern capitalism and traditional images of Korea. In the main work, the main character shows overcoming the alienation, where essence and existence are separated, and completing his identity by facing the end of sacrificing to save his daughter. It shows that the theme of Korean culture is inherent in the establishment of complexity and identity.
 This defines Korean culture and its identity as a union representing universality and specificity as a culture, and overcoming alienation that restores the essence of the union's actions. Therefore, the theology that Korean Christian theology should pursue is suggested to be a K-theology with ‘Consilience’ that combines Christian theology with various cultures to create a new culture by understanding the ‘complexity’ of K-content.

Chippin’ In: An Analysis of the Criminological Concepts Within Cyberpunk 2077

The cyberpunk genre dominates much of our popular culture, from how we think of cyber- and white-collar crime, to our understanding of how technology influences the criminal justice system. This article explores the common criminological themes prevalent within the recent video game Cyberpunk 2077 as an example of popular criminology. Specifically, it explores the game's story and environment by examining key characters’ responses to structural inequalities through an anomie theory lens. Key characters and groups within the game exemplify Merton's (1938) different responses to rampant poverty and socioeconomic inequality. This is then extended to the “cyberpsycho” problem within the game, incorporating General Strain Theory to discuss why specific individuals develop the problem within Cyberpunk 2077.

Akira and the Tokyo Olympics in 1964 and 2020/21: Reading the games through manga and anime—reading manga and anime through the games

ABSTRACT When the manga series Akira appeared in 1982, it quickly became a bestseller, and the 1988 anime version strongly reinforced its popularity. Ōtomo Katsuhiro depicted the dark cityscape of Neo-Tokyo compellingly. However, until now, interpretations mainly focussed on Akira as a prime example of the cyberpunk genre. Yet, the story also revolves around the preparations for a renewed Olympics, celebrating the rebirth of Tokyo. By referencing the 1964 Games, Ōtomo paints a highly critical image of the first Tokyo Olympics, reflecting the mood of the early 1980s, when citizens vehemently opposed plans to host the Olympics in Nagoya. Ōtomo primarily employs some of the 1964 architecture to link Akira to the first Tokyo Olympics. For example, the Temple of Lady Miyako replicates Tange Kenzō's National Gymnasia next to the Meiji Shrine. Together with the new venue for the (Akira) Olympics in 2020, the Temple is one of the main action scenes, indicating that a spatial reading of the manga can yield fresh interpretations. Nevertheless, Akira's critical stance toward the Olympics did not prevent Ōtomo from contributing to the original plan for the 2020 Olympic opening ceremony, which featured characters from Akira to harness its popularity for the global Cool Japan factor. For these reasons, analyzing Akira's various Olympic dimensions help us better understand Japan's entanglement with this sports mega-event over the last decades. At the same time, a thorough Olympic reading of Akira is long overdue.

The dying city and the sick messiah: apocalypse and utopia in Neo Tokyo

ABSTRACT This article examines Katsuhiro Ōtomo’s film Akira (1988) not simply as a touchstone of the 1980s cyberpunk genre dealing heavily with the themes of post-humanism, but as a metaphor for utopia’s demise and the death drive of a world in decline; as a cinematic text, it is paradigmatic of postmodernity’s cultural formations and utopianism’s fate in the age of late capitalism. In particular, by focusing on its setting (the city of Neo Tokyo), and by examining it both as a concrete space and as a metaphor, this article calls us to understand the urban landscape not as just another cyberpunk city embedded with the genre’s dystopian features and clichés, but as a space that undergoes numerous transformations from a modernist utopia to a post-modern hell-scape in its society’s effort to construct a better and just world. Finally, a significant part of the article focuses on the idea that a catastrophe is an opportunity for renewal. Thus, special attention is given to the representation of millenarianism in Akira, and Tetsuo – the story’s central antagonist – as a yonaoshi, a deity destined to bring the end of a corrupt society and usher in the birth of a new one.

Linguistic Means for Creating Images in the Cyberpunk Novel by S. Lukyanenko “The Labyrinth of Reflections”

The article deals with the linguistic means of genre formation of the cyberpunk novel “Labyrinth of Reflections”. The process of analysis took place taking into account genre deformation: S. Lukyanenko presented an ideological and artistic innovation, which consists in including in the text of the novel the motif of “the human face”, of course, uncharacteristic for the cyberpunk genre. It was noted that, despite the departure from the canons of the genre, the language of the work has not lost its artistic power, still performing the function of genre formation. We studied such linguistic means as toponymy, which divides the space of the work into a real and virtual plan, occasional formations that actualize the signs of cyberpunk, terminological and borrowed vocabulary, which is the main means of stylizing the work, anthroponymy, which characterizes the plot-forming images, individual author’s metaphors, which perform a whole range of functions to create a virtual space and reflect the author’s intentions. The results of the study showed that the dominant language level of genre formation is lexical and stylistic, which primarily represents the artistic world of the novel as a spatio-temporal phenomenon identical to the world of “dystopia of the future”.

영화 〈내츄럴 시티〉와 〈예스터데이〉에 나타난 사이버펑크 장르의 한국적 변용

This essay examines the generic conventions of cyberpunk and their appropriation seen in two South Korean SF films: Natural City and Yesterday. These two films borrow the genre’s typical characters such as cyborgs and mutants, a futuristic metropolitan setting, and visual images and style from cyberpunk classics, exemplified by Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner. What distinguishes them from the Western and Japanese cyberpunk texts is that they reveal the particular social problems that Korean society confronted during the early 2000s when these two films were produced: gender hierarchy and sexual violence, poverty and class divisions, and blind faith in science and technology. For example, cyborgs and mutants—respectively seen in Natural City and Yesterday—are the stock characters of the cyberpunk genre, representing the dehumanization of humans living in a world dominated by technocrats, mega-corporations, and totalitarian governments. In this sense, the two movies are loyal to the genre’s ethos, following its central themes and conventions.<BR> However, in contrast to cyberpunk’s global setting blurring national and cultural boundaries, Natural City and Yesterday translate the topic of dehumanization into the specific regional conflicts of Korean society, for instance, the sexual oppression of women, the miserable life of the underprivileged, and the discrimination against new immigrants. These issues unfold against the backdrop of contemporary Korean social scenes, set in the “ruined downtown” in Natural city, and the “ghetto” in Yesterday. Another feature that distinguishes classic cyberpunk from these Korean adaptations is the latter’s emphasis on the definitions of humanity and humanism, instead of the original posthuman tendency crossing the boundaries of the human and the nonhuman. This difference may result from Korea’s unique cultural and ideological development whereby the presence of the “premodern” creed and institutions, as well as the influence of universal humanism, is still powerful, despite the nation’s rapid economic growth and modernization.

Where the physical world meets the digital world: representations of power structures and cyberspace in television series set in New York

This article analyzes, within television series of the past twenty years, the tensions and power relations surrounding the private, intimate, and secret spheres, through the constant renegotiation of a dyadic structure linking the physical and the digital worlds. Can secrets be kept and people remain anonymous in a sprawling megalopolis? This article focuses on four series that are different in genre and audience, but share two characteristics: these tensions and constant renegotiations are at the heart of their narratives, and they are all set in the iconic megalopolis that is New York City. Person of Interest (CBS, 2011-2016) features mass surveillance controlled by an artificially intelligent system; Gossip Girl (The CW, 2007-2012) pits the gilded youth of the Upper East Side against the eponymous blogger; Mr Robot (USA Network, 2015-2019) presents itself as a direct heir of the cyberpunk genre; finally, Elementary (CBS, 2012-2019) depicts a fragmented city held together by a ubiquitous digital clout that the investigators have to face up to. Our comparative politico-spatial analysis of these four series will thus address contemporary representations of the complex relationships between the physical and the digital worlds.

The Cyberpunk Dystopia as a Reflection on Late Capitalism

The cyberpunk genre has long been caught in a dystopian view of the future as opposed to the rest of science-fiction which has presented us many utopian scenarios of a future where humanity is saved by technology. This countercultural aspect of it comes from a critique on corporate power, which is thought to use technology in an attempt to reshape the human subject into a more efficient worker and consumer. The growth of digital corporations, the practices of internet surveillance and the ever-increasing presence of technology in our daily lives surely add to the plausibility of this cyberpunk future. In a corporate society, everything from information to human relations will be functioning by the logic of capital, every aspect of human life becoming something to be shared and exchanged for someone to make a profit. Nothing that is not quantifiable and marketable will be of any use, thus making it hard for the human subject to value human experiences outside of this system. The danger that augmentations advocated by transhumanists pose is that in the capitalist system they become consumer goods, that will act in the same way as any other product does, increasing already existing inequalities by giving more advantages to the rich that will afford them. Moreover, human nature itself will be modified when these off-the-shelf augmentations that are supposed to liberate us will contribute to the uniformization of character, our intelligence, charisma or beauty being a serial product that will hold nothing original. The cyberpunk literary genre starting with William Gibson’s novel “Neuromancer” can give us some insight into how to live with this dystopian future that seems imminent.

ЖАНР «КИБЕРПАНК» КАК ОСМЫСЛЕНИЕ ФЕНОМЕНА ИНФОРМАЦИОННОГО ОБЩЕСТВА

The article analyzes the cyberpunk genre as an understanding of the phenomenon of the information society. The emergence of cyberpunk associated with the proliferation of personal computers, thanks to which many scientific ideas materialized in the 1950s and 1960s. The most famous representatives of this direction can be called Walter Yon Williams, Allen Steele, Rudy Rücker, Pat Cadigan. In the CIS, the first cyberpunk literary work was the story “The Network”, written jointly by A. Tyurin and A. Shchegolev. Elements of cyberpunk are found in the works of S. Lukyanenko, V. Panov, A. Zorich, D. Simmons.If the cyberpunk was originally part of the underground and infatuation of the information elite, then gradually, as major publishers became interested in it, it became part of popular culture and dissolved in it. Both theorists of the information society and representatives of the cyberpunk genre tried to analyze the world in which life would change radically under the influence of computer technology. The cyberpunk ideologists used their books as a metaphorical warning against the alarming trends in the development of modern society. The creators of the theory of the information society mainly focused on its positive aspects, while cyberpunks talked about the negative that can come into the life of society and an individual person if it becomes a reality. Cyberpunk focused on the dark side of high technology, without which the existence of any phenomenon is impossible. Neither the philosophical constructions of the theorists-apologists of the information age, nor the gloomy prophecies of the representatives of the Movement were fully embodied in reality. The reason for this can be seen in the fact that the understanding of the information that the first and the second operated on turned out to be false (more realistic, obviously, is the consideration of information not as a resource, but as communication). The information, according to D. Ivanov, is communication, the operation of transmitting characters, encouraging action. Its huge technical, economic, political role is explained precisely by the fact that it is not meaningful (as opposed to knowledge) and not substantive (as opposed to a product). Information is operational, it serves to justify action. That is why it is so valuable to modern man, being his idol. In a traditional society, or in a modernizing society, built on an ideological basis of activity, information on such a role could not claim.

Has Akira Always Been a Cyberpunk Comic?

Between the late 1980s and early 1990s, interest in the cyberpunk genre peaked in the Western world, perhaps most evidently when Terminator 2: Judgment Day became the highest-grossing film of 1991. It has been argued that the translation of Katsuhiro Ōtomo’s manga Akira into several European languages at just that time (into English beginning in 1988, into French, Italian, and Spanish beginning in 1990, and into German beginning in 1991) was no coincidence. In hindsight, cyberpunk tropes are easily identified in Akira to the extent that it is nowadays widely regarded as a classic cyberpunk comic. But has this always been the case? When Akira was first published in America and Europe, did readers see it as part of a wave of cyberpunk fiction? Did they draw the connections to previous works of the cyberpunk genre across different media that today seem obvious? In this paper, magazine reviews of Akira in English and German from the time when it first came out in these languages will be analysed in order to gauge the past readers’ genre awareness. The attribution of the cyberpunk label to Akira competed with others such as the post-apocalyptic, or science fiction in general. Alternatively, Akira was sometimes regarded as an exceptional, novel work that transcended genre boundaries. In contrast, reviewers of the Akira anime adaptation, which was released at roughly the same time as the manga in the West (1989 in Germany and the United States), more readily drew comparisons to other cyberpunk films such as Blade Runner.

Mind-Body Dialectics in the Latest Science Fiction TV-Series

The article is devoted to the analysis of the latest science fiction series in the context of the mind-body philosophical problems. The synthesis of theoretical knowledge and empirical science (phenomenological, psychoanalytic, neurophysical and cybernetic experience) is used for the analysis. Prospects for the development of artificial intelligence, including the issue of creating self-conscious robots, unfold not only in science fiction but also in reality thus causing the high ratings of the cyberpunk genre. The destruction of the boundary between man and machine, natural and artificial body, physical and non-physical, real and virtual, is the key point of the newest series The Black Mirror, Electric Dreams of Philip K. Dick, Altered Carbon, Westworld. Mind-body dialectics in philosophy construed by R. Descartes and B. Spinoza, further developed by phenomenologists, is actualized today in the context of technological development. Despite the insights and warnings of science fiction writers, scientists seek for making the breakthrough in the invention of an artificial man. This tendency is caused, first of all, by the desire to conceive the arrangement of human consciousness: how it is generated by matter - the network of neurons of the brain. Solving this philosophical dilemma inevitably leads to unpredictable consequences and radical changes in the development of civilization. Nevertheless, this step is fatal in the general tendency of demiurgy and mimesis, which underlie all the cultural, creative and aesthetic activities of mankind. The author comes to the conclusion that cinema demonstrates models of the possible development of events and the consequences of technogenic tendencies, while the reality clearly indicates that the era of posthumanism has already begun, and were witnessing the most incredible scenarios created by the world of science fiction.

‘It’s like she is a hologram stuck behind my eyes’: Cybernetics and gendered spectrality in William Gibson’s Burning Chrome

Abstract Rereading the short stories contained in the Burning Chrome collection published in 1986 is a rewarding experience. With two exceptions, all the stories predate the publication of Neuromancer (1984), the novel that made William Gibson world famous and launched the cyberpunk genre. Indeed, the concept of cyberspace is present in the title short story of the collection and so is the idea of a matrix, which hackers try to break into and ‘burn’. Nearly all the stories resort to male first-person narrators. The proximity and subjectivity thus created between reader and narrator crudely highlights the way in which female characters are pushed to the periphery of an already disembodied and spectralized world. Through a close look at ‘Burning Chrome’, ‘The New Rose Hotel’ and ‘Winter Market’, this article aims to show how corporate global capitalism as represented by Gibson paradoxically reinforces the invisibility of women by using state-of-the art technology to turn them into seductive holograms, disembodied voices and spectral presences. The question is: can the Gibson women fight back against this centrifugal move towards non-existence and how do they go about it?

“Computer Cowboys” and “Ass-kicking Techno-babes” Challenging Cyberpunk’s Conventional Representations of Gender and Sexuality in the Futuristic Digital World of Moxyland

SummaryThis article analyses the effects created by Lauren Beukes through her use of the cyberpunk genre in her first novel, Moxyland (2008). Because of its challenge to conventional ideas of embodiment and identity formation, together with its counter-cultural punk ethos, cyberpunk would seem to offer the prospect of transgressive versions of gender and sexuality. However, various critics note that instead of realising this potential, cyberpunk endorses heterosexual masculinity in its narratives, while repressing or marginalising the feminine and homosexual relations. In Moxyland, Beukes actively engages with the conventions of cyberpunk in order to subvert such reactionary reiterations and the conventional gendered power struc-tures that underpin them. Through techniques such as exaggeration, splitting and exploring contrasted forms of masculinity she criticises the cyberpunk genre's conventional treatment of gender, as well as the patriarchal power relations it promotes. Beukes also refutes cyberpunk's tendency to restrict the transgressive potential of its empowered female characters by portraying them in terms of sexualised femininity. She challenges essentialist notions of gender as she depicts women characters in active relation to technology. Her version of the female cyborg conveys a potentially transgressive blending of technology and biology, dramatised outside the conventional lens of the masculine gaze.

Spazio psichico e organizzazione sociale in Neuromancer (1984) di William Gibson

Neuromancer (1984) by William Gibson is a central text in the cyberpunk genre. This article analyzes how, in this book, computing is a metaphor used to represent some characteristics of the psyche and also a social organization not subject to review by a single person. Memory is individual, embodied, and changes continuously. Its transposition in external media has the price of a symbolic death for the subject. At the same time the impersonality of the social machines becomes the object of a psychological projection by the individual, and takes on anthropomorphic forms. The “Matrix” is the space of “virtual” relationships (in the sense of computing). Through simulative processes that take place in real time, it’s possible to make an illusory fusion of the subject with the social body which I, however, linked to a repression of the deeper drives, affective and individual experience. The story ends when the protagonist becomes able to distinguish between external reality and psychic life.