hmm [Laughter] damn it stop shaking I honestly believe that really think you're special I'm Different you're not I am [Music] cyberpunk Edge Runners was an anime I originally started watching for a more traditional review or reaction because it was a big name Studio making anime for a big name developer it would probably and did see a lot of traction and that's a sad consideration of our world what's gonna sell the best this is something I've accepted about my passion yielding to the whims of someone else creatively sucks but it beats living my entire life doing something I hate you accept it and keep going because that's the only option I bring this up because this feeling that I had the idea of acceptance is at the heart of edge runner's message and World building their world is cruel in the ways you'd expect of a technological dystopia your washing machine can turn off mid-cycle because you run out of money which means it's checking your bank account constantly which is terrifying your apartment can be locked Anytime by your landlord who can Badger you for rent anywhere with the phone installed in your head garbage is piled on the streets of poor areas while trains run overhead for the rich to avoid them you're left to die by emergency services that rely on subscription packages and regular EMTs will rob you rather than save you and if you don't make it through with those amazing odds your ashes get given to your loved ones from a [ __ ] vending machine after the doctor reminds you to pay the bill in monotone because anyone can have a weapon in any part of their body because everyone is just barely held together by extreme levels of medication and can snap just like that you never know when it'll be your turn to be the ashes in the machine well that's at least true if you're poor the rich get to avoid such things instead of working hard they can lean back and download all the skills they could ever need they get to show off the fruits of other people's labor brag about how awesome the work base stole is the monetization of this world creates a border that can't be crossed it would require too much time money and energy for any normal person to go from the lower tiers to the higher ones moving up is impossible but just enough near the edge can lead others to chase it but that's just a lie there's an order in this world that's meant to be kept adreners opens on David and his mother living what little life they can to stress why this doesn't matter she works for extended hours even running illegal Goods on the side and that's not enough to keep up with how much David's School costs especially when they can force you to buy and upgrade at any time to try and give her son a better life she misses out on being able to actually live one with him she exists to keep him in arasaka Academy above all a place with the most telling course load for this world it's endlessly fitting at the one class we get to see is a period of meditation why would they have actual classes when you can just transfer the data to yourself and have it on a whim I think we confer that's the whole situation here this isn't a school this is a place you have to pay for over four years to keep anyone from a lower status out of the higher echelons of society it's literally buying a good future the poor people stay where they are look down on by the trains and towers as their gun dead in the streets or caught in the crossfire with their lives suddenly ruined David's life is from ever Changed by just this trapped between the gunman and their target on the highway his mother crashes in the chaos and dies off screen because they didn't have good medical care they did nothing wrong but someone else's single action can tank an entire life's worth of work and savings one moment can kill the life a mother dreamed for her child one that was supposed to be worth giving up all of her own but that's how their world is all they do is accept it and move on this is where the excellent World building comes in selling just how much this is true of every single character in this world part of this is the series simply being unabashedly brooding and Moody and completely going off my script for a second but it just leans so heavily into the grit Instinct that accompanies sci-fi dystopias but it is more than that it isn't just some cheesy look at the future I mean people treat this city like a toilet in a bedroom all at once because based on everything we've said so far why shouldn't they they sleep on sidewalks and vomit on vending machines and piss in the open because what reason do they have to take care of a situation that can never get better to be kind to a city which has never been kind to them they weren't born with the money to buy a future to afford such kind of niceties they greet each other naked in smoke-filled rooms or using automatic flashlight in public because no matter how much shame or health Consciousness they have there is nothing it will change they escape into immensely [ __ ] up super VR where you think you're living the experience of mass murder and death to escape the life they're forced to accept they Chrome themselves is out replacing their entire bodies with metal even at the cost of their own sanity because what does sanity do in this world it just lets you remember how [ __ ] everything is their doctors casually mentioned how it'll kill them and they just keep going anyway no one is really trying to die but it's the single Escape they have from the pain they all share they share it so much it unites them in a way this is a diverse world full of all kinds of people and pieces of their cultures they speak different languages or with different accents but that's never made fun of it's never even mentioned they don't fight over any of that like you see even in our world instead they fight over class because that's the only true force between people in that world who cares what you look like or sound like when everyone has the same exact fate all of this amazing world building accomplishes one goal it makes the anime ooze a [ __ ] up sense of acceptance life is [ __ ] There Is No Escape Humanity has been robbed of anything real so they have no reason to seek anything at all then it puts us to good use by showing us what happens to those who somehow do everyone in the world is like a drive Limited in capacity from the moment they're created their storage is taken up with useless personal data and when it's full it's thrown away and that's that and efficient future Society has made life itself another allotment like food or water you're only to get so much but this does present One technical option how quickly do you fill up on that storage if everything is [ __ ] and that'll never change you can accept that and solely fill up on vague Meandering experiences on the streets but you can also throw all caution to the wind and decide that a few Great Moments are better than a life full of not so great ones this is where we find David he's a kid desperately creating real stimulation and excitement never able to sit still as he tries to maintain himself in any Bland situation his leg bounces endlessly when he leaves the house he jumps on a pile of trash below instead of taking the steps just for a momentary thrill the second he gets any kind of cybernetics he abuses them to the Max and delights in it after takes it to his bullies he stops in the streets and laughs before falling into depression at home staring at his mother's ashes we begin to see what defines him here he's losing his acceptance one's willing to drop out of school and work a regular job and act of acceptance David begins to believe he is a special case in the city one who can make it his an act of denial he distracts himself from the truth with the excitement he finds himself thrown within his introduction is exactly this feeling as he engrosses himself in the experience of a murder spree ending in death bodies cut in half guns and explosions cybernetics Galore and then exit from the world different from everyone else something [ __ ] up but special he catches a glimpse of a legend when he passes this spot later he smiles because that was someone who for a moment escaped the clutches of this world found excitement who did what he's always desired and suddenly he finds his own challenge to this world stagnation Lucy pulls him into the schemes of the edge Runners The Outlaws of this world making a living stealing chips from the rich and selling them to find more Chrome more guns and more parties after their jobs they face that head-on jumping out of moving cars without second thought stealing as much as they breathe brooding in the cold colors of this world without connection and finding a woman with which contrasts it as they share dreams and stories in a way no one ever sees they lived through all the [ __ ] together not alone with resignation David and Lucy teaming up is exceptionally quick and as we'll see later it's because it's all applied to get back the implant he inadvertently stole from her boss and for a 10 episode series there wasn't enough time for some long courting romance it had to be done quick but as an element of the story it also makes sense it serves another purpose it pulls you in wraps you up in something entirely different from the first episode suddenly the brooding feels personal and special the escapism feels like a dream and not a distraction the threat of death a challenge saying come and get me you stupid world as they frolicked on the moon I found myself lost in what was happening with a good song and good animation I just loved it I wanted it to be real like a naive David and like a jaded Lucy I wanted to escape into a new world from my own issues into an anime I found myself invested in theirs how awful it was and wanted something to prove it all wrong to show there was some hope that Humanity wasn't lost I wanted excitement and change something wild I've never seen before and the downright insane trigger style action and animation and storytelling I wanted to see them succeed in proving those things getting out of an awful world even though it's initially fake David argues his way out of their Ambush and becomes a part of the team where all the these things continue a reprieve a bit of tension killed by the levity of him joining on he goes from their target to their newbie to their friend and eventually their leader and now we'll get into the real trigger [ __ ] as things kick off for the mini Heist and a batshit car chase jumping barriers and grinding on the side and motorcycle samurais and arm cannons and just everything [ __ ] it who cares This is Wild Ride Trigger action who really cares forget for a moment get invested this is the real [ __ ] we've been waiting for I mean look at this cast there's the grizzled old man taking David under his wing doryo who can [ __ ] all your [ __ ] up with her fists Rebecca and peel are just being crude to [ __ ] and funny all the time kiwi hacking behind the scenes like Cyra badass and of course Lucy doing that and just general badassery too there's these people who don't download experience they found what was stolen from Humanity in a way they form genuine bonds and live a genuine fun life in a world where those things aren't supposed to exist yes they're chromed but they also actually train and actually speak about real [ __ ] open and honest like a real teacher in Maine and a real student and David not some hologram like they had in school they're out there making the experiences other people download there are humans living in a city which despises living they have found an answer they've broken the cold tones of their world with warmth I want to see them prove [Music] [ __ ] and then this happens just as the story starts to feel like the most Vivid and wild escapism the same kind of [ __ ] David craved the thing he thought he found it's all thrown back at us everything was going well a sense of complacency started to set in as they went into these training montages in this General everyday life it felt like this was leading to what happened next in the anime that would just be their Adventures as a crew but then the bloodiness and awfulness is turned on the people we wanted to win we're reminded of what we forgot you can't both live happily and long in this world the overt excessive goal reserved for throwing characters is now for our main ones the people who are supposed to help us forget for a moment now make us brutally remember they're killed by nobodies people with no importance to the story more than bringing death to kill and be killed there's only so much life allotted to those below the highest tiers the ones who live freely in this world do so at the cost of others who want to do the same they make us remember Escape isn't possible no one in the city avoids their fate all they can do is choose how quickly they want to reach it Maine's last words to David are exactly this and it's whole fast is what you do best ain't it just keep running David ran he never processed the loss of his mother never stopped to take in what this world had done to her and done to him he began to lose the acceptance of the world once he couldn't take it anymore and started running never to stop again he started to believe he was special coping against fate he ran to Lucy he ran to Maine and he ran into a world even more cruel than the one he knew the cybernetics that make all of this possible drive them insane your memories get turned into snot films for Rich [ __ ] your mind is hijacked and toyed with by those same programs driving you insane just a bit quicker than the Chrome and the medication going fast doesn't mean there's less pain like everything else that's a guarantee with just a variable length you just hope that there's so much going on that sometimes it's easier to forget how much you hurt or you never process it you run and never stop to notice and eventually you die without ever knowing your body may be mangled but you leave behind a metaphorical corpse one that's still beautiful for someone there's another line from reprodoc that sums this up go on become that legend or whatever the [ __ ] you must do not a tale for the next dreamer David becomes a lot like Maine before him taking up his promise even to use Maine's hands once he's done with them he bulks up the same way refuses to back down the same way he was chasing a legend both then and even from the start his mother was chasing a legend too she had the idea that he would climb the ranks of arasaka the largest corporation of night City using that bot future to become a legend himself someone to escape fate she gave her entire being to this idea and he wanted to follow it through she does the same thing that he eventually does in a drug-fueled stupor with his entire body lost to cybernetics his mind slipping off the deep end and knowing he's about to die he climbs arasaka tower all the way to the top for as brief a moment as possible and then he falls back down and is killed he achieves the dreams others set for him he chased Legend and became one himself he escaped everything which was guaranteed to be awful in this world but only for a moment but only in the most bastardized most cruel way imaginable he had to run into just as much pain only in a different and quicker and more concentrated way he lost his mind and body and everyone he loved he had to kill innocent and evil people alike he had to become the exact thing that stole his mother away for someone else so did he ever even really Escape did he actually do something Grand did he actually become a legend or was he simply manipulated to feeling like one by a force from above in the end David wasn't special at all he was allowed to think he was he was part of a cycle he was allowed to drain to create an example to be followed by more dreamers he was chased out of the shadows and used for his body as a test for arasaka's greatest weapon doing their bidding the entire time Faraday the fixer provided his crew with work was nothing more than a corporate dog meaning the most they ever did was Bash one big player for the sake of another their actions weren't planned but they were sanctioned David was allotted a little more life than most but only because it was useful to someone more powerful he was able to handle an extreme degree of enhancement letting him be the perfect test subject for arasaka cyber skeleton the Ultimate Weapon to take the military market share from their greatest corporate rifle that's what his life everything we see in this anime comes down to he was a test subject they knew he was a Bible one from the second episode they knew of him they could find him anywhere anytime they knew he would probably even hurt some of their own as he does with both Tanaka and his son but that's all just the cost of a good test once his usefulness was up he was discarded when life is so worthless with arasaki even really consider everything that occurred a true cost for their test all that death and destruction or is that just business as usual in this world but even on a basic level like for the other Edge Runners he and his crew were allowed to exist in the way they did so they could become Legends the dreams for those who came next a little bit of Hope the false proof that it's possible to be more than what you're born into to keep people going to keep them complacent to string them along with enough acceptance they trudge through the [ __ ] but always with a glimmer of hope just enough to keep them from actively killing themselves to create more test subjects to keep workers going for profit letting a few people run wild to get that much profit seems like a good trade-off if you're evil There Is No Escape even when they choose to live fast and die young all they are is Pawns in a corporate game nothing makes this lack a value placed on life more heartbreaking than the resignation in Rebecca's voice as David completely loses his grip on reality you're right Mom I know I can I'll do my best all right David let's go to the top then he was a bright spark and she probably hoped a fire would break out from him but her voice makes clear that that hope is dead she just Comforts him feeds his illusion for one moment knowing full well that he's gone for good that they had some amazing times but they're all over now that there's nothing more she can do that from the very start there was nothing she could ever do it's clear that once you enter the life David did you don't leave you're hounded forever only kept around and only allowed to exist as long as you're useful you get drawn in by the excitement the idea of Legends that eventually one day it'll lead to something greater than what you came from and then you're trapped just the same as everyone in the Life below the threshold you start to run and you never stop you never look back and eventually you realize that you might have been running for nothing you keep the blood flowing the excitement pumping and that you're able to be distracted you start to think like he did that you are special that you'll be different the acceptance Fades into a denial fueled by medical suppressants and constant upgrades he began to destroy everything that once provided you Humanity in an inhumane world he turned into a monster one who kills even their closest friends or loved ones who Slaughters innocent and guilty alike without hesitation trying to escape means power and power makes monsters like those at the top eventually you pass along the same fate but you were able to spend a bit less time aware of it less time feeling it creeping up as you went insane but you don't even get to leave behind a good looking corpse it's mangled robbed of its Humanity in gourd and not because of the Chrome it's not cybernetics that make this world less human the most human connection we see is between people Chrome to the teeth they're human because they live because they loved and lost because they chose their own path because they chased Legends like humans do because they believed and hoped even if they had to cut them short to do so the lack of humanity isn't from enhancements to the body it's from our mental and emotional forms being completely mangled it's from those above the threshold who don't even provide the Dignity of a good looking corpse so where do we go from here as we take the role David begins in coming out of a [ __ ] up experience and back into the harsh reality that surrounds us the high of escapism fading out as we're forced to think about our own world having done so for a fictional one I don't know what comes next David's end is simple he laughs the same as he did when he first found the excitement he was chasing in a way he was happy with how it turned out he got to leave behind quite a mess forever escaping the cruelty around him by burning fast and bright is that something at least that he found some form of happiness in that world should we do the same live fast and die young to stick it to the Devils above us you'd be hard-pressed to find me saying exactly that I spent years taking the careful path very rarely detouring from a long drawn-out existence with a guarantee of survival but never of Happiness I'm not happy and you can probably tell from how [ __ ] up this script is how much I've said that word more than usual I feel more connected to Edge Runner's World than most others in anime our own world is not as awful as theirs but fiction is based in reality because of the professional World stress and rat race I've spent nights recently like David staring at the screen lost in nothing at all I've had weeks where I slept maybe six hours of the whole 168 agonizing over the pain I felt tied to in this world one of which tells me to give up a majority of my life to be rewarded with freedom 40 years from now just like it isn't cybernetics or technology which rob their Humanity it's not those things for us it's the forces which Drive such things to be in their current states it's the idea that we are nothing but their way to make money it's the people who ask us to give up our bodies and our energy simply to be allowed to survive when they only succeed from being born into success if you watch anything in the vein of cyberpunk and Don't Come Away with [ __ ] corporations as at least part of the message then you're doing some stupid mental gymnastics [ __ ] the bastards that devalue your life and put us against each other while doing it [ __ ] the people who enforce a scarcity that doesn't exist even to the extent of life itself being hoarded there isn't a hopeful end to the anime there's just a cycle David was always a part of but after we observe this there can be a hopeful end for us to witness these things to ponder them in our own world and then to stand up to them with a resounding no but there's nothing more I could add to the end of this video to make it any better normally I'd like to end on something a bit more open-ended but cyberpunk Edge Runners was very direct and brute with its message these are things I've found in other series you've probably recognized them from other videos but they're just a lot more direct here and that's because Edge Runners is a very Brute Force anime when it comes to this message and that's trigger style and they did it really well and found how that style really works so it's a great series overall with a very true sadly true message but I'm already starting to ramble so I'll just leave you with some important links in the pinned comment most importantly my patreon with these lovely people above me support me directly and help me escape all these things I just complained about which I appreciate to know and but I appreciate everyone watching as always for giving me a moment of your valuable time so I'll just say thank you for watching and I hope I'll see you again soon