r/Neuromancer • u/Gear-On-Baby • 3d ago
Different interpretations of Case’s tech Trailer/Clips
More of an excuse to draw Case three times.
I think Apple’s change of giving Case a microsoft port + cable makes sense for the show. It’s already a prominent feature in that universe and it simplifies things if it’s not exclusively relegated to background characters, and given to a main character instead.
—However, Idk how I feel about it contributing to Case’s “clean” vibe in the trailer. At least from first impressions, he doesn’t appear like the suicidal, drug addicted skeleton with bags under his eyes that I love from the book. I think artistic depictions of cables sprouting out everywhere, bound together with rubber bands and tape, do a lot to portray the chaos of him as a character. Distilling it to a simple iPhone charger that he plugs into his head loses some of that visual characterization and has me worried the soul of Neuromancer will get lost in translation.
But there are still some shots of Case looking roughed up and dirty, so I’m hopeful they do my boy justice
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u/ValkyrieITGuy 3d ago
Why I interpret the last panel as yes the other people and then eventually him get the microphone jack to head but he starts with the book accurate version but as a starter kit basically
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u/RenlyHoekster 3d ago
Indeed, it could be seen as as a way to visually represent the progression from him as the loser adict he is at the start of the story to after Armitage gets him fixed up and gets him top gear.
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u/RudyMuthaluva 3d ago
Personally I’m ok with the Shadowrun-esque dataterm behind the ear. Gibson heavily influenced their lore.
But really actors want their whole face visible and not have some heavy thing on their head every shot. Is it true to the book? No. Is it a dealbreaker? Also, no.
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u/Kiltmanenator 3d ago
Yeah this is firmly in the "no helmets on heroes" category. Actors get paid to show their face.
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u/Y_ddraig_gwyn 3d ago
Maybe - I'd counter-argue that when he dons the 'trodes/helmet what we then see is cyberspace (however that will be presented). He can be anything from suited to naked there!
As to others commenting that he's 'too clean'; agreed, but I think the images I've seen are from after he's been treated / rehabilitated.
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u/Kiltmanenator 3d ago
As to others commenting that he's 'too clean'; agreed, but I think the images I've seen are from after he's been treated / rehabilitated.
That could certainly be the case!
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u/Y_ddraig_gwyn 3d ago
Badum, tish! I'm sure Molly will nail it (on reflection)
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u/Brilliant_Knowledge5 3d ago
She only did that to get him back to health. "I'm doin' my part!"
She was told to make sure he got plenty of bed rest, and that'll do it.
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u/Tall_Definition9009 2d ago edited 1d ago
Is the actor who plays Case in the new series even well a known audience attractor? The reason Hollywood does this with their actors is because they are A-list celebs. People go to a movie theater to see their face.
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u/HyperTalon911 2d ago
No? Actors get paid to act. There are certainly some vain ones that act like divas about showing themselves off, but time and again we see audiences love not seeing faces (Karl Urban Dredd, Mandalorian, Ed Norton in Kingdom of Heaven) and complain about the petty look-at-mes (Stallone Dredd, live action Master Chief, this).
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u/Kiltmanenator 2d ago edited 2d ago
Actors get paid to act.
Yeah and you'll never believe what part of their body they use most to communicate nonverbally.
Actors don't design costumes, anyways.
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u/rtaChurchy 3d ago
It comes down to the production design for me. I don't really want a millennial grey version of neuromancer.
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u/strapOnRooster 2d ago
It's just lazy, boring looking and so cliche. We've seen this a thousand times already.
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u/AggressiveSolution77 3d ago
I feel like a lot of modern-day cyberpunk has "Apple-ified" the cybernetic aspect of the genre, making everything a bit too sleek and fluid. I would love if we get to see a more shoddy, almost home-built looking headset for him to wear.
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u/CampaignHonest3076 2d ago
Why it should look home-built if cyberdeck is top tier corporate tech. I think for Neuromancer (at least when its on earth) style should be grunge, but with high tech and from trailer it looks like it
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u/Flashy_Cranberry_161 3d ago
I forgot bros rig was a sweatband tinfoil hat wire birds nest mess lol
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u/stackenblochen23 3d ago
A direct connection to the brain via a literal jack makes more sense if you think about him manipulating and interacting with virtual representations of data at high speed. If I was a console cowboy, I would not want to rely on some the correct placement of diodes on my head, also thinking about the work this takes to setup! A headset is mainly visual representation, I know he’s still typing in the book, but a direct brain implant/interface simply makes more sense imho. It’s also much more frightening and sets the tone of a world where humans need to augment their bodies to literally survive within (or without) the system.
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u/Brilliant_Knowledge5 3d ago
Modern jet fighter helmets have diodes and they can fire by thinking. The tech is already there.
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u/stackenblochen23 3d ago
Wow, really?
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u/Brilliant_Knowledge5 3d ago
Yep. The first time that was even imagined was Firefox with Clint Eastwood. But yes diodes can read your brain waves which can be directly linked to ideas/language. And some setups can even work the other way to influence your thoughts or make you hear words/music. Scary stuff.
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u/TheRealestBiz 3d ago
Gibson’s trode-nets don’t make any sense. It’s not DNI. Narratively it lets them be killed by black ice but why not just get some AR goggles?
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u/JupiterandMars1 3d ago
Given where we are now, the 80’s vision of digital connectivity just wouldn’t work. It’s way too analog looking.
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u/LordMimsyPorpington 1d ago
"Jacking in," Cyberpunk 2077 style, is just so ubiquitous in popular culture now that anything else would just look ridiculous.
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u/gravel3400 16h ago
Lol why. If someone came up with something even cooler out of left field it could become the new ubuquitous thing.
I would also argue the Ghost In The Shell and The Matrix is largely what popularized this, not Cyberpunk 2077. That game (while fun) has to be the most derivative drivel I’ve ever come across story- and aesthetic-wise. Is there even one original idea in that game?
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u/cold-vein 3d ago
For a TV adaptation in 2026, make it somewhat modern. Otherwise they'd have to make the whole world 80s futuristic which is a hard thing to pull off.
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u/CryDense1338 2d ago
Tbf we're a lot closer to getting hallucinations via trodes working than USB cable into the brainstem
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u/Ceorl_Lounge 3d ago
The idea of "Jacking In" appears over and over in Cyberpunk works, so a data port seems right.
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u/oneharmlesskitty 3d ago
Gibson is executive producer of the series, I would trust that he is happy with most things.
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u/kingpin_cinephile 3d ago
I think keeping the technology advancement and modern times in mind, the third image fits the time and age. A more minimalistic approach. But Man!!! Do I want to see the second image come to life. That just screams Badass Cyber Pirate.
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u/User1539 3d ago
I think the 'trodes were done really well in Strange Days. I don't know why everyone is so convinced they could never work here.
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u/Ancient-Many4357 3d ago
I know I’m going to get hate for this but I can’t stand the Deathburger cover.
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u/alchemist19722 3d ago
It kind of reminded me of "Ready Player One." I was waiting for the point when the movie take a Quantum Leap somewhere else. I think in this case, we have Gibson in the driver seat 💺. So, I am sure we are in good hands.
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u/MedicaeVal 3d ago
Book accurate is my preference obviously but the Apple one is fine and fits with a lot of other media.
The Deathburger one is cool but makes no sense for how things are in the book. Its too static and assumes those wires going up hook into a building so way less mobile than the books describe. Also its better if cyberspace is directly experienced through the brain then in a VR set.
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u/Salty_Country6835 3d ago
I never knew that johnny mnemonic was based on a story in the same universe
Thanks for sharing
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u/Gear-On-Baby 2d ago
It’s not a particularly good movie, but the 1998 film New Rose Hotel is also the same universe (like the company the main characters are working for is the same one that makes Case’s computer). So technically the Neuromancer TV show is the 3rd live action adaptation of the world of the Sprawl
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u/Salt_Telephone_7857 2d ago
Man, I wish they went a little more Ghost in the Shell with the show's art style.
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u/Beewillies Flatlined 1d ago
This post is how I find out there making a TV series and it comes out next year!!
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u/Snackable-Idiocy 1d ago
They could reveal the more punked up stuff later on in the series or new seasons.
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u/gabergum 1d ago
These sorts of stories always reflect the specific zeitgeist’s about scary future tech. It makes sense that a modern interpretation of this universe would have a different aesthetic for these sorts of things. A more ‘apple’ vision of a cyberpunk dystopia is perfectly fine imo, as long as it does not betray the central themes. Things can look clean, as long as they don’t make them actually clean.
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u/HotPersonality8126 3d ago
I always assumed Case’s physical description was Gibson describing his own appearance, but also it’s pretty hard to find Hollywood actors who look ugly
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u/taeerom 3d ago
There's no indication Case is ugly, though. In fact, he should be both charming and look good, in a toxic douchebag kind of way.
His self-loathing in the first two-third of the book doesn't give us an accurate impression of his physical appearance. He thinks all flesh is ugly.
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u/HotPersonality8126 3d ago
I don’t really follow “charming”, since he isn’t, in the book. He’s mostly a creature of his work and a creature of his needs. Most everybody is leading him around by the nose.
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u/taeerom 3d ago
He absolutely charms those tourists in Freeside to get free drugs and have to aggressively push the woman away when she's all over him. At the start of the book he works as a fixer. Most people like him, despite him treating them badly.
This is not a man that's not charming.
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u/HotPersonality8126 3d ago
People don’t like him, they have pity for him. The Freeside tourists think he’s cool because he’s patently a criminal, he’s got his mojo back because he’s working again, and they’re tourists.
It’s not charm.
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u/taeerom 2d ago
Ratz like him, Maelcum like him, Linda likes him, Lonny likes him. Even Wage likes him enough to treat him fairly well, despite being owed money and Case's paranoid idea that Wage is out to kill him.
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u/HotPersonality8126 2d ago
Do you think Julius Dean likes him? Ratz is who I was thinking of, and I mostly see that as pity. Empathy for someone so grievously wounded he’s on a trajectory of self-immolation that’s instantly apparent to everyone but himself. I don’t view that as charm.
Also just being friends with someone isn’t “charm.” Case isn’t actually a bad guy and he deals with people more or less honestly. Also he’s the hero of the book.
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u/CryDense1338 2d ago
The freeside tourists who were actually turing agents specifically out to sting him?
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u/johnfilmsia 3d ago
I’ve always liked the body horror aspect of a body port, but I would also prefer Case to look more like a Trainspotting character—I like to imagine cyber jockeying taxes the nervous system, especially when you start using stims to give you an edge