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110 - William Gibson’s Neuromancer (feat. maia arson crimew) (Patreon)

Published:
2023-10-25 06:00:04
Edited:
2025-04-22 13:31:33
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

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Content

Hacktivist/irl tiny kitten maia arson crimew (maia.crimew.gay) returns to discuss Neuromancer, the 1984 sci-fi novel that coined the term “cyberspace” and inspired a generation of hackers. Topics include breasting boobily up and down stairs, the parallels with 1995's Hackers, and how impressively William Gibson manages to capture the feeling of being perpetually on the run.

maia arson crimew (it/she): i am gay, mostly for girls, and i’m a tiny kitten :3. i know lot’s of things about cyber security, programming and far too little about music but i still try to do all those things at once. Twitter // Instagram // Tumblr // Bluesky

Want more TWOAPW? Get access to our full back catalogue of premium/bonus episodes and add your name to the masthead of our website by subscribing for $5/month at Patreon.com/worstofall!

Media Referenced in this Episode:

Neuromancer by William Gibson (Ace; First Edition, 1984). Goodreads // Bookshop.org

Hackers dir. Iain Softley (MGM/United Artists, 1995). Letterboxd // TMDB

“Europe’s Richest Royal Family Builds $300 Billion Finance Empire” by Benjamin Stupples. Bloomberg, September 29, 2023.

“’Trina’s Dorm” by icedCelery. Ao3.org

Commercial: “Case’s Dream” featuring Greg Foster as Case

Files

Comments

Autumn Cedar

I just finished reading this book, can't wait to listen !

BarFly

I like the first 10 minutes or so of Johnny Mnemonic, before the action shifts to Newark. It's got a surprisingly cool tech-noir vibe with great analog tech, and Reeves portrays Johnny's businesslike competence very well. It really goes downhill from there.

Dergon

Just starting this episode, and I gotta say it's super refreshing hearing people discussing cyberpunk without absolutely shitty takes like "cyberpunk means reclaiming power with technology!" Or "Most cyberpunk media isn't very punk!" Because of course if a genre name has punk in it, then if course it must be inline with the very modern and very online usage of punk. Even if the origin of the word was some guy trying to think of a term to convey annoying kids and their computers.

Dergon

All this is to say I should probably be on Xitter less, lol

Anne Huston

The audio editing on this one is so fucking good, you guys.

Paula Sulpice

Not sure exactly what in this episode made me think of it (maybe just thinking about other notoriously confusing books and proto-cyberpunk) but a Thomas Pynchon episode would be really cool. It would be fascinating to hear your thoughts on the Crying of Lot 49

ArcticFridge

I have a suggestion for another seminal piece of Sci-Fi that I want to hear your thoughts on: A Canticle for Leibowitz. It’s dystopian and full of Christianity and really interesting

Förfäders spår

it’s specifically extremely catholic, which I imagine should make a fun contrast with the usual evangelical fare

ArcticFridge

True, but I don’t think it’s super pro catholic

John Leavitt

Oh hey I know someone who consulted on a screenplay adaptation of MONA LISA OVERDRIVE. His contribution was inventing a mobile pop-up clean room people could use to work on chips

KaiaBlomst

Surprisingly, this episode made me want to reread The Expanse series. A world not ruled by Americans, overwhelming corporate exploitation, Space Mormons, and descriptions of the incomprehensible.

零 Rei

Y'all, I love you, I love this episode, and I love maia's enthusiasm every time you have her on, but also this episode made me feel one thousand years old, instead of a mere half century. As thanks, let me share with you the song that always pops into my head when I see or hear the word "icebreaker": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9g6XYQdQrs

零 Rei

Also Chiba City, which is just across the bay from Tokyo, has pretty nice weather most of the year! Just putting that out there. Futari Escape is a cute little story about cute little lesbians trying their very best – mostly successfully to avoid doing anything productive. So I don't really know what that first line was all about.

零 Rei

One final thought I had while listening to this is how John Shirley took a lot of the ideas and window-dressing of Neuromancer (which, to be clear is probably in my top 10 favorite books of all time) and dialed them up to 11 for his Eclipse trilogy, which turned it into splatterpunk schlock on the one hand but also depressingly accurate about subsequent developments in far right politics in Europe.

零 Rei

Also also also it has always been a WHOOOOLE thing for me that the most significant Black characters in Neuromancer are Space Rastafarians (and then, in Count Zero, combination Hoteps / buppies / b-boys). The way that Gibson uses Black / African characters to signify "cool" in his writing has always fascinated me, as well as over time most clearly demonstrating that he's a Boomer. There was probably a lot of reggae playing in the head shop.

By Tove!

Awesome! Gibson's *Pattern Recognition* would make another good episode about post 9/11 internet culture and early brand influencers

Zipzapzop

I have to read that one

TheTaciturn

It never really occured to me just how much of the lore from the Cyberpunk tabletop RPG and Cyberpunk 2077 game comes directly from Neuromancer.

Thom Coté

Oooh yes I love Canticle and it'd be perfect for this pod!

J

Not sure if anyone's gonna see this, but Apple has apparently greenlit a Neuromancer TV show

Tom Hauptman

Amazing sound design during the holoshow excerpt, dropping the music for the bit then slamming it back on as Josh went back to the quote, just perfection.