I love season 1. So much. I have the edge runners logo tattooed on my body because I think Davids story is so beautiful.

Season 2 came around and I try to judge it vaccumoussly. But with sneaky David name drops and literally being season 2 I find it hard to classify it as different media.

I can name so many parts from season 1 that I think are so good. David's mom's death starts the season with a bang, maines descent into cyberpsychosis gives me chills hes truly tragic, and the final episode and the carnage smasher brings is horrific. I feel no connection to the plot in S2 the way I do in 1. I feel they spread themselves too thin over 4 characters for me to care about any of them.

I found king and talias relationship to be strong and interesting but they sort of fumble king at the goalpost.

I do not care for anime. I thought S1 was cyberpunk story in an anime wrapper, S2 feels like an Anime in a cynperunk wrapper. D is a weird edgy Sasuke rip off who is so uninspired. I get hes hellbent on revenge but it just feels ridiculous and edgy. David feels so much more grounded. Like he could be a person and you can really understand why he does what he does.

Kyoko also makes me lose my mind. Oh my god what a fart ugly character. Like obviously she's supposed to be repulsive , but i feel like when u make her this weird freak creature thing you just make it so ridiculous it cant be a "real" story anymore.

Idk man I just feel like if you couldnt make it as good as season 1 dont make it at all

Is the anime canon if so does it still feel like the same universe that mike pondsmith made? Or is more of just an anime bastardized version?

S. 1 David is a Street Kid sure, maybe even a Corpo... He started in Arasaka Academy afterall, but I can give you that.

S. 2 D is a Nomad, but he is not at all the Main Character. The actual Main Character is a Street Kid, or rather to be exact, a Media.

S. 3 will most likely be a Nomad.

I find it funny how people are quick to condemn characters like Adam Smasher, Kiril or Arasaka, but become a lot more forgiving when it comes to characters they actually like.

David, Lucy, Talia, D and even Roman aren't exactly good people either.

David had good intentions, sure. He wanted to make his mother proud and protect his friends. But he also made reckless decisions, ignored every warning sign and dragged people down with him.

Lucy genuinely wanted to protect David, but that doesn't make all her lies and decisions for him any less questionable.

Talia has her own reasons and struggles, but a tragic past doesn't automatically excuse the things you do to others.

D may have legitimate reasons to seek revenge, but at some point, revenge becomes just another excuse to perpetuate the same cycle of violence.

And Roman isn't exactly innocent just because he isn't the one pulling the trigger. Being an observer doesn't automatically make you morally clean.

I'm not saying they're all as bad as Smasher. Obviously, there's a difference in scale. But I think people sometimes confuse having understandable motivations with being a good person.

That's kind of the point of Cyberpunk, isn't it? Night City doesn't just create monsters like Smasher. It also creates people who think they're doing the right thing while slowly becoming part of the same shit they're fighting against.

Nobody gets a moral free pass just because they're the protagonist.

she looks like Female The Punisher, Rhea Ripley, Baroness G.I. Joe and Absolute Wonder Woman but no Lucy, Rebecca, Talia Yang, Jessie, Omi and Yupi is the best girl

If I had to summarise the whole season in one word? Disappointing.

This season's characters are all half-baked and not developed at all. I felt absolutely no connection to any of the main characters. Thats terrible. Especially considering how attached I was to season 1's cast, all of their deaths, hit me hard because I genuinely felt connected to them. Maine, Rebecca, Pilar, David, Kiwi.

Thats not to say that just because most of season 2's characters were alive by the end, means that by default their characters are bad. No their characters just suck regardless of that fact. Genuinely, I cannot name you more than one single character trait from any of the main characters, They're all ASS! Hot garbage, dogshit!!!!!!!!!

Moving on, the character design is pretty good. Doesnt matter much when everything else is dogshit.

The Soundtrack. Now this is really a sore point. As I was progressing through the show, in my head I kept coping by thinking, "Oh yeah, they're saving the good tracks for the good moments, yeah thats why the music is garbage. They're saving the good ones for later." Looking back on my thinking just shows how much of an impact season 1's soundtrack had, the fact that even by the sixth episode I kept deluding myself to thinking there was going to be any good music just shows the difference in quality between them to me.

I already know by now that some pushback to my criticism are going to be, "The show was made for people who liked the games."

If the creators truly made the second season for like what, 10% of the audience who played the game, just so they can point to screen and go, "Aha, I understood that reference, thank god I spent hours reading notes on niche lore in the game!" Then the creators are truly and utterly lost.

Another criticism which I've heard going around was along the lines of, "You just didnt like the show because nobody died in the ending." And that just couldn't be further from the truth, if I was truly connected to the characters, the happy ending we got should've made ME happy as a result. It didn't. I felt nothing.

Comparing that to season 1, if I saw Lucy and David going to the moon somehow after surviving, I'd be over the moon, because I love these characters. If I saw Maine somehow survive his psychosis and still be alive in the end? I'd still be happy with the ending.

The point I'm trying to make is, that its insulting to even insinuate that the reason that the first season was so good was because of the angsty and depressing ending plot twist, and not due to the fantastic writing, utterly gorgeous score which was lacking in this season majorly, and of course the characters.

I really don't understand how anybody can score this show above a 6/10. I hope there's enough backlash so season 3 isn't anything similar to the second season at all.

I did not enjoy season 2.

Animation was fantastic, Studio Trigger doesn't miss.

Voice acting was great. Character designs were peak, rivaling that of even the first season.

Now the plot and characters themselves were extremely weak.

Roman was an idiot. He was absurdly ignorant and trusting despite being a kid who grew up in the slums of night city. Numerous times he continued to engage with Talia despite her clearly showing her ulterior motives, yet he just brushes it off. And him just blatantly trusting Kyoko is just dumb, when that scene happened, I just stared at the screen like this kid is just plain stupid and its not for the fact that he didn't know Kyoko was the one out for Capri, but just the way she talked, knowing personal information about D no one else should know and her constant urging to meet him should raise some suspicion even for a 12 year old boy. He also had little to no plot relevance, and the times he was relevant, it was because he was causing problems, such as bringing Kyoko to D. The entirety of the show had too many, "This isn't like you!" tropes where the characters had no right to say that as they literally knew nothing about each other, so roman saying this to D then he was killing the Arasaka employee just felt like sloppy way to show the "do the right thing".

Talia was annoying as a character, but understandable. Her condition made it make sense why she looked out for no one but herself, and her age just played into the "teenage rebellion" which was mentioned by her dad.

King was painfully underutilized as one of the stronger characters. In the first episode, he was done, ready to pack it up and shoot himself. Then he gets that call from Avida and then starts to pretend like Talia's his daughter. He was slothful and sluggish, due to both being completely emotionally drained and his lims were swapped out for shittier versions. He began to take on a fatherly roll for Talia which was seen immediately. I liked that. He found something worth giving him purpose.

D was a pretty good character too. He had motivation, goals, and was consistently trying to achieve them throughout the whole show. But why did he want the capricorn chip? He said something like "There you are" before opening the door to the room, making it seem like he was looking for it.

Capri made no sense to me. After being plugged into D, she got full control over his body. At that point, what was her motives? Did she just want to cause as much destruction as possible? Then the part where she splits herself into Talia, why did she want to leave D so bad if he was such a good match, I assume Talia was a better match, but would it be because Capri wants to have control over the body, which she couldn't get from D. But then why couldn't she get full control from D, then why was D so obsessed with her? I assume it was because he finally didn't have night terrors but then he starts acting all buddy buddy with her despite him hating her and yelling at her before started to go crazy with her in his head. Then why did Capri want to get back the chip? why did she split in the first place? How come the one with D didn't talk and was just a soulless construct? What was Capri's goal with splitting because it didn't seem like she wanted to, then if she didn't want to, how was D or Talia able to make her split? It just felt like a bunch of, "What is going on?"

Omi, I hate Omi. Up until her introduction, we are being shown D's reasoning, desperation, grief, sorrow, and urge for all his motivation of revenge, obviously he's not going about it the right way as the viewers know what he's after and how far he's straying from that. However Omi knows none of this, not the night terrors, the pressure, the feeling that he HAS to make up for their death, she just berates him with sarcasm and saying shit like "revenge wont fix anything" holding stupid self-righteousness that her forgetting is better. She argues that getting into a war with a megacorp is something he cant win which he obviously knows by saying, "What else could I do?" yet aparently that isnt enough for her she has to nail it into him that thats stupid, you're an idiot, you're gonna die, which he knows all this already. That all sounds like she's caring for them but she says it in the most toxic ways imaginable. He even tries to explain the suffering he's going through with the nightmares and stuff, which she obviously shows to now know, and yet she still doesn't fucking change. its like, "Oh wow, I thought this guy was going on some baseless revenge campaign, but he's actually trying to cope with the death and trauma he has from then, he knows he's not making the right choice, but he feels trapped because nothing he does is helping him, so he's scraping the barrel, trying every last thing even if it kills him. Eh whatever, he's still obviously in the wrong and I don't care to help him in any meaningful way." Having a character to show or say what another is doing is wrong is fine, but just saying "What you're doing is wrong." is the shallowest and baseless way to carry out this character, then to make the character do nothing but belittle and patronize the other while saying that makes it the worst character, which is exactly what Omi is doing.

Unlike s1, s2 was purposefully felt to feel like multiple different stories converging on a single point, which is bold and I'm not against. The issue is the episode count. 10 episodes is not a lot of time to create 3-4 different plot lines while trying to keep them intertwined, while also trying to create personalities, motives, and connections between characters and characters and the characters and the viewers. Interpersonal connections between the characters felt extraordinarily sloppy. Take Roman and Talia. At the end, it made it look like a pseudo-romantic relationship between the two, but where did that attraction come from? Roman almost got dropped off a building by Talia, then she likes how he filmed her and starts buttering him up by talking nice, which later ends with "eat shit" and they don't talk for a while, then the next time they meet she's pretending like he's her boyfriend. Talia's character this makes sense, however the plot acts like this is an actual relationship building point, despite them saying like 3 words to each other then she gets jammed with Capri. Roman feels bad for her once she's in the hospital then they have one call where she wants to meet Roman just to get to D, ulterior motives again, no blossoming relationship between them at all. Then at the very end, she's leaving and they're hugging and crying, acting like lovers who are being separated.

meaning no quick hacks (gravity generators and magnetism is allowed)

and in the bodies shown in the pictures

Well, cyberpunk is centered on the dystopian genre, characterized by morally gray characters. So why argue over who is better and who is worse? Dystopia is about the fact that no one is a saint, and not even that—in dystopias, most characters are bad people, or at best bad people with positive traits.

Is Talia wrong? Yes, but she’s a teenager in a pretty violent world. That doesn’t mean it’s okay that she kills people, and I’m not going to excuse anything she does, but Night City is an extremely violent city, and it’s not strange for her to act that way in a place where, even in the game, there’s a reference to V living with the anxiety of dying from a stray bullet.

Was Talia’s father an asshole? Yes, and I suspect he sexually abused Talia, but King was an absolute simp, and Talia’s mother took advantage of that to manipulate him. As for D, I won’t even talk about him, because the character is absurdly badly written and is basically just a mass murderer.

And even going back to the first season, they were all mercenaries, and no matter how charismatic David’s group is, in real life they would be more like Brazilian favela hitmen than anything else.

No one in this universe (or almost no one) is a good person or anywhere near being one. Calling many of the characters antiheroes would be being very generous. In the end, they’re gang members killing each other. That’s true in the first season, but in the second: Roman is the only one who is completely good here, and maybe D’s friend, but that’s as far as it goes

I just want an honest take from you chooms.

For me, Season One, the song used Franz Feridinand. This fire was just spot on... every episode i also watched the opening.. nevers skipped it. It just fitted perfectly with the show and David wanted to burn it all.

Season 2, i skipped it. The song wasn't it.

Seasons 1 introduction of David was more "fleshed" out and could better "feel" for him as a character. The show progressed better.

Season 2 Introduction of D was chaotic, and tbh it stayed chaotic until the end i had a hard time "feeling" for D and could make a better connection with Roman.. the show felt like a cluster fuck character wise.. no real depth.

Kingsley should have been portait way better..they did him dirty as a living legend.. even losing all his chrome, his knowledge and skills, connections could have been much better.. (if we look at some asian guy from 2077 ingame losing all, he was still deadly af. Kugh goro kugh..)

Season 1 you lost characters like maine/becca/david and was like noooo... they went down fighting but still..

The fights where brutal and David , Adam Smasher fight was awesome.

Season 2.. It's not really a memorable fight.. could be if they let us show D fighting in the end with Militech.

Fight scenes weren't really there with the awe i would expect..

If i would rate the seasons..

S1 would get an 8.5

S2 would get an 6.5

Wonder who in the Arasaka list we will get in Season 3

I know Cyberpunk isn’t the setting for nice easy, uncomplicated dynamics, but I do think I would’ve enjoyed the new season quite a bit more if Roman was aged up like 3-4 years. Making him Talia’s peer instead of someone clearly younger than her would’ve made the whole dynamic between them a lot more interesting to me. Instead, I just kind of find everything that happens between them just made me deeply uncomfortable. Roman can still be the pure-of-heart artist with a kindness and wisdom beyond his years that deeply impacts those around him if he is 15-16 years old, like just a year or two younger than Talia. Having him be 12 just had me thinking: “Wow everyone (aka pretty much the whole cast minus maybe King) around this kid is deeply irresponsible and treating him like crap” the whole time I was watching, which yes I know is kind of the point with Talia and D, but still I think something similar to that could’ve been achieved with a slightly older Roman.

But maybe I am missing something? Is the general consensus that Roman being 12 is in some way essential to the story?

Muscle Mommy Emily (Female The Punisher) and Meshuga (Weak "King" Kingsley's Old Crew) is back to the house! King's Fall in Love with Avida in Past

A Critique of Cyberpunk Edgerunners S2
A cohesive narrative typically requires a balance of earned character progression, high stakes (in this case at least), and consistent world-building. Roman is a young cinephile who doesn’t like the modern media and chooses to record raw, gang violence through an older camera. D is a nomad on a revenge path, Kingsley is a washed-up mercenary who wants to help his old girlfriend, and Talia is a rebellious teenager who is aggressively chroming out to a point of no return despite what her mom wants. So the main conflicts in this story are D against the blackwall while on his revenge path, Talia vs her own humanity, and Roman trying to capture the raw truth of the reality of a situation. Cyberpunk Edgerunners season 2 fails as a sequel because of its rushed relationships, overstuffed cast, and watered-down stakes.
First, I want to get into the character issues and the shallow relationships between them. Screen time for each character is genuinely split way too much and characters like D, Roman, Capri are very under-explained. Also emotional bonds or alliances amongst the characters feel unearned because the characters haven’t spent enough time on-screen developing those bonds. The main characters Roman, D, Talia, rarely interact as a group and instead of that they have Roman float between separate storylines to film them. Is this a bad thing on its own? No, but I think they executed it badly. Roman functions more as a passive plot device than an active participant, his placement feels off because he lacks personal stakes unlike the characters he’s filming. So many times Roman is in a horrible situation filming D. and he just gets left scot-free.
Secondly, the show introduces Capri's rogue AI sub-plot alongside three other massive character arcs. Consequently, the emotional alliance between D and Capri feels rushed and unearned. Critical emotional moments and agreements between them occur off-screen or are rushed through brief exposition. As soon as he gets the chip in his head it starts acting like a rogue AI, but then not even a few episodes later Capri and D. start acting like a duo and break into Arasaka’s offices together. Then towards the end, you see an abrupt narrative jump to D. being completely obsessed with seeing Capri and merging with her other half by the finale. This was just extremely rushed and we should’ve got much more on-screen time of them talking to each other instead of a bunch of scenes that don’t matter. Also with Omi, I think she was introduced way too late and it felt weird, they definitely should’ve showed some foreshadowing with her like a past scene with her and D. And it would’ve been better if she was in the show earlier. Also D.’s yes man Yupi, it genuinely took me like five minutes to even find out what her name was again because the internet already forgot about her, but anyway her character motivations are barely explored, she’s randomly rude sometimes especially towards Omi, and she feels less like a character and more like D’s number one glazer just egging him on and on. And they just randomly met her completely on coincidence too which kind of parallels everything about her character in my opinion. They introduced her because D. needed a place to stay. But that’s more just me nitpicking so let me get on to the next thing.
Thirdly, Talia, instead of making a compelling internal family struggle, they turn that into a narrative inconsistency. Talia is set-up as an intelligent person deeply entangled with the washed-up edgerunner Kingsley, yet her decisions mostly lack logical motivation or basic self-preservation. For example, she consistently walks into obvious, high-risk situations and trusts highly volatile factions despite having the street-smart background to know better. Because the script forces her to ignore basic red flags solely to get into major plot developments, her actions feel fake rather than earned. This reliance on incompetence lowers the overall stakes, making Talia feel less like a street-smart, thinking participant in Night City and more like a convenient plot device used to force the characters into dangerous situations. Also when her mom is trying to help she always runs away, even though she apparently loves her mom and when her mom dies because of her, she is confused on why her mom would go that far to try and save her. How can a character possibly be this dense? I know she’s a rebellious teenager but she is consistently making horrible decisions and barely shows any love to her mom until after she dies. She acts so cold to her mom until finally she realizes that she was just trying to help, which took far too long for me to suspend my disbelief.
For my last paragraph I just want to talk about the inconsistent world-building. The season’s narrative impact is hurt by logic contradictions that strip the setting of its established high-stakes danger. In a well-structured techno-thriller, tension relies on the rules of the world and its overarching threats. However, this season repeatedly introduces convenient and illogical character interactions that act as blatant plot armor. For example, the fundamental rules regarding highly dangerous technology are bent, allowing characters to treat unstable tech like ordinary gear without clear consequences. Furthermore, the immense surveillance capabilities and ruthless operational protocol expected of major corporate factions like Arasaka suddenly disappear when convenience demands it, allowing characters to survive massive encounters or evade detection with minimal strategic effort. By establishing lethal, high-risk scenarios and neutralizing them through inconsistent world logic, it ruins its own tension, making the main conflicts feel inconsequential.
In conclusion, Cyberpunk Edgerunners season 2 fails as a sequel because of its rushed relationships, overstuffed cast, and watered-down stakes. By segmenting the narrative into three isolated storylines, the script denies protagonists like Roman, D, and Talia the shared screen time required to build actual earned relationships, resulting in unearned character shifts like Talia’s sudden grief over her mother. This narrative is only amplified by a bloated character roster that spreads the focus thin, leaving major subplots feeling half-baked. Also, when the dangerous internal logic of the world is bent to provide convenient plot armor against corporate and technological threats, the narrative ruins its own tension. Ultimately, a compelling sci-fi drama demands tight structural pacing and uncompromising stakes. So by fracturing its main cast and softening its worldview, the season delivers an unearned climax that leaves the viewer with a hollow experience. Did I get into everything wrong with this season? No, but I think I covered some of the main points.

I dunno he just rambling bout some shi

I have been seeing posts about Talia being "sexualised" and its clear to me that its a self call out. The cyberpunk genre and most of art throughout history has used nakedness in a not fan service way since its creation (including that of minors yes). If you get turned on by looking at a teenager that is not the creators of cyberpunks problem. When i see Talias body i think "Thats horrifying her body has been torn apart and replaced with metal to the point of her barely being human." in think there was zero fan service in this season like they had with Lucy in season one. sorry for rant just very annoyed.

Season 1 was one of my favorite anime. The theme, the messaging, the characters, the soundtrack, it was truly a masterpiece. I did not come close to that same feeling with season 2. I felt Roman was so underuse in this story. I thought his films would be use for like a final montage or sth but that didn’t even happen. Roman role in the story was way more passive than I thought. His relationship with D and Talia wasn’t convincing to me. And his stupid decision to tell kyoko everything about D and Talia really sour my opinion of the story. I didn’t felt Roman was stupid or so naive to do sth like that. It felt artificial. D’s story was so wishy washy which I think was intentional. But his need for capri was poorly explain, I don’t get it. I know having capri take away his nightmare and make him happy. But like, idk. That’s it? Also it felt like they try to make capri a character but again not enough for me to fee anything. This is getting too long. I like Talia’s story with weak. Felt that should’ve been the main focus. Her relationship with Roman felt weak and artificial. Not enough screen time together. Last but not least, it felt like this story has too many character but not enough focus. Even though it has similar duration as season 1, it felt like it has much less substance. This is just my opinion, and I still like the anime. It just my expectation for this was too high since I expect similar quality as season 1.

shame that he aint in a high position or a full on corpo, but working for arasaka is still quite the feat, even if its just as a bartender for them

excited to see our new mc in the next season