David Martinez was a shitty character & deserved to be killed by Adam Smasher.
drow_girlfriend
I loved it, I just wish it was much longer and took way more time with its characters. You can tell they had no faith in it being as successful as it turned out to be.
Zanfers
I got bored of it 2 episodes before the end. Never finished it.
I love both Cyberpunk 2077 and anime, but didn’t enjoy Edgerunners. Not saying it’s bad, but it was annoyingly hectic and fast for me.
But this is just a matter of taste.
VNilla_
This really isn’t a hot take or whatever, but I don’t think Edgerunners is as sad as people make it out to be. I liked it, of course, and plan to give it a rewatch in a year, but it’s not depressing imo.
Anime rarely ever makes me sad, though so maybe that’s why I feel that way.
Complete side note, but if you guys liked Edgerunners then you might also enjoy Akudama Drive
IDoWhatIWant2_
I really hate Lucy… After getting betrayed by her David should have never messed with her. Her whole character is about wanting to follow her dream of reaching the moon, which is cool ig, but it is only really mentioned a few times. Her relationship with David seems rushed and without a whole lot of reasoning behind it. And even though she tries to save David, she could have actually saved him by using communication. She was a boring character too, and pretty one sided.
Now Becca on the other hand: 1. Sweet and crazy, best combo; 2. Actually wanted him; 3. A literal unit and ride or die choom. 3. Actually had relationships growth with David and a relationship would have made more sense.
While I am a Rebecca Stan through and through, I think I would still say this about Lucy at least…

volantredx
The pace for the last few episodes is terrible and sort kills a lot of the impact.
David’s chromed up body is gross as fuck and not drawn in a way that actually matches his features.
Hey__Martin
Lucy is the whole reason for David’s downfall. She’s stupid AF disappearing from the crew then withholding the intel that Arasaka is out to get David from him and his squad. First she went behind his back and kept killing Arasaka contacts until she attracted too much attention and got caught. So she made herself into bait for David to get into the cyberskeleton. Second it is because David and his squad didn’t know that they eventually took the setup gig, that he got tricked into the cyberskeleton. It’s all Lucy’s fault. If she just told the crew “hey BTW watch out Arasaka is out to get David, stay clear from any gigs that sound fishy from Arasaka” and she stayed with the crew, then David would be much harder to track down, PLUS they’d have an actual loyal netrunner in the crew that could have even foiled Kiwi’s scheme. And at least eventually when Arasaka cracks down on them inevitably, the crew would be prepared to mount up a fight or plan to skip town with an actual plan, not David turned into a cyberpsycho megatron.
Relevant_Sign_5926
Lucy is a groomer and a manipulative bitch. Feeling bad about doing something bad doesn’t redeem you.
rtyler18
Rebecca is mid. Cool character design though.
SimsStreet
I thought it was alright. Rebecca was creepy because she acts and looks like a kid. Lucy was ok but her romance with David felt weird with how it went from 0 to 100. David was a little bland but he’s an audience placeholder so whatever. Adam smasher was great, arguably better presented than the main game. Same with the mega corps and max tech.
JebbeJ
it could’ve / should’ve been a movie
WindMageVaati
Edgerunners was FINE. It was FAR from the revolutionary show everyone claimed. Its characters? Great. It’s world? Great. Select moments? Amazing! But the pacing is just TOO rushed, and they did Rebecca dirty. Seriously, every side character gets an impactful death scene, but nope, she gets forgotten basically instantly. The show could have been as great if it had, like, 2 more episodes so we could slow down the pacing a bit. Like, Maine undergoes cyberpsychosis in basically one episode. His and Dorio’s relationship barely gets to exist. Falco is basically a non character. Overall enjoyed the show, but like, it’s a 6-7/10
BlindWalnut
David kind of deserved what he got.
He basically told his friends that were worried about his chrome addiction and constant need to be better to get fucked. He even noticed the warning signs himself but couldn’t let go of his pride and dick measuring.
Also it didn’t fit well into the games storyline. There is no fucking way corpo V, who worked for Saka counter-intel in 2076 didn’t know in detail about this event. Arasaka definitely would have used it as propaganda.
redohottochiripeppa
Liked it, its a story of a tragic junkie and his lover. just set in 2076, you can replace the implants with some drug and the result might be similar.
However it is not the BEST that the world of cyberpunk can offer, the game is the prime source of what cyberpunk is. This anime falls prey of the typical japanesse story telling and archetypes, even so, this series should be watched on English not Japanesse, it suits better to the style.
Belcatraz
Apparently, “Information that’s not in the game isn’t part of the game” is an unpopular one around here.
That and “Johnny Silverhand is a terrorist”.
ShadowStormDrift
The only people who liked this show were horny teenage boys.
GraXXoR
I have an entirely unpopular EdgeRunner take and a possibly popular CyberPunk 2077 game take:
So a possibly popular take is that Cyberpunk 2077 the game itself was always an incredible story, hampered by poor management and production, forced into premature release and shat upon by the public…
… before having one of the most incredible REDEMPTION ever told, comparable to the now legendary No Man’s Sky. Spectacular… From the music to the characters, to the set pieces to the side gigs to the series of gut-wrenching endings… The entire game is emotional and visceral as fuck and deserves to be remembered as a true classic.
….. and ok… now for my unpopular take…
My take is that Edgerunners was overrated shite. It was animated by a studio (Trigger) whose best efforts are now well in the past. Animated often at a mere 6 frames per second and with entire minutes of freeze-frame or just panning over a single still. The voice acting was marginal in both Japanese AND English. And the story was risibly purile and often just followed the male-gaze to cheap Japanese schoolgirl, camel-toe and tittie fetish shots. There was little development in character, the backdrop was merely an homage to the game without adding anything meaningful and the world they built was entirely forgettable and passé.
Worse, the characters – one of the key drivers and central characteristics of the game – were even less well drawn and emotionally 3D than the animation itself… and the fact that some young whippersnappers actually had the gall to say it was better than Arcane made me laugh and cough my whiskey over my keyboard in ridicule…
You asked. And so in typically Reddit fashion I wait the downvotes despite answering the OQ honestly… This is what I find most amusing about the internet.
supercyberlurker
James Norris is the real hero of Edgerunners, because he does exactly what we’ve all eventually escalated to doing in-game: go on a killing rampage, destroy a bunch of nc cops, eventually taking on MaxTac. *He’s all of us.*
Pariah-6
I wish Edgerunners was a little bit longer and had character centric episodes, kinda like a “day in the life” of X character.
LazyLich
Each of the three arcs (joins the crew, runs the crew, crew implodes) shouldlve been seasons on their own.
Or at least the first two arc.
Wanted more Night City adventures and showcases of the characters and world.
Dont get me wrong, what we got was good!
But it makes me yearn for more story
RagingAlkohoolik
The driving makes this game made me quit 3 times but i still love the overall game
Nnamz
Rebecca is weird and the love the community has for her is weirder.
Select_Collection_34
David and Lucy were bad together and each led to the others downfall
xbtkxcrowley
That People who find Rebecca attractive are pedos she’s modeled after a child. Can’t change my mind. It’s disgusting
Ace_the_Slayer-13
I have a few. For one, I think the show was waaaay too short which is kinda sad that the creators of the show lacked so much faith in this when it clearly had some potential.
2. David had a promising start as a character, but then just devolved in the second half of the show to the point that I didn’t feel sad for his death. Kinda glad that Smasher finished him in the end.
You’d think with how smart he is and human he was that he would’ve viewed Maine’s descent into cyberpsychosis and eventual death as a warning for what could happen when you seek so much cyberware to feel invincible and “special”. Writers could’ve gone in a better direction and made him wary of acquiring more cyberware and to not be arrogant, but nope, they just made him arrogant and he ended up repeating the same mistakes that Maine made which lead to his death in the end.
3. The characters in the edgerunner crew weren’t fleshed out enough for me to feel any sympathy for them when they died. I was pretty darn curious about Kiwi’s past, how her mouth ended up in the condition it was in, and how she acquired her masterful skills as a netrunner. But, unfortunately, like other characters, she wasn’t fleshed out enough.
Sometimesieatcorn
the last couple episodes where david’s a walking tank weren’t paced very well. i had to rewatch the last episode to understand what happened. still an amazing story just wish it had 2 more episodes, or atleast another episode
farkos101100
The song used for the moon scene and Davids death scene is cringe
nkohari
It was… fine. It felt like a fairly low-rent Netflix anime, a lot like Castlevania, and I don’t really understand why some people are super obsessed with it.
I’m happy it brought more people to the game and the genre, though!
Suckisnacki
DAVIDOOOO
Hrydziac
The cyber skeleton design was super weird and really took me out of the show. Still finished and enjoyed it, but I wish it had been more humanoid or something.
Hellion_Immortis
The fact that you can’t kill Wakako after finding out what she did with Evelyn is pretty disappointing.
I don’t get why people like Lucy so much. She is manipulative and doesn’t even treat David well. Rebecca actually respects him. Though this isn’t really a hot take, since many people do think the same way.
Kiwi actually redeemed herself by trying to take out Faraday’s crew as much as she could at the end. She didn’t deserve what came to her.
Rat-king27
My hot take is I want the option, hopefully in the next mainline game, to side with a corp, I want to be a massive asshole and muder my way up the corperate ladder.
skrott404
The English dub is better and the way the series was meant to be.
Lostcause75
I like it a lot but the story feels a bit generic and predictable and pacing is imo a little off
WhiskeyTrail
Kiwi did nothing wrong.
She was beat nearly to death by a Cyberpsychotic Maine and then everyone is surprised when Faraday hires her for Arasaka? What? Sorry that David and Lucy are all touchy feelie and Rebecca is full of unrequited love for David and falco is just looking for a stable job.
The team can get fucked for being pissed at her, she was beaten and abandoned and underpaid. She looked out for herself. She’s a professional and she STILL hooked them up after getting clapped by Faraday.
-stumondo-
David wasn’t special….went psycho like anyone else
ExotixFlower
David was a self centered asshole and Lucy caused his downfall
H3llkiv97
I was not ready for this 😭😭
Pleasant_Hatter
The anime was good but could have used two more eps. bridging when David takes over the crew and the final arc. Also, David wants to get Lucy to Moon, you think he would have looked up the prices earlier? Lucy is kinda responsible for the shit show at the end too.
TheBeesElise
We could really have done without the Loli in Edgerunners
Tiger_Fish06
The main story of 2077 is not good for an open world game and doesn’t encourage exploration of night city. The story with V potentially dying at any point makes the main story feel like you need to rush through it to get ti a conclusion rather than taking your time to explore night city
chaosking65
A second season would probably ruin the first.
xXR3DRiotXx
It’s better than that arcane anime and should have won the best video game adaptation.
Starlix126
I didn’t feel remotely sad by the ending
KikiYuyu
Whenever there’s a story where the cast all dies one by one, as soon as I realize that’s what’s happening the impacts of the death evaporate. Because now it feels like the death is destined and I can see the hand of the writer(s) looming over everything. Rebecca’s death felt like it was penciled in at the last minute because she just had to die.
I also think a lot of the pacing was jank as hell. I wasn’t even sure David’s mom was dead at first because of how fast that happened. Everything after the timeskip to superbuff David failed to impact me like the stuff with Maine did.
I enjoyed a lot of the anime, but yeah. Flaws.
Ecliptic_Espionage
Rebecca’s death was purely shock value
clownilinguist
Lucy is a groomer. She was clearly an adult with an extensive history and he was a dumb 16 year old kid whose mom just died.
49 Comments
**I hate this**
This image is cursed af.
David Martinez was a shitty character & deserved to be killed by Adam Smasher.
I loved it, I just wish it was much longer and took way more time with its characters. You can tell they had no faith in it being as successful as it turned out to be.
I got bored of it 2 episodes before the end. Never finished it.
I love both Cyberpunk 2077 and anime, but didn’t enjoy Edgerunners. Not saying it’s bad, but it was annoyingly hectic and fast for me.
But this is just a matter of taste.
This really isn’t a hot take or whatever, but I don’t think Edgerunners is as sad as people make it out to be. I liked it, of course, and plan to give it a rewatch in a year, but it’s not depressing imo.
Anime rarely ever makes me sad, though so maybe that’s why I feel that way.
Complete side note, but if you guys liked Edgerunners then you might also enjoy Akudama Drive
I really hate Lucy… After getting betrayed by her David should have never messed with her. Her whole character is about wanting to follow her dream of reaching the moon, which is cool ig, but it is only really mentioned a few times. Her relationship with David seems rushed and without a whole lot of reasoning behind it. And even though she tries to save David, she could have actually saved him by using communication. She was a boring character too, and pretty one sided.
Now Becca on the other hand: 1. Sweet and crazy, best combo; 2. Actually wanted him; 3. A literal unit and ride or die choom. 3. Actually had relationships growth with David and a relationship would have made more sense.
While I am a Rebecca Stan through and through, I think I would still say this about Lucy at least…

The pace for the last few episodes is terrible and sort kills a lot of the impact.
David’s chromed up body is gross as fuck and not drawn in a way that actually matches his features.
Lucy is the whole reason for David’s downfall. She’s stupid AF disappearing from the crew then withholding the intel that Arasaka is out to get David from him and his squad. First she went behind his back and kept killing Arasaka contacts until she attracted too much attention and got caught. So she made herself into bait for David to get into the cyberskeleton. Second it is because David and his squad didn’t know that they eventually took the setup gig, that he got tricked into the cyberskeleton. It’s all Lucy’s fault. If she just told the crew “hey BTW watch out Arasaka is out to get David, stay clear from any gigs that sound fishy from Arasaka” and she stayed with the crew, then David would be much harder to track down, PLUS they’d have an actual loyal netrunner in the crew that could have even foiled Kiwi’s scheme. And at least eventually when Arasaka cracks down on them inevitably, the crew would be prepared to mount up a fight or plan to skip town with an actual plan, not David turned into a cyberpsycho megatron.
Lucy is a groomer and a manipulative bitch. Feeling bad about doing something bad doesn’t redeem you.
Rebecca is mid. Cool character design though.
I thought it was alright. Rebecca was creepy because she acts and looks like a kid. Lucy was ok but her romance with David felt weird with how it went from 0 to 100. David was a little bland but he’s an audience placeholder so whatever. Adam smasher was great, arguably better presented than the main game. Same with the mega corps and max tech.
it could’ve / should’ve been a movie
Edgerunners was FINE. It was FAR from the revolutionary show everyone claimed. Its characters? Great. It’s world? Great. Select moments? Amazing! But the pacing is just TOO rushed, and they did Rebecca dirty. Seriously, every side character gets an impactful death scene, but nope, she gets forgotten basically instantly. The show could have been as great if it had, like, 2 more episodes so we could slow down the pacing a bit. Like, Maine undergoes cyberpsychosis in basically one episode. His and Dorio’s relationship barely gets to exist. Falco is basically a non character. Overall enjoyed the show, but like, it’s a 6-7/10
David kind of deserved what he got.
He basically told his friends that were worried about his chrome addiction and constant need to be better to get fucked. He even noticed the warning signs himself but couldn’t let go of his pride and dick measuring.
Also it didn’t fit well into the games storyline. There is no fucking way corpo V, who worked for Saka counter-intel in 2076 didn’t know in detail about this event. Arasaka definitely would have used it as propaganda.
Liked it, its a story of a tragic junkie and his lover. just set in 2076, you can replace the implants with some drug and the result might be similar.
However it is not the BEST that the world of cyberpunk can offer, the game is the prime source of what cyberpunk is. This anime falls prey of the typical japanesse story telling and archetypes, even so, this series should be watched on English not Japanesse, it suits better to the style.
Apparently, “Information that’s not in the game isn’t part of the game” is an unpopular one around here.
That and “Johnny Silverhand is a terrorist”.
The only people who liked this show were horny teenage boys.
I have an entirely unpopular EdgeRunner take and a possibly popular CyberPunk 2077 game take:
So a possibly popular take is that Cyberpunk 2077 the game itself was always an incredible story, hampered by poor management and production, forced into premature release and shat upon by the public…
… before having one of the most incredible REDEMPTION ever told, comparable to the now legendary No Man’s Sky. Spectacular… From the music to the characters, to the set pieces to the side gigs to the series of gut-wrenching endings… The entire game is emotional and visceral as fuck and deserves to be remembered as a true classic.
….. and ok… now for my unpopular take…
My take is that Edgerunners was overrated shite. It was animated by a studio (Trigger) whose best efforts are now well in the past. Animated often at a mere 6 frames per second and with entire minutes of freeze-frame or just panning over a single still. The voice acting was marginal in both Japanese AND English. And the story was risibly purile and often just followed the male-gaze to cheap Japanese schoolgirl, camel-toe and tittie fetish shots. There was little development in character, the backdrop was merely an homage to the game without adding anything meaningful and the world they built was entirely forgettable and passé.
Worse, the characters – one of the key drivers and central characteristics of the game – were even less well drawn and emotionally 3D than the animation itself… and the fact that some young whippersnappers actually had the gall to say it was better than Arcane made me laugh and cough my whiskey over my keyboard in ridicule…
You asked. And so in typically Reddit fashion I wait the downvotes despite answering the OQ honestly… This is what I find most amusing about the internet.
James Norris is the real hero of Edgerunners, because he does exactly what we’ve all eventually escalated to doing in-game: go on a killing rampage, destroy a bunch of nc cops, eventually taking on MaxTac. *He’s all of us.*
I wish Edgerunners was a little bit longer and had character centric episodes, kinda like a “day in the life” of X character.
Each of the three arcs (joins the crew, runs the crew, crew implodes) shouldlve been seasons on their own.
Or at least the first two arc.
Wanted more Night City adventures and showcases of the characters and world.
Dont get me wrong, what we got was good!
But it makes me yearn for more story
The driving makes this game made me quit 3 times but i still love the overall game
Rebecca is weird and the love the community has for her is weirder.
David and Lucy were bad together and each led to the others downfall
That People who find Rebecca attractive are pedos she’s modeled after a child. Can’t change my mind. It’s disgusting
I have a few. For one, I think the show was waaaay too short which is kinda sad that the creators of the show lacked so much faith in this when it clearly had some potential.
2. David had a promising start as a character, but then just devolved in the second half of the show to the point that I didn’t feel sad for his death. Kinda glad that Smasher finished him in the end.
You’d think with how smart he is and human he was that he would’ve viewed Maine’s descent into cyberpsychosis and eventual death as a warning for what could happen when you seek so much cyberware to feel invincible and “special”. Writers could’ve gone in a better direction and made him wary of acquiring more cyberware and to not be arrogant, but nope, they just made him arrogant and he ended up repeating the same mistakes that Maine made which lead to his death in the end.
3. The characters in the edgerunner crew weren’t fleshed out enough for me to feel any sympathy for them when they died. I was pretty darn curious about Kiwi’s past, how her mouth ended up in the condition it was in, and how she acquired her masterful skills as a netrunner. But, unfortunately, like other characters, she wasn’t fleshed out enough.
the last couple episodes where david’s a walking tank weren’t paced very well. i had to rewatch the last episode to understand what happened. still an amazing story just wish it had 2 more episodes, or atleast another episode
The song used for the moon scene and Davids death scene is cringe
It was… fine. It felt like a fairly low-rent Netflix anime, a lot like Castlevania, and I don’t really understand why some people are super obsessed with it.
I’m happy it brought more people to the game and the genre, though!
DAVIDOOOO
The cyber skeleton design was super weird and really took me out of the show. Still finished and enjoyed it, but I wish it had been more humanoid or something.
The fact that you can’t kill Wakako after finding out what she did with Evelyn is pretty disappointing.
I don’t get why people like Lucy so much. She is manipulative and doesn’t even treat David well. Rebecca actually respects him. Though this isn’t really a hot take, since many people do think the same way.
Kiwi actually redeemed herself by trying to take out Faraday’s crew as much as she could at the end. She didn’t deserve what came to her.
My hot take is I want the option, hopefully in the next mainline game, to side with a corp, I want to be a massive asshole and muder my way up the corperate ladder.
The English dub is better and the way the series was meant to be.
I like it a lot but the story feels a bit generic and predictable and pacing is imo a little off
Kiwi did nothing wrong.
She was beat nearly to death by a Cyberpsychotic Maine and then everyone is surprised when Faraday hires her for Arasaka? What? Sorry that David and Lucy are all touchy feelie and Rebecca is full of unrequited love for David and falco is just looking for a stable job.
The team can get fucked for being pissed at her, she was beaten and abandoned and underpaid. She looked out for herself. She’s a professional and she STILL hooked them up after getting clapped by Faraday.
David wasn’t special….went psycho like anyone else
David was a self centered asshole and Lucy caused his downfall
I was not ready for this 😭😭
The anime was good but could have used two more eps. bridging when David takes over the crew and the final arc. Also, David wants to get Lucy to Moon, you think he would have looked up the prices earlier? Lucy is kinda responsible for the shit show at the end too.
We could really have done without the Loli in Edgerunners
The main story of 2077 is not good for an open world game and doesn’t encourage exploration of night city. The story with V potentially dying at any point makes the main story feel like you need to rush through it to get ti a conclusion rather than taking your time to explore night city
A second season would probably ruin the first.
It’s better than that arcane anime and should have won the best video game adaptation.
I didn’t feel remotely sad by the ending
Whenever there’s a story where the cast all dies one by one, as soon as I realize that’s what’s happening the impacts of the death evaporate. Because now it feels like the death is destined and I can see the hand of the writer(s) looming over everything. Rebecca’s death felt like it was penciled in at the last minute because she just had to die.
I also think a lot of the pacing was jank as hell. I wasn’t even sure David’s mom was dead at first because of how fast that happened. Everything after the timeskip to superbuff David failed to impact me like the stuff with Maine did.
I enjoyed a lot of the anime, but yeah. Flaws.
Rebecca’s death was purely shock value
Lucy is a groomer. She was clearly an adult with an extensive history and he was a dumb 16 year old kid whose mom just died.