Mark your calendar: on October 20, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 landed on Netflix with ten new episodes, a brand-new cast, and CD PROJEKT RED joining forces with studio TRIGGER once again.
New legends are coming in this standalone story, so now is the perfect time to look back at the show that started it all.
When CD PROJEKT RED teamed up with studio TRIGGER for a Cyberpunk anime, fans had one question: could anyone fit the chaos, chrome, and heartbreak of Night City into ten episodes?
Then Cyberpunk: Edgerunners hit Netflix in September 2022, and the answer was a resounding yes.
The Show that Sent Everyone Back to Night City
Edgerunners didn’t arrive alone. It came alongside the Edgerunners Update for Cyberpunk 2077, which brought new gigs, transmog, and gear pulled straight from the show. And since the anime takes place in the same Night City players already
know from Cyberpunk 2077, you could finish an episode, boot up the game, and walk the same streets David did.
And people did, in huge numbers. Within days of the premiere, Cyberpunk 2077‘s Steam player count shot up. Within weeks, the game was sitting at the top of Steam’s bestseller charts. Veterans came home. Newcomers showed up for the first time, sold
on Night City by an anime they’d binged in a weekend.
The momentum didn’t stop there. Update 2.0 and the Phantom Liberty expansion followed in 2023, and a whole new wave of players was ready for them. Few adaptations can say they changed the story of the game they came from.
Edgerunners can.
TRIGGER: Controlled Chaos, Perfectly Cast
If you’ve seen Kill la Kill or Promare, you know TRIGGER’s style: explosive motion, neon-soaked color, and action that never stops to catch its breath. Put that studio in Night City and it feels less like a collaboration than a reunion.
Director Hiroyuki Imaishi keeps the pace fast on purpose. Episodes rush forward the way David’s life does, with no brakes and no time to look back. By the final episodes, you realize the speed was the point. The show pulled you in so fast you never had a chance to brace yourself.
The fights hit hard and look gorgeous doing it. This is a version of Night City only animation could deliver.
The Voices Behind the Legend
A story this intense needs performances that can keep up, and the Edgerunners cast delivers.
Zach Aguilar (Tanjiro in Demon Slayer) makes David impossible not to root for, even as he pushes himself further than anyone should. In the Japanese version, KENN brings the same fire. Emi Lo gives Lucy a quiet, aching depth that becomes the show’s emotional core. Giancarlo Esposito turns Faraday into pure ice. And Alex Cazares made Rebecca so unforgettable that a supporting character became a fandom icon almost overnight.
Great voice work can make or break a story. In Edgerunners, it’s part of the reason these characters live rent-free in fans’ heads years later.
David’s Story: a Kid Who Wanted More
David Martinez starts out as a student at Arasaka Academy, fighting to keep his head above water in a city built to drown people like him. After he loses his mother, he makes a choice that changes everything: he installs a military-grade Sandevistan, an implant that lets him move at superhuman speed, and steps onto the path of an edgerunner.
He falls in with a crew led by Maine, who takes him under his wing. From there (no spoilers), David’s story takes him from the classroom to the sharpest edge of Night City’s streets. Edgerunners stays true to everything cyberpunk stands for, and that’s exactly why it hits so hard. You’ll feel this one long after the credits roll.
You don’t need a single hour in Cyberpunk 2077 to fall for this show. That’s its quiet superpower. It’s a perfect entry point, and it’s why so many viewers went straight from Netflix to exploring Night City in Cyberpunk 2077.
An original hero, real emotional weight, fearless pacing, and a cast firing on all cylinders: Edgerunners earned its Anime of the Year crown at the 2023 Crunchyroll Anime Awards.
Bring Night City on Your Walls
Edgerunners didn’t follow the adaptation playbook. It wrote its own. Instead of retelling the game, it gave us something new: one kid, one city, one unforgettable run. And it brought a whole generation of fans into the Cyberpunk universe.
If the show left a piece of Night City lodged in your chest, you can keep it on your wall too. Displate’s officially licensed Cyberpunk: Edgerunners metal poster collection features character portraits of David, Lucy, Rebecca, Maine, and Faraday, plus iconic scenes from the series.
New legends hit Night City on October 20. Gear up your walls before they do.
