cyberdoomer

[cyberdoomer]

true

[cyberdoomer]

Depressing commentary ahead (sorry):

Mike Pondsmith has said he is working on a history of Johnny Silverhand. It begins with him being sold by his dad for a pack of cigarettes at the age of 4.

Mike doesn’t say who bought him, which is scary to think about, but regardless… yikes. With a kind of dad like that, we can imagine his first 4 years on Earth were …not conducive to developing a secure attachment style. Later, he was taken in by a group of Nomads.

Interview with Pondsmith below. Note: I attached a time stamped link to start at the discussion, but I can’t get it to work on tumblr. It works everywhere else. 🤷🏼‍♀️

The discussion starts at 32:18.

So, what was he like as a kid/teen?

Opinion - besides being a little trouble magnet, his ACEs quiz score would be pretty abysmal, for one. Or as Johnny would say, he was “fucked in the head”. He would have been much less temperamental due to not having cyberpsychosis (yet), but he was still dealing with heavy childhood PTSD from the very beginning.

If the Nomads who took him in were at least somewhat good to him and grounding, having a positive experience in a family-like community would have likely kept him from going over the edge sooner in life. Perhaps they encouraged him to play guitar and write songs around the campfire, which was an outlet for his many developing issues that helped him cope, until he got older. Plus, his raw talent got him the attention from adults he missed early in life.

When V experiences his memories on stage, they say something along the lines of feeling full of hatred, no matter how much he screamed into the mic. So, Johnny was trying to get it out, but couldn’t. (The alcoholism, drugs and cyberpsychosis didn’t help, but I’d imagine music was some kind of outlet for him as a kid.)

Anger issues aside, being abandoned as a small child in such a profoundly brutal way would cause a person to develop DEEP feelings of absolutely zero fucking self worth. In his case, this lead to narcissism as a defense mechanism that probably started early on, but wasn’t nearly as bad as it became.

Johnny joining the military at age 15 to do the “right” thing was not only residual childlike enthusiasm/idealism/naivety that he held onto despite his rough childhood (he was stubborn as hell), but perhaps it was also him trying to escape his life and become someone “worth” more than a pack of smokes. From the age of 4, it was imprinted in his psyche that he was basically worthless. Shit like that in early childhood gets baked right into the limbic system. He spent most, if not all of his life, trying to prove otherwise (very loudly).

And yeah, the war, plus bonus cyberpsychosis from the arm was the final nail in the coffin for Robert John Linder…

tl;dr - he was fucked in the head

what kind kid/teen you think johnny was?

i just see him as really open and passionate about his friends and hobbies (with some teen edge ofc as he grows older).

like that's part of the reason why he enlisted willingly. he says himself he was one of the kids who heard that they'll look cool while "fighting for the right cause" and went with it.

[cyberdoomer]

The hubby got me this sticker.

[cyberdoomer]

Hell yes, this is what I wanna see. More 2013/2020!

Where else will you find Adam Smasher in a Hard Rock t-shirt?

P.S. @chipped-chimera You should absolutely read it. I have a whole ass library of sourcebooks from the 80s & 90s. Even if you don’t play, it’s worth it for the lore alone. Rache Bartmoss’ Guide to the Net is one of the most entertaining things I’ve read.

Johnny canonically struggles to pick locks.

Klepped from the 1988 edition of Cyberpunk.

[cyberdoomer]

Johnny canonically struggles to pick locks.

Klepped from the 1988 edition of Cyberpunk.

[cyberdoomer]

me and the filipino baddie i pulled by being an insufferable piece of shit

[cyberdoomer]

the real tragedy of Loki (2021-23) is that loki and sylvie never got to stab each other. not once. not even a little bit. 😔

[cyberdoomer]

My absolute favorite official Cyberpunk 2077 art from CDPR is this piece by Łukasz Poller

Not just for the old school Edward Hopper style and Syd Mead vibes that's used, but just because there's something very simple and easy about it. I feel like the plot moves so fast that it never seems like V can catch a break within the story. But in this piece, they're just chilling, shooting the shit, like it's a lazy day in. The air looks still, the conversation seems lazy. V's not even dressed.

I can't even explain it. Guess there's just something comforting about the world as you know it crumbling around you and still being able to find a moment to breathe during it.

[cyberdoomer]

johnny for @lenspluslight pose challenge week

[cyberdoomer]

“Johnny Silverhand - at least he’s not Kerry.” -Spider Murphy

Excerpt klepped from Rache Bartmoss’ Guide to the Net.

[cyberdoomer]

✅ Born to wear cute updos and make terrible life choices with this gonk.

❌ Forced to fuck a cop.

[cyberdoomer]

It me.

[cyberdoomer]

brrhhhhh

[cyberdoomer]

Arasaka Tower || 8.20.23

[cyberdoomer]

we are the daughters of parents who should not have had kids

[cyberdoomer]

[cyberdoomer]