Apple TV+ remains the dark horse of streaming that just keeps on delivering. We say it here a lot. While everyone talks Netflix, Disney+, and Amazon, and while Paramout+, Peacock, and the others create news by wondering what the hell to do with themselves, Apple TV just quietly sits there in the corner churning quality content.
Yet their parent company has perhaps the deepest pockets of them all, with so much actual ca$h in the business that shareholders frequently try and want bigger dividends.
If something is big, expensive, and possibly a little bit of a gamble, Apple TV+ quietly presses the “Go” button on it. Next up for them is Neuromancer.
Unless you have been living in a geek-free cave for about 40 years, you will know that Neuromancer is a 1984 science fiction novel by American-Canadian writer William Gibson. It is considered one of the earliest and best-known works in the cyberpunk genre. Famously, it is the only novel to win the Nebula Award, the Philip K. Dick Award, and the Hugo Award. It would go on to establish the Sprawl trilogy. Perhaps most impressively, it was Gibson’s debut novel.
It tells the story of Henry Dorsett Case. He is a low-level hustler in the dystopian underworld of Chiba City, Japan. Once a talented computer hacker and “console cowboy”, Case was caught stealing from his employer. As punishment, Case’s central nervous system was damaged, leaving him unable to access the virtual reality dataspace called the “matrix”.
He partners with Molly, an augmented mercenary with mirrored eyes, and is pulled into a web of digital espionage and high-stakes crime as they attempt a heist on a huge corporation that will stop at nothing to prevent them from succeeding.
Apple TV+ has reportedly ordered a ten-episode series adaptation. This has been set up at Skydance Television and Anonymous Content. Co-creators Graham Roland (Dark Winds, Jack Ryan) and JD Dillard (Sleight) are behind this project. Roland will be the showrunner with Dillard directing the pilot and both will executive produce.
Cyberspace, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, and the technology revolution were not really a thing back in 1984, so the world presented in the book was mindblowing. Nearly all of those things are now commonplace, so the challenge will be how to capture the mood of the book in this new reality.
Roland and Dillard say in a joint statement:
“We’re incredibly excited to be bringing this iconic property to Apple TV+. Since we became friends nearly ten years ago, we’ve looked for something to team up on, so this collaboration marks a dream come true. Neuromancer has inspired so much of the science fiction that’s come after it and we’re looking forward to bringing television audiences into Gibson’s definitive ‘cyberpunk’ world.”
Several attempts to adapt Neuromancer in the past have failed, but none of them would have had Apple streaming money. There was a 1988 video game role-playing adaption with a soundtrack by Devo.
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