Apple’s Neuromancer Adaptation Finally Gets a Teaser

Along with Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, William Gibson’s 1984 novel Neuromancer is the urtext for modern cyberpunk. Although it wasn’t the first cyberpunk novel, there’s no denying that Neuromancer’s vision of all-powerful megacorps, console cowboys who traverse cyberspace with their minds, and sleekly augmented street samurai is what most people think of when they think of the genre.

Over the last 40+ years, there have been several attempts at a Neuromancer film. Back in the early ’00s, Chris Cunningham signed on to write and direct an adaptation, with Aphex Twin providing the soundtrack. Although Cunningham’s script received Gibson’s blessing, the film never materialized, making it one of cinema’s great “What if?” projects. But in February 2024, Apple announced a 10-episode Neuromancer TV series that will sit alongside their other sci-fi adaptations (Foundation, Dark Matter, Silo). Here’s the official synopsis:

Neuromancer follows a damaged, top-rung super-hacker named Case (Callum Turner) who is thrust into a web of digital espionage and high-stakes crime with his partner Molly (Briana Middleton), a razor-girl assassin, as they pull off a heist on a corporate dynasty with untold secrets.

The above teaser gives us our first real look at Apple’s vision of Chiba City, and it’s definitely promising. They seem to be leaning into the dystopian aspects and I appreciate that it looks like they’re not trying to modernize the novel’s tech or make it more “realistic.” (I’ve always liked Neuromancer’s nigh-fantastical approach to cyberspace; Gibson famously had no idea how computers actually worked when he wrote the novel.) We catch a few glimpses of Molly, the deadly “razorgirl” with the mirror shades and razor blades, as well as Case’s visions of cyberspace.

I am curious to see how Apple’s adaptation will approach the topic of AI, which figures heavily into the novel’s storyline but has obviously become a hot-button topic these days. We’ll find out when Neuromancer — which also stars Mark Strong, Peter Sarsgaard, Dane DeHaan, and Emma Laird — begins streaming on Apple TV on January 22, 2027.