Keanu Reeves certainly made a splash at E3 2019 when he showed up on Xbox’s stage last year. Now, Cyberpunk 2077 has finally released, and everyone is meeting Reeves’ portrayal of Johnny Silverhand in their respective playthroughs. As one of the most iconic characters in the Cyberpunk tabletop RPG’s universe, it makes sense that an actor with the pedigree of Reeves would be cast in such a role for one of the most anticipated games of all time. Johnny Silverhand was the frontman rockerboy of Samurai, who had supposedly died in 2023 after the bombing of Arasaka’s headquarters, but that doesn’t technically happen in Cyberpunk 2077.
During the beginning hours of Cyberpunk 2077, regardless of which lifepath a player chooses, a series of events brings V into contact with Johnny Silverhand. No, not the living Johnny Silverhand who would theoretically be an elderly man, but a cyber-biologic version of the legend. Cyberpunk 2077 performs an interesting narrative retcon to bring Johnny Silverhand “back to life,” setting up the main questline for the game. While Cyberpunk 2077 is still certainly its own unique story in the Cyberpunk universe, the game draws from some significant Johnny Silverhand lore to frame its main story in an intelligent and lore-appropriate manner.
In the original Cyberpunk tabletop version of Johnny Silverhand’s story, much of the events match what happens in Cyberpunk 2077‘s story. By the year 2013 (in Cyberpunk‘s universe), Johnny Silverhand’s band “Samurai” had already split up, and he was finding his own success as a solo act. His girlfriend, skilled netrunner Alt Cunningham, was finding similar success in her career in developing cyberware for neural processing. Ironically, while Silverhand’s musical performances celebrated anti-corporation and antigovernmental messaging, Cunningham’s work in neural processing cyberware caught the attention of the ITS corporation and it funded her R&D.
Arasaka, a rival corporation to ITS, had discovered what Alt Cunningham was working on and wanted to co-opt her efforts for their own benefit. After one of Johnny Silverhand’s concerts, Alt Cunningham was kidnapped by Arasaka’s mercenaries, forcing her to work on a software called “Soulkiller.” This software would essentially backup and restore a netrunner’s mind on any subject, killing that person’s original body in the process. However, when Johnny organized a rescue effort to save Alt, one of Arasaka’s goons initiated Soulkiller on Alt, which uploaded her conscience to the Net while her physical body died. Johnny would later learn how Alt may still be “alive.”
Years later, in retaliation, Johnny Silverhand would lead a military assault on Arasaka’s headquarters alongside several infamous Night City mercenaries. In a bout to end the Fourth Corporate War, Johnny would lead a strike team with a mini-nuke payload straight into Arasaka tower. Additionally, Johnny had learned Alt was still alive on the Net, so he wanted to know for sure if she was still around. At the end of the night, the nuke was detonated in Arasaka’s headquarters. Johnny Silverhand was nowhere to be found, presumably killed by the borg Adam Smasher. His body was never found, presumably because the nuclear detonation would’ve disintegrated everything.
As mentioned previously, Johnny Silverhand follows a similar trajectory in Cyberpunk 2077, but things really change at the Arasaka bombing. Unbeknownst to Johnny, Alt’s Soulkiller neural processing software was still in the hands of Arasaka at the time of the bombing. In Cyberpunk 2077‘s timeline of events, Johnny Silverhand didn’t actually die in Arasaka’s headquarters at the hands of Adam Smasher. Rather, he was incapacitated and later captured from the rubble and brought to Saburo Arasaka. After a short interrogation, Johnny Silverhand was instead killed, physically speaking, via the administration of Alt Cunningham’s Soulkiller software.
That’s where the player’s perspective comes in, as the biochip stolen in the beginning hours of Cyberpunk 2077‘s story is Johnny Silverhand’s conscience. As for why the heir of Arasaka is still holding on to Johnny Silverhand’s uploaded conscience, well that becomes the subject of Cyberpunk 2077‘s main story to tell.
It’s an interesting move by Cyberpunk 2077: Not only does the game’s story not sacrifice any of the original narrative from Johnny Silverhand’s story, but instead builds off of it in a compelling way. Using Alt’s Soulkiller to contextualize Johnny Silverhand’s influence on V’s story makes for an interesting character dynamic, without making the game’s story seem too linear either. Players can influence and reason with Johnny Silverhand, largely because they have to, but also as a sort-of narrator for the protagonist. That way the whole blank-slate protagonist now has color commentary from a frankly unreliable narrator, adding a strange layer of depth to the game’s story.
While Johnny Silverhand’s fate is arguably just as tragic in Cyberpunk 2077 compared to the source material, his involvement in the game feels all the more organic within the narrative. His arduous and confrontational relationship with V makes sense when players discover the origins of Soulkiller and why he’s been injected into the player’s conscience. Players’ adventures in Night City would’ve been lacking without it.
Cyberpunk 2077 is available now on PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One, with PS5 and Xbox Series X versions also in development.
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