15 Comments

The youft will miss that allusion, having never encountered a TV that involved "tuning". Not the same thing as selecting the appropriate app...

Expand full comment
Dec 5, 2022Liked by John Birmingham

I've always wondered if it wasn't a sly reference to TS Elliot's The Lovesong of J Alfred Prurock:

"Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherized upon a table"

Expand full comment

There is a comment that it has gone through two different plausible meanings before finally becoming meaningless.

Early digital TVs went blue when tuned to a channel that wasn't broadcasting; current ones go black, but modern youft don't really have a concept of channels, or indeed TVs.

Expand full comment

Don't forget that Neuromancer was written (published) in 1984: digital broadcast wasn't yet a thing, so the "colour of television tuned to a dead channel" would have been analog amplified noise, possibly with echoes of nearby channels: the greyish shifting pattern that is sometimes shown in movies.

Perhaps even the not-so youft miss the allusion too.

Expand full comment

Sorry, I meant "two different plausible *alternative* meanings". Bad English; I know what the original meaning was.

Expand full comment

I think Gibson also wrote the Peripheral. The series on Amazon . A lot of fun so far. Chloe Grace Moretz is great.

Expand full comment

Indeed. I'm quite amazed at how well it's working. Almost perfectly cast, I think. Moretz is just about exactly as I had imagined Flyn.

Expand full comment

We will see. They fucked up Altered Carbon, so Im not hopeful -but you never know I guess

Expand full comment

sad emoji face. Apple TV is not on my list of streaming services. I can only hope that if they make it it turns out like Cowboy Beebop (actually i don't wish that on anyone, even out of jealousy)

Expand full comment

Squeeeeeeee.

So excited.

Expand full comment

Fingers crossed as it was a story I enjoyed reading, but as I am sure many can point out its a long way from buy the rights to see the production on screen.

Expand full comment

Yeah. The caution in my optimism stems mainly from Johnny Mnemonic...

Expand full comment

Also, my memory of Neuromancer is that the surface detail was gorgeous, but the plot was close to impenetrably obscure. Not sure that it could make any sense as a TV show.

Expand full comment

the complete disconnect of how 'cyberspace' works in the story and how it works 'in real life' may lend itself more to metaphor and fantasy in the TV series which the obscure plot may work in its favour.

Expand full comment

That's fair

Expand full comment