Cyberpunk: Edgerunners: Plot, Characters, Timeline and Where to Watch

Timeline#

1. 2045Cyberpunk RED tabletop setting, after the Fourth Corporate War.
2. 2075Edgerunners opens. David loses his mother and gets a Sandevistan.
3. 2076The jobs get bigger and the series builds toward Arasaka Tower.
4. 2077Cyberpunk 2077 takes place.
5. 2078Edgerunners 2 takes place, about a year after the game.

What it is#

Edgerunners is an original net animation, which means it was made for streaming and never aired on TV. CD Projekt Red, the studio behind Cyberpunk 2077, co-produced it with Studio Trigger in Japan. Hiroyuki Imaishi directed. Netflix and CD Projekt announced it on June 25, 2020, during a Night City Wire livestream for the game.

All ten episodes dropped on September 13, 2022, and each runs 23 to 28 minutes. The series is a standalone tie-in: you do not need the game, and the game does not need the series. Akira Yamaoka composed the score, and Franz Ferdinand's "⁠This Fffire⁠" opens it. One evening is enough to watch it. Whether you recover is another matter.

The plot, spoiler-light#

David Martinez is a kid from Santo Domingo who attends Arasaka Academy on the strength of his mother's paramedic wages. After a tragedy in the first episode he gets a military-grade spinal implant, a Sandevistan, and drops out of the system that was supposed to be his way up.

A netrunner called Lucy pulls him into a crew of edgerunners, which is the Night City word for freelance mercenaries with chrome in their bodies. The crew takes jobs against Arasaka, the megacorp that owns most of the city. The question the series keeps asking is how much cyberware a body can take before the person stops being in charge.

Where it sits in the timeline#

The series runs from 2075 to 2076, so it comes just before Cyberpunk 2077, which is set in 2077. The tabletop game Cyberpunk RED is set in 2045, thirty years earlier. Edgerunners 2 is set in 2078, about a year after the game.

Canon note: Edgerunners is a CD Projekt Red story built on Mike Pondsmith's tabletop universe. When the older Cyberpunk 2020 books and the 2077 timeline disagree, 2077 and the anime win for anything set in the 2070s. Pondsmith's company, R. Talsorian Games, also published a 2024 tabletop kit, the Edgerunners Mission Kit, so you can play in the series' version of the city.

Who's who#

The main crew and the people around it. Voice actors are Japanese first, English second.

• David Martinez: The lead. Voiced by Kenn and Zach Aguilar. Full profile: David Martinez.
• Lucy: Netrunner and the series' second lead. Voiced by Aoi Yuki and Emi Lo. See Lucy.
• Rebecca: Firearms specialist, Pilar's younger sister. Voiced by Tomoyo Kurosawa and Alex Cazares. See Rebecca.
• Maine: Runs the crew and takes David in. Voiced by Hiroki Tochi and William C. Stephens.
• Dorio: Maine's girlfriend and second-in-command. Voiced by Michiko Kaiden and Marie Westbrook.
• Kiwi: Veteran netrunner and Lucy's mentor. Voiced by Takako Honda and Stephanie Wong.
• Pilar: The crew's techie and Rebecca's brother. Voiced by Wataru Takagi and Ian James Corlett.
• Falco: Nomad driver the crew hires. Voiced by Yasuyuki Kase and Matthew Mercer.
• Faraday: Fixer with ties to Militech. Voiced by Kazuhiko Inoue and Giancarlo Esposito.
• Adam Smasher: Arasaka's head of security. Voiced by Yukihiro Misono and Alec Newman. See Adam Smasher.

Reception and effect on the game#

Critics praised the writing, characters, action, animation and music. It entered Netflix's top ten in its first week, and sales and player counts for Cyberpunk 2077 rose after its release. The game launched in December 2020 to heavy criticism over bugs, and the anime is widely credited with helping its reappraisal. A cartoon fixed the game's reputation. Make of that what you will.

Beyond the screen, it spawned the MADNESS prequel manga, which follows Rebecca and Pilar and began on December 13, 2024, and it brought Lucy into Guilty Gear Strive as DLC on August 21, 2025.

Where to watch#

Netflix, worldwide, where it has been since launch. A Blu-ray box set from Aniplex came out on May 28, 2025 if you want to own it. Edgerunners 2 is also on Netflix; its confirmed facts live on a separate page, Cyberpunk Edgerunners season 2.

The English dub and the Japanese track are both good. Our read: the Japanese version suits the pacing slightly better, but Emi Lo's Lucy and the Smasher voice, which Alec Newman carried over from the game, are worth hearing in English.

Fixer's notes#

If the series sent you to the game, start Cyberpunk 2077. The Afterlife bar and Arasaka Tower, both on screen in the anime, are places you can walk into. The Night City page has the district map.

Tabletop players: the 2024 Edgerunners Mission Kit uses the RED rules and is set in the 2077 timeline, so you can run a crew like David's. Tip: tell your table the ending is coming. It makes the early sessions hurt more.

The crew's driver has a page too: Falco. So does the Arasaka executive they end up targeting, Tanaka.