Hosts In The Shell

You've all been very good children this year, so cyber-Santa has a special treat for you: the Hosts are having a crack at a shambolic award ceremony!! A crew of returning guests share their well wishes and their votes for best cyberpunk release of 2022 - tune in to find out who will win the coveted (ahem) award, and whether Jon has actually seen any of them... Featuring ace augmented humans:...

After months of pathetic excuses for not playing Cyberpunk 2077 yet, Jon has been forced at mantis-blade-point by Matt to whet his appetite with Studio Trigger's 2022 spinoff anime series Cyberpunk: Edgerunners. Spoiler alert: it's good!!

It's a bit late for Halloween, but that didn't stop the boys getting dark and disturbing in this episode about CYBERPUNK BODY HORROR!! Brilliant writer, Japanophile, livewire and cyberpunk encyclopedia Brent Millis joins the show to discuss classics like Tetsuo: The Iron Man and various other media where people get unwanted bits grafted on... 

Break out the cyber-champagne and the, errr, nanotech party poppers, because it's time for the CYBERPUNK DAY festivities to commence!!! In honour of 2022's celebration of all things cyberpunk, the Hosts thought they'd take the opportunity to self-indulgently interview each other about their favourite works that haven't made it onto the podcast so far - comedy, controversy and c...

It's yet another adaptation of a Philip K Dick masterwork, this time (The) Minority Report, which was blockbusterized in 2002 and is beloved by many, including brilliant and extremely likeable cyberpunk writer Frasier Armitage! Tune in to hear us to chat to him about this Spielberg/Cruise heavy-hitter, and help us prove the system is infallible...

Jon's stretching the definition of cyberpunk to breaking point, but it's all for a good reason, because in this episode the Hosts get to talk about one of the greatest and most influential first-person shooters of all time with one of the greatest and most influential YouTubers and modders in the Quake community! The brilliant Dumptruck_DS talks about how Id Software's masterpiece i...

It had to happen... the Hosts finally tackle arguably the biggest cyberpunk work of all time, Neuromancer, along with its genre-defining creator whose shadow looms terrifyingly large across a Matrix of his making!! Thankfully their prayers to the cyber-gods were answered and a brilliant writer, William Gibson expert and all-round top bloke was beamed in to join them, in the shape of Tim Standish.

After a chance encounter at a recent comic book event, the Hosts are delighted to welcome multi-talented musical genius Kavus Torabi to the show, who was kind enough to take time out of his massively busy schedule (where he fronts or performs in at least 87 different bands including Gong, Knifeworld and recent Glastonbury debutants The Utopia Strong) to discuss his influences, favourite comics, ps...

This week the boys are joined by disturbingly brilliant horror writer and Schwarzenegger super-fan Zoe-Lee O'Farrell to discuss the terrifying sci-fi/horror mash-up that is the original Terminator... and to attempt to rank it alongside the rest of the franchise's movie instalments! Tune in to find out which of the more recent sequels was banished to the hydraulic crusher... 

Imagine if Doctor Frankenstein had had access to cyberpunk technology... the sinister monstrosity he created would have been about 10% as shambolic and disturbing as this very special mash-up episode!! We had a brilliant time chatting to the fantastic crew of the L0wl1f3 podcast about Avalon, Mamoru Oshii's underappreciated 2001 live-action cyberpunk movie.

The Hosts are joined this time by phenomenally talented writer, oracle of cyberpunk knowledge and utterly lovely fella, Nik Whittaker, to discuss one of Kurt Russell's most memorable performances as the grizzled, eye-patch wearing anti-hero, Snake Plissken! Listen as all hell breaks loose when Jon suggests that John Carpenter's masterpiece Escape From New York might not count as cyberpun...

What kind of self-respecting cyberpunk podcast waits until its 14th episode to cover Blade Runner!?? Erm, this one, it would seem... the Hosts finally tackle this genre stalwart (as well as its sequel and spinoffs) with special guest and brilliant writer Craig Lea Gordon - see if you can guess which of us failed the Voight-Kampff test!

Matt and Jon are joined by the razor-sharp mind of Rachel E Beck to discuss her brilliant books, the Glitch Logs, as well as the crossover of the cyberpunk and superhero genres as embodied in the animated series Batman Beyond! Encompassing systems theory, the horrors of the class divide in education, and the Joker shooting a bloke dead with a comedy gun, this is possibly our most wide-ranging epis...

In this episode, the Hosts' excitement is at fever pitch as they welcome legendary comic book and graphic novel artist and writer, Bryan Talbot!! Creator of Luther Arkwright, Bryan is discussing the brand new volume of the hero's adventures, as well as his other award-winning works including Alice in Sunderland and Grandville, and exploring the multiverse decades before Marvel did...

This time round the Hosts are scrutinising Leigh Whannell's 2018 cyberpunk action blockbuster, Upgrade... tune in to find out if the movie is an enhanced extravaganza or a botched operation!

Matt's back with a vengeance, joining Jon and awesome writer Ted Weber to discuss Ted's cyberpunk fiction, as well as the popular genre trope of the plight of the underclass... but can the trio avoid becoming technologically obsolete!?

Matt is taking a well-earned break for this episode, so instead Jon is joined by ultra-talented writer and architectural genius Jim Keen to discuss gore-splattered science fiction classic, Robocop!! Tune in immediately... you have fifteen seconds to comply.

In this episode the lads are joined by CT Phipps, whose works include the wildly successful Supervillainy Saga and awesome cyberpunk parody Daughter Of The Cyber Dragons... and speaking of parodies, he's here to explain why Snow Crash is both one of the best and most famous cyberpunk novels ever written, and also a top-drawer genre parody! Find more about CT and his work here: https://ctphipp...

Matt and Jon are delighted to welcome the awesome and incomparable Mark Everglade to the show; Mark is a writer, musician, polymath and all-round genius (as well as a lovely fella!) and much of this episode consists of the Hosts trying to cling on to Mark's coattails as his mind takes us on a tour of cyberpunk philosophy and other fascinating concepts - enjoy!

Your favourite augmented analysts are on their own this time, and enthusing about a debatably cyberpunk but unarguably ace movie, Total Recall!! The Arnie one is the main focus, but they'll touch also on the 2012 remake, which despite an all-star cast is bereft of the magic of the original... and also of Richter, much to Jon's chagrin!

In this episode, Jon and Matt are delighted to welcome S.C. Jensen, creator of cyber noir thriller series Bubbles In Space, to talk about the thriving cyberpunk indie writing scene! An insightful chat with a fantastic writer and top-quality human - what more could the lads want??

Matt and Jon welcome ace cyberpunk writer Patrick Tillett to the show to discuss the much-maligned nineties cyberpunk cinema flop, Johnny Mnemonic... but how can a movie with Dolph Lundgren on fine form, Keanu Reeves in his prime, Takeshi Kitano as the baddie and a Vietnam war veteran dolphin (!?) be anything other than a smash hit??

Two episodes in and Jon and Matt are having their first feud!! Will their dispute about the quality of the new Matrix movie threaten to tear the podcast, and the world as we know it, apart?? Or will they politely disagree, and move on to discussing how ace the first movie was? Tune in to find out... (Huge thanks as always to Peter Ormerod for the cool theme music!!)

Jon and Matt are delighted to welcome the show's ever guest, specifically the queen of cyberpunk herself and creator behind the gripping Behind Blue Eyes novels, Anna Mocikat! Anna talks to the lads about her love of Ghost In The Shell and how it inspired her own work, and their wide-ranging chat takes in everything from underrated sequels and controversial live action remakes to cybernetic M...

Like all the best works of cyberpunk, our trailer has been cobbled together using spare parts, duct tape, and the most sophisticated hacking equipment we could scavenge... check it out so you can get as excited as we are about our new show, Hosts In The Shell! (Big thanks to Peter Ormerod for the cool synthy music in the background)