THEMES / CONCEPTS
- CRIME: Hardwired
is all criminals, all the time. Virtually no one in the
book has any sort of legitimate job. The three major
protaganists are a hacker, an assassin, and a smuggler. [ESSAY]
- CYBERTECH: Hardwired
has, as one might expect from the name, lots of
cybertech. Cowboy is basically maxed out, from his
cybereyes to his hardwired, speeded-up reflexes. Sarah
has a deadly cybersnake living down her throat. Before he
dies, Reno is basically a brain living in a robot body,
the classic cyborg.
- POSTHUMANISM: The
question of what Reno has become is raised in Hardwired.
Cowboy, naturally, feels a profound sense of unease when
interacting with him. The book ends with Reno downloaded
into someone else, neatly putting an end to the ghost in
the machine, but raising new questions about the location
of identity.
- POST-WAR: Along with Neuromancer,
Hardwired is the defining example of the
meaning of the post-war environment in cyberpunk. The end
of the war was an end to the Earth's function; the whole
world is now a Third Word, being exploited for raw
materials, a captive market, and cheap labor by the
orbitals.
