Cyberpunk 2077: You Have My Word #2

Cyberpunk 2077: You Have My Word #2

Dark Horse Comics 2021

Written by Bartosz Sztybor

Illustrated by Jesús Hervás

Coloured by Giulia Brusco

Lettered by Frank Cvetkovic

With the death of her daughter embroiled in a network of dangerous cyberpunks and a suspicious connection to a major corporation, Teresa returns to a life she had left behind—but Night City's grown larger and darker—to get some answers, she'll need an upgrade…

I am immensely enjoying this. While I was kind of upset that Oriona was killed last issue but this issue more than makes up for that. I would have preferred she lived and was able to go on the run or something but as it stands we get the next best thing in her mother going to the city to find out exactly what happened to her daughter. We always say that a mother will protect her young to the death and usually in some animal kingdom kind of analogy but to be fair (to be fair--to be fair) don’t piss off a mum in any way shape or form and killing her daughter has awoken a sleeping giant. She’s also pretty badass and I have to say that I think I’ve found a new hero in Teresa.

I think the way that this is being told is pretty brilliant. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceptionally well. The character development that we see through the dialogue, the character interaction as well as how they act and react to the situations and circumstances which they encounter continue to flesh them out as these believable people. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing more and more of the story the more and more impressed that I become with this book.

I really like the way that we see this being structured and how we see the layers within the story continue to grow, evolve and strengthen. The layers within the story contain the characterisation, the plot twists and so much other goodness and whether they work with the main arc or swirl around it they add depth, dimension and complexity to the story. How we see everything working together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is achieved extremely well.

The interiors here are really rather amazingly well rendered. The linework is fantastic and how we see the varying weights and techniques being utilised to create this level of detail in the work that we see is astonishing. I really like how we see backgrounds being utilised throughout the book to enhance and expand the moments but how they work within the composition of the panels to bring out the depth perception, sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story is extremely nice to see. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a remarkable eye for storytelling. The colour work is exceptionally rendered. The various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work exceptionally well rendered.

​

There is this great electricity and excitement surrounding this book and it is hard to put in exact words how it makes you feel but it’s palpable. How Teresa feels about Alina is more than obvious and that she’s not letting this girl out of her sight during all this is interesting and completely untrustworthy although I suppose if you are Teresa and your daughter was murdered you’d be even more distrustful than usual. That and somehow she’s ashamed that her daughter loved another woman makes it even kind of worse. With such strong and powerful writing and these amazing interiors start off this chapter with aplomb.