Let You Down

"" is the first episode of CD Projekt RED and Studio Trigger's series.

Characters
In order of appearance:
 * James Norris
 * David Martinez
 * Gloria Martinez
 * Lucy
 * Katsuo Tanaka
 * Ripperdoc

Description

 * After a night of streaming illegal braindance, David wakes up to reality: a rundown apartment with a broken washing machine and an overworked mother.

Summary
Let You Down opens with a top-down view at night from the neon lit skyscrapers onto Corpo Plaza of Night City. NUSA military Lt. Col. James Norris is shown for a brief moment, before the scene switches into the middle of a crime scene with a voice-over conversation of the cops. Norris, who is heavily equipped with cyberware, goes cyberpsycho and shoots a cop through the window of his car, before he attacks the other NCPD officers, and activates his Sandevistan. MaxTac eventually can hack his system and is able to neutralise Norris.

The audience then realises, the shown action was actually a braindance, when the next scene introduces David Martinez, who just watched Norris' memory of this brutal event in his mother's apartment. He then is contacted by Doc, who admits he got this BD fresh from master editor Jimmy Kurosaki.

A new morning begins, David is staring into the washing machine, that still contains his wet school uniforms. He then wakes up his overworked mother, who is an emergency medical technician, in the living room. They discuss the money he needed for a necessary update for his class. Gloria wants him to get the legal update from her money, but David is frustrated and insists, Doc helped him with that matter and there is nothing to worry about. Network News 54 interrupts their conversation with the breaking news about Lt. Col. James Norris' death and missing cyberware. David is excited when he sees his mother on TV with the body bag, but she seems uneasy about something, interrupts the program and sends him to school. Before the scene switches to David on his way to school, Gloria gives someone with the name Maine a call, but nothing of this dialogue is revealed to the audience.

David wanders the crowded and rundown streets to the song "Who's Ready For Tomorrow". For a glimpse, he seems to see a girl with white hair, but within seconds, she is gone again and he continues his walk. He finally arrives at Arasaka Academy, and immediately is chided by his AI teacher for not wearing his uniform. Katsuo Tanaka, a privileged student, verbally attacks him and talks badly about David's tech. David brags about "his ways" of getting the expensive wreath update, but the next meditation session goes horribly wrong and David's illegal software damages the system.

Gloria and David are called to the principals office and she promises to pay for the repairs. The principal questions Gloria's financial situation and calls out David's misbehaviour in class, with a hint to better leave Arasaka Academy. Gloria insists, that David has all the right to attend.

On their way home in their car, Gloria is angry with David and they discuss the situation further, to the point, where David thinks about to just drop out, because he sees no future for a Santo kid at Arasaka. Gloria is heartbroken, since she wants David to succeed in this life, so she works the extra hours for him. Their ride suddenly comes to an end, when an Animals gang vehicle arrives next to them and the gang members begin to open fire. The gang then shoots another car, which tumbles over and crashes into Gloria's car. David finds himself buried under crashed car parts with fire all around him. In the distance, he can see his mother lying on the street. The Trauma Team arrives, but both of them are not clients of this service and are denied first aid.

The following scene shows, that David somehow managed it to get out and brought his mother to a run down hospital, where she received surgery. The surgeon gives David a bag with his mother's belongings, but his mother still needs to stay at the hospital. After arriving at the apartment, David must realise, the rent is past due and the apartment is locked. He breaks in through a window. Inside he opens the bag with his mother's items, and finds Norris' Sandevistan, the missing cyberware from the cyberpsycho incident that was shown earlier in the episode. He offers the cyberware implant to Doc, but the Ripperdoc wants it for only 10K, and David angrily leaves the call. David researches the Sandevistan's stats.

The next scene opens with the next morning, David is on his way to school again. He has a luring vision of delightful dancing white hair of the girl he had spotted the other day, but this time the image turns into the disapproving face of Katsuo. In an alley, Katsuo bullies David again, and finally beats him up with his Strong Arms 400 with Martial Arts chipware. Wounded, David breaks down in the alley and receives a call from the clinic about his mother's demise. He takes the cremated remains of Gloria and walks the Night City streets, and now also wears her EMT Jacket. While doing so, he receives a variety of voice messages, one is from the principal, who sent Gloria their payment details, he again mentions an institution transfer for David.

David returns home to the apartment with the ashes to the song "Let You Down". He offers the illegal cyberware again to Doc but he denies the old offer and now only would pay 6000 for it. David is devastated and unable to cope with the situation, and just in that moment, he also receives a call from Katsuo, who mocks him and his mother's death. In his anger and grief, David's eyes suddenly focus the cyberware in the bag, and he sees his chance for revenge.

The episode ends with a surprise visit at Doc's place and David's final lines, saying:

This quote is used again in the intro of S1/E2: Like A Boy.

Soundtrack

 * "Who's Ready For Tomorrow" - written and performed by Rat Boy
 * "Health" - written by Jake Duzsik, John Famiglietti, Lars Stalfors, Performed by Major Crimes
 * "Kevin" - written and performed by Antigama
 * "Let You Down" - By Dawid Podsiadło, Magdalena Laskowska
 * "This FFFire" - Franz Ferdinand (used in the credit roll)

Trivia

 * The episode is titled after Dawid Podsiadło's song "Let You Down" created for Cyberpunk: Edgerunners.
 * Katsuo's attack on David is a clear reference to Kenshirō's Hokuto Hyakuretsu Ken attack from the Fist of the North Star franchise.
 * David's contact with Lucy is already secretly set up in the first episode, without introducing her name. She can be seen from behind for a short moment in the city, when David runs through the streets to his school. In episode 3, it's revealed she also works for Maine.
 * "To chrome up" is a continuous theme in the series, although David is clearly warned by various characters.
 * David's story in the last episode also closes with a similar view on Corpo Plaza, like the opening scene in the first episode.