The League of Less than Ordinary Gentlemen
An Analysis of the Punk
-Steam and Cyberpunk

For this section I attempted to read and then subsequently drop League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore. The genre of both cyberpunk and steam punk has very much now become and aesthetic/look in contemporary and modern works. They have become now a setting which to place a story, game or show. What was then a genre in which tropes and conventional plot points existed now become a tool/setting to drive forward a story. The punk genres now serve as a critique/reflection of our society and values as a whole. For example, In the works Ghost in the Shell, Blade runner, Blade Runner 2049, and Deus Ex: Human Revolution, we are introduced to a world in which personal freedoms are gone and capitalism and materialism reign supreme. The ideas and practices of consumerism and the trade between personal rights in exchange for services and ease of life are prevalent in the works of cyberpunk. Human life no longer has value; they are now currency/object in this world. With this also comes into the moral ambiguities in a world of consumerism. What constitutes as human now? Freedom vs safety? What is the measure of the human soul if in this world it has no value or freedom and is instead treated like a commodity? Unlike the space operas cyberpunk goes more into depth the stories and fable like cautionary tales of the past to explore the human psyche and its behavior.

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