Hosts In The Shell

Just a small topic this week... no guest, just two Dune fans trying to cram an analysis of the legendary trilogy, every film and TV adaptation, the later novels and even the spinoff board and video games into a 45 minute podcast episode. Tune in to find out if we've managed to remotely scratch the surface of the desert planet!

The lads are delighted to chat to up-and-coming, painfully talented and irritatingly young artist Jim Hobbs about comic book art, working with bands and writers (including some terrifying character named Matt Adcock...), inspirations and his ingenious mashup Space Wumbles project!

(Check out Jim's stuff on Instagram @hobbsies_comics or e-mail him at [email protected])

Paul Cuisset's early 90s cinematic video game masterpiece is undoubtedly cyberpunk, pulling from all manner of movie inspirations of the time. Tune in to here the Hosts discuss it, its legacy, its troubled sequels, ramble on about completely off-topic stuff, and attempt questionable French accents.

Interviewing musicians is always an absolute treat, especially when we're already big fans!! New Arcades are a synthwave duo who've been making music since before that genre was a thing, including the theme tune to ace Robocop documentary RoboDoc! Join us to discuss their creative processes, favourite artists, and ramble about retro video games!!

https://www.newarcades.com/

It's an honour to welcome back returning guest and brilliant writer Jim Keen to talk about his fascinating new art project, as well as to compare and contrast the 1987 and 2025 movie adaptation of Richard Bachman's (aka Stephen King's) The Running Man! Find out whether the lads preferred the older cult classic, the new more faithful adaptation or, surprisingly, maybe neither??

(Check out Jim's work at jimkeen.com, or visit fleetobscura.substack.com)

For full disclosure, although our podcast name is a pun on the title of this seminal manga and its myriad adaptations, we don't purport to be absolute experts - in truth, like everyone else we're just massive fans of the Mamoru Oshii anime version (as well as its spin-offs and sequel).

So when we heard there was a new version hitting our screens in 2026, and that it was a more faithful adaptation of the original manga, we had some trepidation about checking out - after all, how could it possibly surpass the 1995 classic?? Well, having watched all...

Put on your best sleeve and join us for part 2 of our interview with the legendary Richard K Morgan, author of Altered Carbon as well as a HOST (see what we did there) of other brilliant books!

In episode 2 we talk more about Richard's work, as well as the writing and ideation process (and how it's bizarrely similar to rock-climbing), and even veer off into famously non-controversial topics like AI and politics!

Enjoy the show, and please don't forget to visit Richard's website at www.richardkmorgan.com for the latest RKM news, including details of...

It isn't often you get to interview a person that meets the following criteria:

i)  Is a literary hero and writer of some of the best books ever

ii)  Is cyberpunk royalty

iii)  Is a fascinating interviewee

iv)  Is a lovely bloke

... but in Richard K Morgan, we have managed to achieve this implausible superfecta!! (And also learned a new word by googling 'what is a trifecta but for 4?')

Feast yer ears on the first half of our bumper-length cyberpunk showdown with one of the genre's grea...

The last time we talked about Fallout, we crammed in the entire video game series, some spinoffs, and of course the first season of the hugely popular Amazon Prime TV series!! This time we're focusing (ish) solely on season 2 of the latter, which was bigger, more ambitious, and potentially a bit more muddled... find out if we survived our visit to the Mojave Wasteland, or if we were gobbled up by deathclaws...

Who could be more cyberpunk than the man who wrote Blade Runner (aka Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?), Total Recall (aka We Can Remember It For You Wholesale), Minority Report and a host of other revered books, short stories and future movie adaptations??

The answer, actually, is multi-award-winning author T R Napper, a man who is LITERALLY a doctor of cyberpunk!!! Hear his thoughts on one of the greatest writers of all time, as well as on his own brilliant books including the recently-released This Machine Kills Billionaires...

Tim's website: https://nappertime.com/

You've probably heard Jon talk about Robocop about five million times, because he loves the film so much he's probably seen it about that many times... but you'll rarely have heard him mention the largely forgotten 2014 remake, because until now he's never seen it! Tune in to find out if the star-studded movie really is as much of a flop as ED-209's boardroom demo...

We are honoured and delighted to welcome another big-hitting literary guest to our humble show, this time celebrated British sci-fi and fantasy writer Adrian Tchaikovsky! Famed for writing about non-human intelligences, Adrian also makes some fascinating predictions about future technological advances... as well as a compelling case that spiders might be alright after all.

Adrian's website: https://adriantchaikovsky.com/

Find Adrian on Bluesky: @aptshadow

Adrian's podcast: https://starshipalexandria.com/

Not cyberpunk?? Pffffffft we'll be the judges of that! And anyway, who can begrudge us an episode to enthuse about arguably the greatest beat-em-up of all time... just watch out for bin chickens!

The term 'legend' gets bandied about... but today's guest absolutely 100% meets the necessary criteria, having invented the word 'cyberpunk' as the title of his seminal 1980 short story!! We are honoured, delighted, starstruck and did we mention honoured to welcome Bruce Bethke to the show, who talks about being a genre pioneer along with his other work, including publishing other writers via Stupefying Stories (link below) , and tests even Matt's encyclopaedic literary knowledge to the limit!

Find Cyberpunk here: https://www.infinityplus.co.uk/stories/cpunk.htm

Stupefying Stories: https://stupefyingstories.com/

The lads are back, this time to chat about George Miller's iconic Mad Max movies!! Get ready for a guzzoline-soaked race through a wasteland that's anything but MEDIOCRE!!!!!

No daft puns this time: it's an interview with Hugh Howey, the phenomenally talented, staggeringly successful, and astoundingly likeable writer, known primarily for his smash hit Silo novels, which went from self-published short pieces to internationally acclaimed novels and more recently an Apple TV adaptation!! Can't wait for you to hear this one: we're Silover the moon about it (okay maybe one daft pun...)

https://hughhowey.com/

Is this the least cyberpunk thing we've ever covered? Probably! Does it feature a loveable robot who inarguably embodies the true spirit of badass punk?? Possibly!! Is there one incredibly problematic aspect to these movies that the lads had completely forgotten about when they decided to talk about them??? Very much so!!!

The baddies are always the best characters... but which of cyberpunk's rogues' gallery deserve the title of all-time greatest? Tune in to hear the lads joined by brilliant writer Tim Standish, author of The Sterling Directive, as they attempt to answer this very question...

Where to find more about Tim:

Website: https://timstandish.co.uk/who-is-tim-standish/

Twitter: @TimStandishUK

In today's episode, Matt and Jon are chatting about Harlan Ellison's massively influential 1967 short story, as well as its 1995 video game adaptation! In a typically rambling chat, they're also debating the most evil AI of all time, as well as the art of the perfect movie trailer...

Today's topic is another gem of a cyberpunk movie, Neill Blomkamp's Elysium, and today's guest is a gem of a cyberpunk writer, the prolific Phil Stitelmann! Tune in for a fascinating chat with a top creator, as well as Jon attempting a South African accent so bad that it may constitute a war crime.

Phil's debut novella and other upcoming books and articles can be hunted down at the following co-ordinates...

Website: https://digital-gods-and-fallen-angels.com/

Patreon: patreon.com/c/PhilStitelmann/home

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@PhilStitelmann

Instagram: @phil...

If the lads had been able to think of a suitable pun, this podcast probably would have been named after Alien instead of Ghost In The Shell; that's how much they love this enduring, legendary, and admittedly patchy franchise. So it was with some trepidation that they ventured into Noah Hawley's TV show... tune in to find out what they made of it, and which character/eyeball stole the show!!

(Podmetheus? You Have My Sympodthies? Weyland You-hear-me?)

Our first guest of the new season is the brilliant, talented, likeable, articulate and all-round ace SD Miller; alongside his excellent Nekonikon Punk novels, we'll be discussing a cyberpunk gem of a video game: Watch Dogs: Legion!

We're trying to be a bit better about including our guests' contact deets, so here's where to find out more about SD Miller's great books:

Website: https://www.sdmiller.ca/

Substack/Newsletter: https://www.thistoo.ca/

Instagram: @nekonikonpunk

WE'RE BACK BAYBEHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! Season 3 of Hosts In The Shell kicks off in style with our customary discussion of something related to Ghost In The Shell, this time the spin-off anime series Standalone Complex. Tune in for an amusing and ever-so-slightly informative chat about the subject matter, a load of random tangents, and some EXCITING updates about forthcoming guests... including the creator of our brand new theme tune and inventor of the word 'cyberpunk' in his seminal 1983 short story, the staggeringly talented Bruce Bethke!!

The boys are BACK BAYBEHHHHH!!!!! Season 3 is incoming and promises more frequent episodes, the usual scintillating chat, some guests we're frankly staggered we managed to trick into appearing, and this rubbish trailer!!! Looking forward to wagging our cyber-chins with you in the coming weeks  :-)  :-)  :-)

Season two of Hosts In The Shell lurches, careens and, erm, clatters to the end of another rollercoaster run! It's just Matt and Jon to close it out, revisiting their main inspiration and beloved anime franchise to revisit and (sort of) reappraise the 2017 live action version... listen as they figure out what went wrong with the movie, gush about our lovely guests and audience, and fantasise about a cyber-resurgence for the UK...

As we hurtle like a malfunctioning hovercab towards our season finale, we thought it would be fun to dust off this 2021 recording: the first time Jon and Matt ever met! It was a guest appearance by Matt on Jon's other podcast, Dark Natter (where dark fiction gets dissected), but unsurprisingly Matt picked a cyberpunk topic - it's almost like this show was their inescapable destiny...

Those scoundrelly Hosts are joined by the far more wholesome, lovely, and massively talented cyber-graphic-novel-creator, Gustaffo Vargas, for a brilliant deep dive into the world of Peruvian cyberpunk! Tune in to find out how to modernise an ancient culture, Jon's favourite Studio Ghibli moment, and why Matt is changing his name to Adquot...

For those who haven't yet been introduced to this (ahem) masterpiece, Nemesis is the 1992 brainchild of legendary cyber-B-movie director Albert Pyun, and after you've watched it you'll be as incredulous as Jon that it spawned four sequels!! Tune in to find out what Jon and Matt made of this inexplicably endearing cyberpunk action (ahem) extravaganza...

Despite covering The Matrix Resurrections way back at the start of this podcast's existence (before the cyberpsychosis had really kicked in), the Hosts have unbelievably never covered the original Matrix trilogy! Thankfully, brilliant multi-genre writer Keith Anthony Baird was on hand to join us to remedy that shocking state of affairs, resulting in a belter of an episode that aims to once and for all answer the question: why were the Matrix sequels so much worse than the original masterpiece??

After years of podcasting, chatting and general cyber-film-buffery, it's unbelievable that the lads have only just realised they both absolutely love Kazuaki Kiriya's underrated (and bonkers) gem of a movie! Get yourselves suited up for a nice relaxing dip in a pool of body parts and Neo Cells...

It's about time we covered this modern classic novel and its TV adaptation, and we're delighted to be joined by multi-award-winning cyberpunk writer T R Napper to do it! Join us for another wide-ranging chat that veers into Aliens and Bishop's knife trick (not the Fall Out Boy song...)

Despite an all-star cast, the viewing public weren't enamoured with Kathryn Bigelow's millennium-paranoia-fuelled, disturbing-tech-exploring 1995 thriller... 30 years later, tune in to find out if the lads enjoyed the original SQUID game!

The Hosts are delighted to be joined by thriller writer extraordinaire, Don Hartshorn, to talk about Luc Besson's beloved and bonkers 1997 science fiction spectacular! Expect crazy costumes and deranged hairstyles, and that's before we even get to the movie...

Sometimes things go under your radar despite being really really really cyberpunky. That was definitely the case for Jon with today's topic, a 2019 movie co-written by James Cameron... Matt had already seen it, obvs.

It's been a LONG wait for decent Terminator output, but Netflix's 2024 anime series about a Skynet rival has been a hit with many fans of the ailing franchise - including brilliant cyberpunk writer James L Graetz, who joins us to talk about the show, his work, and the imminent apocalypse!

That's right, it's a merry cyber-Christmas once again, which can only mean one thing: time for a particularly daft episode that we wouldn't normally get away with! To celebrate Yuletide the Hosts welcome ChatGPT (aka Steve) to the show where they ask it hard-hitting questions like whether it's immoral for writers to use AI... and which reindeer would win in a fight.

Matt and Jon discuss Westworld, both the 1973 sci-fi horror western and the more recent TV series/Ed Harris cool-em-up! Find out why the Hosts loved the movie and the early seasons of the show, and why they think the later seasons ended up shambling around in the desert with memory loss...

Jon and Matt are joined by Larry Kuperman, Director of Business Development at the brilliant Nightdive Studios, to discuss how their remakes and remasters play a crucial role in video game preservation. His account of the trials and tribulations of remaking System Shock are fascinating, his sci-fi reading recommendations are eclectic, and his anecdotes are hilarious - a must-listen!

Those cybernetically augmented oddballs are back, and this time they're honoured to be joined by fantastic and award-winning science fiction writer Gareth L Powell! Gareth talks about his work, his new publishing imprint, and influences including William Gibson's Burning Chrome collection and uniquely weird short story The Game of Rat and Dragon by Cordwainer Smith.

Jon and Matt gush about one of their all-time favourite writers, including his many novels about the utopian Culture, erm, culture, as well as his other standalone books, into each of which Iain M Banks packed more ideas than most writers manage in an entire career - a legendary literary figure to whom the lads try to do justice in their usual rambling style!