It's a Trigger series. Awesomeness is practically in their blood at this point.
Warning: Spoilers Off applies to Awesome Moments pages. Proceed at your own risk.
Pre-Release
- The NSFW Trailer
(Yes, it is actually NSFW, not just named that) is an absolute feast for the eyes and ears. With a frantic electronic remix of "Ode to Joy" blaring in the background whilst scenes of absolute insanity fly by at a rapid pace, showing you just what kind of ride you're in for. A few standout moments in this trailer, however, are...- The unnamed cyberspsycho using his Super-Speed to rapidly point-blank shoot a squad lined up with guns in the back of their heads in less than a second.
- David on a gurney, rolling at high speeds down a freeway, with Lucy on top and laughing like she's having the time of her life.
- Maine punching a man's head clean off.
- David firing a bullet through a grenade in mid-air.
- Lucy using her Monowires to slice two people's heads clean off with a flourish.
Post-Release
- Once again, Trigger manages to set our expectations for the rest of the show in the first five minutes.
- To wit - we start with some absolutely gorgeous shots of Corpo Plaza.
- Then there's the cyberpsycho's rampage. He begins by taking out one cop via shotgun to the face, and then breaks out the rest of his arsenal, including a knee-mounted Mantis Blade when one unfortunate cop gets too close.
- There's also MaxTac's swift and efficient takedown of him when they arrive on scene, starting by overheating his system and then pumping him full of lead. When he still doesn't go down, one officer marches forward completely unimpeded by the barrage of bullets being sent his way and ends it via a charged Achilles shot point-blank to the face.
- As seen in the trailers, Lucy and David's high-speed escape via hospital gurney against freeway traffic, all capped off with Friday Night Firefight blasting as the soundtrack.
- David's first gig with Maine's crew. His original job was to steal a datashard off of their target that would let them access said target's car. He pulls it off, no sweat, but what happens afterwards is what causes it to make it onto this list.
- When the gig goes awry due to their target being randomly called in, David and Lucy have to jump into the car themselves. When their target inevitably catches them, David, with some encouragement by Maine, punches it and hightails it out of there. Of course, he then runs into a traffic jam up ahead, with Tyger Claws looking to claim the newly-placed bounty on their heads bearing down on them from behind. So what does he do? Jump the car over the divider and weave through incoming traffic with the help of his Sandevistan, even successfully managing to take out one of their pursuesrs via swerving out of the way of a garbage truck last-second.
- David's high tolerance for cyberware installation is considered this in-canon. Despite being a slightly scrawny 17 year old who'd never had a cybernetic before installing the millitary-grade Sandevistan, he manages to adjust to it far better than he should and uses it several times more than the recommended limit with barely any repercussions (something even the extremely chromed-out Maine is impressed by). David's tolerance for handling extreme amounts of cyberware is so impressive that it lands him on Arasaka's list as a prime candidate to test out their prototype cybernetic exoskeleton. That, combined with learning about Lucy's kidnapping, is what finally sends him into full-blown cyberpsychosis, but even then, David still manages to have moments of control and lucidity until Smasher finally puts him down in City Center.
- Even though he's vastly outclassed by Adam Smasher, the fact it took the single deadliest being on the planet to finally put him down after going on a rampage through Millitech's corporate army and Arasaka's headquarters and slaughtering them in the dozens, and Arasaka couldn't entirely cover it up all to save Lucy makes David easily one of the greatest Night City legends by far. At this point in time, it's an assault on an unprecedented scale, with it only being topped by V's assault on Arasaka Tower a year or so later.
- Smasher was impressed enough at David that he offered to spare him so that Arasaka could use him as a test subject for the Soulkiller. David blows him off without hesitation.
- The 1.5 update for Cyberpunk 2077 reveals that David eventually had a drink order named for him at the Afterlife, an honor given exclusively to edgerunners that went out in a blaze of glory.
- The first thing David does with his newly installed Sandevistan? Beating up the student who'd been bullying him non-stop (going so far as to beat David up while badmouthing his mother), first by casually walking up to him in class and kicking him out of his seat.
- David then dares said student to attack with the same Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs move that he used the previous day, and this is where we first see him using his Sandevistan in action. David, at this point watching the fists coming at him in slow motion, casually walks around the attack and then hits the bully so hard it sends him careening facefirst into a nearby wall hard enough to crack it.
- Despite Maine's Roaring Rampage of Revenge being caused a mix of Dorio's death and him suffering from Cyberpsychosis, it's hard not to be impressed watching him tear through Trauma Team and the NCPD like wet tissue paper on his own.
- Usually, only one MaxTac team is needed to take down a cyberpsycho, even a military grade one. However, when David goes on a rampage though Night City in the cybersuit, the NCPD sends THREE MaxTac teams after him. And even then, David tears through them like paper.
- Which, in turn, puts Adam Smasher's complete squash of him in its own jaw-dropping context. One MaxTac team can completely shut out a cyberpsycho, even with military-grade cyberware. David was able to rip through three of them, and Smasher still absolutely curbstomped David.
- Tragic and gruesome as her death may have been, Rebecca doesn’t flinch or try to run when she sees Adam Smasher about to collide with her at full speed, instead standing her ground in order to get one last shot at the psychotic full borg. Here’s hoping she also gets a drink order named for her at the Afterlife.Rebecca: We’re having a moment here! FUCK YOU!
- David's Heroic Sacrifice—despite having no chance in trying to legitimately square up with Adam Smasher in his state—is nonetheless ballsy as hell to send Adam Smasher past his Rage Breaking Point to allow Lucy and Falco to escape the bloodbath by having him go to town on David instead. Even though it was an absolutely brutal stomp on David, he doesn't care as he's beaten to death as, in his own eyes, David already won and fulfilled everything he set out to accomplish at that moment, including allowing Lucy to fulfill her dream of escaping to the Moon, and Adam Smasher killing him accomplishes absolutely nothing. Even Adam Smasher acknowledges that David put up a good fight, thanking him for providing some proper enjoyment and saying that he'd make an interesting Construct if he wanted. David just tells Smasher to go fuck himself.
- From a villainous perspective: Adam Smasher, having prior been portrayed as an Anti-Climax Boss in the game's finale, is in full form here and is quick to properly introduce why he's the World's Strongest Man as he squares up David after he attacks Arasaka's headquarters. Horrific and tragic as it is, his whole showing in the finale really presents him in the same light of Darth Vader appearing at the end of Rogue One as there isn't a chance for anyone to do anything meaningful to the guy, even Lucy (who has the best chance by going for his Achilles' Heel by hacking him) is No Selled and nearly fried herself for the attempt despite formerly being one of the most gifted Arasaka netrunners, and by end, all anyone can do is jump ship and get as far away as humanly possible from him before he has a chance to kill them too.
- By extension, this make's V's solo defeat of Smasher during the "(Don't) Fear the Reaper" ending that much more awesome. Adam Smasher is by all intents and purposes Arasaka's juggernaut, the weapon they deploy when the Godzilla Threshold has been passed and it's time to simply cut their losses and Leave No Survivors. For most Edgerunners, Smasher is nigh unstoppable, and the prospect of surviving his wrath, let alone killing the borg psycho, is an idea bordering on insanity. And V, all the while slowly dying due to the Relic malfunction, not only slaughters their way through a building full of Arasaka goons while spitting up blood, but also ultimately takes down Adam Smasher himself. Alone. It's no wonder that the battle has the prospect of catapulting V into Night City legend practically overnight.
