History Webcomic / DrugsAndWires

* BSideComics: Started off as a series of loosely connected Website/DeviantArt and Tumblr strips, which were recently republished as [[http://tapastic.com/series/DW-Oneshots "D&W One-Shots"]]. Most of these are no longer canon, but offer extra insight into the characters and their relationships.

** The entire world fits the trope, really. Stradania may be a beacon of crapsack, but everywhere else isn't much better either. In the US, CorruptCorporateExecutive types run wild and abuse their employees with wild abandon, the Third World is struggling with a pandemic of an untreatable leprosy-like disease which can only be prevented (maybe) by preemptive amputations, and most of the world's industry is handled by sweat shops ran by the aforementioned CorruptCorporateExecutive types. Seriously, what do you expect from a comic whose TagLine is "Everything Went Wrong"?
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Marilyn Hope-Fokker, CEO of Hope-Fokker Capital Ventures. She's essentially a heartless modern robber baron who treats her employees as useful resources at best and cattle at worst, travels with bodyguards in riot gear and runs sweatshops. Her EstablishingCharacterMoment is holding a "save-your-ass bake-off" for the employees of one of her factories, before summarily firing all of them for being ineffective and leaving on a blimp while her riot police beats up the protesting workers.

* {{Expy}}: Dan is a washed up former hacker who sank deeply into drugs after losing his ability to access cyberspace. Lin is a crazy cyborg with scalpels in her fingers. [[Literature/{{Neuromancer}} Sound familiar?]] And its been noted [[http://tapastic.com/episode/143662 in comic]].

* MoonLandingHoax: Apparently, belief that the moon landings were faked has become so universal that "the US ''actually'' landed the moon in the 60's" is considered the crackpot conspiracy theory.

* ThePlague: The Black Rot, a nigh-untreatable infection with leprosy-like symptoms, except much, much more virulent. The amputations practiced by the doctors in an effort to stop its spread were what kickstarted the booming prosthetic industry of the setting. It's mostly supressed in the West by the story's present, but it's still a persistent problem in Third World countries.

* SmallNameBigEgo: Vlad "fancies himself as a Byronic poet, philosopher, and general renaissance man." Of course, in reality he's none of those things and is perpetually mooching off his girlfriend.

* TheCameo: Domino and Marcus from ''{{Webcomic/Hellp}}'' can be seen in the Icebox club on page 19 of the second chapter. Likewise, Dan has made an appearance in ''{{Webcomic/Hellp}}'' as a lemonade salesman.

'''''[[http://www.drugsandwires.fail/ Drugs and Wires]]''''' is a weekly CyberPunk webcomic launched in 2015. It follows Dan, a bitter, burned-out VR operator and serial addict trying to put his life back together after a near-death experience with the mysterious Skullfuck worm.

* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Marilyn Hope-Fokker.

* BSideComics: Started off as a series of loosely connected DeviantArt and Tumblr strips, which were recently republished as [[http://tapastic.com/series/DW-Oneshots "D&W One-Shots"]]. Most of these are no longer canon, but offer extra insight into the characters and their relationships.

* MoonLandingHoax: Apparently, belief that the moon landings were faked has become so universal that "the US ''actually'' landed the moon in the 60's" is the crackpot conspiracy theory.

* TheCameo: Domino and Marcus from {{Webcomic/Hellp}} can be seen in the Icebox club on page 19 of the second chapter. Likewise, Dan has made an appearance in {{Webcomic/Hellp}} as a lemonade salesman.

* Stradania. While Unylsk is grey and depressing, but still reasonably modern for a post-Soviet city, the country is full of superstitious, babushka-clad peasants jaded by years of Soviet "progress" who will shoot cyborgs on sight.

''D&W'' takes place in Unylsk, the dysfunctional capital of a still-unnamed Eastern Bloc country, some time after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Thanks to the magic of AlternateHistory, Unylsk is a mixture of cyberpunk cliches and actual '90s technology, with an added dose of Russian misery.

* ElectronicEyes: Lin's left eye is a blank camera prosthetic.

* {{Expy}}: Dan is a washed up former hacker who sank deeply into drugs after losing his ability to access cyberspace. Lin is a crazy cyborg with scalpels in her fingers. And its been noted [[http://tapastic.com/episode/143662 in comic]].

* {{Expy}}: Dan is a washed up former hacker who sank deeply into drugs after loosing his ability to access cyberspace, Lin is a crazy cyborg with scalpels in her fingers. And its been noted [[http://tapastic.com/episode/143662 in comic]].

D&W takes place in Unylsk, the dysfunctional capital of a still-unnamed Eastern Bloc country, some time after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Thanks to the magic of AlternateHistory, Unylsk is a mixture of cyberpunk cliches and actual '90s technology, with an added dose of Russian misery.

[[caption-width-right:350:Mostly drugs, some wires.]]->''“Low tech. Lower lives.”''

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->''“Low tech. Lower lives.”''