Image credit: CD Projekt Red / Netflix

Last night, I sat down with a greasy pizza and a few bottles of beer and braced myself for 10 episodes of heartbreak. Cyberpunk: Edgerunners' second season is out, and it follows in the footsteps of Studio Trigger's beloved, and tragic, debut . My expectations were way off.

Not because it wasn't good: Edgerunners Season 2 is fantastic. Packed with a wonderful cast of troubled characters, their story brought to life with gorgeous and often unorthodox animation. The soundtrack, the voice acting... Quality-wise the bar is as high as the first season. What surprised me was the decision to bring something many may find peculiar given Cyberpunk's dire setting and desperate energy. The show is hopeful. Defiant, even.

Spoilers for the show below.

In the show's opening episode, we are introduced to characters at rock bottom. King, having suffered from cyberpsychosis, has had his augmentations stripped out of his body, and lost his home.…