Cyborg (film)

Cyborg, a 1989 American film blending martial arts with cyberpunk, was directed by Albert Pyun. Jean-Claude Van Damme plays Gibson Rickenbacker, a mercenary fighting a gang of murderous raiders along the post-apocalyptic East Coast. The raiders are led by Fender Tremolo, portrayed by Vincent Klyn. This movie kicked off the Cyborg series, with two sequels arriving later: Cyborg 2 in 1993 and Cyborg 3: The Recycler in 1994.

A plague called the living death collapses civilization. A handful of scientists and doctors, based in Atlanta where the CDC is located, strive to develop a cure. They require data stored on a computer in New York City. Pearl Prophet volunteers to carry this information and undergoes surgery to become a cyborg. Bodyguard Marshall Strat accompanies her. They retrieve the data in New York but are chased by Fender Tremolo and his pirate crew, who want the cure to control its production. Strat is badly hurt fighting them and tells Pearl to find a mercenary, known as a slinger, for an escort. Cornered, she is saved by slinger Gibson Rickenbacker. After she explains her mission, Fender’s gang overwhelms them, and falling debris knocks Gibson out. Fender demands Pearl accompany him to Atlanta or die.

Fender’s group kills a family, steals their boat, and heads south on the Intracoastal Waterway with Pearl captive. Tracking them, Gibson arrives at the slaughter scene that night. A shadowy figure attacks him, but he subdues her. She is Nady Simmons, a young woman who lost her family to the plague and mistakes him for a pirate. She joins Gibson. He cares less about a cure than about killing Fender. They trek south through wastelands, where bandits ambush them. Gibson tries to send Nady away for her safety. After she offers sex, he refuses, confessing he only wants revenge on Fender, who killed his lover and destroyed his chance at a normal life.

Near Charleston, South Carolina, Gibson intercepts Fender’s crew, defeating most of them, but Fender shoots him with an air rifle. Wounded, Gibson realizes Haley—his dead lover’s younger sister, whom Fender kidnapped—is now a loyal member of Fender’s crew. He escapes the pirates and ends up alone with Pearl and Nady. Pearl refuses to go with him, calculating he is too weak to defeat Fender and get her safely to Atlanta.