Molly Millions
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Molly Millions (a.k.a. Sally Shears) is a recurring cyborg character in stories and novels written by William Gibson, particularly his Sprawl trilogy. She first appeared in Johnny Mnemonic, to which she makes an oblique reference in her second appearance in Neuromancer (where she's referred to primarily as "Molly", no last name given), and finally appears using the name "Sally Shears" in the book Mona Lisa Overdrive.
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In all three stories, Molly is a physically tough (but not instantly imposing) bodyguard/mercenary referred to as a "razor girl" (in apparent homage to the song "Razor Boy" by the band Steely Dan, whose songs are frequently referenced by Gibson throughout his stories) and also as "the Steppin' Razor" to the residents of Zion, a Rastafarian space station. A useful contact for dealing with gangs and black market elements, she tends to show little remorse for the opponents she ruthlessly dispatches in the course of her objectives, and in fact shows few deep emotions towards anyone outside of hatred, suspicion or bemused contempt. An exception to this was Johnny (of Johnny Mnemonic), whom she still mourned at the time of Neuromancer, part of the personal history she relates to its protagonist, Case, at length, in addition to the revelation that she worked as a prostitute in a "puppet parlor" (a brothel where girls loan out their bodies while maintained in an induced trance state) to pay for her considerable cybernetic enhancements. Pseudonyms aside, she rents a hotel room in Neuromancer under the name "Rose Kolodny," the name by which the Turing Police refer to her.
An attractive woman who appears at first glance to be wearing mirrored sunglasses, her eye sockets are in fact sealed with vision-enhancing mirrored lenses that have been surgically attached to her face, and she has razor-sharp retractable claws underneath her fingernails - ten double-edged blades of four centimeters in length. Her metabolism and reflexes are also artificially heightened, with the tracery of electronic circuitry visible beneath certain areas of her skin, such as near her shoulders. Additionally, she frequently employs a flechette pistol that fires a variety of different rounds, ranging from poisons to explosives.
The 1994 film version of Johnny Mnemonic replaced Molly with a character named Jane who did not have the modifications to her eyes or razors on her hands. Jane did share the modified nervous system, but used a single razor attached to the tip of a telescoping "car antenna" as a weapon. It is generally assumed that this was due to the "Molly" character being attached to the rights for any possible future Neuromancer film adaptation.
- William Gibson, Burning Chrome ("Johnny Mnemonic"), 1986, ISBN 0-06-053982-8
- William Gibson, Neuromancer, 1984, ISBN 0-441-56956-0
- William Gibson, Mona Lisa Overdrive, 1988, ISBN 0-553-28174-7
- Razor girls: Genre and Gender in Cyberpunk Fiction
- William Gibson aleph Fan site
- Voidspace Online excerpts from Neuromancer and Mona Lisa Overdrive
- MOLLY'S MIRRORSHADES; ZEISS-IKON EYES "I could never dream up a sufficiently convincing way to imagine them being attached."
Novels: The Sprawl Trilogy: Neuromancer, Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive • The Difference Engine (with Bruce Sterling) • The Bridge Trilogy: Virtual Light, Idoru, All Tomorrow's Parties • Pattern Recognition • Spook Country
Short stories Johnny Mnemonic • The Gernsback Continuum • Fragments of a Hologram Rose • The Belonging Kind • Hinterlands • Red Star, Winter Orbit • New Rose Hotel • The Winter Market • Dogfight • Burning Chrome • Skinner's Room
Film adaptations: Johnny Mnemonic • New Rose Hotel • Pattern Recognition
Miscellanea: Agrippa (A Book of the Dead) • No Maps for These Territories • X-Files episodes