55 missed calls from Panam and the main problem with the Phantom Liberty ending in Cyberpunk 2077
The most gut-punching scene in Cyberpunk 2077 looks completely mundane – just a phone log with a counter showing 55 missed calls from one nomad. V's favorite nomad, no less.
We're talking about the "Tower" ending, which arrived with Phantom Liberty in September 2023. V agrees to the surgery, spends two years in a coma, wakes up in 2079, and loses the ability to install cyberware right along with the chip.
The first thing V gets is a string of messages where Panam Palmer runs through a full emotional cycle in a matter of minutes – demanding a straight answer, snapping, apologizing for the outburst, begging V to just say they're alive, and finishing in all caps.
It all fits her character – impulsive, hot-tempered, and insecure – someone who flat-out warns her partner multiple times throughout the game exactly what they're signing up for.
The problem isn't Panam herself, but the fact that this script triggers regardless of how the relationship actually played out. Panam sends these messages even when V isn't her friend or lover, but someone she flat out told she hates.
It feels like the game grabs the player by the collar and spells out which ending counts as "bad," instead of letting them decide for themselves.
What really breaks the logic is that V can't send a single message before the surgery. Everyone close to V knows about the death sentence hanging over their head, and everyone knows a merc's career in this city is short and violent. One player put it bluntly:
Everyone knows that V has a countdown to mindwipe over their head and is in a desperate race against time for survival. Everyone also knows that the life of a merc is short and violent. When V goes unresponsive the default reactions should be "well I guess there wasn't a cure" or "they probably caught a bullet and are buried in the landfill somewhere", not "dammit V ghosted me"
The discussion threw out options far more elegant than what shipped:
being tied to a clinic and ongoing treatment that makes it physically impossible for V to go back to their old life
motor function glitches, where the body barely obeys and commands have to be repeated
the status of a living legend reduced to a shadow, with no money, no connections, and no contracts left
The other romance reactions look far more logical by comparison. Judy grieves and moves on, which fits her habit of quickly closing chapters, while Kerry stays in touch and is willing to talk things through instead of writing V off.
Panam, meanwhile, gets cast as the emotional sledgehammer of the "Tower" ending, even though her own arc could easily have let her understand and accept someone who left to save their own life.
