They’re bringing the dark side of NYC life to light. 

To brighten up her windowless bedroom, Sophia, a crafty Brooklynite, purchased and mounted a $114 “fake window” to her wall, creating the illusion of natural sunlight — and igniting a firestorm of shade from haters who deem the setup a “dystopian” nightmare. 

“This is a fake window in my New York City apartment,” said Sophia, demonstrating how the faux glow works to her more than 1.4 million video viewers. 

“There is a building that was built on the other side of this window so it’s just a plank of wood,” she explained. “I bought a light box and I just set it in…and this literally saved my life.”

“It looks really real!” the bubbly brunette chuckled. 

But to critics living outside of the concrete jungle, Sophia’s makeshift sunshine in her confined quarters looks like “prison.”

“I would never live in NY. This is a nightmare,” decried a digital detractor. 

“This is so dystopian, everyone deserves to have natural light in their space,” another groaned. 

“Depressing but necessary,” noted an equally unimpressed outsider. 

“People in New York City live like prisoners in a prison,” spat another. 

And although the boroughs might boast a building or two with its entrances guarded by steel bars, impenetrable gates and security officers, locals, by and large, certainly don’t liken themselves to inmates. 

To most, the privilege of calling the concrete jungle “home” comes with a bevy of built-in bonuses, such as the sights, skyscrapers and celebs walking the streets. Even with sky-high rent demands and low quality of life ratings, it’s still the pride of the East Coast. 

Heck, Gotham was just crowned “the most romantic” city nationwide, besting metropolises where windows and sunbeams surely abound like Nashville, Tennessee, and Austin, Texas. 

And folks like Sophia, who’d rather make-do than move, are simply remedying the city’s dim shortcomings with illuminating technology.