From Harlan’s World to the Beyond: Expanding the Altered Carbon Universe in Season 2
The Altered Carbon universe still enjoys a triumph that many other series could only dream of. It runs only for two seasons and gets canceled “despite” positive reception from viewers and critics alike. A lot of other TV shows, no matter how many dozen episodes aired, were forced to conclude following poor viewership.
Now, two seasons comprising 18 episodes might not seem like a particularly long show, but praise is given as it delivers a more-than-appropriate adaptation of a brilliant source material, a 2002 novel of the same name by Richard K. Morgan.
In case you’re unaware of the series, let’s first begin with a short recap of the opening season. Altered Carbon is set centuries in the future in a futuristic place known as Bay City. Technological advances have allowed a person’s consciousness and memories (or DHF, for digital human freight) to be stored as files on a disk-shaped device called “Cortical Stack.” If you have enough money in the future, you can afford to purchase the disk and have it implanted into the back of the neck of an artificial body or sleeve. A cortical stack is expensive, because it’s re-engineered alien technology, and the metal material to mass-produce it only comes from planet Harlan’s World, located light years away from Earth. Also, if the sleeve gets injured or deteriorates, you’re free to purchase a new one and implant the same disk repeatedly. Technically, money buys you immortality.
Altered Carbon Season 1 chronicles the journey of a convicted criminal, Takeshi Kovacs, as he is tasked with investigating the murder of Laurens Bancroft, one of the world’s richest individuals. Bancroft’s death is officially listed as suicide simply because evidence suggests that it is, but the allegedly murdered man himself doesn’t believe that to be the case.
In Altered Carbon Season 2, Takeshi Kovacs finds himself in Harlan’s World in a new sleeve. He’s now in a new world and a new body, but he still has to deal with the same old problem: everybody is trying to kill him at every turn. It won’t be easy because he just excels at not getting killed. The story starts not entirely different from the previous season, in the sense that Kovacs gets hired to investigate the death of a rich man. And just like before, of course, it serves merely as a tool to get many more characters involved in the story in later episodes.
Although the story is set on an entirely different planet, Altered Carbon Season 2 is intertwined with everything that happens during the first season. One of the major interconnecting lines is Kovacs’ continuing personal mission to find the long missing centuries-old love Quell Falconer. Rumors have it she has recently been spotted after all these centuries in Harlan’s World.
He eventually does come across Quell, but she doesn’t appear to remember anything about him. She even behaves like an entirely different person and a cold-blooded murderer, in fact. It would take a long while until she admits to killing people, although the confession only triggers another mystery because she claims to have no idea why she’s been around murdering certain individuals.
Intricate (yet with a complete lack of subtlety) politics are at play here. Kovacs comes to realize that her victims belong to a group of people known as the “Founders,” or basically people who claim to be the firsts to land and colonize the new planet. The Founders are led by Konrad Harlan, hence the planet’s name.
As the story continues, it’s revealed that Harlan has been lying about the claim. The entire world is built on a lie about Harlan being the first to colonize the planet. During the first scan and exploration for intelligent life on the planet, Harlan discovers a nursery of another life form called the “Elders,” (or “Martians” as they’re known all across the Milky Way galaxy) which would strip him of the right to claim the planet. Instead of following the first contact protocol, as enforced by the United Nations Interstellar Protectorate, he decides to kill every single Martian in the nursery.
It turns out that Quell has been infected by the Elders, who seek revenge on the Founders for committing genocide. The season (and the series) actually ends in a rather happy-ending format with Harlan and the rest of his group getting killed, so mission accomplished for the Martians. Kovacs and Quell also survive the final battle.
We think Altered Carbon Season 2 continues an enjoyable trajectory of political intricacy and high-text complexity as seen in Season 1. It also offers quite a lot of flashbacks, which work exceedingly well in case you forget some crucial plot devices from the previous season. But the flashbacks are not just for remembering old stories; they’re there to add a bit more depth to the storyline and intensify the plot twists as well. If there’s one thing to complain about, it’s going to be about the sidelining of Kovacs and Quell’s love story. As the series approaches its end, the relationship between the two doesn’t seem to matter much anymore because it’s overshadowed by all the other more interesting developments.
Can you name any other sci-fi technology similar to the Cortical Stack? Do you think the TV adaptation of Altered Carbon does justice to the source material? We’d love to hear from you.
Other Things You Might Want to Know
Will there be another season of Altered Carbon?
It doesn’t seem likely, at least on Netflix. The cancellation happens because of the same old reason; the viewership vs. production cost issue. It’s an expensive series to make. Even if the viewership is reasonably high, Netflix doesn’t think it justifies another season.
Is there a big screen adaptation of Altered Carbon?
There is one, also available on Netflix. And it’s an animated film “Altered Carbon: Resleeved” released in March 2020, not a month after the series’ cancellation.
Some of the latest of Anthony Mackie’s film credits:
