Netflix Cancels 'Altered Carbon' After Just Two Seasons (variety.com) 110
According to Variety, the sci-fi series "Altered Carbon" has been canceled at Netflix, after airing just two seasons. From the report: The second season of the sci-fi series aired on the streaming service back in February, while the first season aired in 2018. An anime special titled "Resleeved," which was set before the events of Season 1, was released in 2019. The series was based on the novel of the same name by Richard K. Morgan. It followed the adventures of interstellar warrior Takeshi Kovacs, who was played by Joel Kinnaman in Season 1 and by Anthony Mackie in Season 2. "Altered Carbon" took place in a futuristic world where the human mind has been digitized and a person can transfer their consciousness from one body to the next. According to an individual with knowledge of the decision, the decision to cancel the show was made due to Netflix's traditional approach of cost versus viewership of a series.
Too much change (Score:5, Insightful)
I watched the first season and enjoyed it, but indefinitely put off watching the second because the descriptions made it sound like all of the actors and setting had changed. And this was basically true, with a few exceptions I didn't notice until watching trailers much later. It's an age-old lesson in TV that you just can't change too much between seasons, being re-learned yet again.
What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Too much change
Really?
The entire premise of the books - and therefore the TV show - is that minds can be stored, transmitted, and transplanted into different bodies. This is how interplanetary "travel" is done.
The second book takes place 30 years after the first, on a different planet, and the protagonist, Takeshi Kovacs, is in a different sleeve.
What kind of series continuity were you expecting?
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
While you are right that the book allows that, but in reality this is a different actor, different style, the personality is not the same even if it was it would be strange.
People get used to a person, its a hurdle for people to become adjusted. The only show I have seen that has done this is Dr Who, and even then the doctors stick around for a few seasons.
In a book you can do it, because you just describe the persons look differently but you don't actually see them, its a minor part not so, in a TV show. You possibly could do it with some trick like only show the new character when they look in a mirror. I don't know I am not a director.
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You possibly could do it with some trick like only show the new character when they look in a mirror. I don't know I am not a director.
Reminds me of Quantum Leap [wikipedia.org], where the protagonist "jumped" into a new body every week. The lead actor never changed, and they started every episode with him looking at his "new" reflection. Not sure that'd be so great on a seasonal basis though.
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I don't know - even on a seasonal basis it could work pretty well. The story had him changing appearance, but that only mattered to the occasional reflection and the way people reacted to him. Since the lead actor never changed except for his outfit, and playing the part, there was still a strong sense of continuity.
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They often do the "same personality, different body" thing by getting the actors to mimic each other. There is a great episode of 3rd Rock from the Sun where they do this and while it probably helps that all the acting is exaggerated anyway it works in serious shows too. Things like speech mannerisms and gestures.
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Then explain how Dr. Who is still around?
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While you are right that the book allows that [...]
The book demands that. It's the whole point of the series!
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This formula seems to have worked for shows like American Horror Story though. Fargo and True Detective are a couple of other examples that have run multiple seasons despite massive cast changes between seasons.
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I understood that, and it made perfect sense, but it didn't change the way I felt when they (seemingly) took all of my friends away. It was probably a story best left to one season or the books.
Re:What? (Score:5, Interesting)
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It would have been nice if the new Kovacs acted like the old Kovacs though. In the books he is the same person just with a different body. There are lots of ways to do that on TV, as many a comedy body-swap episode can demonstrate.
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The most jarring part of the show to me is how different in personality Will Yun Lee is (who is supposed to be Kovacs in his original body) vs his sleeves and how relatively little screen time he gets. And also jarring is why Kovacs wouldn't want to use his original body again given they repeatedly show they have the technology available to clone it.
I'd have much preferred Will Yun Lee to be the star of the show with occasional jumps into other bodies. I think that would have given the show more consistency
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And also jarring is why Kovacs wouldn't want to use his original body again given they repeatedly show they have the technology available to clone it.
Neither season gave him the option - in both seasons his sleeve was chosen for him. Additionally, it's unlikely he is able to clone his birth sleeve since he has no sample of his own DNA.
I'd have much preferred Will Yun Lee to be the star of the show with occasional jumps into other bodies. I think that would have given the show more consistency and helped make it easier to follow.
It was looking like that was a possibility for Season 3, but now we may never know.
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Result is there are a LOT of series now that are good for the fi
Nonsense! (Score:1)
You really don't know what you're talking about in this instance.
Series one was based on the first book of a three-book series.
Can you guess what series two was based on?
Re:Nonsense! (Score:5, Insightful)
Given the fact that season 1 was so different to the actual book that it was less like being "based on the book" and more like "based on a reading of the back cover of the book", I'm not sure what season 2 was going to be based on.
I enjoyed season 1, but it was so different from the first book in the series that it could have been based on another book entirely.
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Given the fact that season 1 was so different to the actual book that it was less like being "based on the book" and more like "based on a reading of the back cover of the book", I'm not sure what season 2 was going to be based on.
I enjoyed season 1, but it was so different from the first book in the series that it could have been based on another book entirely.
The first season was based on merging all three books into one season because they didn't expect to have a second season.
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They did so much more than that, they made the government law enforcement agency into the terrorist group - that wasn't a minor change at all, and significantly changed the tone.
Re: Nonsense! (Score:1, Flamebait)
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I didnt know the books before hand and I would say that season 2 was significantly better than season one, in part because the lead actor was considerably better and also because more of the backstory was fleshed out.
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It happens a lot. Writers and producers only expect to have the show for one season, and write a story arc.
This does seem to be the formula for streaming television. They come up with a story arc that stretches across the entire "season", and each episode moves the story along at a glacial pace. It would be fine if they took the time to do character development and exposition, but usually you're 3 or 4 episodes in and still wondering "who the hell are these people and what the hell is going on?", because the tiny tidbits of exposition the writers throw in each episode are the bait to keep you watching, and fuc
Re:Too much change (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe I'm just getting old, but I remember television being better, when writers weren't afraid to put a story arc on hold to do a few standalone episodes each season.
Meanwhile I remember television putting the story on hold for "monster of the week" episodes that don't really do any development at all.
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Mostly due to syndication and a belief that audiences would turn off if they missed an episode or two. Maybe they were right but as we moved into the age of streaming and pay-channels they found that audiences like long form stories.
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Ah, the age old battle between episodic and serialized television shows. 8^)
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Maybe I'm just getting old, but I remember television being better, when writers weren't afraid to put a story arc on hold to do a few standalone episodes each season.
Meanwhile I remember television putting the story on hold for "monster of the week" episodes that don't really do any development at all.
There's always the 'dream episode' to help stretch out a season.
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Maybe I'm just getting old, but I remember television being better, when writers weren't afraid to put a story arc on hold to do a few standalone episodes each season.
TV in the olden days didn't have long stong arcs on the whole because the format didn't lend itself well to that. Box sets didn't exit and then did bet were phenomenally expensive. Basically they had to rely on people dipping in after a few episodes and maybe missing one here or there. Sure many people had VCRs but that didn't help if you miss
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Yeah, I think in many ways Babylon 5 has still set the high-water mark for long-form storytelling. They did have their standalone episodes, but they mostly still were a big contribution to character- and world-building, even if they didn't do much to move the story arc forward. And I think the first season really benefited from the extra focus on those key world-building questions of "who are these people?" and "what is this universe like?"
Contrast with X-files, which ran at about the same time, and did h
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Contrast with X-files, which ran at about the same time, and did have an overarching story as well, but for the first several seasons was really a weekly creature-feature with (maybe) a few hints dropped in that a bigger story even existed.
I could be mistaken but I remember Chris Carter once said that the format he was aiming for with the X-Files was one week of "Mytharc" stories alternating with one week of "Monster of the week" stories. I don't believe this ended up to be the actual format (there seemed to be more "Monster of the week" than "Mytharc" episodes) but it the show vaguely followed this format (to my recollection anyway).
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Yeah, I think in many ways Babylon 5 has still set the high-water mark for long-form storytelling.
There have been a few things since, but it's still rare and I think that's partly why it's held up better than expected. GoT could have been that, but it wasn't planned to the end from the start because fuck you GRRM!
They did have their standalone episodes, but they mostly still were a big contribution to character- and world-building, even if they didn't do much to move the story arc forward. And I think the
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Your idea of olden days is quite different from mine.
And, though the typical sitcom didn't rely much on long-term story arcs, there were shows that did, e.g. soap operas.
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And, though the typical sitcom didn't rely much on long-term story arcs, there were shows that did, e.g. soap operas.
Most of the soap operas kind of rambled around. I mean they sort of had story arcs but they all kind of smooshed into one another and went off in new directions and no end. Not like Bab5 which had a clear beginnig, middle and end planned from before it started.
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I don't know about any of that, but the first season was great while the second was meh. Joel Kinnaman did a fantastic job and the story was great in season 1 with a satisfying culmination. In season 2 all the interesting existential thoughts go out the window and it's a basic action movie + aliens with moderately talented actors. I would have cancelled the show as well, though not for the reasons Netflix did.
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The second season just didn't have anything original going for it except different actors and characters. For a show that depended so much on novelty, it just didn't have enough. So, having seen the second season, I would disagree with you that they changed too much. Even with a completely different actor taking the lead, it was held back by the fact that they didn't change enough. Plus, they kept playing too hard into the melodrama. You didn't miss anything.
Not surprised (Score:5, Insightful)
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The first season largely followed the first book, although toned down to TV. The second season was an odd mash up of the 2nd and 3rd books and a lot of original ideas that didn't really work.
It's a common problem. Game of Thrones, for example, was good while following the books and got progressively worse as it overtook them until we had that disastrous final season.
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Still, Netflix renewed Another Life and let's be honest, that is pretty dire - but presumably comparatively cheap to film having a limited set.
Altered Carbon was pretty good, and yes, S1 was better than S2, but it would be nice to have the book trilogy all completed as a TV series, and I was looking forward to that.
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I've got to agree. The first season was very compelling with a strong pull to binge on just one more episode. The second was... meh. Not bad, and I ended up finishing it to see how everything finally came together, but it wasn't really binge-worthy. It also seemed to involve a lot more gratuitous violence - which given the violence of the first season is really saying something. I'm not sure if the second was actually substantially more violent, or if the violence was just a lot more pointless to the
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WAY too many cancellations. Since they've implemented the new cancellation policies they've basically not had a single show last more than 2-3 seasons.
Netflix is canceling good shows that people like and they are doing it because they don't actually know what their viewers like or what they are watching because the streaming model has totally different viewership rules. Find a good show you like on Netflix? Expect it to be canceled within 2-3 seasons.
Not to mention the ridiculously short seasons with only 1
good (Score:2, Funny)
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Yes, agreed. And also if they don't replenish the anime catalog, Crunchyroll is going to eat their lunch.
Good (Score:4, Insightful)
The books are great, but the TV show was bloody awful.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
The books are great, but the TV show was bloody awful.
Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
Personally I found the first season was a very reasonable adaptation, and highly entertaining. The second season was about as good as I could have expected as an adaptation given the second and third books'... uneven and unrelated nature. Book two and three weren't great. Starting with that... it'd be hard to expect a TV version to be great.
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No, it is a fact. The books are so-so with some bright moments.
Season one of the TV series was pretty, but stupid.
Season two was produced by putting the books in a blender and skipping the pretty part, just unwatchable.
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The first book is a classic. The other two I enjoyed but weren't quite as good. If anything I actually wanted a bit more from the sequels. I'd buy a 4th book if he ever writes it.
Couldn't get in to his fantasy novels, read the first one but gave up on the second.
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Definitely! Anyone who says otherwise, hasnt read the books. They munged so many characters together, it was just weird.
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Seconded
Two seasons is what Netflix shows get. (Score:2, Insightful)
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Interestingly enough, that is a strangely US/European series broadcast culture; to find a good story people like and then make an excuse to attempt to drag it out indefinitely or kill it trying. Japanese TV series aren't as obsessed with this "neverending story" format, and more often target a conclusion to the storyline from the start, and then hold to it. Some of the best anime are published at a fixed-length one or two seasons and nobody questions it when it ends. They tell all their friends, then mov
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Interestingly enough, that is a strangely US/European series broadcast culture; to find a good story people like and then make an excuse to attempt to drag it out indefinitely or kill it trying. Japanese TV series aren't as obsessed with this "neverending story" format, and more often target a conclusion to the storyline from the start, and then hold to it. Some of the best anime are published at a fixed-length one or two seasons and nobody questions it when it ends. They tell all their friends, then move on to the next story.
On top of that you get the whole Latino Telenovela culture, which are also fixed length runs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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thats all fine and good. I love shows set to run in a fixed amount of time, but Altered Carbon is based on a trilogy. Should they drag out the material to be 5 seasons or more, probably not, but actually telling the story as a trilogy and ending it gracefully after 3 seasons is a lot better than making a show and cancelling before it reaches its end.
Netflix has clearly figured out a series length that works for attracting customers (hopefully it retains them too) but it would be nice if they started contr
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Some European shows followed a similar path. At least BBC shows do at times. The original "The Office" was set to be a specific length and they stuck to it. Consequently, the American version drug on long enough that, while still enjoyable, there were some episodes that made me question why they thought they needed to keep going.
I really need to get back to anime. Some of them are just fantastic stories with great characters. I would guess knowing what your end-point is probably helps keep things focus
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Likewise the development costs are greater. You have market the show the a TV network. You have to pay for their overhead. You have to pay for the stations to broadcast. You have to market to advertisers. All of this gives pr
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This is one of the ways the Netflix model has changed TV from the days of broadcast, where a show would go on for as long as people wanted to watch it.
I find this model preferable as they wrap series up nicely rather than letting them jump the shark. If they jump the shark early or are just inadequate then they get cut early (as is the case with Altered Carbon b/c season 2 jumped the shark).
It's actually a handy way to look for series on Netflix. if something has been discontinued for more than a year and it only has one or two seasons you know to stay away because it failed to be worthy of completion. If a show has 3+ seasons, it at least picked up enoug
No evidence of that (Score:1)
My understanding is that Netflix has data that says a show is only effective at attracting new subscribers for the first two seasons.
Where is that "understanding" from exactly? Because there is no evidence of that in what Netflix is actually doing.
Simply put - popular shows get more than two seasons. Stranger Things, Sugarbird Rush, Nailed It, Seven Deadly Sins, Voltron, even the Umbrella Academy (a show not cheap to produce) is very likely to get a third season.
As others have said, Altered Carbon second
Re: No evidence of that (Score:2)
The evidence comes from Netflix employees themselves... Hereâ(TM)s a great article that goes into a lot of detail. About halfway through they break down why Netflix started cancelling a lot of shows after two seasons:
Netflix Plays New Role: Budget-Conscious [theinformation.com]
"Netflixâ(TM)s metrics-driven approach shows up in other ways. For instance, it now routinely ends shows after their second se
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What little I could read without registering said exactly what I said - that shows that got viewers got more seasons. Maybe it talked somewhere in the middle about a two season strategy but I didn't see it.
Well... I'm sorry you didn't see it because you didn't look, I guess..? =)
Here's a website that summarizes the original article [comicbook.com], but doesn't go into nearly the same detail. The original article has quotes from producers and sources at Netflix that explain why Netflix doesn't see the value in continuing shows past season 2. Even if that doesn't make sense to you, that's apparently what they think, which is all I'm saying. They calculate the value of a show against how many new subscribers it can bring in, an
good (Score:2)
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I think what really failed with season 2 was the failure to realize what made season 1 compelling. Season 1 had a lot of great sci-fi concepts and a world that felt "lived-in" and real. It also had some fabulous metaphysical and psychological explorations that were interesting. But most critically in my opinion, the entire season was basically a film-noir detective story with some sci-fi violence thrown in. The season was compelling because the mystery kept the audience's attention even with the constantly
decent acting, production was garbage (Score:1)
What's weird is there's some really good actors there that didn't really do that great.
Will Yun Lee, who played the original Takeshi Kovacs and has a bigger role in Season 2 is quite good in many of his other roles and decently strong here.
Renee Elise Go
Damn (Score:3)
Season 1 was interesting, Season 2 was crap. (Score:2)
Season 1 was good -- not quite great -- but good enough given the drought of Sci-Fi.
* It had decent world building
* It had the foundations of good Sci-Fi: Exploring the social implications of technology. It raised some interesting questions about conciousness.
* Great chemistry between Takeshi Kovacs (played by Joel Kinnaman) and Kristin Ortega (played by the beautiful Martha Higareda)
* The plot with the Bancrofts and the sister had decent pacing, plot twists, and development of the narrative.
Season 2 was *
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Didnt bother finishing it. 2nd season was a slog to get through once you start seeing the diversity hiring casting decisions.
Only really good sci-fi series still seems to be westworld.
Re: Season 1 was interesting, Season 2 was crap. (Score:3)
The Expanse is really good. Started on Syfy, they dropped it and Amazon picked it up.
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The Expanse is arguably better than West World. West World just comes across at times like it's trying too hard.
Granted, that could partially be my tastes. I miss good space based sci-fi. There isn't near enough of it.
West World's first season was pretty good, but the combination of not really having a clearly defined direction at times and trying to make things so shocking and so obscure just doesn't always hit as hard as what they seem to think it should.
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Agreed The Expanse is great!
West World Season 1 was good. Season 2 and Season 3 [youtube.com] sucked.
What other good Sci-Fi is on right now? Everything good keeps getting cancelled or worse "Get Woke. Go Broke". :-/
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One that caught me by surprised because of the network involved (CW) was Pandora. There's a bit of hocus-pocus involved, but it's essentially borderline sci-fi/space opera. About a girl that may or may not have special powers (the science part here is still up in the air), and her uncle takes her in after her parents die in an attack. Her uncle also runs a big school that she and her friends attend. There's some interesting interaction with an alien race, though sometimes that gets a little topical it d
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* Sure swapping out the main actor for another one was part of the story -- the problem is that main protagonist, played by Anthony Mackie, was boring as hell. I believe he does have potential as an actor -- just not in this show.
He was dealt a pretty shitty hand. Plus, the problem with the protagonist is that when he was in different bodies the director never made an attempt to maintain similarities of dialogue, facial expressions, mannerisms, etc. This was a problem in the first season, too, but it was easy to overlook as there weren't too many flashback scenes with his original self. Here, we had grown accustomed to how he was played by one actor, so the glaring differences were even more obvious. They didn't even seem similar wh
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Plus, the problem with the protagonist is that when he was in different bodies the director never made an attempt to maintain similarities of dialogue, facial expressions, mannerisms, etc.
Exactly. They could have consulted with the Umbrella Academy creators.
Someone there made sure that Number 5 has proper "old man" mannerisms when played by a young kid. And that worked pretty well.
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Great point and an excellent summary of why audiences never really connected with Anthony Mackie.
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Agreed that the series went way downhill after Season 1. Poe was a cool character, but they overplayed him and ended up with too many contradictions to the point his character didn't really make sense anymore.
On a more substantive level, it also felt like they ran out of ideas. The first season played with some interesting discussion about the meaning of humanity and implications of immortality. The second just split vague cliches about living too long.
Second season also got a bit too into the soapy melodra
Well they were running out of content anyway (Score:2)
not cost effective (Score:2)
From what i recall, a lot of the third book took place on an alien ship. The sets would be pretty expensive.
Translation: (Score:2)
the decision to cancel the show was made due to Netflix's traditional approach of cost versus viewership of a series.
It was an expensive show and was not bringing new people to the platform.
enjoyed first season, second season meh! (Score:2)
It started great (Score:1)
I was totally hooked at the beginning of 1st season, but then they transformed the thing in a detective story.
Then 2nd season came and besides another detective story, Netflix applied their "trademark" to the product and transformed this into yet another woke feast.
Sincerely, if I didn't have a Netflix subscription shared among my family, I would have quit the subscription many months ago. They greatly reduced the number of 3rd party shows/movies and all their series/films just feel like some ideological ag
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I'm glad I'm not the only one who didn't like S2 (Score:2)
Not surprising (Score:2)
It was crap though wasnt it?
Dang (Score:2)
This was some super hard core Sci-Fi. I really enjoyed both seasons. I did wonder where they were going to go after Season 1. Season 2 was not as good - although I did find the ending kind of interesting - how Quellcrist Falconer basically was able to turn Takeshi Kovacs, for the second time.
This is a consequence of the... (Score:2)
Second Season was sub-par (Score:2)
The second season looked cheaper and seemed to suffer in the writing compared to the first. I don't know why.
I stopped after 2nd episode of 2nd season. (Score:1)
Kind of crap (Score:2)
About the only thing I found notable about Altered Carbon was that if there was a female actor in the show, she would need to get her tits out before the end of the season.
First season was awesome... (Score:2)
I tried to get through the second season, but it was just so slow-moving that I couldn't do it. It's too bad.
Season 2 was weak (Score:2)
Not sure if it was the writing, direction, or acting, but Mack's Kovacs came off as too much of a goody two-shoes. It wipes a lot of grit out of the world.
Poe's problem was drawn out too long. Either do a better job of showing how hard it is, or trim it down.
Some of the callbacks to the first season were overdone, particularly Lizzy. The actress is great, but that content doesn't mesh nicely.
There were changes to the antagonist and Falconer in season 1. This made it impossible to adapt the plots from subseq
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To be fair, it was planned before 2008.
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I found the ending... lacking... but overall, I agree.
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Nah, it has the same problem as altered carbon - it went seriously downhill after the first season.
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It was uneven, certainly... and yes the second season was lacking compared to the first. However, it found its feet again and became pretty compelling again in my opinion.
The ending though? Honestly, I hated it. It felt tacked on and rushed in part because nothing about that ending was foreshadowed at any point or even made any real sense. It's worth watching the end of the series for closure... but those last few minutes of the episode were seriously bad.
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I watched the first episode or two and it looked really intruiging, but it seemed to have a baseline depressing tone that really turned me off. Did that get any better as it progressed?
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Actually, the show was very well done. The first season was the best TV I watched that whole year. I am definitely hoping somewhere else picks it up for a season 3.