Author Topic: Altered Carbon  (Read 8413 times)

Dubble_g

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Altered Carbon
« on: 20 January 2018, 23:46:24 »
« Last Edit: 02 February 2018, 19:10:11 by Dubble_g »
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #1 on: 21 January 2018, 00:14:11 »
It looks interesting. And the concept is intriguing. Didn't realize it was based on a book though.

However, visually...it looks like they just did a visual clone of Blade Runner (the flying cars especially). Guess it makes sense as Blade Runner pretty much defines Cyberpunk on film.

(Plus it has James Purefoy in it, so that's worth watching right there.)

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #2 on: 21 January 2018, 00:24:58 »
It looks interesting. And the concept is intriguing. Didn't realize it was based on a book though.

However, visually...it looks like they just did a visual clone of Blade Runner (the flying cars especially). Guess it makes sense as Blade Runner pretty much defines Cyberpunk on film.

(Plus it has James Purefoy in it, so that's worth watching right there.)

The trailer seems to echo the books feel (the flying cars, etc are in the book). I'm excited for this series, I'm hoping it catches on and they will cover all the books eventually.
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Dubble_g

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« Last Edit: 02 February 2018, 19:11:11 by Dubble_g »
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #4 on: 21 January 2018, 08:39:54 »
Read the book years ago and really enjoyed it. Hoping it lives up to that


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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #5 on: 29 January 2018, 10:02:13 »
If its up to the quality of the book it should be great

Looking forward to it
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #6 on: 29 January 2018, 13:02:55 »
Personally, I'm looking forward to the Telemundo adaptation, Altered Cabrón.


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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #7 on: 29 January 2018, 13:57:38 »
If its up to the quality of the book it should be great

Looking forward to it

If it's half as good as the book, it'll still be an excellent show, IMO.

Someone I know (who's not read the books) compared it to Game of Thrones, and I jokingly rejoinded that they'll need to tone down the sex in the books considerably or GoT will seem prudish by comparison.  Of course, Netflix produced Sense8, which featured incredibly explicit sex scenes with just about every sexual orientation covered, so it's a possibility that they won't one it down at all.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #8 on: 29 January 2018, 16:29:57 »
Another book on to-read list.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #9 on: 29 January 2018, 16:43:21 »
Another book on to-read list.

As well as the Takeshi Kovacs trilogy, I highly recommend Black Man (which I believe was called Thirteen in the US)
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #10 on: 29 January 2018, 18:55:58 »
In all seriousness, I love the hell out of the Takeshi Kovacs trilogy, and I really hope this adaptation lives up to that. I liked Joel Kinnaman in that Robocop remake they did a few years back that was way better than it had any right to be, so I'm hoping he does a good job with the character, and ideally they'll get to do a three-season run with a book per season and different actors for each new sleeve, but I guess we'll see what happens. Mostly I'm just hoping it won't suck.


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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #11 on: 30 January 2018, 07:34:52 »
Can highly recommend his take on fantasy as well  ;D

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #12 on: 02 February 2018, 19:12:13 »
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #13 on: 04 February 2018, 14:20:12 »
I'm through the 1st four epsand the torture sequences in ep4 were just a bit over the top for me.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #14 on: 04 February 2018, 15:55:00 »
Binged the whole season Friday night...and it was...okay. I doubt I would have watched it all if it had followed the traditional one episode a week format. (And I doubt I'll watch a second season.)

Don't really have any specific complaints; just none of the characters really interested me in any way.
How far in the future does it take place? A thousand years? A couple thousands? Oddly enough it didn't really feel all that advanced (expect for a few scenes).

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #15 on: 04 February 2018, 18:33:23 »
Watch the first 6 episodes and loving every second of it.
Gimme more more more of it! :D
It's brutal, it's intense, it's interesting. I love the setting, the noir, the turns.

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #16 on: 04 February 2018, 21:20:21 »
I'm four or five episodes in, and so far I've nothing to complain about.  I do love me some cyberpunk. . . almost makes me want to hit up roll20 for some Shadowrun action.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #17 on: 04 February 2018, 22:07:52 »
I'm four or five episodes in, and so far I've nothing to complain about.  I do love me some cyberpunk. . . almost makes me want to hit up roll20 for some Shadowrun action.

I had the same - watched first two episodes and ended up firing up Shadowrun: Dragonfall again on the PC


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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #18 on: 05 February 2018, 01:50:39 »
This show is more transhumanism than it is cyberpunk.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #19 on: 05 February 2018, 01:58:55 »
It's postcyberpunk, in as much as it combines themes of classic cyberpunk with a reflection of modern social issues, technological innovations and science fictional ideas that postdate 80s and 90s cyberpunk, or weren't included in the older canon of same - like transhumanism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyberpunk_derivatives#Postcyberpunk
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #20 on: 05 February 2018, 22:33:09 »
Except for the lack of magic and magical races, this is basically Shadowrun and Shadowrun without magic is cyberpunk.  Megawealthy tycoons that are governments unto themselves?  Check.  Authority figures on the take?  Check.  Beat cops doing what is necessary to see justice done?  Check.  Buying high-tech hardware from a street vendor who keeps said bleeding-edge bang-bang in an ice cream cart?  Check.  Band of misfits consisting of an assortment of flotsam served up from the streets?  Check.  Ortega ends up with a cyberarm, for Pete's sake.  About the only thing not classic Shadowrun in this show was the fact that the runners actually knew the identity of the person they were working for.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #21 on: 06 February 2018, 09:22:21 »
Just finished the season. Not too fussy about labels myself--dark, dystopian urban near-future with flying cars, body augmentation and plenty of hacking seem cyberpunky enough for me, but whatever--though I agree the social message gets played up a lot more here than in traditional cyberpunk.

That would have worked better for me if I wasn't rooting for the sister. Without getting too spoilery, they changed Quellists from being sort of quasi-communist (in the books) to full on anti-technology Luddites who want to get rid of digitized consciousness. I mean, opt out if you want, but I don't think anybody would have the right to make that choice for others.

It was okay though, good but not great. I enjoyed the over-the-top parts (two horned gladiators! and a knife-wielding assassin! and a berserk crowd! and a ninja gymnast with a katana!) and thought they made a good effort to personalize the story and tie all the plot threads together into a more coherent whole than is in the book. I think they tried too hard to up the DRAMA of every scene too much though, with sometimes silly results (like the fight in the clone bank...so, so many boobies). The final "everyone stands around revealing the plot" was straight up daytime soap opera, too.

That ending was heavily hinting at a sequel tied to Woken Furies though, wasn't it? Hope they don't skip Broken Angels, that was my favorite.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #22 on: 06 February 2018, 17:39:18 »
on binge now...have to get more popcorn...
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #23 on: 06 February 2018, 17:59:34 »
I really wish the spoiler tags were working... :/

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #24 on: 07 February 2018, 17:42:30 »
I havn't seen the show, but reading the basic jist of the setting, it sounds a lot like Eclipse Phase.  Is that a good comparison?
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #25 on: 07 February 2018, 17:49:11 »
I havn't seen the show, but reading the basic jist of the setting, it sounds a lot like Eclipse Phase.  Is that a good comparison?

Eclipse Phase's creators cite Morgan's books as a major influence. 
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #26 on: 07 February 2018, 18:07:01 »
Yes, as someone who GMs an Eclipse Phase campaign I usually tell people that Altered Carbon is more or less required reading for running it, because so much of the setting is lifted directly (or changed only very slightly) from the Takeshi Kovacs books.


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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #27 on: 08 February 2018, 22:56:25 »
finished the binge...
ending left few openings so sequel can go on...even without original cast
very nice

btw is it my imagination that ever since a lot of creators got away from the big 5 shows made starting about 9 years back started to get way better?
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #28 on: 09 February 2018, 21:57:23 »
It started with the Sopranos back in '99, but no, it is not your imagination.


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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #29 on: 09 February 2018, 23:51:58 »
Binged 8 episodes so far and I'm looking forward to reading the books. The nudity is a bit over the top sometimes though. The torture scene was rather interesting. Raising grandma in a male body was rather funny and the actor did a fairly good job at it I think. Especially since he then had to turn around and play another role of a nutjob.

But alas... time to fix a snack for ep 9&10.

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #30 on: 10 February 2018, 13:13:00 »
It started with the Sopranos back in '99, but no, it is not your imagination.

It started with Oz back in ’97. Without Oz paving the way for hour-long drama series at HBO, The Sopranos would never have gotten made.

And without The Sopranos we wouldn’t have Mad Men.

And without Mad Men, we wouldn’t have the current era of “peak TV”, a.k.a. the Second Golden Age of Television.

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #31 on: 16 February 2018, 13:59:57 »
Just finished Ep 4.

Please tell me the social commentary goes significantly beyond transhumanism vs. religion. I do not object to exploring this facet of social reaction to technology - I love Dune - but it shouldn't be the only or even dominant one. E.g. the points of disruption to individual maturity and the economic divide has only briefly been touched on in comparison, yet these seem equally core to how the society reacts to the tech.

Other than that, and that is about the only thing I can criticise - this is hitting all the cyberpunk buttons that GITS failed so miserably to do. LOVE it. I think I've found the book series I need to fill the Btech-shaped void in my reading life ;D but after I binge the rest of the series :D

Questions so far: I can guess the upcoming Ryker-Ortega connection reveal, but why is Henchy important? who are CTAC and the Praetorians? what were the Envoys and Quellists fighting for?

Looking forward to revelation ;)
« Last Edit: 16 February 2018, 14:05:16 by Kidd »

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #32 on: 16 February 2018, 14:26:34 »
After a bit of reflection, I'd say I enjoyed the first half pretty well (mostly just because of the murder plot). But the last few episodes were just meh.

Really did enjoy the AI Poe though. He was awesome.

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #33 on: 18 February 2018, 23:40:49 »
Kidd, there is more . . . and I think its the background canvas the story is written on to explore.  Down side of such explorations on TV is that it is sometimes hard to get the viewpoints, but I am on Ep 9 and it DOES spend some time looking at the philosophical divide between Kovacs reborn idealism and his Meth master's pragmatism.

Honestly, the ruthless way his will is set up definitely keeps the 21 legitimate kids in line.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #34 on: 21 February 2018, 14:03:36 »
Finished all 10 episodes. I must say my reaction is as below too:

After a bit of reflection, I'd say I enjoyed the first half pretty well (mostly just because of the murder plot). But the last few episodes were just meh.

The resolution was... hollow. The identity of the real Big Bad and connection to Kovacs was... boring. It's not the kind of twist needed at this stage - it doesn't help showcase the world of Altered Carbon, which is what a first season plot ought to do. To be blunt, I could have expected this kind of "twist" from any soap opera in any setting elsewhere. The red herring solution was more interesting than the actual one.

Now I'm going to read the novel and see if its any different.

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #35 on: 21 February 2018, 14:24:58 »
Eh, I do not know . . . the different levels of blackmail to get to Bancroft was sort of interesting.  Even the admission of devotion to her brother was a bit hollow- her aim was 653 disrupting her empire.  Kovacs getting woken up and pardoned was a happy coincidence.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #36 on: 21 February 2018, 14:26:34 »
Now I'm going to read the novel and see if its any different.

The plot is almost identical while the details being about 80% different.  I think they sit beside each other well.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #37 on: 21 February 2018, 14:35:20 »
I have started the novel.  Its a good read and I think its one of the few times I think the changes were for the book/TV difference and some of the ways they introduced setting information from the book was quite original.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #38 on: 04 March 2018, 12:24:47 »
The plot is almost identical while the details being about 80% different.  I think they sit beside each other well.
Finished the Takeshi Kovacs trilogy. I don't think any of the Netflix original content is an improvement except Poe, love that guy. The general line of the plot is indeed similar but... also so different. Like 3025 CBT and MechAssault different

What is it with TV writers anyway, its like they all contracted Hobbititis off Peter Jackson. There's so much content in the source material they'd have their hands full just cutting it down to fit TV. Why invent stuff from whole cloth? Take a gamble that your plotting is better than the author's? Well excuse me, did you get your bestsellers optioned or did he?!
« Last Edit: 04 March 2018, 12:28:56 by Kidd »

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #39 on: 04 March 2018, 13:36:13 »
Loved the Show...and loved my internal chuckles as a lot of the Forest Scenes of the ENVOY base brought back my memories of wandering around that area last summer. 

For those interested:

https://www.seatoskygondola.com/adventures/suspension-bridge



But a very interesting show.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #40 on: 02 August 2018, 06:39:09 »
Season 2 has been renewed and will star Anthony Mackie, aka Falcon. Will be interesting to see him in an ultra violent role. But it's expected to hit Netflix only in 2020. I wonder how the plot will go.

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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #41 on: 02 August 2018, 12:32:10 »
It could well be an adaptation of the second novel, Kovacs is sleeved in a black body for most, if not all of the book.
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Re: Altered Carbon
« Reply #42 on: 02 August 2018, 13:58:45 »
It could well be an adaptation of the second novel, Kovacs is sleeved in a black body for most, if not all of the book.
I hadn't noticed.

But what I meant was that Season 1 was more... "inspired" by the book than an adaptation. Some significant plot differences. So I wonder how this one will go.

 

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