Brief Summary:
30 years after season 1, Kovacs gets offered another job, gets a sleeve upgrade (more on that below), goes back to his homeworld, and finds his long lost love. Poe is back, but he’s got a glitch and needs a major reboot, though this will wipe all his fond memories. Our dear rebel leader shows back up and is killing some really old dudes who helped found Kovacs’ homeworld.
What doesn’t work:
Surprise, starting off with the bad here, and oof, this season has waaaaaaaaaaay too many issues for me. Actually I won’t lie, I abhorred season 2. It was such a slog to get through, wasn’t good at all, and actually made me wonder how they could actually screw up this show so badly. I only finished it because I was pot committed.
Let’s start with the basics, Altered Carbon was billed as a cyberpunk SF, ummmmmm where did all that go? Season 1 was a murder noir-style mystery where Kovacs is presented as someone with actual problem-solving ability, yeah that disappeared here. Season 1 had deep-thinking themes on life, time, religion, soul, humanity. Yeah, that definitely got cut when crafting season 2’s scripts.
The simplest way I can describe the massive change from S1 greatness to S2 boringness is if you took Game of Thrones off of HBO and put it on SyFy, stripped away the political plotting/intrigue, and tried to give Hot Pie a bigger story arc (though I would watch Hot Pie all day, so bad analogy).
This may become an unpopular opinion, but I don’t like Anthony Mackie here as Kovacs’ new sleeve. Oh, before I forget, those sleeve upgrades only consists of him being able to use the Force to bring guns to his hands, but that LITERALLY ONLY HAPPENS TWICE THROUGHOUT THE SEASON!!! And he also gets the shit kicked out of him multiple times…But back to Mackie. He isn’t my favorite actor out there, but my god, he played Kovacs completely different than Joel Kinnaman in S1, and I’m sorry, this show is about characters living a long time, they don’t just go from brooding smart man to angry mediocre in just 30 years (remember, Kovacs is 300+). This comes down to the writing, I get that, but there are only 1 or 2 scenes where Mackie actually is good, otherwise he is just strutting around doing nothing.
I applaud trying to add more characters to this season, but wow, are they the flattest bunch I’ve seen changed on a season to season shift. Let’s add a bounty hunter and make her a badass, but that badassness comes from these three weirdass coils in her head that adds nothing to the story other than she can “sense” something relating to the terrible villain once or twice. Let’s add a character from Kovacs’ past but make him so one-note, I’m surprised he wasn’t standing in his baseball chest protector, sorry, I mean armor, in the corner twirling his mustache while cackling. And then let’s add a political villain that has as much charisma as a river rock, and then let’s double down and try to make her cool and suave. The less said about the new AI character, the better…
I mean, here’s the thing, I like schlocky SF shows, such as The 100, Wynonna Earp, and let’s get really deep-cut, Earth 2. But that’s just it, I didn’t sign up for schlock. S1 of Altered Carbon was amazing, there was so much going for it, but S2 became a paint-by-numbers SF show. Close up shots of the villain after he/she makes a statement. Super tense music in scenes that aren’t very tense (case in point, Kovacs is hanging off a cliff, Bounty Hunter tosses him a rope, OH MY GOD it’s a few feet short, cue tense music and get ready for him to jump to reach it…). Just flat out bad dialogue. The set/background goes from this glitterbomb of neon and awesomeness to small scale sets that are drab and bland (I get it, different world in S2, but blah). And then, to top it off, let’s add a mysterious elder creature who has invaded one character’s brain, making her kill others. THEN when we show said creature, it goes into twirling mustache villain. THEN let’s have the climax be a fight scene that looks like it’s straight out of Mortal Kombat from 1995.
I mean, what was the plot in S2? Elder god-thing and the rebel leader returning. Could have been the grounds for something really good, but that plot was so bland and straightforward, it was boring as all get out. There were no twists whatsover, no big AH-HA moments. There wasn’t ever a time where I actually had to think about what was going to happen next, even a child could see where things were going. It was just a mess.
What works:
The only saving grace of S2 is Poe. I loved his character in S1 and in this season, he is still the best. The only levity and seriously good writing came in Poe’s glitch arc. He was the only one given anything to work with and the actor playing him was excellent as ever. I actually cared about Poe’s storyline, that’s good writing.
OG Kovacs is still awesome. I love the actor, and when he was on-screen, I like it.
Rating: 1 out of 5
Just bad. Took everything great about season 1 and thrust it out the door to make a boring follow-up season. Doubt I would waste my time with a third unless they brought back all the good stuff and hired better writers.
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