Altered Carbon Review (Season 1)

BLURB

After 250 years on ice, a prisoner returns to life in a new body with one chance to win his freedom: by solving a mind-bending murder.

Wikipedia version:
Altered Carbon is an American cyberpunk television series created by Laeta Kalogridis and based on the 2002 novel of the same title by English author Richard K. Morgan.[1] 

In a world where consciousness can be transferred to different bodies, Takeshi Kovacs, a former soldier turned investigator, must solve a murder.

The first season consists of ten episodes and premiered on Netflix on February 2, 2018.[2] On July 27, 2018, the series was renewed for a second season of eight episodes,[3] which was released on February 27, 2020, with an anime film set before the first season released on March 19, 2020. Though the series received generally positive reviews, it was canceled after two seasons.[4]

Thoughts

So... a book, a series and then an animated series? I "get" a book, a movie and a series, but an animated series that goes over the first live action series makes me think money grab. 
But maybe not. 

I'm all in for:

• A book, a movie, and an animated series.
• A book, a movie, and either a series in anime or live action (not both)

But this just seems like they are trying to bank on everything and everything they can.

Reaching all different types of formats is okay... if the previous versions were successful. Why not spread it to as many versions as people want. It just seems that hashing the same thing over and over is exhausting.

Then again, tv series get canceled for no apparent reason to mass viewers.

Maybe, if the animated series was announced after the first season of the live action and before the cancelation after the second season, I'd think, okay, they are just going for a different medium so they can finish the story. 

But that's not the case, and I'm *squirrel*─ing again and this has nothing to do with the story. 

There is some grumblings about season 2 not being up to snuff from season 1 and I get what they are saying, but I have my own thoughts on that too. 

Cast of Characters

Normally, I have the names and explanations of each character, but I found these and they explain the characters perfectly... I'm just giving you the short version of their role in the story. 

​The entire cast and crew can be found here: 
​https://m.imdb.com/title/tt2261227/fullcredits/cast

Quellcrist Falconer - Inspirational Leader (that started it all)

Takeshi Kovacs - Main Character/Investigator

Kristin Ortega - Investigator/Fake Antagonist

Laurens Bancroft - Client

Miriam Bancroft - Supporting Character

Poe - Ally

Reileen Kawahara - Antagonist

Vernon Elliot - Ally

Lizzie Elliot - Ally

Review

This unique blend of cyber punk dystopia thriller has a classic and unique take on the future. 

I've been introduced to a new genre called Transhumanism. Transhumanism is based on the premise that the human species in its current form is not the end of our development but rather a comparatively early phase.

Plainly said, humans will advance technology to the point that we will learn how to live forever.

Fascinating stuff!

Altered Carbon addresses the conflicts, ideas, and benefits of Transhumanism. It touches on points of Space Colonization, Artificial Intelligence, and the potential of living forever expressed with the technological optimism of an entitled teenager. ​

It's has me thinking and researching more about transhumanism and where not just the genre could go, but how feasible it is to take the next evolutionary step in our lifetime.

More Thoughts

There are some things I find unrelatable or down right implausible with Altered Carbon's themes.

Such as wide access.

It's easy to think that only the super rich has access to things, but the super rich is only 1% of the entire population. There is more money within the middle class because of numbers. According to Investopedia, 52% of the population is middle class.

Now, you can certainly make a living off of selling to the 1%. But ask yourself, how did the 1% get there?

Think about this... 52% is higher than 1%, right?
 
Technology has always been available to the masses because its more profitable. 

Only the super Elite in Altered Carbon are able to be post-human because of the currency value of a body. Which, in RL is about $160 (according to CounterPulse.) 

What the fuck happened to the economy and inflation that $160 is too expensive for all the material of a body? Seriously, I would expect bodies available for "sleeving" to be like a smart phone. Even the ultra poor in third world countries have fucking smartphones. 

I mean, fuck, we can duplicate dogs for $50K. I can't even get a house for that but I can have fluffy live forever for that much. If Amazon can store meat in stadium sized freeze lockers, we can store human bodies. 


While in Altered Carbon you can get a "sleeve", it makes no sense that the posthuman realm can only be explored by a few elite (or that's what is implied). 

The full realization of the core transhumanist value requires everyone should have the opportunity to become posthuman. It would be sub-optimal if the opportunity to become posthuman were restricted to a tiny 1%.

And while ya'll think that everyone out there is a bad person and looking out only for themselves, I see a fuck-ton of star-gazers that want to heal the world. When they get out there and realize it's not the planet, but humans that need saving, they will work on the transhuman issue. 

This Nick Bostrom dude that has a PhD says it way better than me and you can find his words here: https://www.nickbostrom.com/ethics/values.html

No only is wide access the ethical, humane, and economically viable solution, there are other reasons supporting everyone being able to live forever: 

• to reduce inequality
• because it would be a fairer arrangement 
• to express solidarity and respect for fellow humans 
• to help gain support for the transhumanist project 
• to increase the chances that you will get the opportunity to become posthuman 
• to increase the chances that those you care about becoming posthuman
• because it might increase the range of the posthuman realm that gets explored 
• and to alleviate human suffering on as wide a scale as possible

The wide access requirement underlies the moral urgency of the transhumanist vision. Wide access does not argue for holding back. On the contrary, other things being equal, it is an argument for moving forward as quickly as possible. 150,000 human beings on our planet die every day, without having had any access to the anticipated enhancement technologies that will make it possible to become posthuman. The sooner this technology develops, the fewer people will have died without access.

Consider a hypothetical case in which there is a choice between allowing the current human population to continue to exist, and having it instantaneously and painlessly killed and replaced by six billion new human beings who are very similar but non-identical to the people that exist today.

All that experience, all that knowledge, all that these people have to contribute─gone. 

Such a replacement ought to be strongly resisted on moral grounds, for it would entail the involuntary death of six billion people. The fact that they would be replaced by six billion newly created similar people does not make the substitution acceptable. 

Human beings are not disposable. 

For analogous reasons, it is important that the opportunity to become posthuman is made available to as many humans as possible, rather than having the existing population merely supplemented (or worse, replaced) by a new set of posthuman people.
 
The transhumanist ideal will be maximally realized only if the benefits of technologies are widely shared and if they are made available as soon as possible, preferably within our lifetime. 

Does that sound like a dude that just wants money or the uber elite to have access to foreverness? Go ahead, I dare you to say "yes". Just look at this:

TABLE OF TRANSHMANIST VALUES

Core Value

• Having the opportunity to explore the transhuman and posthuman realms

Basic Conditions

• Global security
• Technological progress
• Wide access

Derivative Values

• Nothing wrong about “tampering with nature”; the idea of hubris rejected
• Individual choice in use of enhancement technologies; morphological freedom
• Peace, international cooperation, anti-proliferation of WMDs
• Improving understanding (encouraging research and public debate; critical thinking; open-mindedness, scientific inquiry; open discussion of the future)
• Getting smarter (individually; collectively; and develop machine intelligence)
• Philosophical fallibilism; willingness to reexamine assumptions as we go along
• Pragmatism; engineering- and entrepreneur-spirit; science
• Diversity (species, races, religious creeds, sexual orientations, life styles, etc.)
• Caring about the well-being of all sentience
• Saving lives (life-extension, anti-aging research, and cryonics)

Smart people are already working on you and I living for a long damn time. They aren't going to restrict access. In fact, it wouldn't help anyone to restrict access or have too much of a financial barrier because (case in point) if technology was too expensive for most people then nobody would have an iphone. Besides, Elon Musk only being able to talk on his smart phone to Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and Warren Buffet might get boring.  

But for why am I harping on this?

Because I am tired of people bitching about their slow internet (myself included) and pissing all over technology. We wouldn't be able to say screw you Covid if it weren't for guys trying to improve technology. 

Enough about that though, I have a question.

If we are just animals to begin with, and our needs and wants are still basically food, water and shelter, then how will society and human enlightenment benefit from living forever?

Or will we become deranged and perverted like how the meth's are in Altered Carbon?

Some believe our involvement in society will change, morph and become MORE involved with each other. Maybe not in like my neighbor knows what time I get up in the morning but supportive on a global scale. Check out this article.

As if we will become one with what I call THE ALL. THE ALL is what I believe is where thought is collected.

I'm gonna get deep here but I need to if I'm going to explain this right.

THE ALL is where everyone's thought is collected. If you need to think of it as a cloud of thought─then there's your visualization.

THE ALL is how we are connected. It goes into the 100 Monkeys phenomenon. Where 100 Monkeys learn to wash their hands and then monkeys across the world, with no contact with each other, start washing their hands. That thought had to come from somewhere. The somewhere is the unconscious consciousness of THE ALL. 

So now that I've gone off on a tangent (...squirel) it makes sense (or maybe I've just confused you) that we would experience empathy on a global scale. We would experience others adventures, horrors, sadness, hope and life through VR, computers and technology. 

But can we evolve with our needs still as what they are? 

We've become domesticated animals with our homes, medicine, abundance─even our worries are not where our next meal will come from (for most of us) and more about what next to watch, what to write about, what next to ponder upon. We might become even more fluffy bunny (more domesticated? How does that happen?) if death is no longer on the line as a consequence. 

I Would Recommend Altered Carbon to Fans of: 

Cyber Punk

Transhumanism

Dystopian

Complex Stories

Epic Series

Evolutionary Concepts

Galley of Favorite MEME's, GIF's and Images

To see more reviews on shows I'd recommend, click on "WHAT I'M WATCHING" under Categories in the side bar.

S.N. McKibben

Will Write for Puppy Chow!

​Stephanie reads for the love of words, and writes fiction about Dark Hearts and Heroes revolving around social taboos. Her whole life can be seen through a comic—sometimes twisted, sometimes funny, but always beautiful and its title is adventure.