Altered Carbon Poll Thread

[Charmonium]

I wouldn't go by a popularity poll to determine what you watch. Then you end up watching reality TV.

IMO, if you want lots of flashy CGI, watch this.

If, you want nuanced, intelligent SciFi, watch Counterpart.

I like both in equal measure.

I think that the people on this forum generally reflect my tastes which are for darker, more intelligently written scifi and fantasy. But at the same time, I don't have any problem with things that lean more heavily on action rather than plot as long as it's not too predictable and there's good eye candy. Ghost in the Shell was like that. The story kinda got lost in the movie but it was still a decent movie to go see.

I think I'm probably on the same wavelength as most of you here.

 

[JEDI]

watched ep1.

plot hole #1: the AI brothel hasn't had a customer in 50years.
how did they pay their bills? (electricity, rent, property tax, etc)

plot hole #2: bad guy mentioned microwave.
they know about 21st century microwaves in their VERY advanced future.
(he was dead for 250yrs!)

 

[DaveSimmons]

watched ep1.

plot hole #1: the AI brothel hasn't had a customer in 50years.
how did they pay their bills? (electricity, rent, property tax, etc)

plot hole #2: bad guy mentioned microwave.
they know about 21st century microwaves in their VERY advanced future.
(he was dead for 250yrs!)

#1 - it is an AI hotel not brothel. The AI might have existed for hundreds of years now and be a billionaire who runs the hotel because he wants to, not needs to.

#2 - microwaves may still be in use 10,000 years from now, people might still call quantum-food-heating-thingies "microwaves," or the far-future version of language may be being translated to 21st century English for us viewers.

Those are nits, not plot-holes, and open to reasonable explanations.

 

[iCyborg]

One thing that bothers me: after being dead for 250 years, he didn't seem to require much time to adjust to the future, right away he seems at home with all the technology and terminology. Did technology progress completely stall in the meantime? If someone from the late 18th century was resuscitated in 2018, he'd be in for quite a bit of a shock, I'd think reintegration into society would be rather slow and painful.
FWIW, I haven't read the books.

 

[DaveSimmons]

It might be that technology is stagnating under the rule of the immortals, but a lot of 20th - 21st century technology has reached plateaus.

From the nit above, a 2018 microwave isn't that different from a 1988 microwave. A TV set looks nicer in 2018 and might have 200 cable channels + streaming but it's not that different from a 1968 TV. Desktop PCs have just gotten a little faster over the last 10-15 years, and cell phone designers are starting to run out of new tricks.

Plus, the Envoys are supposed to be especially capable of being dropped into unfamiliar environments and acclimating themselves very quickly.

 

[thestrangebrew1]

I went with avg because I'm not familiar with the source material and I'm not particularly impressed with the acting. The female detective is especially annoying. I think she's trying too hard to be a badass female detective and it feels forced, rather than her actually being badass if that makes sense. I also think the nudity is forced as well, filler maybe, and pretty much unnecessary. I'll finish off the series to see where it goes, but average to me right now.

 

[TheAdvocate]

I have not read the books and am 7 episodes in. FWIW, I did not enjoy Westworld, and found it not worthy of the accolades it received.

This show though - the story is ambitious. It's trying to be so many things. While it falls short in some ways, I am won over by all the things it does right. I think my biggest complaint is that a couple of the actors are a little wooden/stiff (especially Rei? - she's nice to look at but she is a poor actress, and the head of the resistance/envoys - Quell is her name?, she seems miscast - she doesn't do hardened ideologue / zealot well with that face). The violence is a little over the top in terms of how it is sensationalized (like a 12 year old would enjoy). And a couple of the battle scenes (the shuttle take off scene - don't wanna spoil that) seemed a tad syfy original movie level cheesy.

Everything else works really well. I like how they dive right into the world and the key detective story while occasionally working in the world's and characters' backstories. Its also kind of funny at times - several good one liners. As for characters - I love Poe (the AI hotel), and Ortega's actress does a good job making her interesting (and she is also easy to look at). But what I love the most are the overarching themes. I never got won over by Blade Runner, even though I like moody stuff. This seems like a much more visceral take on the same types of themes, with a dose of Matrix tossed in for good measure. I am now a very enthusiastic fan.

 

[HomerJS]

It's good, but not "House Of Cards Season 1" good. All of the violence and sex seems to be a bit over the top... it started reminding me of the Starz version of Spartacus towards the end.

Lots of violence and sex? Marked for later watching.

I noticed Netflix queued that up next for me after finishing Cloverfield Paradox

 

[Red Storm]

Thoroughly enjoyed season 1. Quality sci fi IMHO. Excited to read the books now.

 

[Ackmed]

We finished it, and both really enjoyed it. Good twists, and plenty of surprises. The ability to have a sleeve makes things possible like that. Not the best acting, not the best plot, but overall very enjoyable. Hoping for a second season.

Disappointed that there was no 4K for this though. Netflix had been doing a good job with 4K released when its their own, yet with this they didnt? When plenty of scenes would have made for great visuals.

 

[Charmonium]

I started watching and I do love the ambiance. It really does scream Bladerunner which I think is great. But at least here you get a little more in the way of contrast. BR was dreary and oppressive throughout. It didn't matter if you were a street vendor or Tyrell. Your worlds weren't all that different stylistically. Here there's much more contrast.

I noticed a couple plot holes but promptly forgot them. The only one I remember is about re-sleeving. Supposedly if you resleeve to a different body too many times you can go insane but that seems to be the norm for non-meths. Yet there's no mention of this being an issue. Not a big deal, just something I noticed.

I think the dialog could use some work in spots but overall I'm pretty happy with this so far.

 

[Red Storm]

I started watching and I do love the ambiance. It really does scream Bladerunner which I think is great. But at least here you get a little more in the way of contrast. BR was dreary and oppressive throughout. It didn't matter if you were a street vendor or Tyrell. Your worlds weren't all that different stylistically. Here there's much more contrast.

I noticed a couple plot holes but promptly forgot them. The only one I remember is about re-sleeving. Supposedly if you resleeve to a different body too many times you can go insane but that seems to be the norm for non-meths. Yet there's no mention of this being an issue. Not a big deal, just something I noticed.

I think the dialog could use some work in spots but overall I'm pretty happy with this so far.

I don't know if they mentioned how many times it took for the average person to go insane from too many sleeves. I guess it takes more than a handful.

I agree about the comparison with Bladerunner. Loved the first BR, absolutely hated the recent one (had to force myself to finish it). Altered Carbon did a great job of showing the vast rift between the rich and the poor when this type of technology is available. It's not hard to see a future like that if our tech gets there.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I started watching and I do love the ambiance. It really does scream Bladerunner which I think is great. But at least here you get a little more in the way of contrast. BR was dreary and oppressive throughout. It didn't matter if you were a street vendor or Tyrell. Your worlds weren't all that different stylistically. Here there's much more contrast.

I noticed a couple plot holes but promptly forgot them. The only one I remember is about re-sleeving. Supposedly if you resleeve to a different body too many times you can go insane but that seems to be the norm for non-meths. Yet there's no mention of this being an issue. Not a big deal, just something I noticed.

I think the dialog could use some work in spots but overall I'm pretty happy with this so far.

I expect that most of the population can't afford to re-sleeve enough times to go insane, their core ends up in storage somewhere or is discarded at some point.

 

[glenn1]

The only one I remember is about re-sleeving. Supposedly if you resleeve to a different body too many times you can go insane but that seems to be the norm for non-meths. Yet there's no mention of this being an issue. Not a big deal, just something I noticed.

That’s actually addressed in the books. Lots of folks can’t even afford to resleeve once. The few non-meths who can afford it generally wait until their birth sleeve died of old age, then would only be able to afford another very old or very sick sleeve. That’s their version of “immortality” wasn’t like the Meths with eternally young and strong bodies, but more like an eternity of pain and suffering and infirmity. So most of them didn’t bother resleeving after the first or second time or only get spun out for very special occasions like weddings are such.Thus the typical non-Meth would never experience enough instances of resleeving for the psychosis to occur.

 

[ultimatebob]

Lots of violence and sex? Marked for later watching.

I noticed Netflix queued that up next for me after finishing Cloverfield Paradox

Perhaps they felt like they owed you a good Sci Fi show after foisting that turd on you

 

[Thebobo]

I liked it a lot, was a tad slow in the first episode it picked up I binged on through.
I will admit I got lost on some of the characters, who was who ect but that my memory has always been like that. Had the same problem with GOT. But after watching some of the episode again it all cued up. Very enjoyable, is there supposed to be a season 2

I need a cue card with faces and names of all characters to remind me ~

 

[zinfamous]

I found it slightly above average. I liked where they were going with the over-arching story, but it seemed the main action of this season was to drive interesting plots towards yet another over-done stupid fight sequence, again and again. Are we really not tired of these overly-dramatic, copy-pasted pointless fight sequences yet?

The ending was a major letdown, because I think the ideas behind this show are much bigger, and far more interesting than being a tossed-away driver for yet-another-Netflix-fight show.

 

[ch33zw1z]

Halfway through, I like it. 1.5 thumbs up

 

[Drako]

Spartacus was awesome... although there might have been a bit too much "Cock in Ass!" in a few episodes

Jupiter's Cock!

 

[JEDI]

Halfway through, I like it. 1.5 thumbs up

same here but the little plots holes are adding up.

the virtual reality torture was bs.
you can will the chains away?
you can will your restraints to pop open?

 

[Thebobo]

same here but the little plots holes are adding up.

the virtual reality torture was bs.
you can will the chains away?
you can will your restraints to pop open?

I didn't have a problem with that if you had the idea and some training you could . I see it like the matrix.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I didn't have a problem with that if you had the idea and some training you could . I see it like the matrix.

Training that included a fair amount of VR torture so that your brain could partially adapt to it, slowly and very painfully. Their brains learned to make some of the same changes to the VR that the machines were doing, like self-hypnosis.

 

[ch33zw1z]

same here but the little plots holes are adding up.

the virtual reality torture was bs.
you can will the chains away?
you can will your restraints to pop open?

Controlling the matrix

 

[Sonikku]

Like the title says. Vote, or you don't matter.

I'm tired of all these polls.

So many polls around here we have a damn strip club.

 

[bigi]

Properly violent, tasteful and pretty nudity, great sci-fi concepts, bladerunner influence.

Excellent. Very, very solid effort by Netflix in this genre.