Altered Carbon Season 2 Review: Not Quite As Good But Still Entertaining
This is a show we talk about a lot on LCB because both me and Trillballins enjoyed the first season. It weaved an entertaining story around this dystopian landscape, and had a pretty unique concept with the sleeving tech. I liked the performances of Joel Kinnaman, Chris Connor, Martha Higareda and Dichen Lachman. The SFX also looked pretty damn good for a TV budget. I'd never call it must-watch, but I liked it a lot for what it was: A corny but fun ride that sometimes took itself too seriously.
Season 2, unfortunately, was not exactly what I'd hoped it would be. One of the bigger problems I've had is Anthony Mackie's performance as Takeshi Kovacs. All three iterations of Kovacs in season 1 (Joel Kinnaman, Will Yun Lee and Byron Mann) were extremely similar in that they were convincingly dark and brooding. Mackie is a phenomenal actor, but I just don't buy him as Kovacs. I understand the casting because a lot of this season had to do with Tak's relationship with Falconer, and it's harder to have a robotic actor do that. It just didn't feel right to me, though. To that point, I didn't really like almost any of the new additions. Danica Harlan felt like a rerun (no pun intended) of Rei, Trepp wasn't given enough characterization, and Ivan Carrera was given too much characterization that didn't feel like it took.
[*SPOILERS*]
It's kind of hard to talk about my issues with the plot without spoilers, unfortunately. This show obviously takes place in the future in a universe where humans colonized a whole bunch of planets. However, I think the plot revolving around Aliens was just not that riveting. Part of what I liked about season one was how much it worked around humanity, raising some pretty thought-provoking questions about what it is to be considered human, the afterlife, consciousness etc. This season still explored that, but it felt like a lot of those themes were superseded by the alien stuff. What I did like about this season was getting more of Poe. He is a character I hated after his first introduction in season one, but he grew on me so fast. His relationship with Dig was great, and the failing AI mind reminded me a lot of the Halo 4 plotline (which i low key liked a lot). I also think it was fun to leave Earth, but we saw so much of Harlan's world last season. Like, at least 20% of last season was flashbacks of training, Stronghold, childhood etc.
The season is still enjoyable, just not nearly as much as the first one. This just makes me want to see Mackie in 'The Falcon & The Winter Soldier' already.