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Boris Galerkin posted:The character/actor is funny but I have to correct you right there: he’s not a “bearded biker” he’s a literal Nazi (he has a 88 tattoo, which doesn’t mean he’s born in 2x88). I know it’s just a TV show but we kinda have a problem with nazis right now, so I’m just pointing it out for more awareness. I thought it was Tom Segura for a while.
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Feb 4, 2018 11:16
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I was worried that the show was going to lose a lot of the unsettling weirdness about sleeving, but (Ep 4) Ortega sleeving her crotchety gran in a neo-nazi for Die de Muertos is loving genius.
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Feb 4, 2018 12:58
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The series is sort of a mess especially near the end but all the things like the more unsettling stuff make up for it.
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Feb 4, 2018 13:43
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I started reading the book a few days before the season came out because a friend made me, and I'm really loving the book, so I think everyone definitely should watch it. But man, I am not digging the show at ALL. The characters feel like weird second rate parodies of the book characters, and the whole tone of the show feels off compared to the book. I originally wanted to watch the show first and then go and read the book, figuring they'd just leave out a ton of stuff like they always do and I could dive deeper into the world, but now I really wish I'd done it that way, because I don't think I can actually finish a whole season of this. Book Kovacs / show Kovacs: In the book Kovacs is strong willed and opinionated, not afraid of giving it straight to anyone. In the TV show he's some kind of loving Saturady Night Live level parody of a hard boiled mercenary. "Some people just need killing" type poo poo. One early massive tone difference stuck out to me. In the Raven/Hendrix lobby scene, in the book version Kovacs just ducks down and covers his ears when the autocannons start firing. In the TV show they do some kind of retarded slow motion Matrix kung-fu action scene where he's spin kicking dudes left and right while quipping at them. Someone put it pretty well when they said this was 90s Sci-Fi TV level poo poo but with higher production values. E: That being said, the TV show did have some neat moments as well. I thought the broadcasts were portrayed pretty well and I loved the little girl who had been killed in a car accident and resleeved in the haggard body of some old lady. That's like when they gave Harry Dresden a hockey stick for a staff in the TV show, a cool little addition that fits the world real well. Shaman Tank Spec fucked around with this message at 14:58 on Feb 4, 2018 |
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Feb 4, 2018 14:51
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Just finished the series, it was pretty good overall I reckon. Episode 7 felt like a movie, great cinematography and the ravine setpeice was impressive, especially when it was all covered in ash.Development posted:this. also jfc I am really enjoying this show. the backpack is probably my favourite prop. Just like the backpack in The Expanse! MrMojok posted:Were there ever any games like this, with neurachem upgrades to the body in a cyberpunk type setting? Deus Ex: Human Revolution, that has a similar setting but revolves around augmentations and implants, it is where the quote in the thread title is from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kq5KWLqUewc drunkill fucked around with this message at 16:15 on Feb 4, 2018 |
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Feb 4, 2018 16:12
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lmao at all the pearl clutching articles crying about the violence and whitewashing in the show.
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Feb 4, 2018 16:42
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So they turned it up to 11 and now they go to 12? This show is awesome.
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Feb 4, 2018 17:29
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Finished it, thought it was pretty good. I haven't read the books so these opinions are just from the show only. I was initially unhappy when it turned out his sister Rei was the big bad, but in the end I think it did a good job of showing how being a fabulously wealthy, immortal Meth really does make you totally selfish and corrupt. Kovacs didn't seem like a true believer in Quell's philosophy and Uprising so much as he believed in her as a person. Rei ultimately was selfish and used Tak as an excuse to justify her selfishness. Then after centuries of being a Meth she's completely corrupted, contrast the scenes of her and Tak as kids watching her mother get beaten and now she's running a brothel in the sky that specializes in letting wealthy patrons torture, rape, and kill women. I kind of wish they had gone into the Elder civilization a little more. Leave it as a big mystery still, but I think they could have sprinkled a little more alien stuff in to add more weirdness. I also think it would've been cool if we saw more of the scope of Quell's Uprising, and maybe her philosophy and Envoy training are connected to the Elder aliens in some way, Jedi-style. Quell invented stacks, which are based on alien technology, it's not a stretch that she discovered other alien stuff she used in Envoy training. What we get in the show is a couple dozen Envoys practicing kung fu and ~control your body~ mindfulness in the jungle. I would've liked to see other Uprising cells on other planets, and actually seen some of the "terrorist" acts and missions they went on. The show doesn't do a good job of establishing how scary the Envoys were supposed to be.
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Feb 4, 2018 17:42
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Der Shovel posted:I started reading the book a few days before the season came out because a friend made me, and I'm really loving the book, so I think everyone definitely should watch it. I'm with you 100% on all of this. Take out the R rated content and this feels like some cheesy NBC show that gets cancelled after one season. Most people seems to be really digging the show but I don't get it. It's very "dark and gritty" instead of dark and gritty. One example is the interrogation scene. In the book he's put into different sleeves and actually physically tortured and killed and it's super effective and hosed up until he talks his way out of it. In the show, he's tortured in the virtual world and they try their best to dress it up with a leftover set from Saw but it's still just a guy laying on a table twitching. I also think him killing everybody as he's escaping is far less dramatic than him escaping and then walking back into the lion's den to massacre them. The whole grandma subplot also feels like a mid-season "well we have to get to 22 episodes somehow" filler. I don't want to be one of those "not my Altered Carbon" guys but the show just has a really lame "TV" feel to it that it can't rise above.
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Feb 4, 2018 18:20
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I'm up to episode 9 and so far this show is holding strong. I don't get the criticisms. As having read the book, I honestly think this show is about as good as you'll get based on the source material. Random side note: the actor that plays the neo nazi / abuela / etc. is really loving good. He really sells the different personalities.
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Feb 4, 2018 18:46
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Book Scene X was better than in the TV Series.
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Feb 4, 2018 19:04
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Human Tornada posted:One example is the interrogation scene. In the book he's put into different sleeves and actually physically tortured and killed and it's super effective and hosed up until he talks his way out of it. In the show, he's tortured in the virtual world and they try their best to dress it up with a leftover set from Saw but it's still just a guy laying on a table twitching. I also think him killing everybody as he's escaping is far less dramatic than him escaping and then walking back into the lion's den to massacre them. That scene would be far less effective with different sleeves. Without a view to his internal state, it'd just look like torturing different people.
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Feb 4, 2018 19:14
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a foolish pianist posted:That scene would be far less effective with different sleeves. Without a view to his internal state, it'd just look like torturing different people. If it was handled as clumsily as the rest of the show, probably, but I'm sure there's an effective way to portray it out there. Or the scene could have been effective in the virtuality, but it wasn't. Maybe present the torture as real at first, then reveal it to be in the virtuality. Jigsaw's lair was just corny.
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Feb 4, 2018 19:48
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The change that most irritates me is a really minor one in ep 2: he buys all his guns from a blackmarket dealer In the book he goes to a swanky walnut walled establishment, where a very dapper synth sells him perfectly legal hyper-cyanide tipped knives, and a mag-flechette with a spare battery and "a charger compatible with all standard household outlets" It gave a really nice civilised veneer to the dystopia, and made it a lot more than a generic gritty cyberpunk.
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Feb 4, 2018 20:01
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Human Tornada posted:If it was handled as clumsily as the rest of the show, probably, but I'm sure there's an effective way to portray it out there. He was tortured in the virtuality in the books as well. Kovacs was put in the body of a woman in Sharya (sp?), one of the worlds he'd fought on as an envoy. But it was all virtual. I enjoyed the series, but it definitely had some rough moments. Not sure the melding of the Envoys and Quellists really worked.
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Feb 4, 2018 20:07
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Strom Cuzewon posted:The change that most irritates me is a really minor one in ep 2: he buys all his guns from a blackmarket dealer If they had gotten Peter Serafinowicz to basically reprise his role from John Wick 2 they could have put that scene on screen perfectly.
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Feb 4, 2018 20:44
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Ugly In The Morning posted:If they had gotten Peter Serafinowicz to basically reprise his role from John Wick 2 they could have put that scene on screen perfectly. Strom Cuzewon posted:The change that most irritates me is a really minor one in ep 2: he buys all his guns from a blackmarket dealer I think I might do a “Let’s Read” of Altered Carbon with some extra highlighting of where the books and show diverge.
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Feb 4, 2018 20:56
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4 episodes in and it's enjoyable so far. Good but not great. It lacks the organic worldbuilding that The Expanse managed to achieve, and a lot of the early episodes feel extremely cluttered with exposition since they need to explain so much for the audience. Some scenes feel extremely off both tonally and contextually, like the AI poker club. Overall though I really like it, but then I'm a sucker for broody cyberpunk stuff.
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Feb 4, 2018 20:58
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really reminds me of first season of the Expanse or possibly Spartacus very complex amoral world of sex violence and wealth. I really enjoyed it and it was the first series since Stranger things that blitzed through. I feel a second season would refine a lot of weakness away like the Expanse managed. Also true from the top my head with Justified, Leftovers and loads others. Loved the aesthetic of it.
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Feb 4, 2018 21:30
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Lobster God posted:Not sure the melding of the Envoys and Quellists really worked. They didn't quite merge them though, did they? He was doing the "Envoy" thing with the empire; the whole "needlecast interstellar deathsquad" deal. It's just, they just kinda degraded the imperial deathsquad to kinda lame and also stole the name because I guess "Envoys" sounds hella cool and they didn't want the less thoughtful viewers end up with the impression of "wait, the deathsquad jig was actually cooler tho?". I did hate the quellist bits and definitely wish there was less of it and done better, but I still feel like it's relevant they weren't quite blend of the two distinct concepts in the previous one, they just shifted some of the "cool bits" from the teleporting nazis to the treehugger hippies.
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Feb 4, 2018 22:35
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navyjack posted:I think I might do a “Let’s Read” of Altered Carbon with some extra highlighting of where the books and show diverge. I’d be down to follow along. Just link it here when you get it set up.
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Feb 4, 2018 22:38
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Human Tornada posted:The whole grandma subplot also feels like a mid-season "well we have to get to 22 episodes somehow" filler. I think it was intended to show that getting resleeved in some random body didn't always have to be a tragedy. Once everyone realized that the hulking tattooed nazi was their abuela come back to visit then they were basically fine with it. Also it fleshed out some of the background on the religious opposition to resleeving.
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Feb 4, 2018 22:45
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One thing that did bemuse me was that they hosed over his recruitment bonus for joining the teleportation interstellar death squad (at age ten or something? They just sleeved him right into an adult body) and shoved his sister into a lovely orphanage instead of getting her adopted into a family. I would have thought having loyal teleporting deathsquads would be a priority for this kind of government and it was such a minor thing. I can absolutely see an rear end in a top hat regime being that petty but then why did they then actually give his sister serious money, new sleeves, clones, etc when she betrayed Quell? It would seem more in character to just never spin her back up and trash the recording.
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Feb 4, 2018 22:47
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I'm only at episode 4 or 5, but I just want to say how pleasantly surprised I've been with this series so far. It's easily the best-looking Netflix original series I've seen, and despite the trope-iness and a few cliches here and there, I think it's still fairly original enough. The idea is interesting and the show does a pretty good job at keeping it that way. While I hate to describe works solely by comparison, as I feel it's lazy and detracts from the works' actual merits/demerits, it's kinda impossible for me to watch this and not think "It's sort of like Blade Runner meets Metropolis, maybe with a dash of something like Firefly thrown in (due to the whole small group of rebels being defeated by a larger federation-type deal in the past)." There are far, far worse comparisons, so kudos to this. What's the prose like in the book? I might be interested in checking out the source material if it's competently written. e: withak posted:Also it fleshed out some of the background on the religious opposition to resleeving. That's what I got out of that subplot, myself. It didn't really strike me as filler or unnecessary because it served as a pretty decent exposition-delivery system. Thought it beat the hell out of just an expo-dump spelling everything out for us, and far more enjoyable. Terra-da-loo! fucked around with this message at 23:06 on Feb 4, 2018 |
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Feb 4, 2018 22:56
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Teal posted:They didn't quite merge them though, did they? He was doing the "Envoy" thing with the empire; the whole "needlecast interstellar deathsquad" deal. It's just, they just kinda degraded the imperial deathsquad to kinda lame and also stole the name because I guess "Envoys" sounds hella cool and they didn't want the less thoughtful viewers end up with the impression of "wait, the deathsquad jig was actually cooler tho?". During the scenes where they were training for interrogation, I thought it was either stated or implied that Kovacs was one of the "good guys" before he joined whatever terrorist organization he joined. The woman in charge of the training was telling the story about her friend who was being interrogated by the "good guys" and how she tricked them into getting all the VIP military officers into one room and then she blew herself up and killed all of them. Kovacs said something about how he was sent out of the room, because he wasn't important enough to stay.
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Feb 4, 2018 22:57
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Boris Galerkin posted:During the scenes where they were training for interrogation, I thought it was either stated or implied that Kovacs was one of the "good guys" before he joined whatever terrorist organization he joined. The woman in charge of the training was telling the story about her friend who was being interrogated by the "good guys" and how she tricked them into getting all the VIP military officers into one room and then she blew herself up and killed all of them. Kovacs said something about how he was sent out of the room, because he wasn't important enough to stay. Yeah but I thought (I haven't read it, I'm piecing this together from posts here and summaries of the book elsewhere) that's what the Envoys were in the book; the "good guy" death squad for crushing resistance and suppressing planetary dissent. He still started like that in the movie and they still had the whole "trained to quickly adjust to resleeving" stuff, just the kung fu, torture resistance and the name got offloaded onto the rebels.
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Feb 4, 2018 23:27
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Terra-da-loo! posted:What's the prose like in the book? I might be interested in checking out the source material if it's competently written. I found it to be overly stylistic and complicated in a very cyberpunk sort of way, in a way that detracts from understanding what's going on. I think the strengths of the book are the imaginative ideas. But that's just my opinion. To give you an idea of what I consider to be good writing, currently Joe Abercrombie is probably my favorite scifi/fantasy author.
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Feb 4, 2018 23:52
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That was the biggest change from the books IMO. That the quellists were apparently still an effective boogeyman throughout the universe 250 years later, and that Quellcrist Falconer was basically Neo instead of just being a rebel on a backwoods planet and a source of punchy revolutionary quotes.
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Feb 4, 2018 23:53
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I just don’t understand why they made Reileen (book info) Tak’s sister in the show. She makes way more sense as a character being this known piece of poo poo Meth that Tak worked for once. She knows Bancroft since they’re both Meths and refers him as an investigator. The way they shoehorned her in as being related to him is just weird. The quasi-merge of Quellists into Envoys was a strange decision, too, that’s already been touched on, but it at least makes some sense within the narrative. Reileen being Tak’s sister just loving baffles me, and it apparently makes no real sense to people who haven’t read the book either. She went from a formidable villain in the book, whose made all the worse from the fact that she came from nothing and became this Meth and titan of an industry that preys on people just like she was when she was young, to a jealous little sister who inexplicably creates a vast prostitution ring to...uh...get her brother back? Somehow? I usually prefer reading books before seeing an adaptation, seeing all the little changes they make is usually pretty cool if the adaptations good. I originally read this series back when a movie was rumored to be in the works. Really wishing I could have somehow gone in blind now because that change just threw me right out of the show. I enjoyed it overall and am hoping for another season, but am having a real hard time getting past that. Looking forward to the person above who said they might do a let’s read of it, please link here if you do.
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Feb 5, 2018 00:13
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pendulous thread posted:I just don’t understand why they made Reileen (book info) Tak’s sister in the show. She makes way more sense as a character being this known piece of poo poo Meth that Tak worked for once. She knows Bancroft since they’re both Meths and refers him as an investigator. I haven't read the book, but I like this change. Gives it a more personal connection for Kovacs and kind of drives home that meths become monsters because of their immortality. She was already a bit broken before due to her childhood and Yakuza slavery, but 2 centuries of life and her desire for power really killed what was left of her humanity. She was abused and now she does the abusing. Rei also explicitly mentions that she needed to have power / influence to find her brother, which she did when she manipulated Bancroft into picking him to solve his "murder".
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Feb 5, 2018 00:34
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navyjack posted:Ok, the freakin bearded biker abuela in ep4 is breaking my fucken heart. Nazi Abduela rules.
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Feb 5, 2018 01:40
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I'm really split on this and it kind of feel like a half-season of excellence and then a lot of 'err, wait, what'. Will also caveat as being a fan of the book(s) which is almost certainly colouring my viewing. While I don't love Rei being his sister and was certainly a big switch, it didn't distract from the overall plot but made it far more personal for him The virtual erasure of Envoys was just weird. On the one hand you had Kovacs voiceover doing a lot of talking about Envoys, and some snippets of the new version in training, on the other it took away the mythology of them. No need for them to be barred from public service when they're just failed resistance fighters. and on that note, the dramatic reduction of Quelcrist and Quellism was weird. On the one hand she featured far more, especially in his head, on the other her philosophy was pretty much erased. Other than 'living too long is bad' and this switch to her having invented stacks. Likewise removing Sharya and Innenin took out some depth, and changing Rawlins to 'they dropped a bunch of ash as a stack virus' just removed all that narrative. On that note, did I miss how he apparently obtained all the stacks that were infected with Rawlins 4851? Music was great, imagery was great. Annoyed they changed the whole 'get guns' scene as I was looking forward to that, and really not sure why they went with the almost generic backroom dealer rather than the upscale merchant from the books. Overall decent just some odd choices. Will be interesting to see if they renew and if so how they go with it, suspect the open-hanging ending will be the choice rather than furies/angels. PST fucked around with this message at 01:58 on Feb 5, 2018 |
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Feb 5, 2018 01:52
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PST posted:I'm really split on this and it kind of feel like a half-season of excellence and then a lot of 'err, wait, what'. Will also caveat as being a fan of the book(s) which is almost certainly colouring my viewing. While I don't love Rei being his sister and was certainly a big switch, it didn't distract from the overall plot but made it far more personal for him The virtual erasure of Envoys was just weird. On the one hand you had Kovacs voiceover doing a lot of talking about Envoys, and some snippets of the new version in training, on the other it took away the mythology of them. No need for them to be barred from public service when they're just failed resistance fighters. and on that note, the dramatic reduction of Quelcrist and Quellism was weird. On the one hand she featured far more, especially in his head, on the other her philosophy was pretty much erased. Other than 'living too long is bad' and this switch to her having invented stacks They did get renewed for S2 already. I would really rather have Broken Angels next, personally, but if they do something new I would be receptive as long as Richard K Morgan is involved. Anyone who likes this should go pick up Crysis 2, by the way. It was written by Morgan, and has a lot of the stuff that makes Altered Carbon and the sequels really cool. It’s a solid FPS, too.
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Feb 5, 2018 02:00
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PST posted:On that note, did I miss how he apparently obtained all the stacks that were infected with Rawlins 4851? There was a scene earlier where he was looking at them in a museum display, where Rei was in the little girl sleeve too. For Season 2, it seems like they have set it up to go towards Woken Furies, though I guess they could keep the "find where Quell's mind is uploaded" quest going through just about any other kind of plot.
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Feb 5, 2018 02:17
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Thanks for the feedback on the books. That's sort of unfortunate. It kinda sounds like the show has it beaten in some major ways--what I just heard about the source material doesn't sound like a read I'd enjoy much. Then again, I've honestly not actually read that much sci-fi. Favorite author is Vonnegut, and a lot of his definitely pretty sci-fi (though not in the same sense as something like this), but other than that I've only read some Philip K. Dick, a Trek novel and a little Arthur C. Clarke. I'm interested in checking out some of the books The Expanse is based on, but haven't gotten around to it yet. One of my biggest criticisms with the series is that I don't care for what's being more or less presented as "Envoy superpowers," and unless I misunderstood something I read, it sounds like the it's even more over the top in text (?). No thanks. Fortunately, it's been mild enough so far to not get discouraging. That said, I do love how Kovac is a pretty effective anti-hero. So far he's still mostly a sympathetic character, but I'm pretty sure he might very well be a sociopath or something. Not sure. Still, I like that. I think the majority of attempts at anti-hero in shows like this usually come up a little short on the 'anti' part and just wind up with a mildly unlikable protag.
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Feb 5, 2018 02:33
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Bobbin Threadbare posted:The PnP RPG Eclipse Phase is to Altered Carbon what Shadowrun is to Neuromancer. Yeah, it's so cribbed from Altered Carbon it's not funny, like uses the same terminology like "cortical stacks", "neurchem" (which is basically wired reflexes), and "needlecast", but it borrows from other contemporary science fiction, like David Brin's Uplift universe, Peter Watts, etc. It's also more like the post-apocalypse of Altered Carbon: Earth got Terminatored, with most of humanity reduced to a billion or two across the solar system and a few exoplanets. And not many people escaped with their bodies, being held in some horrible immigration limbo as infugees or having to make due in synth bodies. While most people think the worst is behind them, it's not, with humanity on the brink thanks to people not leaving poo poo That Man Has No Business Dealing With.
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Feb 5, 2018 02:46
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There's worse things they could do with the second season than Quest for the Princess.
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Feb 5, 2018 02:49
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The book is great. If you enjoyed the show there's no reason at all not to read the book.
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Feb 5, 2018 02:55
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The Ninth Layer posted:The book is great. If you enjoyed the show there's no reason at all not to read the book. Seconding this.
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Feb 5, 2018 03:00
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Just started episode 3, this show spent it's money right. It looks expensive as gently caress. I'm really starting to like the Hotel AI too.
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Feb 5, 2018 03:48
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