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What TV SHOWS are you watching?

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26 Feb 2018 11:36 #264039 by Shellhead
I haven't seen Altered Carbon yet, but I enjoyed the trilogy of books so much that I have read them all twice. I look forward to watching the show and hope they did justice to the books even if they took some liberties in translating from the page to the screen.

The really big idea in this setting is that your memory, your personality, pretty much everything that makes you who you are mentally, can be reduced down to a set of data stored on a small device. Many people have this device attached to their spinal cord, and do periodic backups. A person could live a really long time, by periodically having this data moved to a different and younger body. And it is much easier to transport this data across interstellar distances than to transport entire living human beings. As a side effect of this technology, racism isn't really a thing anymore, and gender identity is less rigid.

The main character, Takeshi Kovacs (which roughly translates to "military smith" or "war maker"), has Envoy training. This gives him total recall, makes him extremely alert to his surroundings (including body language and advanced pattern recognition) and removes normal human restraints to violence. Envoys also have great control over their emotional and physiological reactions. Envoys are feared as the ultimate troops, and their abilities also translate well to criminal activity.

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26 Feb 2018 11:49 #264041 by Joebot

Shellhead wrote: I haven't seen Altered Carbon yet, but I enjoyed the trilogy of books so much that I have read them all twice. I look forward to watching the show and hope they did justice to the books even if they took some liberties in translating from the page to the screen.

The really big idea in this setting is that your memory, your personality, pretty much everything that makes you who you are mentally, can be reduced down to a set of data stored on a small device. Many people have this device attached to their spinal cord, and do periodic backups. A person could live a really long time, by periodically having this data moved to a different and younger body. And it is much easier to transport this data across interstellar distances than to transport entire living human beings. As a side effect of this technology, racism isn't really a thing anymore, and gender identity is less rigid.

The main character, Takeshi Kovacs (which roughly translates to "military smith" or "war maker"), has Envoy training. This gives him total recall, makes him extremely alert to his surroundings (including body language and advanced pattern recognition) and removes normal human restraints to violence. Envoys also have great control over their emotional and physiological reactions. Envoys are feared as the ultimate troops, and their abilities also translate well to criminal activity.


I just finished watching Altered Carbon. All of what you described from the books is generally present in the show. Although what we see of the Envoys is of the "Tell, don't show" variety. We're often TOLD how dangerous they are. We rarely ever SEE it.

The show looks great. Netflix clearly dropped some money on this, and the sets, costumes, and special effects generally all look really good in a Blade Runner-ripoff sort of way.

I got annoyed by how often the characters are surprised, or fooled, by this consciousness-transfer technology that has been around for hundreds of years. One character discovers that his wife's consciousness has been transferred into the body of a man. He's SHOCKED by this and initially refuses to accept it. Again, this technology has been around for centuries! Why are people not used to this sort of thing? Why haven't they developed new ways of recognizing a person besides just facial recognition, which is clearly no longer to be trusted? The sci-fi ideas presented here are big and meaty and bring up all kinds of interesting philosophical questions ... none of which are really explored.

Season 2 of The Expanse finally showed up on Amazon Prime, so I'm happily going back to that show, which I like quite a bit more.
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26 Feb 2018 12:02 #264043 by jeb
Replied by jeb on topic What TV SHOWS are you watching?
Joebot notes a lot of my issues with the series. The world lacks verisimilitude. The people living in it don't seem like they actually live there. They are always shocked by this development or surprised by that. And while they talk endlessly about how badass the Envoys are, most of the show is about how much they get their asses kicked on the individual and team scales. I was not buying it, and they really need to sell it.

I wanted it to be better. That's my biggest gripe. They went for titties and squishy gore when acting and writing is what they should have paid for.

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26 Feb 2018 12:06 - 26 Feb 2018 12:07 #264044 by Cranberries

jeb wrote: They went for titties and squishy gore when acting and writing is what they should have paid for.


Wait, are we talking about Game of Thrones?

I read the first book and it felt like a heavy-handed, unnecessarily violent airport thriller that was ripping off better cyberpunk novels.
Last edit: 26 Feb 2018 12:07 by Cranberries.
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26 Feb 2018 12:18 #264046 by Joebot

jeb wrote: They went for titties and squishy gore when acting and writing is what they should have paid for.


In a perfect world, we would have all of those things.
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26 Feb 2018 13:54 #264051 by Shellhead
Another implication of the Altered Carbon setting is that the main character should be played by different actors later in the series. This might be a problem for viewers, but maybe not. People were able to cope with three different Mountains on Game of Thrones, and two different Dicks, er Darrens, on Bewitched.

The first book does come across as somewhat generic cyberpunk, aside from the cortical stacks and the Envoy training. The second book is very different, and my favorite of the series, getting into some very interesting sci-fi material. The second book mostly takes place in a hot warzone, instead of a cyberpunk metropolis. The third book is also a different setting, and feels like Point Break (!) was an influence, though one of several.

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26 Feb 2018 13:59 #264052 by Shellhead
I recently watched the first episode of season two of The Expanse, and part of episode two. I wasn't in love with season one, though the story is ambitious and the setting is decent. I feel like it wants to be the science-fiction Game of Thrones, but is based on a lesser series of books. I will eventually get around to watching all of season two, but I don't feel the compulsion to binge it.

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26 Feb 2018 15:30 #264054 by Gary Sax
Both seasons are alright, overall. I wasn't disappointed but I also wasn't super excited.

I definitely don't think they captured Amos very well in the tv series. Everyone else seems fine.

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26 Feb 2018 15:36 - 26 Feb 2018 15:41 #264056 by ChristopherMD
I like The Expanse but similar to others I don't get excited about it. I've also never read the books. Part of me expects Syfy to cancel the show before finishing so I might read them later to find out what happens.

Altered Carbon I quit after the first 2 episodes. Just didn't grab me at all.
Last edit: 26 Feb 2018 15:41 by ChristopherMD.

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26 Feb 2018 16:04 #264058 by Shellhead
A couple of my friends read the early Expanse books but couldn't motivate themselves to finish the series. Apparently the pace slows down in the later books.

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26 Feb 2018 16:16 #264059 by Sagrilarus
I've been watching the Expanse and it's also on the edge of the delete list. It's good, but not great. I really, really don't want it to become a bug hunt, and it seems to keep sidling up to that. Appears to leave it alone, then it comes back. I'm concerned it's going to have a big showdown at some point, and that's lazy writing.

I have been pleased with its more political intrigue aspects.
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26 Feb 2018 16:31 - 27 Feb 2018 08:28 #264060 by charlest
It does not turn into a bug hunt really, assuming they follow the books.

I don't really feel like the pace has slowed in the series. Certain books aren't quite as tense as others but they all have some very pivotal moments and geniune surprise.
Last edit: 27 Feb 2018 08:28 by charlest.
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26 Feb 2018 17:53 #264061 by Not Sure

Sagrilarus wrote: We're watching The Alienist, and we're waiting for a plot to appear. As it stands it keeps showing scenes where someone explains something that just adds to the mystery, without providing any footing for the viewer. It's on the edge, could be deleted from the Tivo queue at any moment.


That's a shame, I really enjoyed this book and the sequel. The book was as much about the beginning of the notions of profiling as it was about murders, though. That might be a hard thing to film.

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26 Feb 2018 22:33 #264068 by the_jake_1973
We have been watching the Frakenstein Chronicles on Netflix. It is the Frankenstein story, more or less, told from the vantage point of outside parties. Mainly a constable investigating missing persons and bodies that turn up which are pieces of many stitched into one. So far a decent show.

The constable is played by Sean Bean and they have made a few callbacks to his long running role as Richard Sharpe.

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26 Feb 2018 23:08 - 26 Feb 2018 23:09 #264071 by Gary Sax

charlest wrote: It does not turn into a bug hug really, assuming they follow the books.

I don't really feel like the pace has slowed in the series. Certain books aren't quite as tense as others but they all have some very pivotal moments and geniune surprise.


I've read all of them and I feel like the only real dud is in the middle where:

Warning: Spoiler!


But they surprisingly pick themselves back up after that, IMHO, with the newest plotlines. It has looped around to a fairly predictable conflict with a very obviously opened mystery/loose end in an earlier book.
Last edit: 26 Feb 2018 23:09 by Gary Sax.

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