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Scorecard Weekly - 'Altered Carbon'

Will it be a 5 out of 5?

By Donovan BarlowPublished 6 years ago 4 min read
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Here ye'! Here ye'! Welcome to Scorecard Weekly!

Today, we will begin our weekly review of new TV series and movies. What does this mean for you? It means that each week, you can come back here and get the most honest, uncut, and uncensored scorecards of the 21st Century—Not really, but it sounded nice. Let me explain how this works. We will spend hundreds, if not THOUSANDS of hours watching television shows and films, then we will grade them using our state of the art scorecard. What is being scored?

1. Setting/Characters

2. Obstacles/Conflict

3. Tone

4. Concept

The minimum score for a section and card is one. The maximum score is five. Finally, we decide if it's a recommend or pass. What's in it for you? Nothing but entertainment.

Today's guest will be the new original series, Altered Carbon, brought to us by Netflix.

1. Setting/Characters

Set in the year 2384, we are transported to a future that is as beautiful and complex as it is filthy and suffocating. If you love science fiction, then you should be able to appreciate a world nothing short of extraordinary. The technology of the future offered us many different things: Flying cars, floating cities, Artificial Intelligence, EYE phones, cryogenics, VR, and weaponry. The show provides us with a future that one can only dream of and be equally terrified with.

What needs to compliment this magnificent world we are given? Well, it's supposed to be the people living in it, but that's hit or miss with this show. We are given a protagonist who’s brought back after 250 years after his previous body is killed. His "Stack," which is just a disk that contains his consciousness, has been stored away—until now. His job, if he chooses to accept, is helping a man solve his own murder. If he doesn't accept, he'll be put back on the ice forever. He's 100 percent badass, almost like it's been woven into his being. Skills in hand to hand combat, weaponry, and deceit are all TOP NOTCH! I've seen this type of performance before *Cough Cough* Rick Flag. He is brought back by a "Meth," which is just a person who has achieved immortality. Some guy who's rich, powerful, a douche, loves whores. Really likable...

Along the way, our protagonist meets and kind of, not really, befriends other people. A hardheaded, overly complicated, and quite annoying detective; an AI hotel overseer who, I might add, gives the group a unique dynamic; a stricken father who only wants to bring back his loved ones (can't blame him), all of whom share in the badassery. Granted, there are other important characters, but I won't spoil it for anyone who hasn't watched season one.

Score- 4

2. Obstacles/Conflict

This is where things get complicated, and I'm still processing whether that's good or bad. Maybe a bit of both. Our protagonist is tasked with solving the murder of a man who's still alive because he's immortal. YEP, GOOD LUCK, PAL! Now that seems like an extremely complicated task, so let's add in an unsolved murder, conspiracy, vigilante justice (that's what we'll call it) and just a ton of other unnecessary additions. Without spoiling, there will come a moment in the series where I could only sit and think about Batman V Superman, "Martha." That's all I'll say about that. The supporting characters do get their own story arcs. Some are more in-depth than others, but overall, we learn the who, what, when, where, and why of them all. I still have questions, dammit!

Score- 3.5

3. Tone

When I think of tone, I think of "Mood." So, for me, I'm thinking what the mood of a certain scene or episode was. Many of the episodes were dark; gritty. Some moments it was just sickening. We are all ignorant of what the future holds, but if it's anything like this show, we're royally fucked. At one point in the show, the MC is tortured and killed repeatedly within the "construct," which is a virtual environment. Granted, it wasn't real, but you still feel for him. Again, without spoiling anything, there are a few cringe moments within this show, but I think they were needed to fully encapsulate the tone of this future.

Score- 5

4. Concept

This show is an adaptation of the first book in the Altered Carbon trilogy by Richard Morgan. Without knowledge of the book series, this concept alone has enough depth to be its own being. It is quite consuming and thought-provoking. If a concept makes you ask questions, you've got something good on your hands. The concept wasn't extremely complicated and there weren't any major plot holes. It was solid and fulfilling. This concept sold itself because it is brilliant. Now, I'm sure there are other works of science fiction out there with settings, characters, obstacles, and tones that are like AC, but that doesn't make it any less entertaining.

Score- 4

Overall Score- 4/5

Final Verdict- Recommend

Thank you so much for stopping by! Next week, we will be bringing you yet another scorecard, so stay tuned!!!

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About the Creator

Donovan Barlow

Screenwriter, Father, King of the pirates, Demogorgon Killer, and The People’s Champion (Sorry Rock)

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