Netflix's Altered Carbon: The Perfect Cyberpunk Show Sci-Fi Fans Must See

Getting cyberpunk sci-fi right on the small screen can be hard, but Netflix's 2-part show achieves the rare feat with its incredible take on an award-winning cyberpunk book series.

Netflix is the home of some of the most creative and compelling modern sci-fi shows, like Dark, Sense8, The OA, and Black Mirror. In its vast catalog of original shows, though, there seems to be only one pure cyberpunk series that perfectly captures the essence of the sci-fi sub-genre. The show only lasted for two seasons before being canceled, but it remains one of Netflix’s most ambitious and visually striking sci-fi projects.

Although it never got to reach its natural conclusion, the Netflix sci-fi show in question reveals exactly how cyberpunk should be captured on the small screen.

Altered Carbon Is A Delight For Sci-Fi Fans

Altered Carbon seems to slightly stumble in its second installment. However, in season 1, the show does an incredible job of using "sleeves" as a terrifying narrative device. With its gripping portrayal of how consciousness can be digitized and swapped into different bodies, Altered Carbon shows a future where identity, justice, and even morality become distorted once death is no longer the mark of the end of one's journey.

Even from a visual standpoint, Altered Carbon makes good use of its small-screen budget to deliver a Blade Runner-esque aesthetic.

Getting the cyberpunk genre right in the live-action medium demands a higher budget. However, Altered Carbon's portrayal of everything from gritty urban landscapes to neon-lit holographic advertisements feels realistic. The show is also driven by a gripping "whodunit" that adds another layer of intrigue to its storytelling.

While there are moments where it looks like Netflix's Altered Carbon prioritizes style over substance, especially in season 2, it often respects its audiences' intelligence and avoids spoon-feeding every detail like most other mainstream sci-fi shows.

How Altered Carbon Captures The Essence Of Cyberpunk

The term "cyberpunk" conjures images of neon-lit cities and futuristic tech in one's mind. However, its true essence lies in its portrayal of a world ruled by "high tech, low life." Altered Carbon does not shy away from spectacle, but what makes it the perfect cyberpunk series, especially in season 1, is how it portrays the massive class divides between its characters in a futuristic world.

While the ultra wealthy, known as The Meths, in the series, live in a high-tech utopia above the clouds, the low lives suffer in the overcrowded slums of the Bay City where it perpetually rains and "the sky above the port is the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.”

The Cortisol Stack is the ultimate form of high-tech in the series' world, but it creates the most tragic low-life circumstances for the less privileged who have to wait for centuries to be re-sleeved and revived into a new body.

Altered Carbon Deserved More Seasons

Apart from its portrayal of "high-tech, low life," Altered Carbon also captures other cyberpunk tropes, including William Gibson's classic portrayal of "The street finds its own use for things." Unfortunately, despite covering so much ground, the show only manages to scratch the surface of the narrative scale of Richard Morgan's original book in two seasons.

The show's story also gave it a fun reset button, where each new installment could focus on Takeshi Kovacs new body. Every new installment could have had a brand new A-list lead, exploring a new set of mysteries set further ahead in the future.

Richard Morgan's Altered Carbon also has two follow-up books:

1. Broken Angels
2. Woken Furies

New seasons of the show could have touched on story beats from the two books that were left untouched, which would have allowed it to become a more complete adaptation. Unfortunately, Netflix canceled the cyberpunk show a little too soon instead of allowing it to unfold its true potential.