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Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

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Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#41

Post by philipkglass »

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #39
smnrchrds wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add to your list of questions, Since it is so trivial to fake video evidence or transfer to a new body, why would a video confession have any value? And why on earth are their bank accounts DNA-locked when they can and do change bodies like they change cloths? In the future so technologically advanced, why would a contract need to be physically printed and stamped? Who holds the power in this universe? One episode…

We (wife and I) quit watching halfway through the second show. The plot didn't make sense. Why would someone who is effectively immortal care if a body was destroyed? Aside from "plot point", why was the update of the meth's upload 48 hours? Why not also local, and uploaded to the cloud? For anyone who can upload, which seems everyone except Catholics (plot point), why can't people trade bodies as needed? 7 year old…

There's a lot of internal inconsistency in the story but

Why would someone who is effectively immortal care if a body was destroyed?

Doesn't seem so weird. Bancroft has no memory of being in a suicidal frame of mind, he has a lot of enemies, and somehow his last body ended up destroyed with his own weapon inside his secure mansion. It doesn't matter that it's impossible to really end him by destroying that one body. It should have also been impossible for one of his enemies to destroy that one body in those circumstances. As long as Bancroft isn't convinced of the suicide or wife-did-it explanations he's going to care a lot about how that body ended up dead.

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#42

Post by crankylinuxuser »

philipkglass wrote: post #41
crankylinuxuser wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We (wife and I) quit watching halfway through the second show. The plot didn't make sense. Why would someone who is effectively immortal care if a body was destroyed? Aside from "plot point", why was the update of the meth's upload 48 hours? Why not also local, and uploaded to the cloud? For anyone who can upload, which seems everyone except Catholics (plot point), why can't people trade bodies as needed? 7 year old…

There's a lot of internal inconsistency in the story but Why would someone who is effectively immortal care if a body was destroyed? Doesn't seem so weird. Bancroft has no memory of being in a suicidal frame of mind, he has a lot of enemies, and somehow his last body ended up destroyed with his own weapon inside his secure mansion. It doesn't matter that it's impossible to really end him by destroying that one body.…

We already live in a world with cameras, microphones, and recorders of all sorts spooling data to the "cloud". And this futuristic world wants to sell me the idea that one of the richest families in the galaxy can't afford security that entails in recording all physical happenings that goes on in the house?

I don't accept that.

Sure, video can be forged or deleted. But we can even solve that by spooling to write-once read only systems. A dot matrix printer is an early form of that for Syslog. Hard for a hacker to 'hack' a printout. Or, in this case, whatever techno-magical hardware can be used.

And regarding killing his body and device, all he needs to do is increase the update frequency and make it realtime backup for his residence. Then, no mystery. He'd remember.

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#43

Post by geobourazanas »

https://joannavass.typeform.com/to/Vy18OL

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Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#44

Post by BerislavLopac »

Fnoord wrote: post #34
evo_9 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Laughably bad, actually, esp. if you cut your teeth growing up on Neuromancer, Snowcrash, etc. I honestly thought it was written by a teenager, the scene with the Ai's playing poker was when it went off the cliff for me. Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams, however, is worthwhile and a nice bookend to the new season of Black Mirror.

I've only seen about 20 minutes of the first episode and couldn't enjoy it. I'd like to at least finish the first episode before I make judge for myself whether this one's worth my time (though I'm gonna first watch The Man in the High Castle). Generally though as a rule of thumb: Nice CGI doesn't make up for a terrible story, but a good story can make up for the lack of good CGI. E.g. I did not find the story good i…

> I'm not aware of any motion picture adaptations of Stephenson's or Gibson's works.

Well, for what it's worth, there is Johnny Mnemonic, which wasn't very well received although I personally liked it. Another short story set in the Sprawl, New Rose Hotel, was also adapted to a film (I haven't seen it), and many other works, including Neuromancer, have been in various stages of development for a while. More details at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Gibson#Film_adaptation...

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#45

Post by amag »

carapace wrote: post #33
philipkglass wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I re-read the book a few weeks ago in anticipation of the series. The inconsistencies that you notice are real and present in the source material. I didn't notice them so much the first time I read the book 10+ years ago. The relentless action was fresh the first time around and helped paper over weaknesses in the logic of the world. Also I've apparently become less able to overlook internal inconsistencies with time…

(Oh man, Star Trek... Artificial gravity that no one ever talks about . Gravity control would be a total game-changer. Also, One day I realized, how does the Klingon disintegrator ray stop at the soles of the boots? It never disintegrates the floor.)

Ah, but it works the same way light sabers in StarWars shoot out super-focused light (in fact so focused that it acts as solid matter) and then suddenly terminates about a yard from the shaft.

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#46

Post by amag »

evo_9 wrote: post #27
gipp wrote: post #8

The show is mostly _fun_, but I definitely wouldn't call it a _great_ or well-made show, apart from the visuals. Too much clunky dialogue and half-baked subplots. In particular, there's a certain traumatized daughter whose plot never makes sense at any turn. The show seems to expect us to already know and have a major emotional investment in a character who we've never seen speak and who seems to have almost no tangi…

Laughably bad, actually, esp. if you cut your teeth growing up on Neuromancer, Snowcrash, etc. I honestly thought it was written by a teenager, the scene with the Ai's playing poker was when it went off the cliff for me. Philip K Dick's Electric Dreams, however, is worthwhile and a nice bookend to the new season of Black Mirror.

Agreed, there are so many plot holes in AC it wouldn't even do as a sieve. Still I watch it because it's cyberpunk. I just disconnect my brain and enjoy the settings.

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#47

Post by Joeri »

amag wrote: post #45
carapace wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Oh man, Star Trek... Artificial gravity that no one ever talks about . Gravity control would be a total game-changer. Also, One day I realized, how does the Klingon disintegrator ray stop at the soles of the boots? It never disintegrates the floor.)

Ah, but it works the same way light sabers in StarWars shoot out super-focused light (in fact so focused that it acts as solid matter) and then suddenly terminates about a yard from the shaft.

I always understood lightsabers to be a force field confining plasma, with the plasma leaking through the force field, especially when the field is deflected by impact.

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#49

Post by Fnoord »

BerislavLopac wrote: post #44
Fnoord wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've only seen about 20 minutes of the first episode and couldn't enjoy it. I'd like to at least finish the first episode before I make judge for myself whether this one's worth my time (though I'm gonna first watch The Man in the High Castle). Generally though as a rule of thumb: Nice CGI doesn't make up for a terrible story, but a good story can make up for the lack of good CGI. E.g. I did not find the story good i…

> I'm not aware of any motion picture adaptations of Stephenson's or Gibson's works. Well, for what it's worth, there is Johnny Mnemonic, which wasn't very well received although I personally liked it. Another short story set in the Sprawl, New Rose Hotel, was also adapted to a film (I haven't seen it), and many other works, including Neuromancer, have been in various stages of development for a while. More details a…

Keanu Reeves in the former, Willem Dafoe in the latter. I'll give both a whirl, thank you.

From what I can tell nobody brought up David Cronenberg either. I liked his works [1] when I was younger (not sure if I still would now). I especially liked eXistenZ, but also Videodrome, The Fly, and Scanners.

I just started binge watching The Man In The High Castle and it exactly underlines my statement in my previous post: great storyline (IMO), but not depending much on CGI. I think if the story lacks, all you got going for it is CGI (or not if there is none). CGI may impress you when you're still young, but as you grow older you see through the façade. Especially when its overdone. Because older movies lack it, and therefore are rather limited (take for example old Star Wars which heavily used costumes, models, and camera tricks). It might feel a bit dated, if not just from the hair models. Yet sometimes the nostalgia hits the nail (such as in Black Mirror's San Junipero episode). Not exactly sure why. While I'm thoroughly enjoying The Man In The High Castle series my partner hates anything related to WWII so thats yet another series we cannot watch together.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Cronenberg#As_director

Re: Altered Carbon – All the DNA of great science-fiction with some missing links

#50

Post by dingaling »

carapace wrote: post #33
philipkglass wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I re-read the book a few weeks ago in anticipation of the series. The inconsistencies that you notice are real and present in the source material. I didn't notice them so much the first time I read the book 10+ years ago. The relentless action was fresh the first time around and helped paper over weaknesses in the logic of the world. Also I've apparently become less able to overlook internal inconsistencies with time…

(Oh man, Star Trek... Artificial gravity that no one ever talks about . Gravity control would be a total game-changer. Also, One day I realized, how does the Klingon disintegrator ray stop at the soles of the boots? It never disintegrates the floor.)

> Artificial gravity that no one ever talks about.

Much the same as how most people today don't talk about how 4G works, or how pressurisation on an airliner prevents them from asphyxiating. Until it stops working, like in Star Trek VI...

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