Altered Carbon is now and forever stuck at season 2. Why? Apparently, Netflix decided that the show must not go on, and ended Takeshi Kovacs’ story. However, it’s not for the reason you think it is.

Poster for "Altered Carbon".
The show inspired by the book. Lightly inspired, it seems.

Netflix Engages in Some Stack Smashing

Despite receiving some pretty positive reviews from critics, Netflix will cancel Altered Carbon after just 2 seasons totaling 18 episodes, plus the Resleeved Netflix original anime film. While Netflix’s reasons for cancelling this promising cyberpunk thriller adaptation of Richard K. Morgan’s novel series is surprising, it’s not for the reason you’d think it is. While Netflix cancelled 2 other of their series (The Society and I Am Not Okay with This) for reasons related to that blasted virus running amok, COVID-19 actually has nothing to do with why they’re cancelling Altered Carbon.

An innocent COVID-19 virus, for once.
COVID-19: “It wasn’t me this time! I swear!”

Apparently, Netflix is cancelling Altered Carbon because the series’ production costs were getting too high for them to pay. To be fair, when you look at trailers for the series, you can see that it’s pretty lavishly designed. The backgrounds are incredibly detailed, and the special effects are pretty good. So you can kind of understand where Netflix is coming from, even if you don’t agree with it.

Well, goodbye forever Takeshi Kovacs, unless someone else decides to pick up the series again.

The final nail in Altered Carbon‘s sleeve coffin is apparently the lack of viewers. Or possibly the relative lack of. It seems that there were apparently not enough viewers for Netflix to justify the aforementioned high production costs. Critics’ higher score for the second season makes this apparent lack of viewers kind of peculiar. However, the first season got mixed reviews from critics, so that could’ve contributed to the lack of viewers for the second season.

https://youtu.be/_MzbLQBeR9Y
Goes completely off from the books, but seems to have gotten good scores from critics.

Conclusion

With Netflix giving the series the axe, Altered Carbon will be going back into stack storage. Unless someone else decides to resleeve this series, we’ll not be seeing Takeshi Kovacs again for a very long time, if ever. A pity. The series looked like it was finally finding its feet in season 2, even if it had to go off-rails from the novels to do it.

Source: Deadline