Altered Carbon: 5 Things From This Future We Hope Become A Reality (& 5 We Hope Stay Fictional Forever) – Screen Rant

The journey of Takeshi Kovacs through the futuristic science fiction world of Altered Carbon is a winding one, to say the least. Over the course of two seasons, his mind has inhabited three different bodies. At one point, he was in two at the same time, something incredibly illegal in his world. The ability to avoid death by transferring your mind into a new body is an incredible advancement in technology. But it is by no means the only one.

RELATED:10 Shows To Watch If You Like Altered Carbon

Altered Carbon is filled with amazing technology that seems like it could make life much better or much, much worse.

At the core of Altered Carbon is the cortical stack. This technology was left behind by an alien species and is made from non-terrestrial metal. It allows humans to upload their consciousness into another body. Originally, people used this technology to travel long distances through space by transferring their minds from one body to another on a faraway planet, a process called Needlecasting. It was adapted to allow people who could afford the process and a body to transfer into to essentially become immortal. Cortical stacks and the necessary tech to support their use could change the game for humanity.

The use of cortical stacks and the ubiquitous transferring of human consciousness changed how people viewed their own bodies. They became the equivalent of clothes that you shed at the end of the day before you put on something new. For people who could afford the process, changing bodies became almost as frequent and as easy as changing clothes.

RELATED:Altered Carbon: 5 Fan Theories About Season 2 That Make Too Much Sense (& 5 That Are Just Bad)

While the term sleeve can mean many things in Altered Carbon, it speaks to the disposability of the fragile human form. For some people, this could be a good thing, but for others, it represents a loss of connection to a large part of what makes people human.

For those who could not afford to Needlecast into a human sleeve, there was always the option of using a synth. Thesebiorobotic androids could change their appearance depending on the consciousness that inhabited them. The downside to a synth was their muted senses and the side effect of re-sleeving into one too many times, also known as insanity. This is due to the jarring nature of the transfer process. While the synths in Altered Carbon aren't exactly foolproof, the technology has huge potential if refined. Upgrading the sensory inputs would be a good start. But once that is done, synths could give new life to the entire process.

Regardless of the body his consciousness currently inhabits, Takeshi Kovacs is a dangerous man. His training, experience and skills make him one of the most feared fighters on any world. Add into that all of the weapons he carries, sometimes in a small child's backpack, and you have the recipe for chaos.

RELATED:Altered Carbon: 10 Things The Second Season Does Better Than The First

One of the most dangerous weapons in his arsenal is the Ingram-40 Flechette Pistol. The experimental gun magnetically fires armor-piercing homing rounds from a ten round clip and can recall them to the gun. This effectively gives it infinite rounds, something Takeshi uses to his advantage frequently. This is a weapon that definitely needs to not exist.

Trying to produce effective and realistic virtual reality has been a goal for many companies in real life. While they are getting closer and closer, virtual reality in Altered Carbon is even bigger and more beautiful than many could imagine. It is so thorough and so realistic that almost anything is possible inside of it. Virtual reality can be as a means of storing a consciousness. It can be used as a means of communication. There's even a specific type of psychological therapy that can only be conducted through virtual reality. Unfortunately, a variety of nefarious groups also use VR to torture people, killing them over and over until they get what they want. But you can't let a few bad apples spoil the bunch.

With any advance in technology comes questionable usage of it. As an example, people using virtual reality to torture victims for information. But it's not just criminals using advanced technology for questionable reasons. The police are doing it, too. In Altered Carbon, the Bay City Police Department have access to a piece of technology called a Hawkeye. It's a tracking device that they use to follow suspects, which seems okay on the surface of the situation.

RELATED:Altered Carbon: 10 Times The Show Strayed From The Original Story

But Kristin Ortega of the BCPD also used it to track Takeshi Kovacs when he re-sleeved into Elias Ryker. Keeping an eye on your boyfriend's body while someone else walks around in it was most likely not the intended use for the Hawkeye, and there are a lot of other ways to abuse this tech.

The Online Network Interface is almost as integral to the world of Altered Carbon as the cortical stack, and possibly cooler. An ONI is a device that's inserted into all sleeves, regardless of their origin. It can be controlled from almost any piece of technology, including something as small as a special wristband. ONIs are the pinnacle of easy access to information. They can download and upload data, take pictures, record videos, and a lot more. But it does have its weaknesses. A sleeve can be coded to be invisible to an ONI and its recording features. Still, the ONI, or something like it, is a future evolution of current smartphone technology.

The problem with technology in the future is that someone always seems to be watching you with it, especially when you're someone like Takeshi Kovacs. Everyone wants to keep an eye on what you're doing at all times, even at extremely inappropriate times.

RELATED:Altered Carbon: 5 Times Fans Hated The Show (5 They Loved)

Several of the groups following him around use a bug. That's not a bug like a small, hidden microphone. It is a small remote-controlled device resembling a fly that records and transmits everything it sees. Again, at some really inappropriate timesin the case of Kovacs.

Artificial intelligence is perpetually on the verge of becoming a reality. In the world of Altered Carbon, AI is a reality and has been put to incredible use. Specifically, to run hotels. AI hotels were once all the rage but have fallen on hard times. After being resleeved, Takeshi finds his way to The Raven Hotel, a Edgar Allen Poe inspired place operated by an AI called Poe. He has become one of Takeshi's closest allies since being revived. The idea of a thematically specific hotel run by artificial intelligence has the potential to be extremely interesting. Well, as long as things don't take a HAL 9000 turn.

Something nicknamed meth rarely turns out to be a good thing. While the concept of cortical stacks and uploading your consciousness into new bodies to survive seems appealing, Altered Carbon certainly shows what happens once that system is corrupted by money. Named after the long living biblical character, Methuselah, meths are extremely wealthy people who re-sleeve constantly, often into clones of their original bodies. They even maintain satellites to automatically upload their consciousness to and download them to a new body. It essentially makes them immortal, assuming nothing goes wrong with the process.

NEXT:Altered Carbon Season 2: 10 Things That Didn't Make Sense

NextBrooklyn Nine-Nine: 10 Reasons Jake and Charles Aren't Real Friends

Read this article:

Altered Carbon: 5 Things From This Future We Hope Become A Reality (& 5 We Hope Stay Fictional Forever) - Screen Rant