Joel Kinnaman to star in new Netflix sci-fi series Altered Carbon

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

I recall a time, not too long ago in the grand scheme of things, when the idea of Netflix producing their own television series seemed like something doomed to failure; but, over the past few years, Netflix has delivered quite a few great seasons of television which has definitely put the streaming service on the map in a big way. One of their upcoming series, Altered Carbon, has just cast their leading man.

Joel Kinnaman, who Netflix fans will recognize from House of Cards and The Killing, will play Takeshi Kovacs in the upcoming sci-fi drama. Based upon the Richard K. Morgan novel of the same name, Altered Carbon is set in the 25th century when the human mind has been digitized and the soul is transferable from one body to the next. Joel Kinnaman's character is a former elite interstellar warrior who has been imprisoned for 500 years and then finds himself downloaded into a future he’d tried to stop. If he can solve a single murder in a world where technology has made death nearly obsolete, he’ll get a chance at a new life on Earth. Altered Carbon's first season will consist of ten-episodes, with the first being directed by Miguel Sapochnik (Game of Thrones).

A synopsis of "Altered Carbon" via Amazon:

In the twenty-fifth century, humankind has spread throughout the galaxy, monitored by the watchful eye of the U.N. While divisions in race, religion, and class still exist, advances in technology have redefined life itself. Now, assuming one can afford the expensive procedure, a person’s consciousness can be stored in a cortical stack at the base of the brain and easily downloaded into a new body (or “sleeve”) making death nothing more than a minor blip on a screen. Ex-U.N. envoy Takeshi Kovacs has been killed before, but his last death was particularly painful. Dispatched one hundred eighty light-years from home, re-sleeved into a body in Bay City (formerly San Francisco, now with a rusted, dilapidated Golden Gate Bridge), Kovacs is thrown into the dark heart of a shady, far-reaching conspiracy that is vicious even by the standards of a society that treats “existence” as something that can be bought and sold. For Kovacs, the shell that blew a hole in his chest was only the beginning.

Joel Kinnaman will next be seen in SUICIDE SQUAD, which will hit theaters on August 5, 2016.