Altered Carbon Season 2, Episode 8, titled “Broken Angels,” continues from what we learned in the previous episode when Kovacs discovered that Quell has two minds inside her body—her own and that of an Elder, whose children were killed by the Founders centuries ago and is using Quell to get revenge by murdering the Founders. Another key thing we learn in that episode is that this Elder allows anyone who it inhabits the power to control the high energy beam weapon known as angel fire.
However, in Episode 7, that Elder inhabits the body of Kovacs’ old foe Jaeger (Daniel Bernhardt), setting up an epic battle in the finale between the two of them.
Another obstacle in the finale comes courtesy of Danica Harlan (Lela Loren), who calls a truce with Kovacs to help him to stop Jaeger. However, her true motive is to get the Elder to inhabit her so she can control the angel fire.
Quell has a plan, though like many of her plans it involves an element of self-sacrifice. She plans to kill Jaeger, forcing the Elder back into her body and raining angel fire on both her and the Elder.
The battle comes, and though Harlan does shoot Jaeger, the Elder eliminates her quite quickly, leaving Kovacs and Quell to defeat Jaeger themselves. As Altered Carbon Season 2 viewers know, the Mackie sleeve Kovacs has inhabited has an inhibitor that prevents him from killing any government official. Luckily, the younger Kovacs (let’s call him Kovacs 2, as played by Will Yun Lee) is there to help in the fight. Though “double sleeving,” the act of being in two bodies at once, is very illegal, the ends justify the means, and Kovacs 2 attacks Jaeger and gives the Mackie Kovacs enough time to force Jaeger to shoot himself.
He then perpetrates Quell’s plan himself, allowing the Elder to inhabit him and then rains angel fire down on him, ending both the Elder and Anthony Mackie’s role as the main character of Altered Carbon.
Though who will be taking his place has not been revealed, showrunner Alison Schapker confirmed to Gamespot that a new actor would be playing the role in Season 3 if it is renewed, though Will Yun Lee will also return, suggesting more double sleeving could be afoot in the next season.
She said, “I think that I can say with confidence that, with every season, I do feel I’m drawn to a new sleeve, a new planet, a new mystery…Now, that said, I love Will Yun Lee. I think he’s part of the soul of the show.”
After Mackie’s version of Kovacs died, we see the Lee version get away with double sleeving due to the older version of Kovacs being dead. Quell also gets away, fleeing to a new planet to escape the powers that be that still want her dead.
As this character leaves, another returns. Poe (Chris Conner) comes back to Dig (Dina Shihabi) and reveals that he left himself a clue in the hotel to help him regain his memory—a code that needs decrypting. We soon learn that this code is in fact a human DHF—Kovacs’ DHF, to be exact, revealing exactly how the character can return for Season 3 despite burning up earlier in the episode.
Altered Carbon Season 2 is streaming now on Netflix.
