Is Joel Kinnaman leaving Altered Carbon before season 2?

We should note that there are obviously some Altered Carbon spoilers within the remainder of this CarterMatt article. If you want to remain unspoiled as to the series and some of its content, we suggest that you stop reading now.

If you’re still with us, we’re assuming that you want to keep pushing forward with us.

Throughout the first season of the Netflix series, Joel Kinnaman was clearly one of the main stars in the role of Takeshi Kovacs — or at least the latest skin of the character. Kovacs does have a role still to play in some of the upcoming books, but it isn’t necessarily the same exact Kovacs that we came to know this season. That means that there could be other actors in the role, and this in turn could lead to different stories.

For Kinnaman, he seems to believe as though his story is done. Speaking in a new interview with TV Guide, the actor had the following to say in regards to whatever his future with the series could be:

“I don’t think [I’ll be returning] … We have no idea what the second season would be, but my guess is that they would follow the two other books, and they are all on completely different planets, completely different worlds, and my guess is — and I don’t know — my guess is that it’s sort of going to be an anthology show where maybe a couple of the characters continue into the next season. But no one knows what’s going on in the second season.”

While in some ways losing a star like Kinnaman is a blow, part of the joy of this show is seeing what other performers can do in other roles in the series. We imagine that there are going to be many interesting, exciting ones to come, provided of course that the show is even renewed. As we recently reported, the future of Altered Carbon is somewhat unclear and Netflix could wait for a little while in order to determine its future. This was an expensive, ambitious project and we don’t think that anyone is going to want to rush making decisions about it.

Related – Read our CarterMatt interview with Hiro Kanagawa

What do you think the future of Joel Kinnaman on Altered Carbon could be? Sound off now in the comments! Meanwhile, you can also like CarterMatt on Facebook in the event you want to score some other insight regarding the series. (Photo: Netflix.)