Title from: Phantom Lady (1944)
Thirty years after the events of season 1, Kovacs receives a new job from a new meth. The reward: Quellcrist Falconer.
Tropes in this episode:
- Alien Sky: Kovacs takes one look at the night sky outside and realises he's back on his planet of origin, Harlen's World.
- An Offer You Can't Refuse: When Kovacs refuses her boss's offer, bounty hunter Trepp just shoots Kovacs' female sleeve as she's walking away, then cuts out his stack and needlecasts him to a virtual meeting room where Axley is waiting.Kovacs: She's a psychopath!Axley: Well, coming from you, I'll assume that's a compliment.
- Blood from the Mouth: Female Kovacs spouts blood after getting shot In the Back by Trepp.
- Call-Back: Kovacs decides to hide out in the hotel he was captured in at the start of the pilot episode, now a dilapidated ruin used as a Yakuza drug market. Turns out when he was captured he was working for their boss, but refused to give him up under C-TAC torture, a marker Kovacs is able to cash in on now.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You
- At first it appears that Kovacs was left alive as a fall guy for Axley's murder. Then it turns out that Quell was responsible. She is surprised to encounter Kovacs, but just inflicts enough sleeve damage to knock him out.
- The Yakuza put aside their guns and take on Kovacs hand-to-hand when it's pointed out his military-grade sleeve is worth a bundle.
- Briefcase Full of Money: The man who walks into the Bad Guy Bar to pay Kovacs is carrying the traditional briefcase, but it only contains a card-sized device holding untraceable credits. The reason for the briefcase is explained when it explodes after he walks out of the bar during the inevitable Bar Brawl over the contents (which were actually palmed by the owner in the confusion).
- Captured on Purpose: Kovacs allows himself to be captured so he'll be taken to Tanaseda. Tanaseda even scolds his great-grandson for bringing in a man who could have killed him, were he so inclined.
- The Chanteuse: The lounge singer in the opening scene. She turns out to be Kovacs in a female sleeve.
- Dutch Angle: Used during the VR interrogation scene between Axley and Kovacs.
- Flashback Cut: When Yukito stabs Kovacs he has a brief flashback of being stabbed with a mirror shard by his mysterious attacker. This causes Kovacs to stab himself in the same place to awaken further memories of what happened.
- Gender Bender: Kovacs starts the episode in a female sleeve, allowing him to catch an old enemy unawares.
- Hologram Projection Imperfection: Poe glitches and then reboots only to reveal he's forgotten the previous conversation. It's not made clear how Kovacs was able to salvage his program after Poe's apparent destruction in the previous season, but the recovery was clearly not perfect.
- Homoerotic Subtext: Poe's rapt expression as he watches the nightclub singer takes on a different context when you find out she's Kovacs.
- Huge Holographic Head: Danica Harlen addresses the populace about the cease fire with the Kempists via a giant full-length hologram.
- I Am Spartacus: Man walks into a Bad Guy Bar with a Briefcase Full of Money and offers to pay off his debt to the Famed In-Story Takeshi Kovacs. Three men immediately claim to be Kovacs, so he says he'll let them sort it out and pay off whoever wins. The man slips out during the ensuing violence and the briefcase explodes killing everyone inside. Unfortunately Kovacs wasn't one of them; he's the lounge singer and had ducked out beforehand after seeing the man steal back his own credits during the confusion.
- Kansas City Shuffle: Kovacs approaches some Yakuza and claims to be Tanaseda Hideki in disguise. He is very convincing but one of the Yakuza is Hideki's great-grandson who sees through the charade. Kovacs puts up a fight but is captured and taken to Hideki for punishment. Turns out that it was exactly what Kovacs wanted. Normally it would have been very hard for him to get an audience with the planet's top Yakuza boss but this way he is taken directly to him and bypasses all the usual security checks. Kovacs needs to cash in a debt of honour Hideki owes him.
- The Lost Lenore: Kovacs has spent decades searching for Quell to no avail. Given that his namesake is the Trope Namer, Poe regards it as a love that transcends death and time, whereas Hideki pegs it as an obsession rather than love.
- Nanomachines: This episode confirms that AI hotels make extensive use of nanomachines. While Poe is able to exist as a hologram projected from the emitter Kovacs carries, once he is plugged into a hotel he is able to quickly reformat it into a copy of the Raven. Unfortunately, Poe's software damage means the Raven comes out damaged as well.
- Nothing Personal: Trepp's comment on inflicting mere sleeve death on Kovacs. "Organic damage isn't personal; it's business."
- Not Me This Time: Poe activates and takes in the dead bodies in Axley's apartment.Poe: My word. We just got here.
Kovacs: I didn't kill him.
Poe: What a refreshing change. - Shout-Out
- Kovac's sings "I've got you under my skin" by Cole Porter while sleeved as a lounge singer. Counts as Suspiciously Apropos Music given the use of sleeves and Kovacs obsession with Quell.
- On seeing the sky of Harlen's World, Poe quotes from Edgar Allan Poe's "Evening Sky". Given the damage to the hotel, he suggests calling it The Nevermore.
- The Tanaseda family death poem was cited by General Tadamichi Kuribayashi in his final message before his death in the Battle of Iwo Jima.
- Something Only They Would Say: Subverted. Kovacs knows the Tanaseda family death poem and uses it to claim he's Hideki, but his great-grandson knows it's a trick. However, the fact that Kovacs knows it at all is reason enough to take him to Hideki, which is what Kovacs wanted.
- Spotting the Thread: Trepp is able to identify Kovacs in the singer sleeve because she is carrying a transmitter that is projecting Poe into the club, and Poe's familiarity with Kovacs is an obvious hint that the singer is him.
- Summon to Hand: Kovacs new sleeve has biometric mag plates that can summon his handguns to his hands. He uses this for his I Surrender, Suckers, allowing the Yakuza to disarm him, then disarming them later when they're holding his own weapons on him.
- Super-Soldier: Kovacs' new sleeve is a combat model designed exclusively for the military, in addition to aftermarket upgrades.
- Tainted Veins: Axley (and all other founders killed by Quellcrist) develop these during Real Death.
- Trenchcoat Warfare: Subverted; after it's pointed out the sleeve Kovacs is wearing is worth a bundle, the Yakuza put aside their guns only for Kovacs to sweep back his coat with a dramatic Slow Motion flourish and grab a couple of hidden guns...which then go flying out of his hands when someone kicks him in the back. Hand-to-hand combat then ensues.
- Villains Never Lie: Hideki Tanaseda points out to Kovacs that his sister could simply have lied about Quell's survival, and that Axley found out about Kovacs' obsession and decided to exploit it. Kovacs has always been aware he might be on a wild goose chase, but is compelled to keep searching. Turns out Quell is alive after all.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: No matter how much Kovacs complains, he clearly cares for Poe. He carried his AI emitter around for thirty years before he finally got it back in a proper AI hotel.
- Wham Shot: When Kovacs forces himself to remember what happened to his new sleeve before he finished acclimating, it is shown that Quell was the one who attacked him.
- You Are Too Late: Kovacs awakens in his new sleeve after someone has already slaughtered their way through Axley's men and killed the man himself.
