When a computer bulldozes through the barriers humans build to keep it in check, the consequences are usually pretty grave—at least in sci-fi media. We can be hunted through time, turned into biological batteries, and even locked out of the pod bay. It’s rare to tell an AI story from the perspective of the AI, but Apple TV+’s Murderbot goes a step further and makes its anti-human sentient machine a reluctant, socially awkward hero. It helps that he’s played by Alexander Skarsgård, an actor who ably strikes the balance between emotionless intensity and deadpan idiocy.
When a corporate Security Unit hacks its “governor module” and is no longer forced to obey human instructions, he renames himself “Murderbot” (a playful name that will undoubtedly set off alarm bells if humans discover he has free will) and immediately runs into new problems: He lives in a society of punishing corporate power and he will be melted in acid if they find out about his newfound autonomy. Besides, Murderbot doesn’t care about suppressing humankind or staging a digital uprising—he’s content to watch endless soaps and serials while he’s on the clock and give his new, unwitting clients the bare minimum effort. He’s the most relatable AI in media to date.
But Murderbot, which premieres May 16, isn’t just the latest eye-catching sci-fi series with blockbuster ambitions from Apple—it’s a Hugo award-winning book series adapted by the people who brought you About a Boy and The Golden Compass. Consider this a digestible info pack about everything you ought to know about your friendly neighborhood Murderbot.
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What are The Murderbot Diaries?
Martha Wells had already authored the fantasy series Ile-Rien and The Books of the Raksura, as well as tie-in novels for Stargate and Star Wars, by the time the novella All Systems Red was published in 2017. That’s the first volume of The Murderbot Diaries, and it would be followed by three books of about equal length across 2018 before the first full-length novel Network Effect hit shelves in 2020.
Despite All Systems Red being a quick read (it’s about the same length as Charlotte’s Web), Murderbot adapts only the first novella for its 10-episode season. In the book and series, set in the far distant future, Murderbot hacks his governor module just before he’s assigned to a new mission with a group of scientists surveying an alien planet. All missions are overseen and rubber stamped by “the Company,” an extractivist, expansionist interplanetary corporation far in Earth’s future, who must provide security for their contracted explorers in the form of a SecUnit. Murderbot’s new clients are from “Preservation Alliance,” a small group who exist independent from corporate governance, and who think the Company’s insistence on SecUnits makes them basically slavers. But it’s not like the scientists can negotiate with the mega-powerful Company.
This survey is led by Dr. Mensah (Noma Dumezweni), the scientist whom Murderbot has the most respect for, with help from the augmented human Gurathin (David Dastmalchian), whom Murderbot trusts the least—probably because Gurathin has many of the same tech upgrades that give Murderbot his advantage.
All Systems Red is a legible introduction to Wells’ hyper-capitalist, playfully satiric galaxy. There are about 10 speaking parts, limited locations, and a simple mystery that gets at the crux of how life under the corporation’s thumb makes everyone—both humans and robots—vulnerable to harm. What makes All Systems Red stand out is its first-person storytelling: as a narrator, Murderbot’s perspective isn’t restricted to his eyes and ears; he’s connected to every camera and microphone at the survey team’s disposal, and can read and transmit data inside his head without blinking. Wells takes advantage of the interior monologue form to give her robot protagonist fluid, extensive access to information and communication that he can process and react to with more sophistication than any of the human characters. We want to stick with Murderbot’s POV because it’s the smartest and sharpest in the story, even though he’d rather be watching content than explaining himself to us.
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How does Murderbot change the books?
Creators Paul and Chris Weitz are faithful to Wells’ first Murderbot novella, but there are plenty of changes that expand the book into an exciting episodic structure. The showrunners are more interested in the human characters than Murderbot is, and the group of scientists— played by Tamara Podemski, Akshay Khanna, Tattiawna Jones, and Sabrina Wu—feel like richer characters than in Wells’ novella. Their fleshed-out social dynamics (including a touch of polyamory) only fuel an exasperated Murderbot’s education about cohabiting with human beings.
Pockets of tension or suspense in All Systems Red—like Gurathin’s deep-set suspicion of his SecUnit or the threat of more advanced, expensive, and compromised SecUnits ambushing the Preservation team—are built into robust showdowns or cliffhangers, and Murderbot takes hostile enemies with only one memorable appearance in the book (not just robots, but giant alien centipedes too) and gives them another shot at our isolated heroes. Basically, Murderbot takes everything in the book and gives it a natural extension.
The series’ biggest invention comes in the form of Pen15’s Anna Konkle, who plays Leebeebee, the lone survivor of an unexplained attack on the other known expedition on the alien planet. Konkle is a gifted comic performer and really underlines the panicked urgency coursing through Murderbot’s mystery. Even though she’s not in Wells’ book, Leebeebee aggravates the tensions between Murderbot and his human dependents, serving as a personification of the book’s themes of fraught human-AI relations that would otherwise play out in Murderbot’s internal monologue. Stay tuned for her final scene, as it’s one to remember.
One advantage of putting Murderbot on-screen is that we can actually see the TV shows he won’t stop babbling about in the book. We see snippets from The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon—a cross between old-school Star Trek, space opera anime, and Dynasty— that parallel Murderbot’s ongoing drama, translated into a glitzy, corny melodrama with John Cho, Clark Gregg, DeWanda Wise, and Jack McBrayer playing the lovelorn and treacherous characters. We might be reaching here, but seeing Cho as a dashing space captain in a successful show feels partly redemptive for Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop fiasco.
What makes the series stand out?
Murderbot is goofy, with a broad, mean-spirited satire that isn’t afraid to make all its characters look like short-sighted idiots a step away from a meaningless death at any moment. It may not sound like an appetizing sci-fi vision, but the ace up its sleeve is its robotic lead, who occupies a unique space in AI fiction. Murderbot’s journey isn’t about conquest, but rather adjustment: he’s no longer forced to obey human commands, but he still wants to fit in to make his life easier. Now, he overthinks every order and interaction, trying to second-guess what’s expected of him while also actively suppressing every impulse that hints at his free will.
Murderbot’s portrayal of a violent corporate machine that chews and spits out laborers and resources like they’re sticks of gum is indebted to the conglomerates we see in Alien, Resident Evil, Mickey 17, or Wall-E, but there are political dimensions to the very entertaining Murderbot that resonate with today’s streaming audience.
What do we know about Murderbot? He can access nearly every information stream available, but chooses to pacify and distract himself with easy-to-consume content. We know he’s aware of the oppression and hostility of his society but prefers to keep his distance from those being exploited. We know he’s uncomfortable with social interaction, eye contact, and skips the sex scenes in TV shows. Sound familiar?
Murderbot is a clear analog for a generation raised on the internet, who have internalized the ways that social media and constant discourse have separated us from empathy and community, even as the political landscape grows more grim. The best part of the series is that Murderbot realizes in real time that his survival depends on changing his free will from a self-serving code to an acceptance of all the intimate and scary parts of being alive. Free will may sound like a robot’s dream, but if you insist on turning your independence into isolating individualism, eventually you might be asked: Why did you even want freedom in the first place?
The post Everything to Know About the Murderbot Books Before You Watch the New TV Adaptation appeared first on TIME.
