Humans Review

 

The scariest thing about the drama is how true this could become. We already have geniuses like Stephen Hawking and Bill Gates warning us that widespread use of artificial intelligence would not be a good thing. And we’re already ignoring the warnings. Scientists are making advances in robotics all the time. There’s a hotel in Asia that is fully staffed by robots and I’m sure that’s not the only example. I even saw a news report a couple of years back in which robots were primed to carry out advanced medical procedures, thereby replacing doctors. So it’s fair to say, despite the sci-fi premise, Humans is grounded in some sort of realism.

 

 

We’re exactly halfway through the eight-episode run and all the disparate strands are starting to come together. The main story seems to lie with the ordinary Londoner middle-class Hawkins family whose lives change when Joe the so-called head of the family (and an idiot) buys a pretty synth without telling his wife. Joe and his son Toby are both entranced by the synth called Anita but the females - with the exception of the youngest daughter who’s about five - are suspicious, especially when Anita starts behaving weirdly.

 

Meanwhile a mysterious man called Leo and his synth called Max are trying to find someone called Mia who - plot twist! - happens to be Anita. According to that fount of all knowledge Wikipedia, Anita/Mia was part of a group of synths that were shown to be captured in a flashback back in episode 1 (which I missed). Were they definitely synths? Because the theory I’m entertaining is this: the synths are all humans who have been meddled with on the inside and what we’re seeing is some evil mad scientist mastermind plotting to take over the world with synths. Far-fetched? Maybe. But I’ll be more surprised if this isn’t the case.

 

 

This leads us nicely to the next strand of the plot concerning synth-hating detective sergeant Peter Drummond whose wife coincidentally relies on a (remarkably good-looking) synth to cope with her disability. His story arc had been simmering quite nicely in the background until the end of episode three as we saw him getting more and more jealous of his wife’s relationship with his synth. After an incident that saw him punching a journalist, his marriage falls apart to the extent that Jill is forced to ask him to move out. He moves in with a colleague who - in a plot twist that was predictable but still strangely satisfying - is revealed to be a synth doing a rather good impression of a human.

 

The final plot strand - and the one I’m most interested in - is the story of Niska who would be the obvious anti-hero if she was human. Instead she’s the aforementioned former prostitute synth who has escaped after killing a man and is roaming the streets attacking humans, some of who admittedly deserve it. Whereas I can guess where the other plots are going, I find myself constantly surprised by Niska’s actions - in a good way! There are signs that she’ll team up with Leo and Max in their quest to find Mia and, I guess, stop the mastermind behind the synth operations or something. But then she could strike out on her own and go around London just killing people and somehow I’d still root for her.

 

 

The only plot strand I haven’t mentioned is the case of Dr. George Millican who’s become a prisoner in his own home thanks to his carer synth who must have been based on Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest because she has about as much empathy and compassion. While I’m enjoying his shenanigans, I still can’t work out how much he figures into the story. We’ve learnt that he was friends with Leo’s father but Leo himself seems to have rejected him. Then again I can’t complain too much because I could watch a whole episode of William Hurt’s Millican trying to outwit Rebecca Front’s synth.

 

There’s an obvious meta-commentary going on here from the writers who seem to be telling us that out-of-control artificial intelligence could in fact be *gasp* a Bad Thing! I’ll forgive the lack of subtlety because I think something like this is needed. After all humans would be as stupid as to introduce robots into our home and expect them to do our bidding. Big corporations like Microsoft are already inventing personal assistants like Cortana and Siri, the first step to something like this. The story itself though is so compelling and genuinely scary at times that it avoids the pitfall of being preachy which would have only harmed the series.

 

So in conclusion, Humans is definitely a series to stick with. It’s not often C4 makes dramas like these, although 2015 seems to be the year they’ve decided to up their commitment in drama. The story is still quite confusing, especially for those of us who missed the first episode, but what they lose here, they’ve gained by the fact that the drama itself is still really compelling. And despite this being geared towards sci-fi fans, the scope of the drama means there really is something for everyone. And that can only be a good thing.