HBO’s Westworld is one of the most talked about shows of 2018. It’s also not a good show. Despite the continued buzz surrounding it (and the ridiculous number of Emmy nominations for famous film actors who are “slumming” it by working in a gorgeously shot, poorly written HBO drama), Westworld is a show far more concerned with its puzzle box nature than with creating complex characters, engaging with the (very real) questions surrounding our use (and misuse) of AI, and telling interesting stories that rely on characters being more than mere ciphers. What many people might not realize is that it’s not the only current show centered around what happens when some very advanced, very human-like robots wake up.
For the past three years, AMC has been airing the British series Humans, which tackles all of the issues Westworld ignores while crafting genuinely interesting and complicated characters. Oh, and yes, there are some twists throughout, but each twist is earned through the excellent writing at the show’s core. Basically, this is the show Westworld believes it is. And far too few people even know it exists.
For those who might not have had a chance to dive into the world of Humans, a bit of background on it. The series is set in a world slightly in the future (although no date is given), where synthetic robots are common place around the world. However, they’ve become so common that they have begun to replace humans within a variety of service-based, and even basic managerial, jobs (creating a simmering tension between those who have lost their jobs to synthetics and those who see nothing wrong with the practice). The “synths” are also used within the home to work as nannies and housekeepers. Basically, it’s your typical sci-fi future where robots take care of everything we don’t want to do.
Only there are a handful of synths, those who were created by the father of the synthetic movement, David Elster, who have grown beyond their basic programming and have consciousness. They have feelings. They have memories. They can fall in love. They are as close to human as one could possibly get. Which creates a conundrum: What happens when AI can only be distinguished from human by the technology within? Oh- and there’s a teenage girl who thinks she has figured out a way to hack the normal synths . . . and make them conscious.
The series tackles a host of complicated moral and ethical questions (many that also coincide with political and social arguments raging in both the UK and the States surrounding decidedly non-AI issues), but never does so from a preacher’s pulpit. Rather, the series manages to pretty fairly lay out each side of the issue by putting characters we care about on opposite sides. For example, the question of “waking up” all synths around the world is heavily debated, and several of the conscious synths are firmly against it happening.
Humans also doesn’t shy away from showing the darker side of a world with conscious synths, and the horrific things humans can do out of a false sense of superiority, anger, and fear- and manages to do so without relying on sexual assault and instances of severe violence against female synths as the catalyst for their actions later in the series (something that Westworld has never been able to do, despite claiming such inciting incidents are “necessary” to give their female characters agency in later episodes).
But where Humans truly trumps Westworld is in its characters. Yes, Westworld is awash with familiar actors compared to the cast of Humans (although Gemma Chan, who plays one of the central synths, Mia, was one of the stars of this summer’s Crazy Rich Asians, and Letitia Wright, Shuri in Black Panther, had an arc back in season two). But a famous actor does not a great character make. And Humans is full of complex, interesting, and layered characters played by some truly spectacular actors. And, in a bit of a twist for a sci-fi series, the bulk of these characters happen to be women. That isn’t to say there aren’t some really wonderful men in the show- there are, particularly in the work of Billy Jenkins, a child actor on par with a young Haley Joel Osment, and Tom Goodman-Hill, who plays the patriarch of the show’s central human family, the Hawkinses.
But it’s the women who lead the way throughout the series, which has run for three years with a fourth set for next year. And none of them are perfect. Each has very clear flaws that hinder their ability to succeed or to achieve their particular goal, which, in the case of some of them, could lead to dire consequences in Britain and around the world. The stakes are high throughout the series, but the characters are so engaging and the writing is so strong that the tensions of the larger national and global issues never overpower the immediate needs of our characters. It’s a delicate line to walk, and the series manages it deftly.
It’s easy to get taken in by the flash and star-wattage of Westworld. But if you, like me, have become dissatisfied with the high calorie, low content series, I would ask you to give Humans a look. The richness of the series easily dwarfs even the best episodes of Westworld, and the quality of the writing and acting makes up for the lack of sweeping Western vistas. Humans is worth watching in the jam-packed television landscape. Give it a go. You won’t be disappointed (which is more than I can say for that other series).
