The last two episodes of Season 2 of Swedish TV “Äkta människor“, aka “Real Humans“, have aired on arte. Time to look back at this TV series that has been compared both to “Blade Runner” and “Desperate Housewives“.

Here are my Top 5 observations that make it such a great pleasure to watch:
1. Make humanity prevail: Technology is a threat, true feelings are the antidote
2. Make it beautiful
3. Unwrap the onion of human emotions layer by layer for dramatic intensity
4. Cast a complex web of characters with different trajectories for unpredictable plot development
5. Great acting trumps special effects, aka fiction matters more than science-fiction

1. Make humanity prevail: Technology is a threat, true feelings are the antidote
The plot is guided by the quest for the Code that will free the hubots into real humans. With the Code, the hubots would shed their dependence from humans, they would acquire feelings and free will. Niska, Beatrice and the other free hubots operate as crusaders on a mission to get hold of that software and to rule the world. They live off the local habitants, they kill / remove the ones standing in their way, they hide and conduct attacks. Will they succeed? Beatrice is cold as ice and it looks like she is getting very close to the goal.
Mimi is on a different path to emotional fulfillment: Tobe Engman falls in love with her. Will she be saved into a real human relationship? A virus is slowly killing her.
Free hubot Flash, later called Florentine, finds a shortcut to a life full of feelings and acts out the deep motivations coded into her character as a nurturing hubot. She finds love, marries, snaps a baby and settles as a loving mother and wife. Her own path to happiness ends sharply when another free hubot kills her husband, in an attempt to have her come back on the quest for true freedom.
Can God help men and women decide on a course to adopt when faced with hubots? The answer is unclear. When the priest who is discussing details of the wedding ceremony for Florentine and Douglas realizes she is a hubot, he is unable to continue. But another priest will bless their union.
Can we create a more perfect world with the help of tech? Probably not, as the real measure of good in the world is the authenticity of emotions and the human reason.

2. Make it beautiful
Most of the settings are normal looking living-rooms, kitchens, office spaces, shops, garages and neighborhoods, but lights and colors are carefully crafted for visually highly attractive scenes.
The stylish designs culminate in the he hubot / human party where boys and girls alike embody lavish humanoid characters, not unlike some of Lady Gaga’s outfits. Giant pink eye-lashes to matching dresses, mint-green man’s jacket , glasses with flashy plastic frames create a fun and funky style.
The hubots’s faces all to a degree are like masks, with little emotional expression, contributing to a statuesque expression that is getting close to classicism.

3. Unwrap the onion of human emotions layer by layer
The series operates as a dive into human emotions, starting in Season 1 with rather functional human needs like cleaning and simple warehouse tasks, then moving on to care of the elderly and cooking, all the way to sex, marriage, death and love.
I find it a masterpiece of fictional writing that the scripts makes us familiar with the basic facts in a well-known setup (hubots perform mechanical tasks in a warehouse under human supervision), to then confront us with more disturbing questions: Can a hubot believe in God? What are human reactions to hubots? Can there be real love between a human and a hubot? What are the many ways in which the pervasive presence of hubots transform society?

4. Cast a complex web of characters
Between season 1 and 2, the same set of characters is continued, with a few additions and removals (Leo dies in season 1, David Eischer’s clone appears in season 2). It is a great pleasure to get told the developments of the various characters, some of which stay on their course (Bea as the personification or rather hubotification of evil), some go through various life stages (Roger and his family), others die and then are reborn as hubot (the Engman grandfather), children grow and come of age (Tobe, Matilda).
The complex relationships with unexpected plot twists make for a stimulating viewing experience, aka stickiness.

5. Great acting trumps special effects
How to play a robot which mostly looks like a human? Not a daily task. For „Real Humans“, a mime was hired to coach the actors on decomposing and then recomposing the movements of the characters.
Director Lars Lundström is not a science-fiction author, rather he has written drama and thrillers. This becomes quite evident in the way the acors are directed. Especially in Season 1, where there are more subtle differences between humans and hubots, the acting is fascinating.
In Season 2, the virus-induced „misbehaviors“ and other unnatural phenomena maintain a great level of friction between what looks real and what looks like real science-fiction.

A must-watch series for all tech-lovers who believe in great storytelling.