I’ve been a fan of J.J. Abrams for a long time. He’s made one of my favorite TV shows—“Lost”—and some damn good movies to boot. However, judging by the previews for his new show, “Almost Human,” it seems like the show is going to go down some well-traveled TV drama paths.
From what I can tell, the show revolves around a police detective named John Kennex, played by Abrams mainstay Karl Urban, as he struggles to solve crimes in the future. Now, because this is the future, each detective has to be paired up with a police robot, which is a generally emotionless machine that catches things people don’t. Think Sherlock Holmes without the air of superiority and the accent.
However, Kennex gets paired with an older model of these future robots that is designed to feel, and seems to envy humans their humanity. Stop me if you’ve heard this before.
Judging by this, there are a few things we can guess about this new Blade Runner/Cop Out hybrid.
First of all, I can tell you that this not the first time Kennex has had contact with a robot, and I would gamble that the interaction was not exactly positive. My bet is that a robot backfired in some way and killed his wife, children or some other family member(s). This will lead our gruff but lovable detective to distrust our robot for the majority of the two-hour pilot.
Things will change at the end of the pilot when the feely-robot, who is named Dorian, does something that irrevocably proves his worth to Urban. This will probably consist of saving Kennex’s life in some way, followed by a snide one-liner that may or may not connect to something Kennex said earlier.
But alas! The two will not immediately become best friends. Kennex will gradually grow to truly trust Dorian over the next few episodes as they solve a succession of cases nobody else seems to be able to solve.
Also, for a while at least, the show will play to the feeling that Dorian is actually more human than Kennex. This little bit of irony will manifest itself in different ways, but viewers will mostly be able to notice that Dorian expresses and uses his feelings much more than Kennex does. Kennex seems to be too tough for anything that isn’t sarcasm or, well, toughness.
Taking a break from my predictions, I would like to point out that this has become a common thread in recent television, both comedy and drama. More and more, networks are reworking and retooling old concepts. As I have mentioned, “Almost Human” seems to be a mix between a sci-fi movie and an odd couple skit. I can’t help but imagine J.J. Abrams catching the last hour of “I Robot” on FX and suddenly coming up with this idea for a show. This is not new territory for anyone, let alone one of the men who masterminded “Lost,” a show that could go down as the most unpredictable of all time. While there certainly seem to be unique aspects to “Almost Human,” the overall concept is familiar in everything from “Metropolis” to “Righteous Kill”—and that should be a concern for TV fans everywhere. I understand that TV is a business. I understand that people need to make money, but I wish Abrams would live up to his significant creative talents.
As for the rest of my predictions, I can also guarantee a hard, edgy police chief, a bunch of gadgets that further the plot in precisely zero ways and a love interest that will appear for either Kennex or Dorian within six episodes.
Did you really like “Almost Human?” Let Jake know at Smasal@wisc.edu.
