We’re at the halfway point for Murderbot season one. In this episode, the plot kicks into high gear with a new conspiracy, a new addition to PresAux, and a new threat to Murderbot’s autonomy.
Spoilers ahoy.
So, turns out, Murderbot isn’t dead after all. It’s unconscious for part of the episode, but that doesn’t mean we don’t hear from it. The events that take place while it’s out are depicted via Murderbot reconstructing everything through recordings and voice-overs. Interestingly, many of the scenes that start from Murderbot’s video perspective quickly shift to a sort of third person omniscient but from the perspective of the humans. Ratthi, Arada, Pin-Lee, and Mensah take SecUnit back to their habitat to repair it. They also bring along Leebeebee, the only DeltFall survivor. She’s… an odd duck. When we first met her, it seemed like her strange behavior could be due to shock, but nope. If anything, at PresAux she’s even more unsettling. She says she was working off her indenture doing laundry and maintenance, a claim that seems suspicious to me but plausible to PresAux (everything is plausible to PresAux, those gullible, nerdy hippies).
Leebeebee’s attitude toward Murderbot is so unpleasant and gross, made worse by no one from PresAux stepping in to stop it. Maybe I’m overreacting. I’ve written before that I see a lot of myself in Murderbot’s approach towards sex and romance (I’m asexual, aromantic, neurodivergent, and genderqueer). Like Murderbot, I don’t have any vested interest in other people engaging in those activities, and get bored when I have to watch people be all lovey dovey with each other or listen to people talk about their relationships. I also absolutely do not want in any way, shape, or form, any of that stuff being done to or on me. I get really uncomfortable when someone hits on me. The second I realize it’s happening I do exactly what Murderbot does and flee the scene. So to see Leebeebee sexually harass Murderbot, including forcing a kiss on it, I was bothered, to put it lightly. I thought about someone talking about me and to me in that way and actually had to pause the show and take a break. “Melt me down. Now,” is right.
All the gender stuff I was worried about at the start of the season? Yeah, it’s happening. Leebeebee uses it/its pronouns but also seems to slot Murderbot into the gender box “man” by assuming it would have a penis and testicles based solely on making gendered assumptions about its physical appearance (much like many fans and critics keep doing). She then twice fantasizes about forcing it to have sex with her. Which. Ew. On myriad levels, ew.
Leebeebee could have been an opportunity for the show to use PresAux to further decouple Skarsgård’s body from Murderbot’s character, but instead it plays it as a sort of weird joke. To have no one from PresAux stand up for Murderbot or shut Leebeebee down reflects poorly on them, in my opinion. No one, not even Leebeebee, sexualizes Pin-Lee in a gendered way. No one comments on what body parts they might have and what they might want to do to them. Obviously, that’s because they all see Pin-Lee as human. But to not even bother to intervene on Murderbot’s behalf contradicts what we know about how PresAux sees it as more than just a toaster—Mensah even corrects herself when she accidentally misgenders one of her children as “he” instead of “they,” so it’s not like correcting pronouns is an unknown experience. It’s just so discordant to me to have them care so little about how Leebeebee treats SecUnit while also caring so much about SecUnit that Ratthi wants to name his future child after it.
Everything about this feels contrary to the way the books treat Murderbot. The books never imply a gender; they’re very clear that Murderbot is genderless, so much so that even the human characters don’t gender it. Despite readers who insist Murderbot is supposed to look more like one gender or another, Murderbot is explicitly and intentionally unencumbered by gender. Its gender, like mine, is: “no.” This whole Leebeebee thing taps into what a lot of fans were worried about in terms of casting a (presumably) cis man as Murderbot. It’s easy for many fans to objectify Alexander Skarsgård, and a lot of people are unable to separate the actor’s gender expression from the character’s lack of gender expression. I want to be generous and say the show is using Leebeebee to comment on audience assumptions of gender, but I’m not that nice. Hire nonbinary writers, television shows.
Given what happens in All Systems Red, I can guess what’s coming with Leebeebee’s character and why the show constructed her the way she is. I get that they want to show a stark contrast between Preservation Alliance and the Corporate Rim, particularly with regards to Security Units and Comfort Units. We’re seeing the ways the Corporate Rim turns non-sexual constructs into sexual objects with the Captain and the NavBot’s relationship in Sanctuary Moon, too. It makes sense, but it also undercuts the show’s message about personhood in ways I don’t think the writers reckon with. I don’t think it was necessary to put Murderbot through all that in order to make their point.
Once in med bay, Bharadwaj and Arada remove the tendrils from the combat override module stuck in SecUnit. Gurathin finally gets to root around in Murderbot’s brain matter and freaks the hell out. SecUnit reboots and discovers everyone knows it hacked its governor module. Gurathin accuses it of being behind the sabotage and of colluding with the rogue DeltFall SecUnits somehow, but everyone knows that’s a stretch. The confrontation scene where PresAux learns about Murderbot’s thoughts is one of my favorite moments from the novella. We don’t get that full scene in the show but the part where Murderbot threatens to kill Gurathin and has to be talked down by the rest of the team is just as entertaining to watch as it was to read.
Where Gura sees the worst in Murderbot, Bharadwaj sees the best. She points out that Murderbot has been rogue this whole time and still went out of its way to protect them. It didn’t have to do that, it chose to. The audience knows that several times now Murderbot has considered abandoning or killing everyone, but it hasn’t. Instead, it tried to kill itself to save them. That’s not the action of a rogue murder machine; even Leebeebee is surprised by it. Mensah and Murderbot make a pact: if they get off the planet alive they won’t tell anyone about its hacked governor module and they’ll let it decide what it wants for its own future as long as Murderbot continues to protect them… yes, even Gurathin. It’s a deal both parties have to agree to, because the only other option is everyone dies. Which they still might do anyway.
With HubSystem potentially compromised by an outside threat, it’s time to set off the emergency beacon. Murderbot and Mensah take the hopper to do it manually when they can’t get a signal out from their habitat, leaving the rest of the group to pack essentials. The plan is to spend the next few days waiting for the Company starship to rescue them in hiding in case whatever attacked DeltFall tracks down PresAux.
Mensah, my moon and stars, my queen, my goddess. What I wouldn’t give for an outtake of Mensah monologuing about her “five million children” while Murderbot stands around looking increasingly uncomfortable. She’s done this before, talking to SecUnit like it’s a person, but was more tentative then. Now she’s got her legs crossed and is chilling all casual-like in the captain’s chair bombarding Murderbot with more information about her “offspring” than it ever wanted to know. Noma Dumezweni plays this scene so well. She and Skarsgård bounce off each other in such a compelling way.
It’s so obvious not only why Mensah is the leader but also why everyone loves her so much. She radiates compassion and interest. She doesn’t push but she does ask everyone to stretch a little. When Murderbot responds to her as itself, instead of being offended by its tone or shocked by its candor, she responds just like she would to one of her human teammates. She even seems to remember it doesn’t like eye contact (it told her that while glitching last ep) and doesn’t force Murderbot to look at her. She converses with Murderbot, asks its professional opinions, and digests its responses. Mensah genuinely wants to know what it thinks, and Murderbot in turn gives her its real thoughts. They’re able to break down some of the looming questions like how involved might the Company be and how DeltFall was able to be infiltrated. I think structurally this scene works better in the book—here, without Murderbot’s voiceover explaining things, it feels more like Mensah is stating facts rather than her figuring things out in real time—but emotionally it plays well on television.
Just before Mensah and Murderbot’s hopper reaches their emergency beacon, the thing blows up. The last shot we see is their ship caught in the fiery explosion. This show is so good at cliffhangers!
Final Thoughts
- Episode 5 covers parts of chapter 5 in All Systems Red; the hopper trip to the emergency beacon was invented for the show but uses dialogue from the book.
- Speaking of, Leebeebee also isn’t in the books.
- My issues with Leebeebee have nothing to do with the actress who plays her. Anna Konkle puts her all into the role. I’m more annoyed at the larger context around her role than the character and definitely not the actress.
- We have a new in-show show, this one only mentioned: Rogue War: Tracker Infinite: Tribulation.
- Credit where credit is due: Skarsgård is great at playing a corpse.
- I think part of Gurathin’s annoyance at Murderbot is jealousy. It gets to spend all this time with Mensah and is the tech expert, and he’s just some guy with an augment who yearns for senpai to notice him. It’s kinda sweet, in a pathetic way.
- I wish we could see Murderbot communicating with HubSystem. Like the drones, it’s a big thing to cut from the story, even though I’m sure it’s tricky (and probably very expensive) to do on television.
- Wanna bet the person at the Company who took the bribe was the guy in the middle who was a little too eager to get Preservation Alliance to agree to the contract?
Quotes
“Guess I’m not dead, despite my best efforts.”
“Looking at their hopeful faces, I was glad I didn’t murder them. Mostly.”
“It was weird, talking back and forth in a way that wasn’t just giving facts or receiving and confirming orders. They did it on the serials all the time. I just hadn’t done it myself before.”
Until next week.
I have totally put the sexualization and harassment of Murderbot into a compartmentalization box. It should take the episode down for me but it doesn’t. I do think the writers expect the audience to find it weird and off-putting but a more explicit “wtf, no!” would help. Maybe it’ll happen before Leebeebee’s sudden but inevitable betrayal. I know the “they pretended to be us” line is from the book but it seems to be obvious foreshadowing given the new character. I wonder if they’ll do the thing where the helpless woman rescuee turns out to be the evil boss.
I really liked how Murderbot’s assault on Gurathin was done. It just moved. Much better than the fight scenes which still seemed too human.
I feel like part of Mensah’s issues in previous episodes was because she was uncomfortable with renting a slave. Now that she knows Murderbot is a free agent she seems much more at ease and in control of the situation. As much as she can be anyways.
I want to bite the person responsible for these cliffhangers.
I’m also aroace and while I don’t condone the Leebeebee subplot here, I thought it was another interesting example of how no one views SecUnits as human (it’s less physically painful to be kissed than it is to stand there while someone sets light to your hand, but both are clear that in this life, Murderbot gets no bodily autonomy). I guess it makes sense that people would objectify SecUnits, especially if they see their faces and they’re, well, conventionally attractive humans, but I didn’t love it being included here.
That said, I appreciated the scene anyway because I absolutely go into panic mode for hours if someone tries to flirt with me or hit on me, even in a situation where I know I’m safe, they’re being friendly and there will be no negative follow-up to not wanting this. Murderbot standing there, alone again but with its performance optimisation dropping, is maybe the closest I’ve ever come to seeing how romantic situations feel to me personally on screen. That meant something to me, even if I assume most allosexuals will see it as part of a “comedic” moment and I DO think that it was clumsily handled.
Murderbot’s performance rating tanking after that kiss was so relatable lmao
I’m a very straight male, but am incapable on noticing when someone hits on me unless they’re *very* obvious about it. And, boy howdy, does the Leebeebee thing make me uncomfortable. It’s funny (to me) but still uncomfortable. As much as the earlier times where Murderbot had to look people in the eye.
There’s a couple of typos in this sentence, I think
“Murderbot and Mensah take the hopper to do it manually when they can get a single out from their habitat,”
Google docs autocorrect, ruining me once again.
Alex, your correction took care of the single vs signal issue but not the positive can that was supposed to be cannot/can’t??
The original errors were from my autocorrect on google docs. Fixing the errors was supposed to be from Reactor. I don’t have control over the article once I submit it. Looks like they only changed the one instead of both. I’ll poke them on Monday.
Looks like someone took care of it!
I thought it was pretty obvious that the LeeBeeBee subplot was supposed to show a negative interaction on every level, and also to show that even our nice hippies are hypocritical when it comes to their “friend”. It’s doing exactly what Star Trek used to do, pointedly toward the audience. I mean, even my husband picked up on this and he’s usually very slow to notice something like that.
I’m not arguing that it wasn’t supposed to be negative. But I also don’t think it’s obvious that they were being hypocritical. Esp not if the show is following the books. If they were being that intentionally or overtly hypocritical, it would be in direct contrast to the vibes of the books.
My take is it showed a good example of “uncomfortable politeness.” Which is where someone is obviously saying something awful and uncomfortable but no one challenges it because they want to be polite.
Which is all too common in RL.
“Weren’t there other ways to comment on Murderbot’s assumed gender?” is a perfect tagline. No, you were not the only one who was shocked, disgusted, or contemptuous of the forced kiss scene- in my group of aspec, genderqueer Murderbot fans, I’ve heard plenty of the same revulsion from multiple corners, even from people who otherwise liked the episode, or don’t identify as repulsed aroace. It was sexual assault, straight up! Appalling that the writer’s room and showrunners thought that was worth laughing about. If it looks like a man then sexual assault is just a funny joke, eh? Is this the 90’s still? And you make a great point that PresAux standing by really undercuts the supposed respect their characters have for their SecUnit’s personhood- it opens a question of if they’re really that different from the CR and Leebeebee’s off-kilter character, when it counts. Really gives the impression that for all the showrunners’ stated intentions to depict aroaceness, they didn’t understand enough to be respectful with it.
As a person of color and a fellow aromantic, agender fan of Murderbot, your reviews of the episode have been an incredible breath of fresh air and much needed perspective in the critical conversation on the show. I’m glad someone is saying these things so I don’t have to! Please keep up the good and important work.
Wow, thank you! I really appreciate your comment.
I actually cut a whole paragraph where I went on about how we as a society tend to make jokes about sexual assault on men bc I didn’t feel like I could adequately do that conversation justice, but yeah, that was my first thought. I really think the writers weren’t trying to be malicious with this, but there were so many subtextual misses here that would’ve been caught by a more diverse team of writers. The show wants us to ask questions, I just don’t know that they’re aware just how many questions this ep really asks.
Seriously. They’re trying hard in some ways, but this feels like a harmful miss that could have been avoided. I am maybe ace/aro but cis, and I found it viscerally unsettling and disgusting. Which may have been their intention, but I don’t think so.
In this case, I think the show is taking very great pains to explain, “No, Murderbot isn’t into that shit.”
Like the fact they are like a Ken doll wasn’t enough.
Perhaps they feel they have to underline SecUnit’s asexuality to counter the inevitable consequence of casting a popular, leading-man-type actor in the role, one who presumably already has a fanbase that fantasizes about him.
Ooh… I shudder to think what kind of fanfic will get written about this show. Fanfic authors have a long history of adjusting characters’ canonical sexualities and romantic interests to fit the writers’ fantasies, which wasn’t so bad back in the days when it diversified casts that were censor-mandated to be purely heterosexual, but could be problematical in a case like this, where the character belongs to a marginalized and misunderstood identity group.
That was my read, too. If you’re familiar with the books, or even with the concept of asexuality, it seems like they’re laying it on with a trowel, but they want to make sure that it comes across even to viewers who are not familiar with either of those things.
I am DREADING the fanfic
Fuuuuck I hadn’t even thought of that.
Yeah, I feel like they don’t quite trust the audience with the premise of a non-gendered robot that is absolutely asexual and aromantic. So they attempt to frame the attractive female survivor he “rescued” (who is absolutely the person responsible for the massacre IMHO) as incredibly gross and offputting by sexualizing it.
It unfortunately directs the show a bit more at mainstream audiences versus normalizing MB’s situation and behavior but I think it might actually register with audiences who don’t normally think of these things.
And good point about fanfic.
Yeah, I think that’s part of what they were trying to do, but they did it in the worst way possible. I’m fine with showing PresAux to be not as good of allies as they think they are (a much needed conversation), but you don’t need to get there by further oppressing Murderbot (and by extension, hitting real world fans with similar marginalized identities over the head with it). It’s got larger social consequences than I think the writers anticipated. Or if they did anticipate it and decided to do it anyway, that’s a problem for me.
So, the Murderbot fan community I’m in on Tumblr has an interesting theory about Leebeebee’s actions.
I have to say, that perspective helped me. I’ll be watching to see if the pattern holds. (If, y’know, the pattern has opportunity to hold.)
Gawd, Leebeebee assaulting Murderbot was awful to watch! My impression was similar to yours, that I could see what they were trying to convey but strongly think they could have found a better way than assaulting poor SecUnit. I also agree that the team could have responded more forcefully than Bharadwaj’s philosophical admonishment.
Otherwise this was a really entertaining episode! The actor’s characterization of Mensah is indeed excellent, and it’s great to see SecUnit getting more comfortable around Mensah, almost without realizing.
Side note: I watched ep 3 with my parents and my mom kept unknowingly misgendering Murderbot until I told her, but I didn’t get on her too much bc that is kind of the show’s fault! This is many peoples’ first knowing exposure to an agender person and while agender people can look any way, the show would have done better to cast a sort of more outwardly agender actor, especially if they aren’t going to discuss its gender or lack thereof more specifically. I feel like one of the other SecUnits could have a more cisgender-seeming appearance to show variation in how agender people present themselves. (My mom is a really kind person and tries hard to respect people how they are, and I think she’ll respond well to deeper discussions of asexual, agender, and nonbinary identities, but it will take a bit of time.)
I’ve seen this one now, and though maybe it’s because I read this review beforehand, I didn’t read Leebeebee’s sexual interest in SecUnit as something played for comedy, but as something intended to make us uncomfortable and realize there was something morally questionable and untrustworthy about her. At the very least, it was meant to contrast the Corporation Rim’s perception of constructs as property with the PresAux team’s perception of SecUnit as a person.
I also don’t think the PresAux people were dismissive of her attitude — they were pretty clearly disturbed by her inappropriate sexual musings, but probably didn’t want to call her out on them because they thought she was a traumatized survivor and that her inappropriate discussion was a symptom of her shock or something.
Wasn’t this the part in the book where Gurathin revealed that it called itself Murderbot and it said “That’s private!”? I know I saw that scene in the trailer (and didn’t think Skarsgard sounded upset enough at the invasion of privacy); did they cut it out, or does it come later?