Love Death + Robots Season 2

[tomandtish]

So Love, Death and Robots Season 2 is out. Looks like we get 8 episodes (which is the only disappointing thing about the season, since season one was 18). Season 2 can be watched in under 2 hours. Below are just a few thoughts. Warning, spoilers abound.

This one is hysterical, and a little scary. “If your Vaccubot 2000 is trying to kill you, press 3”. Given that there’s a push to automate customer service whenever possible, and considering that everything HAS to be wi-fi capable now, I foresee the day where this call might not be that farfetched.


Not as much to say about this one. The animation is beautiful, and you definitely have the message that you don’t have to be enhanced to be special or worthwhile. Love Fletcher faking the injury to give Sedgewick a chance to shine, especially since he was willing to risk his life to do it.


Also something that isn’t as farfetched as we would wish. I imagine killing kids who weren’t authorized to be born wears at some after a while. As usual, this shows one of the problems of extending the lifespan. How do you avoid overcrowding? Their solution is … extreme.


First, at the start the animation is incredible. Really have to pay close attention to realize this is animation and not real people. It does become a bit more obvious further on. So apparently everyone wants to kill Snow. I get that but would like clarification on the challenging. “I challenge you” is enough to give you rights to fight someone? But this is another take on immortality. If you regenerate from anything, you’re also functionally immortal. And everyone is gonna try and duplicate it.


Huh. I’m trying to figure out if this is stop-motion animation or a CGI attempt at duplicating it. I think the latter since there are times they move too smoothly. As usual, wandering off is always a bad idea. It seems obvious to me that the conductor knows there’s something to fear here. Props to him for coming to the rescue.


This one made me laugh a lot. Remember, if you go to spy on Santa, you might get a freaky alien looking thing instead. This could be an interesting twist on Krampus, if you assume Santa and Krampus are actually the same being. Needless to say, those kids will need a lot of therapy. The looks on their faces at the end is hysterical.


Reminds me a little of Saturn Three and Red Planet. Trapped in a hostile environment when the robot goes bad. How he ends up there is told in flashbacks, which I’m not sure I like. When you know someone is alive at point Z, then you know they won’t die at points x or y. (I will admit he does a good job of swinging that arm even though his hand has to be shattered).


Hey look! A titan from Attack on Titan! That’s what it initially looked like but changed quickly. A new take on Gulliver’sTravels (namely, what if Gulliver washed up deceased). I have to admit, I’m surprised that everyone takes the discovery of the giant’s body so calmly. Everyone seems way too happy to have a new play toy. I’d assume after a day or two it starts smelling. And yes, a giant phallus is visible.


Anyone else watching? What do you think of it?

[Fredaintdead]

I laughed so hard at All Through The House.
Specifically at the monster disgorging presents and gently reassuring children with headpats.
I dont think ive enjoyed the season as much as Season 1 overall, but that particular episode definitely ranks among my favourites.

[M1982]

I was a little disappointed in S2. Nothing that really stood out to me.

Maybe being shorter just meant the chance that something hits my taste was just smaller.

Also I could swear I've seen the Santa episode before. Not exactly this one, but exactly the same concept. I just can't remember where or when

[Giggling Ghast]

STAY ... GOOD ...

I generally thought the quality of Season 2 was higher than Season 1, which had a far higher percentage of weird and gross shorts that weren’t that enjoyable. I pretty well enjoyed every Season 2 except for The Drowned Giant, which felt like it was building up to some revelation that never came.

(I thought the giant would turn out to be a regular human and the people would actually be the scavengers that ate him. But no, it’s just a giant naked dude on a beach and a scientist droning on about entropy.)

Probably the highlight was Pop Squad, which feels frighteningly plausible if we ever figure out immortality.


Also I could swear I've seen the Santa episode before. Not exactly this one, but exactly the same concept. I just can't remember where or when

“Santa turns out to actually be a monster” is not a hugely unique concept in horror.

[Eldan]

There was just generally not a lot of meat on this? Short season, a lot of very short episodes, and none that really stood out as good. Several seemed to show some interesting worldbuilding and then just... ended? Like, I don't know. I think I've written about this before, in the context of short stories. There are two kinds of short story: some that are just a scene and some that are a complete story. This seemed to be a lot of the first. There were a few interesting vignettes that worked (Customer Service, the Drowned Giant, All Through the House), but several more that just felt like teasers for longer stories to me. (Snow in the Desert, Life Hatch, Ice).
I'd have liked a few longer stories that actually felt like they had something to say. There was no Zima Blue, Aquila Rift, Lucky 13, Secret War, etc.

Also, fridge speculation time about Tall Grass:

So, the conductor knows there's monsters in the grass that eat people, has fought them before, and he knows what it means that the train runs out of steam in the middle of nowhere. And yet, he lets a passenger disembark and walk off.

Was he just trying to get that passenger killed? Is he sacrificing people for the safe passage of the train or something?

[Giggling Ghast]

It’s more like he’s been in this situation dozens of times, and he knows telling people “Don’t try to get a closer look at the lights in the grass, they’re flesh-eating monsters” just gets him dismissed as a lunatic or it encourages people to go look for themselves.

“Stay by the train or it will leave without you” seems to have the best results.

[Thales]

It’s more like he’s been in this situation dozens of times, and he knows telling people “Don’t try to get a closer look at the lights in the grass, they’re flesh-eating monsters” just gets him dismissed as a lunatic or it encourages people to go look for themselves.

“Stay by the train or it will leave without you” seems to have the best results.
I think adding "Careful of the grass, there's snakes in there" might work on the majority of people who aren't amateur herpetologists.

[Giggling Ghast]

I think adding "Careful of the grass, there's snakes in there" might work on the majority of people who aren't amateur herpetologists.

“What kind of snakes?”

“Uh, cobras.”

“There’s no cobras this far north!”

“Look, just ... just trust me, OK?”

(Attendant leaves)

“Well, now that he’s gone, I’m going to have a look at these glowing ‘cobras.’”

[Thales]

“What kind of snakes?”

“Uh, cobras.”

“There’s no cobras this far north!”

“Look, just ... just trust me, OK?”

(Attendant leaves)

“Well, now that he’s gone, I’m going to have a look at these glowing ‘cobras.’”
Eh, "I dunno — I ain't no herpetologist — but they bit the last guy to go off the tracks something nasty" seems like a better response. You won't stop everyone, but it'd probably do better.

[Giggling Ghast]

"Oh no! That light may be a child lost in the tall grass! I better go save them from the snakes!"

Again, my assumption is that the old man has tried a variety of lies over the years and passengers STILL go into the tall grass, either out of curiosity or concern or just plain stubborn arrogance. As Eldan said, he's obviously been in this situation before, or else how would he know how to fend off the monsters with a lit torch?

He's just doing the best he can to protect people. Kind of a heavy burden, if you think about it.

[Blueiji]

Pop Squad was a huge disappoint to me. It felt entirely, shamelessly, and uninventively ripped off from Bladerunner.

In particular, the stuff I felt was ripped off included:
-> The concept of a high-class elite using specialized enforcers/killers to terminate unregistered humans.
-> The upper/lower world divide being a literal upper/lower world (though the lower world in Pop Squad is noticeably greener than Bladerunner's).
-> The flying car (a superficial similarity, but it just goes to show how much was copy-pasted from Bladerunner).
-> The fixation on hands and eyes in the cinematography. This one is especially glaring because in Bladerunner, these anatomical fixations are backed up by those organs being thematically relevant to the narrative (observation of the eyes is one of the major ways to identify a replicant, and the inhuman resileince of the replicants is repeatedly demonstrated through the invulnerability of their hands). Meanwhile, in Pop Squad, the fixation on these organs seems to just be "because Bladerunner did it."
-> Having the protagonist stare into a beautiful sky at the culmination of the piece. In Bladerunner 2049, you could even make the parallel that both protagonists are staring into the sky after sacrificing their lives to preserve/protect the relationship between a parent and an illegally created child.
-> The beat-for-beat way in which a job/case is presented, and most of all—the central thematic journey for the protagonists.
-> Most of all, the central thematic journeys for the protagonists. Both of the Bladerunner films are about their titular enforcers slowly realizing the horror and evil of their work, and becoming human (in a way that matters, not in the natural/replicant sense) by putting their lives on the line to protect the vulnerable. In Pop Squad, the central thematic journey is... identical.

It's one thing to make a tribute to a classic, but I don't feel like Pop Squad manages to justify its tribute by adding anything new or interesting. Focusing on illegal births instead of artifical humans has potential, but there just wasn't a thorough-enough exploration of that theme to make it more than a palette-swap. I'd rather watch something original-but-risky than something safe-but-derivative. Ironic, considering its plotline, that Pop Squad doesn't seem to feel the same way.
I'd also like to clarify that I don't think anyone who likes Pop Squad is wrong for doing so. In a total vacuum, I imagine its a good piece of dark sci-fi. For me though, it doesn't exist in a vacuum, it exists in the obvious shadow of Bladerunner.

[JeenLeen]

RE the Drowned Giant, sounding like an SCP

What got me was that, at the end, everyone's memory seems to have changed to think it a whale.

Made me envision something like a mind-altering phenenoma where there are giants and they do appear dead in human lands somewhat commonly. Maybe one every few decades or something. But some mental effect makes people forget and believe it something else.

I could see an SCP written where this is a thing, and the mental effect is their way of covering it up.
Reminds me of this one: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-5172

[Imbalance]

Agreed with most: good but nothing I'm going to remember much about the next time someone mentions it. The giant could have been audio only and I would've got just as much out of it. I did love the Santa, if for no other reason than it looked a lot like something I drew on the back of my homework in third grade.


Pop Squad was a huge disappoint to me. It felt entirely, shamelessly, and uninventively ripped off from Bladerunner.

In particular, the stuff I felt was ripped off included:
-> The concept of a high-class elite using specialized enforcers/killers to terminate unregistered humans.
-> The upper/lower world divide being a literal upper/lower world (though the lower world in Pop Squad is noticeably greener than Bladerunner's).
-> The flying car (a superficial similarity, but it just goes to show how much was copy-pasted from Bladerunner).
-> The fixation on hands and eyes in the cinematography. This one is especially glaring because in Bladerunner, these anatomical fixations are backed up by those organs being thematically relevant to the narrative (observation of the eyes is one of the major ways to identify a replicant, and the inhuman resileince of the replicants is repeatedly demonstrated through the invulnerability of their hands). Meanwhile, in Pop Squad, the fixation on these organs seems to just be "because Bladerunner did it."
-> Having the protagonist stare into a beautiful sky at the culmination of the piece. In Bladerunner 2049, you could even make the parallel that both protagonists are staring into the sky after sacrificing their lives to preserve/protect the relationship between a parent and an illegally created child.
-> The beat-for-beat way in which a job/case is presented, and most of all—the central thematic journey for the protagonists.
-> Most of all, the central thematic journeys for the protagonists. Both of the Bladerunner films are about their titular enforcers slowly realizing the horror and evil of their work, and becoming human (in a way that matters, not in the natural/replicant sense) by putting their lives on the line to protect the vulnerable. In Pop Squad, the central thematic journey is... identical.

It's one thing to make a tribute to a classic, but I don't feel like Pop Squad manages to justify its tribute by adding anything new or interesting. Focusing on illegal births instead of artifical humans has potential, but there just wasn't a thorough-enough exploration of that theme to make it more than a palette-swap. I'd rather watch something original-but-risky than something safe-but-derivative. Ironic, considering its plotline, that Pop Squad doesn't seem to feel the same way.
I'd also like to clarify that I don't think anyone who likes Pop Squad is wrong for doing so. In a total vacuum, I imagine its a good piece of dark sci-fi. For me though, it doesn't exist in a vacuum, it exists in the obvious shadow of Bladerunner.

I caught some of these similarities, myself, but concluded in the end that Pop Squad ends up being superior to me for one basic reason: it conveyed the same story in only 16% of the runtime. Blade Runner always bored me with so many long, pensive shots that I never understood why it was so acclaimed, but now I see that I really needed to have to stayed awake or got the Cliff's Notes version to enjoy it.

[False God]

Honestly the Drowned Giant struck me more as a political commentary.

None of this season were particularly exciting to me. Good....but more on par with some of the less riveting (but still fun) episodes of the previous season. Felt a lot like "here are some episodes that didn't quite make the cut". Given the high bar of the show already, they're still good, just not great.

[Tyndmyr]

Honestly the Drowned Giant struck me more as a political commentary.

I think it's based on a beached whale or something?

It's an interesting premise, but I kind of expected it to, I dunno, go somewhere. Sort of a perspective swapped Gilligan's Island or something.

I agree that a lot of these seemed weak. I enjoyed the bladerunner expy for what it was, it had an interesting twist in the children/immortality aspect. Decent foundation for a dystopia, I suppose. I also got a good chuckle from the Santa episode.

The rest were mostly pretty mediocre. Not bad or great, just kinda there.