[Warning: General spoilers ahead.]
After 18 months off the air in the U.S., Humans returns to AMC Monday night for its eight-episode second season, and if the premiere is any indication, it’s a very welcome return.
This was a show that snuck up on me two summers ago, and I was so glad I went in cold when I watched it. The first season unfolded in fascinating ways as we met the Hawkins, a British couple in the middle of a marriage crisis and their three children. The family was turned upside down by the realization that its assigned synthetic human aka “Synth,” Anita (Gemma Chan) was actually Mia, a sentient, thinking, feeling form of AI.
Over the course of those first eight episodes, we learned what life had been like for Mia and her Synth siblings, Niska (Emily Berrington), Leo (Colin Morgan), and Max (Ivanno Jeremiah) after they’d been forced to bury their true natures when they were orphaned by the death of their father.
We watched each of the Hawkins–mom Laura (Katherine Parkinson), dad Joe (Tom Goodman-Hill), daughters Mattie (Lucy Carless) and Sophie (Pixie Davies), and son Toby (Theo Stevenson) interact with Mia and her family in ways that were not always humane, until they realized the truth. As the season wrapped up, multiple factions discovered the existence of the alternative Synths and began to pursue Mia and her family, so the Hawkins helped them escape, without realizing that Niska had a hard drive in her custody that could “wake up” every Synth on the global network.
We begin Season 2 several months down the road, exploring where that decision has left all of them, and we’re introduced to new players in the Synth and human worlds. In Berlin, Niska strikes up a new friendship with Astrid (Bella Dayne), a waitress she meets in a club.
Back in England, the Hawkins deal with professional and personal changes, Mia works in a struggling café run by Ed (Nashville‘s Sam Palladio), who’s drowning in debt because of a family illness, and a newly self-aware Synth named Hester (Sonya Cassidy) finds her way to Max and Leo. In California, AI researcher Dr. Athena Morrow (Carrie-Ann Moss) entertains a signficant new research opportunity from Silicon Valley billionaire Milo Khoury (Marshall Allman).
And that’s enough to get you started. This is one of those series returns where you realize how much you’ve missed everyone, and how much the real world has shifted in the last 18 months. I’m very glad they’re back!
Note: The second season has already concluded in the U.K., so don’t go looking for spoilers out there unless you really want to know. I’d recommend you just enjoy the season without reading ahead. It’s only eight episodes, after all.
This season, Humans will air Mondays at 10/9c on AMC. Here are a couple of sneak peeks. If you missed the first season, it’s a short eight episodes and they’re online at Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, and Xbox.
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