Summary
Murderbot is at its most confident and conceptually audacious in Episode 4, leading to by far the strongest individual chapter.
Murderbot still has the usual problems in Episode 4, namely being too rushed and clipped for its own good, but “Escape Velocity Protocol” brings everything together well despite those quibbles. Following the ambush at the end of the previous episode, our SecUnit is injured and confused, and the fantasies of TV serials are merging with the reality of a spiralling mission, threaded by Murderbot’s nascent observations about how human beings really tick. It makes for a chaotic but intriguing 25 minutes, even if a satellite jamming plot gimmick keeps David Dastmalchian and Tamara Podemski out of things for the week.
You’d think, given the runtime, that this would be the rare show that didn’t indulge in flashback sequences, but no such luck on that front since Episode 4 opens with an extended one (“extended” being a relative term, obviously.) It’s a nice bit of lore to hand-wavily explain how SecUnits are made, but it’s really reiterating a thematic point. Corporation Rim is grim. The SecUnits are churned out by disgruntled employees on a soulless assembly line. They’re products, which is precisely why Murderbot’s newfound sentience is a big deal. It’s like a kettle coming to life and suddenly being responsible for your safety.
That notion of safety is pretty integral to “Escape Velocity Protocol”. Murderbot’s job is to keep his humans safe, and his ability to do that has been drastically compromised after being jumped by the SecUnit that murdered everyone on DeltFall. Not only can he not move or defend himself, but the SecUnit has a Combat Override Module to jam into his neck, override his programming, and set him against the humans whose safety he’s supposed to be in charge of.
In case you needed reminding, this is the show’s essential conflict in microcosm. I know I keep referring to Murderbot as a “he” because of the Skarsgård casting, but the key thing to remember is that Murderbot is not a human. With the Override Module installed and cloaked, he can be made to do anything without his knowledge or complicity. What seems like a rescue takes on an interesting quality when it becomes apparent that Murderbot getting back to the PresAux team is the beginning of an even bigger problem.
Akshay Khanna in Murderbot | Image via Apple TV+
The rescue comes courtesy of Mensah, who, it seems, is not just the nominal leader of this expedition but the actual leader of the entire Preservation Alliance. After a disagreement with Pin-Lee about whether to leave their SecUnit behind and save themselves, Mensah turns up in the nick of time to save Murderbot from the rogue SecUnit with the help of a big drill. She doesn’t want to leave a crewmember behind. But she has no real idea what she’s in for.
What follows is Murderbot Episode 4 at its most intriguing and conceptually audacious, because Murderbot is a mess of conflicting inputs and realities, his brain trying to alert him to the presence of the Override Module in the only way he can understand, which seems to be by filtering it through the lens of The Rise And Fall Of Sanctuary Moon. He had already used the theme song to distract his attacker, and before long he and Mensah are both transplanted onto its arch, campy set, as Murderbot tries to rationalize and communicate the idea that he’s a ticking time-bomb while also being positively starstruck that he’s suddenly a cast member on his favourite show.
It’s good stuff this, and shows the value of Murderbot being allowed a human face, because Skarsgård is rejoicing in the opportunity to be as goofy as possible about the whole thing. This somehow doesn’t detract from the tension implicit in the premise, though; it’s a ticking-clock device of an unusually potent variety that builds to the earned conclusion of Murderbot regaining just enough control for just long enough to heroically shoot himself to keep the humans safe.
Would the barking Corporation Rim foremen consider this a SecUnit performing as advertised or going rogue? That’s the real question. In the battle between free will and programming, empathy and pragmatism, who – or what – comes out on top?
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