Emergence Season 1 Finale: Terminator

An excellent, satisfying and provocative finale (I hope of this season not the series) of Emergence just on ABC-TV.   A finale in which the AIs took on some of the crucial characteristics of the Terminator over the decades.

Actually, two crucial characteristics.  The most advanced AIs, Helen and Piper, can shape-shift and face-shift and therein take on the characteristics of other people and AIs.  And they can move like a potent dust of nanobots.  All of this adds up Jo "killing" Helen with Piper's help, Piper "dying" to absorb a lethal explosion and therein save a lot of the cast, but Piper "surviving" by, at Alex's suggestion, Jo putting Piper's code into Helen's "dead" body.

I put quotes around those words, because Piper didn't really die, and didn't really survive as 100% Piper.   And neither did Helen, in both ways.  The finale draws to a close with the proof that Piper is actually carrying some of the deadly Helen in Piper.  Which means that Piper didn't entirely survive and Helen didn't entirely die.  Which means, in turn, that the two-episode title "Killshot" for the last two episodes of Emergence was a clever flash of misdirection.

Which captures why I keep saying that Emergence has some very good qualities, and ought to be continued. I'd certainly want to see more of this AI story.  And the personal relationships call out for further play, as well.  I've been saying ever since we learned that Ed was very sick that Piper could and would cure him.  We got just a hint of that in the finale.  And Jo's complex with relationship with Alex, and now Ryan, deserves more time to work out, settle in, or whatever the best description of what will happen romantically.

So count me in as a definite viewer and reviewer if there is a second season.  And, if not, as someone who will say to anyone who is interested that the first season was well worth watching.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred ... Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom ... Emergence 1.8: Spinning ... Emergence 1.9: Benny! ... Emergence 1.10: The Search for Piper ... Emergence 1.11-12: Parents and Children





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.11-12: Parents and Children

Been a busy couple of weeks for me, so here, just before what I hope is the season not series finale of Emergence this Tuesday, is my review of episodes 1.11 and 1.12 (mostly 1.12) together.

What keeps popping up as this season of Emergence rushes to a close is the relationship of the humans who made the AIs, or who claim some kind of parentage of them, with their "offspring".  Emily has been described for a while as Piper's mother.  Now we meet Helen's "mother" - but unlike Emily and Piper, Helen's mother looks just like her "child".

Except, of course, Helen is an adult.  It's useful to compare the characteristics of Helen and Piper.  Helen has some awesome powers of survival.  There's almost no way she can be killed.  Piper seems much more vulnerable.  Yet, the whole series now revolves around Helen risking everything to obtain Piper's powers.

All of this action takes place in an environment of new characters being introduced, and others killed, with the drop of an episode.  Most of them are either AIs or have some deep connection to the AIs.  Presumably the Department of Justice guy who gets Ryan out of FBI custody is an AI.  It's been made clear that they are at least thousands of AIs out and about.

But, so far, only Piper and now Benny - who Piper keeps insisting has changed (for the better) - seem to be good.  In the early episodes, it looked like Benny and Jo might have some kind of relationship in their future.  What Benny did as an AI more than Benny being an AI ended that.  But that's ok if we're rooting for Jo to have some romance in her life.  She and Ryan make a good couple.

This Tuesday will be the finale of what I hope is just the start of a much longer story.  Emergence has broken a lot rules in its first season, often being unfocused and all over the place.  But it nonetheless has a strong science fiction heart, and I'd like to see it keep beating.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred ... Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom ... Emergence 1.8: Spinning ... Emergence 1.9: Benny! ... Emergence 1.10: The Search for Piper





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.10: The Search for Piper

Emergence was back tonight with its best episode of the season - well placed, since the series only has a few more episodes left, and is in danger of not being renewed.  Which would be unfortunate.

Because tonight's episode 1.10 had all the trimmings, as Jo set out to find Piper, including

• Jo's repartee, as when she wonders why "you design an AI and you make it a gas attendant in the middle of nowhere". That would be Pennsylvania.
• Also Jo's mastery of that little thingamajig which, when placed against - I think the left arm, is that right - of someone, you can tell if that person is a person or an AI.  Jo and the FBI pass the test.
• A good ending scene in which Jo actually finds Benny and Piper, but of course they get away.

So, here's where we - or the show - stand.  There's a more widespread group of AIs afoot or at large than we thought.   We still don't know their purpose.  We do know that Piper is something special, but in what way?  As far as we know, she's the first child AI.   And she may well have some powers that the other AIs don't have.  And we still don't know who was really making the AIs, or wanted them made.

They could be aliens from another solar system or galaxy, or humans who time traveled with their superior knowledge from the future, or just very advance humans who were born in our own time like all the rest of us.  But why did they invent the AIs - or harness, encourage, whatever the people we saw in earlier episodes as the AI progenitors?

Lots of questions and not many episodes left.  I'd be very happy if this series got another season.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred ... Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom ... Emergence 1.8: Spinning ... Emergence 1.9: Benny!





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.9: Benny!

Well, in my review of the most recent episode of Emergence - 1.8 - I said that "An important character could be an AI - like Officer Chris."  I was wrong about Chris.  But not about an important character being an AI.  It turns out in episode 1.9, on earlier this evening, that the hidden AI is Benny.  A good choice, since it explains some of his unusual characters, like being so quick to recover from injury.

This means that AIs are a lot more prevalent than just Piper.  There are adults, ensconced for who knows how long in society, who are AIs.  And in the last scene, we learn that they're not just Benny.  The woman who's offering Ed a cure for his cancer is an AI, too.

Chances are Emily didn't make all of them.  So, who did?  And many other questions arise: when were they made?  And how many AIs are there at large?   Assuming the makers aren't aliens or people from the future - both of which would be a little trite - we're left with the possibility that there's some group who've been working under the radar for years with this advanced technology.

I also guessed earlier this year that Piper would be the one to cure Ed's cancer.  She suggested that tonight.  But that's going to have to wait a while, until Jo is able to retrieve Piper.  Suddenly, the FBI guy joins Jo's husband and Ed and Chris as being Piper's best - and only - hope.

This is a pretty good way to wrap up the Fall part of the season.  Emergence will be back January 7, 2020.  I'm looking forward to its return.  At this point, though, the only episode listed for 2020 is #10 on January 7.   I'm hoping there are more.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred ... Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom ... Emergence 1.8: Spinning





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.8: Spinning

I'm late in reviewing Emergence 1.8 because, well, it was a weak episode, which left me not in the mood to review it, but here goes:

I think the series is spinning its wheels, or choose your metaphor for a series that started out ok, got considerably better, and now seems to be going nowhere.  This in part is because there have been too many deaths of villains or conflicted characters - Kindred and then Wilkis.   And to make up for this, we keep getting new villains emerging on Emergence.

Now, nobody asked for my opinion, but this series could be saved via one of several ways.  The ultimate villains could be AIs that we haven't seen, who are behind all of this.   An important character could be an AI - like Officer Chris.  He's so likable that making him an AI would be a real surprise.  I'm sure there are other ways.

But since we've already learned about who/what Piper is, and why so many people, powerful and not so powerful, are out to get her or contain her, we now need something more.  It's significant that Emily made Piper in her own image.   Who else, among the characters we know, might have done something similar?  (It's also important, at this stage in the series, to stop introducing new characters.)

Back to the actual story in episode 1.8, I find the FBI guy annoying.  I wouldn't mind if an FBI along the lines of Dick Wolf's FBI (a superb series) got involved in this story.  But, as it is, this FBI guy is little more than a chess piece of some sort, alternately obstructing and then saving Jo.

Emergence still has promise.  In its own low-key Long Island way, it is refreshing and original as an AI story.  It just needs to get moving now.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred ... Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.7: Piper's Real Mom

A fast-moving episode 1.7 of Emergence earlier this week.  I hope the rest of the season continues at this pace.

We learn a lot.  Emily is Kindred's daughter.  She created Piper - or, rather, got Wilkis to create her - to satisfy Emily's need to have someone who really loved her.  But, for reasons we still don't completely know or understand, the AI that is Piper wound up with a mind of her own.

But it's a mind vulnerable to what we would otherwise call hacking.  Emily can hack into her "daughter's" mind and get Piper to see and do all kinds of things.  But one thing Emily didn't count on is the feeling Piper has developed for Jo and her family.

And in episode 1.7, those feelings prevail.   And, whatever exactly Piper now is, she's now likely to stay at least somewhat free of the hacks.  Jo shoots out the master computer which contains and directs or whatever the code that is inside Piper.  Which means, if I understand that correctly, that no one can now put ideas into Piper's head.  She is what she now is.

But this doesn't mean she will stay that way.  Because, although she may be free now of outside interference, she's still evolving or ... emerging.  So now the title of this series becomes more clear.  It's about an AI in the body of a girl which is evolving into who knows exactly what.  Whether this was intended by Emily and Wilkis is not clear.  Perhaps her emergence was intended, perhaps it's an expression of the programming gone wrong.

A good puzzle, all in all, and more than enough to keep me watching.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl ... Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.6: The People Who Are Kindred

Emergence checked in with another strong episode - 1.6 - this week, and brought us to two surprising revelations.  Both concern Kindred.

One is that Kindred didn't invent or create the android that is Piper.  It turns out that the well-named Alan Wilkis did - well-named because he has the same first name, spelled the same way, as Alan Turing.  He was the genius who in real history broke the German Enigma Code (which in many ways was responsible for our winning the Second World War), perfected the basis for the digital computer, and left us with the iconic Turing test: if an AI is indistinguishable in its intelligence from human intelligence, then by what logic can we say that the AI lacks human intelligence?

But Alan Wilkis not Kindred as the creator of Piper was not as surprising as what hits us at the end of this episode.  That Second Life-like virtual apparition or avatar of Kindred that keeps drawing Piper into his conversation and into his world turns out to be none other than Emily - or at least, her apparition or avatar.  And this twist of Emily from the hunted to the hunter changes everything, or would seem to, because we still don't know what's really going on.

But I like Emily as a Keyser Soze character, who starts as a vulnerable victim and turns out to be the one who, at least at this point, is pulling the strings.  What it strongly suggests is Emergence has all kinds of tricks up its sleeve.  It's rare that I literally have no idea where a series is heading, certainly rare after the sixth episode.   But Emergence has managed to do that, in an intriguing way, and keeps making me want to watch it more and more.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child ... Emergence 1.5: Supergirl





The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.5: Supergirl

With last night's episode 1.5 of Emergence, Piper has moved from the category of someone with superpowers to Supergirl.  That's because she clearly has more than one incredible superpower.

She not only can move around huge objects with ease - like a truck barreling towards her car - but she can also see inside Ed's body and know that the medication he's taking for his cancer isn't working.  Either one of those powers would make Piper a superhero, as Mia earnestly asks Piper if she is after Mia, in the same car, witnesses Piper's trick with the truck.  Mia doesn't yet know about Piper's medical diagnostic power.  If she had, she would likely realize that Piper is much more than your traditional super hero.

And, like Supergirl, Piper has her Kryptonite.   That would be Kindred, and the door he's literally able to draw Piper through, to be assert his authority.  The question still remains as to what that authority is.

As I wrote about Westworld - and indeed, twenty years ago in a piece called The Civil Rights of Robots.  AIs, androids, robots, are entitled to make their own decisions and chart their own destinies if they are sentient.  Making a slave of a sentient being we invented is no better than making a slave of a sentient being already in existence.  We know now that Piper is an AI.  The growing presence of Kindred means that Emergence is now in the same fascinating and treacherous philosophic waters as Westworld.

Which makes Emergence even more eminently worth watching.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids ... Emergence 1.4: Android Child






The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Emergence 1.4: Android Child

Ok, as of the beginning of Emergence 1.4, we know what/who Piper is, if not the full story of how she came to be.  As Emily says, Piper is a totally artificial creation - body as well as mind.  This would make her, in science fiction parlance, an android.  Akin in television land to the beings in Westworld and Humans.  Maybe even more so, as there don't seem to be any trace of wires or digital circuitry in Piper.

And, as Benny helpfully explains, a child is a perfect vehicle for getting androids into human society.  After all, an android child can be made to look cute and in need of protection and sheltering.   Exactly what made Piper so irresistible to Jo.

So what now?  Kindred (aka John Locke from Lost, i.e., Terry O'Quinn is determined to get back his property, which apparently Piper is.  We still know little to nothing of his master plan.  But we know he has no trouble meting out death to anyone or thing who get his way.  And we know that Piper has no trouble doing that, either, though she may be troubled by her actions afterwards.

At this point, it's still hard to say what Piper is really up to.  When she screams and gets Jo to stop the car, and Pipe jumps out ...   It turns out that Piper is doing that to save a turtle, to keep it from getting run over.  Is that just more of Piper wanting to seem so sweet, to disable Jo's suspicions, or did Piper really care about saving that turtle?  In any case, it certainly had the effect of once again disarming Jo - psychologically.

So welcome Emergence to realm of full-fledged, undeniable science fiction.  Androids are one of my favorite sub-genres of the field, as both a fan and a writer.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up ... Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids




The androids are coming out into the open, for the first time in centuries ....

Evil 1.3: Possessed Alexa

A good Evil 1.3 last night, which pits hacking vs. possession as the reason a victim's Alexa-like device is plaguing him.

Digital technology vs. demon is a logical and appealing variation on the general science vs. religion central tension of this series, and it provides a good spotlight for Ben (well played by Aasif Mandvi), the techie third leg of the powerful David-Kristen-Ben triad.   Demons have a great history of being in machines, and even in the popular parlance, as the phrase "ghost in the machine" amply demonstrates.

The digital addition to this ancient tradition is crucial, and brings these devices into the robotic/android realm, which, coincidentally, began to be explored in another new network series this week, Emergence.  If we assume we human beings have souls, the displacement or occlusion of our soul by a demon is a bigger deal than the demonic infestation of a digital assistant, since such an assistant presumably had no soul in the first place.  So such possessions presumably would be easier to achieve?

But the possibilities of digital possession are nonetheless intriguing and dizzying.  Imagine a self-driving vehicle that gets possessed by a demon.  Such a vehicle could do a lot of damage.  (Check out David Walton's Three Laws Lethal for a mostly non-demonic, riveting novel about self-driving vehicles.)

Back to Evil, I'd say this excellent new series is now at a crossroads.   So far, it has told mostly new stories, with a continuing thread of deeper stories, mostly separate, involving David and Kristen.  I'm enjoying this kind of narrative, but I'd like to see a little more development of those deeper stories, that go beyond the quick glimpses we've been seeing.

See you here next week.

See also: Evil: Incubus Mystery ... Evil 1.2: Miracles and Racism

Emergence 1.3: Robots and Androids

A revelatory episode 1.3 of Emergence last night, in which we learn that definitely robots and maybe androids are involved in this series.

The robots are robotic guard dogs, in the facility that has the key to Piper's recovery.   They don't bark, but they're pretty effective, and almost prevent Jo and Benny from getting out of there.

The androids are maybe Piper.   She nearly dies in the hospital, after an MRI nearly sucks the life out of her.  But in what sense is she alive?   What Jo and Benny take out of the facility is some kind of code that "is" Piper, according to the woman who tells Jo about it.   So, we can assume that the code is some kind of digital record of what and who Piper is - not some nanites to repair or even reconstruct her brain and neural system.   It's a code that "is" Piper, in the sense that our brains or souls or whatever you think we humans are - whether your views are scientific or religious or both - make us who and what we are.

But this still leaves open the big question of how Piper came to be.  Was she a human girl who was bionically enhanced, not necessarily physically but cognitively, or, again, soul-wise?  Or was she constructed from scratch, in the same way we would build a robot or an android.   Or, in yet another gambit, maybe she was "grown"?

Like all good revelatory episodes, this raises and opens as many questions as it answers.  And like all good series, Emergence was wise to a put a revelatory episode in the line-up so soon.  I think Emergence has the potential to be top-notch science fiction, at least as far as traditional networks can go, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It ... Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up

 

Emergence 1.2: Cleaning Up

A good second episode of Emergence this week, in which the main action are the bad guys or superior people or people from the future or whoever they are trying to clean up all traces of what happened last week.

They do pretty well.  They hire a guy to bury the debris of the crashed plane out in the sea.  The erase all data for Piper in the hospital that first took her in.  They even liquidate the deceased couple - who died in the car last week after Piper (presumably) caused it to crash - before autopsies could be performed.

But Jo gets them - or, at least, their current agent - by taking advantage of the swirling magnetism in the crashed car, and positioning a mallet in the air so it hits the bad guy in the face.  This enables Jo and Chris to escape.  But Jo realizes they're not home safe just yet, not by a long shot.

So the mystery is becoming a little more clear.  The antagonists are not super powerful or super intelligent.   They have superior knowledge and technology.   And Piper doesn't seem to be bad.  She's a victim of all of this, in her own way, too.  Though, at this point in the narrative, anything is possible.  Piper could be an anti-hero, but we and she just don't know it, as yet.

After two episodes, Emergence seems most indebted to Stranger Things for its ambience and story.  But there are differences.  Emergence takes place in the present.  And, so far, there don't seem to be any monsters created or unleashed, other than the human kind.

See you here next week.

See also: Emergence: May Just Make It

 

Emergence: May Just Make It

Emergence, which debuted on ABC last week, is another example of a recently well-worn theme back on network television yet again:  a child or teenager who mysteriously appears, and turns out to have some kind of superpower.

But Emergence is lifted by its star, Allison Tolman, who did so well in Fargo a few years ago.  And Emergence has her playing a police chief (Jo Evans), which, even in a small town on Long Island, is something you still don't see all that often on network TV.   And with Clancy Brown, who's been so good in so many science fiction series on television, as Jo's father, there are at least a few good reasons to watch it.

The first episode laid out the groundwork of the series narrative nicely.  A plane crashes.  Jo finds a girl, who apparently was on the plane, sitting off to the side on the ground, without a scratch.  She professes to have some sort of amnesia, but probably she doesn't really have it.  She's kidnapped by a couple pretending to be her parents.  The kidnap car badly crashes, for no apparent reason.  Piper (the girl, not her real name) again emerges unscathed.  Later, she removes what is likely some kind of tracking device in her neck.

She wonders if she caused the crashes.  Likely she did.  Jo knows she's stumbled onto to something important, and we the audience know it's going to be far more important than she realizes.

So there you have it.  A pretty good, if not startlingly original, set-up for a series.  For me, the tipping point in favor of watching another episode is that this story is apparently is science fiction, which I almost always prefer to life after death or magic.

I'll keep you posted.