JJ Abrams is a gifted and talented creator and Almost Human has definitely all the elements to be a very great show. The cast is strong, the visuals compelling and the procedural aspects not too obvious. But I regret that none of the creators acknowledged they took inspiration from the Swedish show "Äkta människor" (Real Humans). We're only 2 episodes in but clearly they did this show so they could use elements from the Swedish series. And I'm not talking about minor elements... Real Humans deals with the integration of human like robots in the society. It features prominently "sexbots" and lots of robot medical engineering . It also plays heavily on how hard it is to distinguish humans from robots. So even if the concept of Almost Human is very different and much more sci fi oriented, I find it takes way too much from Real Humans. Especially considering they take themselves as a truly original show! I don't mind US remakes of European shows (like they did with The Killing or The Bridge and are doing right now with Broadchurch) because they are sold as remakes. But I find it cheap when a big and supposedly highly creative director as J J Abrams comes up with a show that pretends to be all new when it's so much inspired by a another and much more original show. It's still a promising show but I hope Almost Human will grow its own strong and interesting universe so I can forget those annoying similarities.
Review of Almost Human
Almost Human
(2013–2014)
A truly original show... If you never watched "Real Humans"
24 November 2013