There are a lot of times when I think just when I couldn’t put anymore shows on my list of things to watch, a new one comes on. And to be frank it comes on right around the time I am contemplating taking some things off of my DVR list.

After so much waiting and hype, Almost Human on Fox debuts to a 2 night premier and frankly, I am glad that it did. This is a gratifying show that fans of Ghost in the Shell, Total Recall and Blade Runner have been looking forward to for months and to me personally although the first episode was just above average, last night’s episode  was a huge improvement.

The pilot stars, Karl Urban (yes Eomer, Judge Dredd and Dr. McCoy!!) as John Kennex as a cop in the near future where the world is overrun with crime and nearly humanistic androids supplementing the police are the norm. In a fierce battle with drug dealers, Kennix experiences a tragedy when his partner is shot by the perpetrators, and the android who is covering him decides to leave him to his fate. As he is trying to get his dying partner to safety, Kennix loses a leg but that’s not the only thing…

We also find out that this is a memory that Kennix is using an illegal memory doctor to try and recreate to identify his shooters and part of the theme of this episode is that one should be careful what you ask for because as he delves deeper, he finds some shocking answers. Also Kennix is trying to cope with the fact that his lost leg was replaced by a robotic part which, he neglects.

The bulk of the story is pretty standard as Kennix is also trying to return to the force and he has a mistrust of androids as the bulk of the units are run based off of simple logic and not ‘emotion’. Enter Michael Ealy’s Dorian.  Dorian is one of the few surviving earlier models that had a chip which gave him emotion therefore he was very close to ‘human’ as one could get and so the rest of the episode while they are trying to solve the crime of the week is that they must learn to cope with each other which is almost typical of any traumatic cop paired with new cop trope that we have seen.

Now, I am not saying that this was a bad episode but it definitely was a by the numbers episode and a few of my friends who watched were on the fence about it but then Monday night’s episode in the 8pm slot as a lead in for Sleepy Hollow was a much better show.

First of all the episode entitled ‘Skin’ in many ways reminded me of Ghost in the Shell: Innocence as many concepts came about as far as discussing sexbots, concepts of death even in machines  and abuse of humans to make machines better as well as closure in dealing with tragedy.  It was a very excellent show which pointed out where Fox could take this Sci Fi genre with hopes that people get onboard.

I really enjoyed the chemistry between Ealy and Urban.  Ealy’s Dorian is almost the conscience of the team and provides Urban with a sense of sympathy that is needed when sensitive situations arises that bothers Dorian. If you don’t believe it, watch last night’s droid autopsy scene.

Dorian is the modern day Mr. Data had Data been fitted with an emotion chip from day one.

Almost Human looks to be a pretty good show that we offer viewers a live action look at what the world could be when machines comes along that look and act just like us.  In the two episodes that have aired, it’s already raised questions about technology and its proliferation in conjunction with our existence and also where we are drawing the line.

It’s a big breath of fresh air that Fox needed in the sci fi department since Terra Nova and once it starts to go deeper into Kennix’s shooter, I am looking for more and better concepts to be examined

Final Grade: B