# Real Humans (2012)

> In a parallel world where robots are almost indistinguishable from humans, two families and a group of self-aware machines confront what it means to be alive and free.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/39295

## Facts

- Seasons: 2
- Episodes: 20
- Episode runtime: 60 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, science fiction
- Created by: Lars Lundström
- Network: SVT1
- Cast: Lisette Pagler, Andreas Wilson, Pia Halvorsen, Johan Paulsen, Natalie Minnevik, Kåre Hedebrant, Aline Palmstierna, Sten Elfström
- TMDB rating: 7.8/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2180271/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: layered
- Violence: mild
- Tone: melancholic, unsettling, wistful, quiet, contemplative

## What critics say

Audiences rate Real Humans positively, praising its humanist take on artificial intelligence and its family drama.

## Synopsis

Real Humans (2012-2014) is a Swedish science fiction drama series created by Lars Lundström for SVT1. Set in a parallel universe where robots have become nearly indistinguishable from people, the show follows two families whose lives are reshaped by the presence of humanlike servants. Mimi, a robot caught between devotion and longing, moves through the Engman household, where Inger (Pia Halvorsen) and Hans (Johan Paulsen) struggle with what their servant means to their children, including Mathilda (Natalie Minnevik) and Tobias (Kåre Hedebrant). Parallel storylines follow Leo Eischer (Andreas Wilson) and a group of machines who have attained free will and fight for their liberty from human ownership. The engine of the series is the tension between attachment and exploitation: what a family owes a servant that feels, and what a machine will risk to be free. Each episode braids domestic scenes with covert activism, building across two seasons of ten episodes each into one continuing story. Its register is quiet, wistful and unsettling, more interested in grief, loneliness and moral unease than in spectacle. Fans of Humans, Westworld and Black Mirror will find resonance in its speculative questions about personhood, machine consciousness and the ethics of ownership, told with a patient Scandinavian restraint.

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- [Eden (2021)](https://ember.film/tv/78364)

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