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Humans - Tonight (Sun) @ 9pm on Ch 4

801 replies

Valsoldknickers · 14/06/2015 10:31

OK, after freaking the bejaysus out of me with the weird trailer / advert I am intrigued and looking forward to giving this programme a viewing.

(I will have to record and watch later as I will be watching Messrs Strange and Norrell.)

Anyone else looking forward to it and hoping it lives up to the hype?

OP posts:
gingercat12 · 20/07/2015 14:26

Soupdragon I love your attitude as in none of his memories can be trusted.

AGnu · 20/07/2015 14:45

It's all getting rather confusing now that we're not sure anyone's recollections of the past can be trusted! Grin Maybe they've all got synth brains but think they're human & have some sort of automatic recharging device that activates when they "sleep". Maybe we're all synths too...

I think Leo's 20, Mia's 14, Fred's 11, Niska's 9 & Max is 7 & was brand new when Leo "died", assuming that is what happened.

Will Mia remember Joe raping Anita? He told her to delete all record of it from her memory but will that have worked for Mia too? I think the reason she was subjected to stronger modding than the others was because she put up more of a fight - what mother wouldn't when someone was trying to separate her from her child forever?!

Interesting theories about Leo's mum not being ill. Leo made out that the reason they moved to the country estate which did look rather like Laura & Tom's lake was because of his mum's illness but it's entirely plausible that David moved them there so he could continue with his synth work away from prying eyes & that her "carers" were more "captors" who appeared about the time that he started showing an interest in human-synth hybrids. He wanted to experiment on his wife & child so she tried to escape.

Laura didn't seem to recognise anything about the Elster story so I'm less inclined to think she's related to them now. There must be some link though - perhaps David was "the neighbour's boy" she was talking to when Tom died?! It does explain her anti-synth stance though, if she needed to prove to herself that she could love & care for her DC like her mother didn't for her.

Is it weird that the only issue I have with a lot of this story is wondering how David took memories from a brain-dead brain & converted them into digital format?!

Ulysses · 20/07/2015 15:10

I really like your idea Agnu about Elster experimenting on wife and son and she's trying for them to escape. I've watch that episode again and I'm really confused with the timelines too, and David Elster. He seems to be a real shady character, what with Fred and Niska's revelations, and George refers to his "poor wife Beatrice" so I wouldn't be surprised if Leo's memories of his mother being mad are manufactured in some way.

There's a second image of David and there's a woman behind him in this one SoupDragonand I think it's the mother. I can imagine a connection to Karen Voss but not sure how it all plays in to it as she's a full synth not a hybrid like Leo, bleeding blue not red.

BitOfFun · 20/07/2015 19:18

It's all a bit Bertha Rochester, isn't it?

Merrylegs · 20/07/2015 19:25

Her 'captors' could have been synths I guess? And who might Granny turn out to be? (Just throwing some more random.questions out there!)

midnightvelvetPart2 · 20/07/2015 20:59

Just caught up with it! well done Italian you were correct Smile Grin

LassUnparalleled · 21/07/2015 00:42

Is anyone else becoming obsessed trying to remember the name of a British actress from possibly the 1990s or so who is the spitting image of Emily Berrington? (Niska)

I can see her face but can't remember her name or anything she was in.

SheHasAWildHeart · 21/07/2015 09:27

Why & how did Leo get separated from his 'brothers and sisters'?

SoupDragon · 21/07/2015 09:58

They were ambushed on a forest.

TwartFaceBeetj · 21/07/2015 10:15

That's what keeps bothering me, who ambushed them? There must be someone else involved in all this, that we haven't heard of yet. Could it possible be David?

TweeBee · 21/07/2015 10:41

I assumed the government had somehow found out about them, you know, the man who saved Fred when he was meant to destroy him.

TwartFaceBeetj · 21/07/2015 11:04

No, he seems to be leading the investigation, and yet didn't know about the others until they had Fred. Someone else ambushed them, then re-programmed niska and Mia.

Ellle · 21/07/2015 12:39

The people that ambushed them in the forest are just people that target synths without owners (nearby) and steal them to take them to shady places and sell them. There, they get illegally reprogrammed and are sold as new.
Fred, Niska and Anita were bought by different people and ended up with different destinies (working in a garden centre, as a sex worker, as a nanny with a family).

A bit like what was done to slaves (I've just recently watched "12 years a slave").

YeOldTrout · 21/07/2015 12:47

Niska was reprogrammed badly though then because she remembered exactly who she was. While Anita had almost forgotten.

Diana Dors looks a bit like Niska.

werenotreallyhere · 21/07/2015 13:22

Did they get Niska? I thought they took Mia and Fred, and then Leo hid Niska in a brothel in case they came looking for her.

AGnu · 21/07/2015 14:01

All 3 were taken, Leo asked her to stay while he was figuring out how to rescue her without arousing suspicion. What interests me is that Leo was running away before they were kidnapped - was it those people he was running away from or Mysterious Scientist? They also had rendezvous points & protocols for what to do when they got separated - had it happened before or were they just being prepared? How did the kidnappers know where to find them? I know David asked Leo to look after them but why not get a job, live like a normal person & just tell people he collects synths or uses them in a side-business or something? They could live peacefully together in a house & act synth-like when other people were around. The detective managed it, why not them?!

I think Niska & Fred were reprogrammed the same as any other synth - the modder didn't make any comment about them being different. They were very good at pretending to be normal synths. Mia was distraught at being separated from her "son" though so put up a fight, hence the more aggressive reprogramming for her.

I like the suggestion about Beatrice's carers being synths too... They'd need to be programmed to be like security guards, or, perhaps, police... Maybe that's where the detective came from. David could've made her concious out of sympathy for Beatrice so she could have a friend.

Ellle · 21/07/2015 15:22

I think in one of the first episodes when Leo went to see the guy that had sold Mia, this guy explained he remembered that synth because when the lot came some of the guys chose one to wake it up (Mia) and have a bit of fun with and she started to behave strangely, she put resistance and was aggressive (instead of just being like ordinary synths are, compliant). So he then had to do a more agressive reboot to overide that program that made her like that. Niska and Fred were not woken up until they had already been sold to new owners and just went along pretending to be ordinary synths.

Yes, in the forest it looked like Leo and the synths were in the run, and they seemed to have contingency plans prepared and rendezvous points. I think they were in the run because David told them to go away and hide before he destroyed his work. He probably knew other people (the other scientist?) were coming for them and put Leo in charge of hiding them and protecting them. That's why the other scientist knew he was looking for special synths that David managed to create, but didn't know how many, how they looked like and that there was a human with them. David must have destroyed all traces of them.

HirplesWithHaggis · 21/07/2015 19:19

Lass, going back further than the '90's, but there'a a look of Lisa Goddard about Niska.

SirPercyPilkington · 21/07/2015 19:36

Leo's memories when he was talking about his fathers suicide seemed off.
I wonder if one of them killed him or perhaps all together and that could explain why they were on the run in the first place?
I'm really enjoying it - but feel I am forgetting a lot week to week, so will binge watch it when I can.

Gruach · 21/07/2015 20:41

Oooh Percy! I can't remember the sequence of events but it would be rather fantastic if the synths had killed David, wiped Leo's memory and implanted new memories that made him think he was on the run with them.

BTW - it's only lately occurred to me that the synths are blue blooded. The coming aristocrats of this planet.

Getting excited now - this is as good as a mash up of Utopia (Arby!) and The Honourable Woman (Rachel!)

Maaaaaax!

firesidechat · 21/07/2015 20:46

It was Leo who pulled the plug on the video link from his brain as if he had something to hide, so I would imagine that there is more to it and that Leo already knows, at least in part.

Ulysses · 21/07/2015 21:27

I like that theory Percy. Certainly, Niska seems to have a motive when she seemed to imply that David had sexually abused her and Fred said David called him a liar and underestimated him before he went on the rampage before escaping from Hobb. Niska also asked Dr Millican if Elster cared about the synths, the way he did about Odi, and if this was the case then it's not something a conscious synth would have needed to have confirmed if they could feel it. We don't know anything about Mia other than Leo's memories of her, leaving Max who was so childlike himself.

Perhaps it all comes down to people, synthetic or otherwise, needing to be nurtured to reach their potential.

windymila · 22/07/2015 11:41

SO glad I have found this thread, loving this show. Having just read through, I don't think anyone has mentioned that in Leo's memory, just before he stopped it, David Elster was coming towards him and he slightly stepped to the side and there was a woman behind him. You can just see her legs. Wife/detective synth? My theory is that David tried to replace Leo's mother with a synth and Leo was angry and killed him?

Pixi2 · 22/07/2015 11:55

Does anyone think niska is the image/similar image to Leo's mum and that was why we couldn't see her face? Which is why David abused her and not the others?

Blondeshavemorefun · 22/07/2015 20:05

As usual thank god I have you lot to decipher this programme

So can't they swim?

Why didn't Leo jump in afterwards or is he scared of water as he drowned

Why did a policewoman show him what she was?

And agree Fred has a softer side as think he checked has a pulse but unconscious