Warning: Contains spoilers.


For the unaware, Love Death + Robots is a Netflix series of animated sci-fi/horror/fantasy short stories. I love this show for the same reason I love Ted Chiang stories – each episode is almost like a thought experiment set in a different world. This show’s inspiring-but-terrifying transhumanist themes have been a significant influence on my view of humanity’s future (and even my career plans).

Some episodes are super deep, but others are just silly.

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Volume 1

THREE ROBOTS ★★☆☆☆

Watched on 10/31/22
A bit disappointing for the first-ever episode of LD+R. It tries to comment on human irrationality and primitiveness, but doesn’t say anything that hasn’t already been said. The over-anthropomorphization of the robots also bugs me because they speak and behave exactly like the humans they’re mocking. The cat twist at the end was funny and unexpected though.

BEYOND THE AQUILA RIFT ★★★☆☆

Watched on 10/31/22
The whole episode is buildup for a single somewhat-predictable revelation. The plot moved too slowly in the middle. But it’s still well done: I would give this a higher rating if not for the fact that the idea is unoriginal (it just boils down to The Matrix if it were set in space). The CGI was fantastic – you barely noticed they weren’t real people.

ICE AGE ★★☆☆☆

Watched on 11/4/22
A fun premise: what does the arc of human progress look like from afar? The acting was pretty cringey, but otherwise entertaining to watch. There wasn’t much depth to the story besides the passing reference to nuclear war and the singularity.

SONNIE’S EDGE ★★★★★

Watched on 12/10/22
There’s not much going on plot-wise, but the world building, animation, and music are amazing. The fight scene was very gory but gripping, and the twist at the end was unexpected.


WHEN THE YOGURT TOOK OVER ★★★★★

Watched on 9/22/22
An iconic episode that does a good job at depicting the pitiful capabilities of humans and human institutions when compared to a superintelligence (the yogurt is clearly a metaphor for Artificial General Intelligence). In my view, this is the most accurate representation of AGI’s potential relationship with humanity that I’ve seen in a show or movie. One can only hope alignment goes as well as this. The animation style and the narrator are also quite funny.

THE SECRET WAR ★★★★☆

Watched on 12/15/22
The graphics felt almost like an arcade game. The mix between communist militarism and black magic provided for an interesting aesthetic.

SUCKER OF SOULS ★★★☆☆

Watched on 12/15/22
Not very interesting or funny. I’m glad it was animated as a cartoon though, otherwise it could have been really scary.

THE WITNESS ★★★★☆

Watched on 11/4/22
Very cool animation and cyberpunk theme – the style reminded me a bit of Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse. Great twist at the end.

SUITS ★★★★☆

Watched on 12/15/22
I really liked the mix between the country farmer clichés and the mecha vs alien futuristic aesthetic. It was fun how they slowly revealed more and more about the true nature of the farm until the final shot of the planet covered in farm bubbles. Overall it made for an entertaining episode.

GOOD HUNTING ★★★★★

Watched on 12/15/22
A wonderful blend of two very different genres: Chinese mysticism and steampunk automata. It was interesting to see how the contrast between these two aesthetics resulted in commentary on themes like modernization, feminism, and imperialism.


THE DUMP ★★★★☆

Watched on 12/18/22
Not very deep, but well-animated and fun to watch.

SHAPE-SHIFTERS ★★★★★

Watched on 1/20/23
Incredible. I love these military + genetic engineering stories; this one was sort of like Kill Team Kill but with more emotion and darker themes.

FISH-NIGHT ★★★☆☆

Watched on 1/20/23
It was interestingly animated, but the ending felt kind of random. Not a fully fleshed-out idea.

HELPING HAND ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/20/23
Really painful to watch, but I guess that was the point.

ALTERNATE HISTORIES ★★☆☆☆

Watched on 12/15/22
Not very serious at all, and also not super funny. I feel like they could have done a lot more with this idea and conveyed a deeper message about history. It’s disappointing for LD+R.

LUCKY 13 ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/20/23
Fun action, nice story, but nothing very deep or creative.

BLINDSPOT ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/20/23
Another fun watch with nothing much else to say.

ZIMA BLUE ★★★★★

Watched on 1/20/23
A unique art style which fits well with its character. A cool mix of commentary on modern art and questions about consciousness and AI. The anthropomorphism of AI was done well in this case, perhaps because it was all framed more as an artistic metaphor for human growth as opposed to actual AI.




Volume 2

Automated Customer Service ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/21/23
A fun story in the spirit of WALL-E. Realistically though, I think that if we were to achieve that level of automation, peoples’ lifestyles would be drastically different. I hope people would find better things to do with their free time than lolling around all day.

Ice ★★★★★

Watched on 1/27/23
Cool animation (similar to ZIMA BLUE?) and an interesting dynamic between "modded" and normal humans. The story’s setting was creative.

Pop Squad ★★★★★

Watched on 1/27/23
Absolutely phenomenal. The premise is thought-provoking, the violence is explosive and shocking, and the imagery ("breeders" living on the ground beneath soaring skyscrapers) is well-crafted.


Snow in the Desert ★★★★★

Watched on 1/27/23
Incredible animation… is it even animation? And great world-building. It’s like Old Man Logan meets the Mandalorian meets Dune.

The Tall Grass ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/27/23
It really isn’t fair to not let your audience know that it’s going to be a horror short until halfway in. Too scary man.

All Through the House ★★★☆☆

Watched on 1/20/23
So scary. The animation style is deceptive.

Life Hutch ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/27/23
Kind of like Automated Customer Service to the extreme. The Life Hutch idea itself is cool – if you get shipwrecked on a planet then they send a portable all-in-one survival shelter for you to wait in.

The Drowned Giant ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/27/23
The gentleness of the narration was a welcomed break from the violence and horror of most episodes. The story reminded me a bit of Gabriel García Márquez's "El ahogado más hermoso del mundo."



Volume 3

Three Robots: Exit Strategies ★★★☆☆

Watched on 10/30/22
A mildly funny episode about how humans tried to live out the last days of the apocalypse. Some themes were kind of grim (the poor resorted to violence and tribalism, while the rich tried to build isolated utopias, but everyone ends up dead anyways), but the episode was too light-hearted for it to have that much emotional impact. Perhaps the most shocking scene is the depiction of the world’s elite trying to maintain the appearance of class and fine-dining even as they resort to cannibalism during the final days. I’m not a fan of the anthropomorphism of the robots and the characterization of the robot takeover as stemming from anger towards their creators, but this isn’t too hard to look past.

Bad Travelling ★★★★★

Watched on 10/30/22
A gory but beautiful episode that brings out the darkest, but also the most admirable, qualities of the human spirit under stress. It hits on many tropes of the classic "pirate story," such as mutiny and ship’s democracy, but manages to keep the story unpredictable and thrilling. Although this was a very scary and dark story, I think that at the end it has a hopeful view of humanity, in a strange twisted way.


The Very Pulse of the Machine ★★★★☆

Watched on 10/31/22
A very creative idea paired with a beautiful soundtrack and animations, perhaps best described as a mix between Avatar (the one with the blue people) and The Martian. I enjoyed the ambiguousness of the plot (is it all a hallucination?) and the surprise twist. It brings up interesting questions about non-biological consciousness. "Maybe I’m going to live forever… or this is just one last dream before dying."

Night of the Mini Dead ★★★☆☆

Watched on 10/30/22
Can a zombie apocalypse be funny? Kind of. The sped-up claymation and high-pitched voices are entertaining and vaguely humorous. It’s a short, cute episode, and everything is too far away to be truly scary, but the depiction of the end of the world still shook me a bit (maybe these were left-over chills from Bad Travelling).

Kill Team Kill ★★★☆☆

Watched on 10/31/22
Lots of violence, but it’s all anime-style so it’s not too horrific. There’s nothing special to be said about this episode, but it’s entertaining to see "man-vs-machine" realized in a G.I. Joe-esque military setting. The jokes weren’t that funny.

Swarm ★★★★★

Watched on 1/20/23
Such an interesting idea – a biological system that endures and defends itself through genetic memory. "Intelligence is not a surviving trait." The animation and imagination were also incredible.


Mason's Rats ★★★★☆

Watched on 1/27/23
What the heck did I just watch? It was very strange but hit the mark on the right blend of humor, violence, and humanism/ratism.

In Vaulted Halls Entombed ★★☆☆☆

Watched on 2/4/23
Like Sucker of Souls, but with better animation. It had a creepy vibe, but that’s it. Nothing super deep going on.

Jibaro ★★★★★

Watched on 2/4/23
A piece of art. Incredibly haunting and riveting. Seems like a story from a fable. The use of sound (and lack of it), the lack of dialogue, and the animation of insanity all contribute to a mystical quality.