Series Review | The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells

Hello, everyone! This is Shannon from That’s So Poe,
and today I’m here to do a series
review of The Murderbot Diaries by
Martha Wells. This is such a great series
that really has captured my heart.
It is a sci-fi series that has so much
humor, and so much joy, and so much epic
adventure, and so much character
development, and so much representation. I
really adore this series, as do many, many
people. So I just wanted to talk a little
bit today about what it’s about and why
I find it so wonderful. So this series is
ongoing – it isn’t yet finished – but so far
it includes four novellas, which are All
Systems Red, Artificial Condition, Rogue
Protocol, and Exit Strategy. And recently,
the fifth book, which is a full length
novel, Network Effect, came out and I
loved it just as much as the novellas. So
this series is told from the perspective
of Murderbot. Murderbot is a security
unit, which is a robot that has some AI
intelligence as well as some organic
parts. And it has given itself the name
Murderbot because it kind of has a
murky history that it can’t quite remember,
where maybe it malfunctioned a
bit and killed a lot of humans

and
that’s not such a great thing. But Murderbot
is also very unique because security
units are robots that are basically just
owned by corporations and lent out to
various operations that are trying to do
things that need some security, and
Murderbot has actually hacked its
governor module – its governor module is
kind of a thing inside of its brain that
makes it follow orders – but it has
decided to continue following orders
because it’ll just keep its day job
providing security and on the inside be
watching a lot of soap operas and just
being socially anxious. Murderbot is so
funny, and this series really follows
Murderbot as it is put into a lot of
situations where the humans that is
trying to protect get into a lot of
danger and it has to intervene and save
them. Some of the things that end up
happening uncover much bigger
conspiracies and schemes
and it has to do kind of evermore
dangerous things, lots of adventure, lots
of excitement, lots of really cool
technology. And we really follow
Murderbot not just on these adventures to
protect the humans that it’s with, but on
its own kind of personal journey because
Murderbot, now that it has hacked its
governor module, is learning a lot about
itself, about what it wants, about its
kind of relationship to other robots and
to humans, and just sort of developing as
a person. And that is just such a
beautiful journey. And it’s just so, so
much fun to go with it throughout this
whole series. So let me talk about some
of the many, many reasons why this series
has really captured my heart and is so
much fun to read. First are the plots. Now
the plots for each of the novellas and
the novel are very much self-contained,
in that you have an entire plot arc for
that novel, but they also fold into this
much larger story of what’s going on in
sort of the galaxy/universe, as well as
what’s going on for Murderbot and the
people that Murderbot is protecting. I
really love the way that each of the
novellas and novel has a very cohesive
plot that is super filled with action
and adventure and character growth. You
have beautiful story arcs, but they also
knit together pretty seamlessly. And I
feel like each time you finish one of
these novellas or novels, you’re not left
wanting, but you’re left desiring even
more. And it really builds together in
such a cohesive, beautiful fashion. I just
love the adventure. I love the excitement.
This is kind of a lot of really cool
action as well. It’s just so well done in
terms of the plotting of these stories.
Next, there are quite a few aspects of
the world-building that I think are
fantastic, starting with just the
dystopian kind of very capitalist future
that Martha Wells imagined
that is yet somehow still very
hopeful. So in this future, really space has been
colonized in a lot of ways by just
corporations. So not governments, but
corporations that have a lot of power
and a lot of greed – like a LOT of greed.
And I love the way that Martha Wells
just takes kind of the capitalist
society that we live in and
extrapolates to what would that look
like in the far future. And so we see all
of these sort of technological
advancements that are very much along
the lines of advertising and data mining
and so many things. And it’s just… it’s a
beautiful commentary on a lot of
capitalist society and a lot of the ways
that that could lead to a future. So
there’s a little bit of dystopian nature
to that, but the characters that we
follow are really anti-capitalist. And
there’s so much hope in that. And there’s
so much beauty in that Murderbot, in
the very act of hacking its governor
module, is forming a rebellion against
what is going on in the society. And I
just love that. There’s so much in here
about fighting against this capitalist
society. It’s just really beautiful and I
love that aspect of the world building.
Next, a related point, is the way that AI
and robots are represented in this sort
of dystopian future. So I always love
stories that really look at AI
personhood and this series does it so
excellently because it’s told from the
perspective of a robot. So in this series
we’re really looking at this kind of
dystopian corporate future, one where
there are so many different robots, and
AIs, and sort of code even – just systems
that run to operate things – that are
treated as individuals, as sentient
beings. And because we’re getting it from
the perspective of a robot, we really see
that. A SecUnit is in many ways a being
that straddles the line between
what is human and what is
artificial, and we really are able as
humans to sort of see its perspective.
And I just absolutely love that
discussion a personhood, of rights, of the
way that we treat some beings as
disposable. Oh, it’s just absolutely
beautiful, and I just I really love that
approach. Another aspect of the
world building that brings me so much
joy is just the queerness of the
universe that Martha Wells has created.
She’s created a future where it may be
dystopian in terms of capitalism but it
is not dystopian in terms of queerness.
In this future that she has created,
queerness is so 100% integrated and
normal. We see characters everywhere on
the gender and sexuality spectrums.
We see tons of characters with they/them
pronouns. We see tons of same-sex
relationships. We also see a lot of
polyamory. There are many family units
that include more than two people in a
marriage, so there’ll be like three or
four people of different genders. And
this is like 100% normal in
this future. I loved that normalcy of queerness. Also,
it’s just great that we’re getting a
story told from a non-binary or
agendered perspective. So Murderbot does
not have a gender. It is not human. And in
fact, it uses the pronoun “it” – not even
they/them. So I love that we have this
world that really is just built on
queerness. That is the norm. And that is
beautiful to see. In addition to all of
the aspects of the world building which
are so fantastic, I think what really
makes this series stand out is the way
that Murderbot’s character is developed
and how beautiful that is. One of the
aspects of Murderbot’s character that is
so beautiful to see is kind of its
difference in terms of the way that it
thinks. So Martha Wells has said that she
is neurodiverse, and I really love the
representation of Murderbot in terms
of its difficulties with social
interactions and its social anxiety.
Murderbot really struggles to know how
to interact with humans – it does not like
to make eye contact, it doesn’t like to
deal with emotions, it’s very much just
anxious about a lot of things. And I
love seeing that portrayal. Also,
Murderbot’s character has so much humor.
Murderbot is very much kind of snarky and
sarcastic and you get its perspective as
we go through its frustrations with the
kind of difficulties of life, with the
irrationality of humans. There is so much
humor throughout this and I love hearing
all of Murderbot’s thoughts and just
laughing, as we get to also see so
much heart. So Murderbot’s character is
something that goes through a lot of
development throughout this series. When
you start, we’re really focused on a lot
of Murderbot’s anxieties and its desire
to sort of retreat from the world to
just watch its soap operas. But as we go
through the series, there’s a lot of
emotional development, a lot of character
development of Murderbot. Murderbot
starts to develop relationships with the
humans, to kind of understand them, to
care about them, and also very
importantly to allow the humans to care
for it back. That’s a very big step for
Murderbot. Additionally, I think that
Murderbot is really just growing in
terms of caring about itself, and
learning what it wants, learning who it
is, learning what it wants to be. There’s
so much of this story that is really
centered around Murderbot’s independence,
because this is only something gained
very recently. And I love that character
arc growth. It’s so beautiful to see.
Makes me cry pretty much in every book
because I’m just so moved.
Absolutely love Murderbot’s character. So
overall, I think that The Murderbot
Diaries series is just one of the most
fantastic sci-fi series that is out
there today. It is uplifting, it is so
funny, it is filled with action and
adventure, it’s got great representation,
great social commentary, and just so much
about this series is exactly what I want
to be reading. So if you have not heard
of The Murderbot Diaries series, I think
you really should give it a try. I think
that this is a very popular
series for a very good
reason. If you have read this series, let
me know what you think in the comments
below. Or if you haven’t read the series,
let me know if you’re interested in
reading it now. Also, if you’ve read the
newest book, Network Effect, let me
know how you think that that fit into
this series. It’s just… I’m such a fan of
this series. I want to hear anything that
you guys have to say down below. And
thanks for watching!

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