Was Murderbot Smiling in the Finale? Only the Creators Know for Sure.

New York Times

11-07-2025

This interview includes spoilers for the Season 1 finale of 'Murderbot.'
On the surface, Chris and Paul Weitz were in unfamiliar territory when they set about creating 'Murderbot,' the darkly comic Apple TV+ series, which just wrapped its first season on Friday. After all, they hadn't adapted a science-fiction story together before.
But as the Weitz brothers noted in a joint video call last month, the cynical, soap-opera-obsessed cyborg at that show's center (Alexander Skarsgard) isn't entirely dissimilar from the carefree, selfish cad played by Hugh Grant in their 2002 film 'About a Boy,' which they directed and co-wrote (with Peter Hedges).
Like that man, the cyborg of 'Murderbot' is inconvenienced by some of the messier aspects of human existence — particularly emotions. And like him, it must learn to resemble a responsible, loving human being.
'Hugh Grant's character was essentially self-medicating with television and didn't really want to deal with people, and was kind of forced to by a hippie mom and her son,' Chris said. The title character — Murderbot is a name the cyborg privately gives itself — finds itself in a similar dynamic after it is hired to protect a motley group of scientists on an expedition to survey a distant planet.
'I think there's a theme in both our work of people who aren't actually equipped to provide emotional support for other people but who nonetheless figure out a way to do so,' Paul said — even if, strictly speaking, the cyborg's pronouns are it/its.
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