Murderbot 1×09 Review: “All Systems Red”

In Murderbot’s penultimate episode, the titular character confronts GrayCris, but not everything goes according to plan.

TRIGGER WARNING: This review discusses extreme violence and suicide.

The previous episode ended with Murderbot telling the PreservationAux team that it had a plan to deal with GrayCris. “All Systems Red” opens with this idea in action. Unbeknownst to the humans, however, Murderbot has not told them its full plan.

With the PreservationAux team in on (some of) its strategy, Murderbot meets GrayCris’ forces, both human and SecUnit. GrayCris immediately tries to take control of Murderbot, but the attempt fails because Murderbot doesn’t have a working governor module.

While talking to GrayCris, Murderbot is also able to secretly communicate with the PreservationAux team through a second channel on the comms feed. This feature of the comms feed appears prominently in the book series, but hasn’t received the same attention in the show, so I thought the episode could have included more explanation about how GrayCris couldn’t hear what Murderbot was saying to the team.

Speaking to GrayCris, Murderbot claims it wants to betray the PreservationAux team in exchange for its own safety. GrayCris’ people are initially sceptical, but Murderbot convinces them otherwise. It produces the head of the SecUnit that was killed by an alien creature in episode seven, and says that the head belonged to one of the PreservationAux team members (Gurathin, of course), whom Murderbot killed. Murderbot’s plan is clever, but the sight of the severed head is very unsettling.

GrayCris’ humans are so uncaring towards bots that they don’t recognise their own SecUnit and believe Murderbot’s lies.

The PreservationAux team wasn’t in on this part of the plan and are troubled by it. The humans worry that Murderbot is genuinely betraying them, but ultimately choose to trust it.

Murderbot convinces the GrayCris humans to connect their HubSystem with the PreservationAux team’s. With this connection established, the PreservationAux team will be able to launch GrayCris’ emergency beacon.

Murderbot tells GrayCris that the PreservationAux team is at the site of the beacon. GrayCris then decides, of course, to go straight there.

The highly ethical PreservationAux team becomes concerned, as Murderbot’s plan is to get GrayCris’ forces to the site, so that they will be killed in the explosion of the emergency beacon’s launch. I liked that it was Gurathin who figured out Murderbot’s true plan – the story has continuously drawn attention to how the two think the same and are ultimately quite similar, even though they don’t trust each other.

Although the team members have their concerns, they ultimately agree to go through with Murderbot’s plan.

There is a problem, though, as GrayCris brings Murderbot along with them to the beacon site. Murderbot is upset by this turn of events, but is willing to sacrifice itself so that the PreservationAux team can survive. Mensah still tries to rescue Murderbot, however, flying the hopper to meet it and GrayCris at the beacon site.

When Murderbot and the GrayCris team are travelling to the beacon site on the latter’s hopper, a very interesting moment takes place. Murderbot flies in the cargo hold alongside GrayCris’ SecUnits. During the flight, Murderbot accidentally bumps one of the other SecUnits and immediately – and uncharacteristically – apologises to it. I liked how this small scene demonstrated both the difference between the empathetic PreservationAux team’s treatment of bots and GrayCris’ cruelty, as well as the influence the PreservationAux team has had on Murderbot.

Murderbot and the team’s problems only get worse, though. Pin-Lee and Gurathin are using a drone to launch the beacon… but this drone is suddenly damaged by a bird creature! I thought the creature’s sudden arrival could have been foreshadowed a bit more, because it seemed to come a bit out of nowhere.

Arriving at the beacon site with GrayCris, Murderbot loses contact with the PreservationAux team, which means that Gurathin and Pin-Lee are unable to tell it that the beacon won’t launch.

Believing that the plan is still in effect, Murderbot tries to stall GrayCris by making awkward small talk. When the beacon is supposed to launch, Murderbot tries to escape from the explosion, only for nothing to happen. GrayCris realises that Murderbot is deceiving them, only for Mensah to then arrive.

Mensah offers GrayCris information about alien remnants in exchange for Murderbot’s life, but the evil corporation refuses, planning to torture the information out of Mensah instead.

Murderbot offers to do the torture itself, seemingly intending to use the opportunity to save Mensah. In a funny, albeit terrible moment, one of GrayCris’ members realises that Murderbot has been quoting ‘Sanctuary Moon’. The situation then escalates and a fight breaks out.

During the fight, Murderbot tries to help GrayCris’ SecUnits hack their governor modules, but the other bots unfortunately won’t listen to it. In a moment that’s only funny, and not terrible for the protagonists, Murderbot instead distracts another SecUnit by sending it ‘Sanctuary Moon’ episodes.

Elsewhere, Gurathin and Pin-Lee sneak onto GrayCris’ base to manually launch the beacon. This doesn’t go smoothly, and Pin-Lee is horrified after they seemingly kill a guard to save Gurathin. Eventually, Gurathin is able to launch the beacon.

The beacon’s launch blast kills the rest of GrayCris’ forces. Prepared for the launch, Murderbot grabs Mensah and jumps off a nearby cliff, willing to sacrifice itself again. It plans to land in a way that’ll ensure it takes the brunt of the fall and Mensah will be unharmed.

Murderbot survives the landing, but is left in a critical condition. The episode ends with Mensah and the other humans safe, but it’s unclear whether Murderbot will be able to recover.

In my previous review, I speculated that this would be a big episode, and I was correct. GrayCris has finally been defeated, but “All Systems Red” also really highlighted how much Murderbot has grown to care for the PreservationAux team and how this care is now extending to others, like GrayCris’ SecUnits.

I am looking forward to seeing how everything wraps up in the season finale next week. With GrayCris out of the picture, I am predicting that the next episode will focus more on the characters’ relationships and personal arcs.

Author: Iris Autumn

Iris has a degree in Digital Media and a passion for writing. She has published in cultural arts magazine The Artifice. Iris’ interests include intertextuality, media portrayals of fandom and creativity, and stories that are campy.

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