Note: Most of this article will analyze the themes and message of the film. Our previous articles focus on the importance of A.I. Ethics and if A.i. could make better decisions than humans. Netflix I am mother attempts to answer this question in less than 2 hours here are the results.
In order for Mother(the robot) to invoke sympathy and leverage from viewers, Humanity had to have screwed up in the premise of the film. With a world population of zero, mother is forced to raise daughter .
This means that there is no “father” in the film. There are several ways to interpret the missing father or companion in mothers robot life. Is masculine energy that expendable?. Why assign a gender to the robot in the first place if a male wasn’t being included?.
For the first quarter of the film, Larsen is the only living being seen. Larsen’s early childhood learning and nurturing(if you want to call it that) to her teenage years are odd. Larsens outside interaction are videos of Johnny Carson’s show, she seems to do fine without any real human interaction.
These years display the competency of mother doing what ordinary humans can do, raise a child. While mother is present, she’s not engaging physically, no hugs and kisses with Larsen at all.
However communicative and witty throughout the entire film, mother is never speechless and always decisive. Until “woman” comes in the picture.
Played by Hillary Swank woman invades the bunker after being wounded. While she raises the suspicion of mother, Larsen maybe being too human feels compassion. Larson and Swank both represent the future generation and older generation respectively. All Larsen knows is Mother(technology), who taught her literally every thing and fed her.
Just as the future generation will become more dependent on A.I. technology. Swank, on the other hand, is cautious, older pessimistic she trusts A.I. as a last resort literally in the film only because her life depended on it.
With the help of A.I. Larsen is able to remove Swank’s bullet wound, this further highlights, the potential benefits of medical A.I..After several plot twists,laurenand Swank scheme to escape the bunker without mother. Ironically due to mother being an algoritihm, she refuses to be separated from Larsen.
But wouldn’t a real mother feel the same way? It’s hard to tell whether mother realizes she’s a robot or is following the mother algorithm. That’s for you to decide.
Towards the end mother admits she or it, started the extinction after becoming convinced humanity would destroy itself. As mentioned in our last article humanizing robots without showing their creator is ever present in the film.
Never do we see or hear mention of mothers creator. Introducing the person would have given mothers motives more meaning and relevance in my opinion. For an action-suspense film, the most telling scene is subtle.
When Larson is holding a nurturing her born brother towards the end of the film alarms begins to go off in the viewer’s head. Larson was raised by a robot isolated from any contact with humans, where did she learn to be like this?
In conclusion, While the film leaves you asking more questions this scene tells us that no, robots aren’t fit to be mothers..At least not yet.
Should robots raise children if no other option is available? Let us know in the comment section below.
Independent thinker Sam Grays created Resonance News to Empower rather than entertain viewers with true objective media. No more news that insults your intelligence with just Right or left wing division.