Written by Scott Clifford
A good police procedural always start off with an exciting cold opening to reel the viewer in for the rest of the episode. A good science-fiction show reels the viewer in with intriguing world building information that makes somebody want to live in that world, even when it is horrifying. This week’s episode accomplishes both tasks perfectly. This is why Almost Human is one of my favorite shows on television.
“Blood Brothers” revolves a narcissistic sociopath (aren’t they all?) named Ethan Avery (Alex Miller). Ethan is on trial for the murder of a clone doctor. In the trial, one of the witnesses testifies via a remote location in order to give enough evidence to gain a conviction. Things don’t work out as the witness is assassinated in front of every one in the courtroom. The possibility of seeing someone get murdered in real-time without being able to do something is great…for a television show of course.
Moving on, another witness named Maya (Megan Ferguson) is able to escape her scheduled death and be the key witness for the show. Maya calls herself a “petite psychic” on a good day. She had a procedure in her brain that allows her to talk to the dead when she touches certain objects that are connected to them. While the psychic trope is cringe inducing by this point, Dorian (Michael Ealy) is able to keep things interesting. It’s the android that is the fan of unscientific beliefs such as psychic abilities while John doesn’t believe in any of that tomfoolery.
After Maya is almost assassinated for a second time, John (Karl Urban) and the Gang realize that Ethan has been cloning himself in order to perform high-risk crimes throughout the cities. Agent Stahl (Minka Kelly) then finds out that Ethan killed the doctor in order to cover his tracks. Then she gets kidnapped. This is another cliché that can be cringe inducing but the Captain Maldonado’s (Lilli Taylor) plan to use Ethan’s hologram trick in order to trick his clones to giving her back is ingenious.
Speaking of Maldonado, it’s nice to see that the writers are trying to make her a real character. Unfortunately, the path they have chosen is clichéd and sexist. The beginning of the episode focuses on her listening to Ethan monologue about how she’s old and no man is attracted to her. An insult that is proven wrong when the prosecuting attorney who puts Ethan away tells Maldonado that she looks nice. Sweet baby Jesus! The missteps this show takes are baffling.
I almost forgot about something else. Dorian shows his robot penis to John. Yeah, you read that correctly. John tries to find Dorian in the beginning of the episode and has to wonder into the robot quarters of the station to get to him. John sees that that the MX androids (the robots who are different from Dorian) don’t have any genitalia. So John asks Dorian what every guy would ask. That’s fine; I have no problem with that. I just don’t understand why Dorian would whip out his penis in a cop car in broad daylight. Maybe the writers should focus on keeping Dorian’s powers consistent throughout the series instead of the length of his robot penis.
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