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We are in the cold and icy Sweden, and years, perhaps decades, have passed since 2012, the year in which the Swedish series Äkta Manniskor was released on the Swedish channel SVT. We don't know what year it is, but nothing is the same as it was before.
The production of hubots (robots that in the series perform activities that were previously carried out by homo sapiens – primarily manual tasks) has advanced to creating machines that, in many cases, are hardly distinguishable from humans in flesh and bone. Thus, ethics, emotions, and scientific progress come into play, which increasingly seems capable of leading to the next step in evolution – the transition from homo sapiens to the superhuman.
A computer code designed by a scientist in a remote Swedish village "frees" a group of hubots, enabling them to perceive emotions in the same way each of us does. The creation of robots with human-like (both external and internal) features leads to the birth of a populist party called "Äkta Människor" (real humans) that fights for the rights of biological people, even organizing violent demonstrations.
What is right? What is ethical? Can man claim the right to create human beings in a box? Can a robot have the same rights as a "real human"? Can love exist between a robot and a human being? How will politics react to a progress and a revolution of an extent that was never even imagined before?
The two seasons of Äkta Människor leave numerous questions open, painting a possible future scenario in which disputes over nationality or skin color could be replaced by those between humans and robots. Because if there's one thing that will never be lacking, not even in a hyper-technological world, it is political and social conflicts. But above all, who decides what is human and what is not?
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