SciFi Review: Artificial Condition takes us further along the path in which a SecUnit leaves behind a previous identity for that of becoming human. Here Murderbot makes extreme physical changes and discards the protective armor and opaqued helmet that make life bearable. Murderbot (and I) felt naked without it. I want my armor back, please. In Artificial Condition Murderbot also begins to experience and comprehend the concept of freedom and free will, apart from being a bot/human construct gone rogue: "I forgot I had a choice ... . Being asked to stay, with a please and an option for refusal, hit me almost as hard as a human asking for my opinion and actually listening to me." If you hear echoes, you're right. While not as thrilling or mysterious as the first episode, the story is still entertaining, if just for having another encounter with the engagingly insecure and misanthropic Murderbot ("So they made us smarter. The anxiety and depression were side effects."). Watching Murderbot struggle with the human world, is similar to that of any socially awkward anthropoid: "I wish being a construct made me less irrational than the average human but you may have noticed this is not the case." For me, however, the more Murderbot becomes human in Artificial Condition, the less compelling the story, the less I identify. [3★]
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