Director Ridley Scott returns to a world he’s helped shape for over four decades with HBO Max’s “Raised by Wolves.” It’s not just that the director of “Alien” and “Blade Runner” is putting his name on science fiction again by directing the premiere episode of this series, but he is back at play in the deeply philosophical regions of the genre, one that seeks to define that which separates man and machine. In the legacy of Ash, Roy Batty, and David from “Prometheus” and “Alien: Covenant,” Scott now adds the story of Father and Mother, androids designed to do something truly human: raise and sustain life. Created by Aaron Guzikowski (“Prisoners”), “Raised by Wolves” is at its best when it allows Scott and the directors that follow him to dig into the issues, but it lacks in departments like storytelling, mythology, and world-building. It feels like a sketch for a show, waiting to come together into something denser and more engaging. It may be an intriguing sketch, but how long will viewers be patient if it’s not colored in?
Speaking of color, the palette instructions for the team here was clearly gray, both in character and design. On a gray planet, two gray figures land to start a new colony. They are revealed to be androids referred to only as Mother (Amanda Collin) and Father (Abubakar Salim), and their mission is to create embryos and eventually a new start for civilization. The process of life isn’t exactly human, but it’s interesting how much ‘Raised’ leans into biological roles from the start, tethering wires to the android Mother’s torso in a way that’s clearly umbilical in nature given how they produce embryos in separate chambers. One appears to die in “childbirth” and Father states that their order is to then feed it to the other embryos for sustenance. Mother refuses and saves the baby. From the beginning, Father is practical, Mother is protective.
This dynamic becomes even more pronounced as most of the children die, leaving this interstellar family as a trio. The only remaining offspring is a boy named Campion (Winta McGrath). He has been taught by Mother and Father that which his creators entrusted him to pass along, most importantly a firm atheistic belief system. It turns out that the pod that contained Mother and Father was sent ahead from a war-torn and dying planet by a sect of atheists, fleeing an ultra-religious group. The idea was that androids could get further into the reaches of space before man, creating a society away from their touch and influence, one that exerts the power of the individual and community over that of a creator.
Of course, the devout catch up to the family, looking for a habitable planet themselves, led by a man named Marcus (Travis Fimmel), who turns out to have a pretty sizable secret of his own revealed in the second episode. Without spoiling anything, Mother has some remarkable skills in terms of protecting her only remaining son, skills that lead to an entirely new family forming in a way with a new band of children. Who will guide the future on this distant planet—the people who destroyed the old one or a whole new way of looking at humanity and religion?
Guzikowski loves playing with duality and not just with his pair of parental robots. There are stories of prophets that could fit more than one character, as well as another set of parents forced into the roles almost accidentally. What defines not just the android “mother” and “father” but the human ones as well? “Raised by Wolves” often leans into gender roles—Father cracks jokes with Campion while teaching him to work; Mother is emotionally protective of her flock. Even very early on, Mother howls when a child dies, indicating a connection that’s closer to human emotion than android. She also worries intensely when Campion is the only offspring remaining, willing to do anything to protect him. Is this the programming that won’t allow her to fail the mission or something more akin to the way a human mother protects her child? What’s the difference?
Clearly, the driving force creatively behind the concept for the show, Mother is far and away the most interesting thing about “Raised by Wolves,” and it’s just enough to carry the program over some disappointing early episodes. Collin is truly fantastic, moving from the more typically android behavior of the early scenes of the premiere to something else entirely by its end. She can be alternately encouraging and terrifying, willing to make tough, fatal decisions in the blink of a robot’s eye. She can be captivating here.
The problem is she feels relatively alone to start the first season. Campion, Father, and even Marcus are forced to follow in her wake as characters as she leads the narrative, and the human adult half of “Raised by Wolves” feels like too many cheap sci-fi action shows, even if Fimmel is promising. Ultimately, the whole show is surprisingly thin narratively in an era of dense plotting on television. If it’s going to hook viewers, it needs more than a neat concept, great central performance, and high craftsmanship.
About that last part, most of the production carries that Scott sheen of craft—his son Luke Scott, a Second Unit Director on movies like “Covenant” and “The Martian” directs episodes three and four—but there are times when it looks surprisingly clunky. The world-building is disappointing to start with a gray, blank planet serving as the primary setting, visually inspired by The Zeitz MOCAA, a museum in South Africa, per a credit in the close of each episode. Scott is so skilled visually, that fans of his may be disappointed how much this show generally lacks in that department. Again, it could be intentional—an early lack of color and depth that will explode into more elaborate design as Campion grows into adulthood—but early episodes are just about the grayest thing on television.
The patience of TV audiences is at a unique point right now. On the one hand, people are home more than ever, but streamer fatigue is real, and it feels harder than ever for a show to break out from the crowd. Ridley Scott’s name and the HBO brand should bring people to “Raised by Wolves,” but a lack of urgency in an urgent time in history could allow it to easily fade into the gray. [C+]
“Raised By Wolves” premieres on HBO Max on September 3.
