Love, Death & Robots - Season 1 (2019)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2019
	Creator: Tim Miller
	Actors: -
	Country: USA
	Genre: SF, Animation
	Conditions of visioning: March-May 2019, VOD, 10" tablet screen.
Synopsis: An anthology of short animated films around the topics of, well Love, Death & Robots.
Review: I am often surprised by the variety of what Netflix produces itself as movies and series. Love, Death & Robots is more than an animated SF series for adult like Final Space or Rick and Morty (which would already be a success to me), it is an anthology of short films with a serious tone. It couldn't have been made an anthology full-length feature film because there is no link at all between the segments excepts for the topics of the series title and the fact that they are animated. Still it reminds of the cult Heavy Metal and its 2000 sequel. More so, it reminds in its tone and format of The Animatrix series that was released between The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions: different stories, animations styles and approaches to a same global idea. I always found The Animatrix to be a worthy addition to the Wachowskis' trilogy, and I still literally have nightmares about the segment The Second Renaissance. I hadn't seen photo-realistic animated films since Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within in 2001 (does The Adventures of Tintin count?) so I was baffled by the visual quality of such segments which are about half of the first season. I really had to rewind and look for telling details and sometimes couldn't find any (barring the futuristics of course). Beyond the quality of the animation, I loved diving into those short stories like any SF nerd could submerge into written SF short stories since the 1960's. It did feel like that. The short films don't pretend to be anticipating the future, they just tell fantastic stories of a future world. Segments can be light (S1E2: Three Robots) or dark (S1E1 Sonnie's Edge), photo-realistic (S1E7 Beyond the Aquila Rift) or more artistic (S1E3 The Witness), more focused on Love (S1E8 Good Hunting), Death (S1E1 Sonnie's Edge again) or Robots (S1E15 Blind Spot), about pure SF topics (S1E18 The Secret War) or leaning towards borderline poetry (S1E12 Fish Night, S1E14 Zima Blue). There are of course segments that I prefer to others (and that I will probably watch more times) but in this first season I didn't find any single bad one. There are probably many shorts that fit the description of this series being produced around the world, but it's great that Netflix a) funds directors to put their ideas in (very good-looking) images and b) gathers them under one banner (series) and distributes them to a vast audience. I do hope for a second season.
Rating: 8 /10