I watched this in one sitting, and thought it was mostly terrific. It's not going to appeal to action fans at all, nor does it play to the common "AI is evil and/or inherently inhuman" trope; rather, it's a very well portrayed intimate psychological drama about a teenager who has to come to terms with the discovery that she's actually a robot, and that much of what she thought he knew about her life is a lie. But this revelation in no way de-humanizes her character - instead we empathize completely with this very likeable young person who suddenly finds herself essentially the victim in a sci-fi Twilight-Zone-esque nightmare scenario, and her personal journey through this forms the main focus of the series. Everything exploring that theme is really well done. It's somewhat reminiscent of "D.A.R.Y.L." (1985), though that was a kids' film and this isn't, obviously.
The only glaring weak spot is the subplot involving the robotics company that's "out to get" her, and the two brothers running it, who act like cartoon Bond villain caricatures in every scene they appear in, and whose every action seems more calculated to scream "look at me, I'm the BAD GUY" rather than making any actual in-story sense.
As an example, there's a school-assistant robot who a student hacked so she'd, umm... "go down" on him. On discovering this, the *co-head of the company* travels half way across the continent in order to vindictively execute this unfortunate robot, mafia-hit style, with an extra-special anti-robot gun, and where due to a wildly unlikely line-up of unexplained coincidences, he happens to be observed by the protagonist, Aisha, whom he recognizes, which kicks off this sub-plot. Realistically, wouldn't a company who's product had been embarrassingly misused simply send a low-level technician out to retrieve it in a routine and non-dramatic manner, and then attempt to relocate, repair, or re-purpose the presumably expensive robot, rather than shooting it/her in the head execution-style in a public street outside a high school?! And it's also trivially easy to think up several alternate ways Aisha could have been discovered by the bad guys that would actually make logical sense, rather than merely invoking outlandish coincidence... such as, perhaps when she ill-advisedly turned on the WiFi data download that nearly crashed her, it could've shown up on the company's servers as a data request from a robot with an unknown or decommissioned serial number, thus alerting them?) .
It really feels like this sub plot was tacked on to a really excellent psychological-drama script after-the fact by a much less talented scriptwriter with no respect or feel for the material at all, just because someone decided the plot needed "more tension" or had to include a thriller element to the story or something - the difference in writing quality (and logical coherence) is just so very jarring. Fortunately, although it *is* critical plot-wise, it only occupies a tiny part of the series' runtime, and thus it's not much of a detraction overall. (Except insofar as *any* plot hole damages a storyline's integrity, of course). Nevertheless it would have been time much better spent exploring more of Aisha's friends' reactions to discovering she's a robot, though. ...Hopefully we'll see more of that in season 2?
I certainly hope there'll be a season 2!
(Just a thought, but perhaps it could mostly sideline the "evil brothers" by having Aisha go to the press about herself? That would not only create lots of drama, but despite the obvious risk, getting public support is also probably the most realistic option she ultimately has to protect herself, unless she wants to live in hiding indefinitely... not to mention being the only way to be able to live "authentically" as herself, to paraphrase what she told Abel.)
I think it's to this show's credit that weeks after watching it, I'm still thinking about Aisha and her travails.
I certainly hope there'll be a season 2!
(Just a thought, but perhaps it could mostly sideline the "evil brothers" by having Aisha go to the press about herself? That would not only create lots of drama, but despite the obvious risk, getting public support is also probably the most realistic option she ultimately has to protect herself, unless she wants to live in hiding indefinitely... not to mention being the only way to be able to live "authentically" as herself, to paraphrase what she told Abel.)
I think it's to this show's credit that weeks after watching it, I'm still thinking about Aisha and her travails.