In Murderbot, Alexander Skarsgård’s titular SecUnit isn’t a robot exactly. Here’s why this very specific Murderbot plot point inverts a weird robot trope found in other sci-fi, and why it perfectly represents the ethos of the series. Following an attack from some different rogue SecUnits, our hero, Murderbot, finds itself glitching, which naturally leads to some scenes from its favorite streaming series, Sanctuary Moon. But, the side effect is that it does give Murderbot a sense of humanity, whether it likes it or not. So often, humanoid robots in sci-fi exist in stories for us to think about how we would react to those lifeforms.