Losing heart | 3 November 2016

In 2015, the first series of Humans (Sunday) was apparently Channel 4’s most watched home grown drama since The Camomile Lawn: a programme broadcast when Neil Kinnock was still the Labour leader and given a obvious ratings boost by the tabloid outrage about its many nude scenes (and by its many nude scenes). In the case of Humans, though, the British people can’t be accused of ulterior motives, because this is a winningly intelligent piece of sci fi that ponders, among other things, the nature of consciousness and the future of the human race.

Cleverly, too, it’s set, not in a domed city of jet packing commuters, but in a world very like our own. Except, that is, for the presence of extremely human looking robots, known as ‘synths’, who already do most of the manual work and now seem set to carry out much of the white collar sort too.