Apple TV shares first look at 'Murderbot', a killing machine who just wants to watch TV all day

Nobody loves a smart aleck, but we're willing to make an exception for this advanced security droid with a penchant for TV soap operas, justifiable violence, and a razor-sharp wit that can cut through bureaucratic shenanigans, corporate espionage, and political smokescreens like a hot laser through ice cold butter.

Author Martha Wells's wildly popular collection of far-future sci-fi novels, "The Murderbot Diaries" is getting a deluxe treatment by Apple TV+ starring Alexander Skarsgård as the titular character, and now we’ve got our first peek at the acclaimed actor in his cool cyborg getup, along with an official release date of May 16, 2025.

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We first delivered the news back in Dec. of 2023 that Skarsgård ("True Blood," "The Northman," "Succession") would be headlining and executive producing this 10-episode Apple TV+ series adapted from Wells’s bestselling novels revolving around the irascible android and its perilous missions to protect humanity from its many defects.

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In addition to the spring launch date, Apple TV also gave us a tease of what costume designers have come up with to depict Murderbot himself, and the results look damn impressive. Skarsgård's team has nailed the cold penetrating stare of Murderbot and the sleek masked outfit belies an exterior in keeping with the half-man, half-machine’s emotional sterility and unaffected demeanor.

This Hugo and Nebula Award-winning roster of science fiction books centered towards a snarky space-faring Security Unit first saw the light of day in 2017 in "All Systems Red" (Tor). "System Collapse" (Tor), is the seventh entry and most recent addition to the sci-fi saga, which was published on Nov. 14, 2023 and comes after Wells's 2021 prequel novella, "Fugitive Telemetry" (Tor).

Hailing from Paramount Television Studios and co-created by Chris and Paul Weitz ("About a Boy," "Mozart in the Jungle") under their Depth of Field production shingle, "Murderbot" is described by Apple as "a sci-fi thriller/comedy about a self-hacking security construct who is horrified by human emotion yet drawn to its vulnerable clients. Played by Skarsgård, Murderbot must hide its free will and complete a dangerous assignment when all it really wants is to be left alone to watch futuristic soap operas and figure out its place in the universe."

Murderbot is certainly a captivating character — a mostly robotic security model owned and leased out by a futuristic megacorporation called The Company. Unbeknownst to its owners, Murderbot has secretly hacked its governor module and gone rogue, now spending its free time exploring the meaning of existence and commenting on the foibles of humankind with sharply barbed humor.

David S. Goyer ("Blade," "Dark City," "The Dark Knight Trilogy") is also attached to the high-profile project as executive producer alongside Keith Levine for Phantom Four, with Martha Wells herself aboard as a consulting producer to keep the material pure.

Also starring Noma Dumezweni, David Dastmalchian, Sabrina Wu, Akshay Khanna, Tattiawna Jones, and Tamara Podemski, "Murderbot" launches May 16, 2025, exclusively on Apple TV+ with a two-episode debut. New weekly chapters will roll out on Fridays until the season finale on July 11.