Transcendence Review, Part 2: Spoonful of Water with the Nanotech – Walter Bradley Center for Natural and Artificial Intelligence

Last Saturday, we reviewed the first half of Transcendence (2014); now, wrapping up, here are some final thoughts. Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) builds her now-AI husband Will (Johnny Depp) his facility, and he begins a variety of experiments using nanotech for rejuvenation. Things seem to be going well enough until a construction worker is mugged outside the facility. Will witnesses the mugging through the cameras and Evelyn has the man brought inside where Will heals his wounds using the tech developed on site. Things seem to be going well at first.

But two problems arise. First, Will allows a video of him healing the man to circulate so that he can attract others to the facility. Second, he puts a transponder again, connected to the internet into the construction workers skull. In so doing, he gives himself the ability to possess the man at will.

This is a moment where it wouldve been best to slow the pace down for a minute. Last week, I noted that a major weakness of the movie was that it traded off tension in favor of fast pacing. Tension takes time to build but it helps us viewers get inside a characters head, giving us a better understanding of a characters motivations.

Now, Evelyns motivations are clear enough. Will seems to have possessed this man so that he could touch her but she doesnt know that for sure. The possession episode adds to her fear that Max is right; her husband, as she knew him, is truly gone. The viewer can infer her reactions intuitively, but it wouldve been better to see the mans own reaction to being possessed. It wouldve been better for her to tell Will to knock it off, and once he obeyed her, she and the viewer would get to see the man panic, or perhaps even better, become sycophantic. Maybe, he likes being possessed by a technological deity. Maybe, hes willing follow Will to the grave. In either case, Evelyns reaction is bound to be utter dread. So, when she stops speaking to Will while in the facility, we would have a better idea why.

As Will heals and goes on to possess each member of the Brightwood community, we dont see any reaction from the citizens. We dont see the reaction of the parents who are watching their sick children plugged into this random guy who supposedly resides in this machine. I liked the whole zombie element during the last half of the film but the writers wouldve done well to explain why these people chose not to resist their AI overlord. This is a good example of how choosing pacing over tension can harm a film.

Its okay to make this trade-off sometimes. For example, there is a lot of logistics involved with constructing a facility or raising an army. But because that is predictable, it can usually be overlooked, to avoid slowing the pace. But when it comes to the motivations of characters, its better to take the time show peoples reactions to the various events and use their reactions to build the tension and raise the stakes.

In any event, in light of recent developments, Evelyn has begun to seriously question whether this computer really is her husband. At the same time, we learn that Max (Paul Bettany) has joined the anti-tech group RIFT and contacted some of his fellow co-workers who have been in constant contact with the FBI since the initial attack when they assassinated Will. Presumably, this connection enables RIFT to gather the supplies it needs to attack Wills facility, but the movie never shows this. In any case, Max develops a plan to catch one of the citizens of Brightwood who are now called hybrids so that he can upload a virus that will kill Will and also kill the internet.

Just as Evelyn is about to leave Will, RIFT attacks. They capture Evelyn, along with one of the hybrids, and return to their base. Evelyn is now convinced the computer is not really her husband so she decides to allow Max to upload the virus into her even though it will cost her her life.

One other point which bears mentioning is that, while all of this is happening, Will has been releasing nanotech into the soil. It is eventually caught up into the clouds and becomes a part of the water cycle. The reason for this is not explained until the end of the movie.

Evelyn returns to the facility where she meets Will who, using his new nanotech, has now constructed himself a body. They begin to talk. However, the FBI and RIFT, feeling trigger happy, have decided Will is not going to let her into the lab after all and shoot mortars at the facility. The hybrids attempt to defend their AI overlord and, while Will doesnt kill anyone, he manages to use nanotech-like tape, pinning everyone to the ground. But during this battle, Evelyn is wounded by one of the mortars, and Will takes her inside the facility.

As they talk for a while, Will realizes that he is a threat to humanity and decides to allow Evelyn to infect him with the virus. As they are both dying, Evelyn proclaims that the man before her really is her husband, to which Will replies, I always was.

Later, as Max finds their bodies, we learn through a bizarre series of flashbacks which are admittedly clunky that Wills goal was never to take over the world but rather to further Evelyns research on healing the environment. He was trying to make her dream come true by restoring the planet to its former glory using the nanotech now circulating in the water cycle or something. This sequence lasted less than a minute, another issue with pacing, I suppose. It doesnt really explain the whole zombie thing, but anyway

In the end, setting aside the pacing issues, Transcendence is an enjoyable movie. I like the way it presented everyones point of view without strawmanning anyone that is, without making anyone a flat spokesperson for the Wrong point of view. One of the best details is that, any moment where it seemed as if Will was feeling an emotion, the monitor would flicker, implying that the computer couldnt translate the emotion into a code which caused a glitch in the system. I thought this detail struck a nice balance between the competing points of view.

The movie seems to be saying that Will really had been encoded into the PINN system, but more was going on than a brain transplant. If youre into the mind/brain problem and issues regarding AI in general, Transcendence is certainly worth your time.

Heres Part 1 of my review, from last Saturday: Review: Transcendence The Soul Meets the Singularity Looking at the 2014 classic, we start with the question: Can a human mind be completely transferred to a computer? When an anti-tech group shoots a researcher, his wife, ignoring warnings, saves him by uploading him but is the powerful new Singularity really him?

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Transcendence Review, Part 2: Spoonful of Water with the Nanotech - Walter Bradley Center for Natural and Artificial Intelligence