''Murder Drones'' is an Australian

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created, written, and directed by Liam Vickers and produced by Glitch Productions. The pilot episode premiered on Glitch's

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on October 29, 2021. The remaining seven episodes were released from November 18, 2022 to August 23, 2024. The series received positive reviews from critics for its animation and plot, though its pacing and humour have received criticism. The series received three nominations for a

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in the Best Animated Video category, winning two.

Synopsis

The series occurs in 3071 on Copper 9, an

Earth analog An Earth analog, also called an Earth twin or second Earth, is a Exoplanet, planet or Exomoon, moon with environmental conditions similar to those found on Earth. The term Earth-like planet is also used, but this term may refer to any terrestria ...

owned by the

megacorporation Megacorporation, mega-corporation, or megacorp, a term originally coined by Alfred Eichner in his book ''The Megacorp and Oligopoly: Micro Foundations of Macro Dynamics'' but popularized by William Gibson, derives from the combination of the pre ...

JC Jenson (a parody of

SC Johnson S. C. Johnson & Son, Inc. (commonly referred to as S. C. Johnson) is an American multinational corporation, multinational corporation, privately held manufacturer of household cleaning supplies and other consumer chemicals based in Racine, ...

). Worker Drones,

autonomous robot An autonomous robot is a robot that acts without recourse to human control. Historic examples include space probes. Modern examples include self-driving Robotic vacuum cleaner, vacuums and Self-driving car, cars. Industrial robot, Industrial robot ...

s designed to serve

humans Humans (''Homo sapiens'') or modern humans are the most common and widespread species of primate, and the last surviving species of the genus ''Homo''. They are Hominidae, great apes characterized by their Prehistory of nakedness and clothing ...

, inhabit the planet and mine it for natural resources. Eventually, the planet suffers a catastrophic

core Core or cores may refer to: Science and technology * Core (anatomy), everything except the appendages * Core (laboratory), a highly specialized shared research resource * Core (manufacturing), used in casting and molding * Core (optical fiber ...

collapse brought on by the corporation's employees, wiping out all

biological life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, organisation, metabolism, growth, adaptation, res ...

on the planet, including humans. As a result, the planet becomes a frozen wasteland, and only the Worker Drones remain. One day, three violent killing machines known as Disassembly Drones—nicknamed "Murder Drones"—invade Copper 9 to exterminate the remaining Worker Drones. The Worker Drones live in constant fear of the Murder Drones and hide behind a series of blast doors, in an attempt to protect themselves. The protagonist of the series is Uzi Doorman, an angsty teenage Worker Drone who plans to defeat the murderous drones and save her kind. In the process, she forms an unlikely partnership with two of the Murder Drones—N, a male drone with a friendly and curious disposition toward Worker Drones; and V, a sadist who is purposely elusive about her history with N—and works with them to uncover the truth about their origins and purpose in the planet's harsh environment.

Cast

* Uzi Doorman (Elsie Lovelock), a rebellious teenage Worker Drone who seeks to end her oppressed lifestyle. Throughout the series, Uzi struggles with being possessed by the Absolute Solver, which she learns to use to manipulate reality. * Serial Designation "N" (Michael Kovach), a friendly and eager Disassembly Drone who befriends Uzi and provides her with emotional support throughout her possession * Serial Designation "V" (Nola Klop), a sadistic Disassembly Drone and N's teammate who secretly harbors protective feelings towards him * Serial Designation "J" (Shara Kirby), the neglectful leader of N and V's Disassembly Drone squad * Khan Doorman (David J. Dixon), Uzi's father, architect of the hydraulic doors protecting the Worker Drone colony, and leader of the colony's defense force * Thad (

Sean Chiplock Sean Edward Chiplock (born June 21, 1990) is an American voice actor who is known for voicing English versions of Japanese video games and anime. Based in Los Angeles, California, Chiplock is known as the voice of Aiden Flynn from Camp Buddy, R ...

), Uzi's friendly jock schoolmate * Lizzy (Katie Hood in episode 1 and Caitlin Dizon from episode 2 onward), Uzi's popular classmate who bullies her and befriends V * Doll (Emma Breezy), Uzi's

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

-speaking classmate who harbors a vendetta against V for murdering her parents. Like Uzi, Doll can manipulate the Absolute Solver and has much more control over it than Uzi does. * Cyn (Allanah Fitzgerald), a Worker Drone who serves as the Disassembly Drones' system administrator and the host of an evil, reality-altering computer program called the Absolute Solver (also voiced by Fitzgerald) * Tessa Elliot (Steph Crothers), a human girl who salvages N, V, J, and Cyn before the former three's remodeling into Disassembly Drones. An adult version of Tessa appears on Copper 9 as a JC Jenson technician, but is later revealed to have been killed as a child by Cyn, who impersonates Tessa while wearing her skin. * Nori Doorman (Darcy Maguire), Uzi's mother and one of the Absolute Solver's hosts. Initially stated to have been killed by a Disassembly Drone, she is later revealed to have sent her consciousness to her own mutated core to survive.

Production

Liam Vickers had previously achieved online attention for his 2D animated series ''CliffSide'' and ''Internecion Cube'', both currently unfinished. He first pitched ''Murder Drones'' to Glitch Productions with some early concept art and story, before becoming the series' writer and director. ''Murder Drones'' is animated on

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and

Unreal Engine Unreal Engine (UE) is a 3D computer graphics game engine developed by Epic Games, first showcased in the 1998 first-person shooter video game '' Unreal''. Initially developed for PC first-person shooters, it has since been used in a variety of ...

. (YouTube playlist. See episodes 1-8 credits.) Including the pilot, the series lasted 8 episodes. It pushes into darker territory while making it more photorealistic than previous shows on Glitch. This series (alongside ''

Meta Runner ''Meta Runner'' is an Australian independent-animated eSports action drama web series created by Kevin and Luke Lerdwichagul. Produced by Glitch Productions, with funding support from Screen Australia, Crunchyroll, AMD, and Epic Games. The ...

'') also marks to many fans a departure from the

Machinima Machinima () is the use of Real-time computing, real-time computer graphics engines to create a cinematic production. The word "Machinima" is a portmanteau of the words ''machine'' and ''Film, cinema''. According to Guinness World Records, ma ...

style often associated with Glitch, as its co-founder Luke Lerdwichagul is well-known for his ''Super Mario'' parodies on the channel ''SMG4''. On August 6, 2021, Liam released the full version of "Disassembly Required", the song that plays in the teaser. The video description reveals the character seen in the teaser to be "V", one of the titular ''Murder Drones''. By the time the series was announced, it had been worked on for one year until February 18, 2022, when Glitch Productions announced that the full series was in development now at the studio and would be released later in 2022. The show ended with the eighth and final episode released on August 23, 2024. On May 16, 2025, all eight episodes of the series were made available on

Amazon Prime Video Amazon Prime Video, known simply as Prime Video, is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming television service owned by Amazon. The service primarily distributes films and television series produced or co-produced by ...

Episodes

Every episode is written and directed by Liam Vickers.

Reception

Critical reception

Prior to the release of the pilot episode, Lauren Rouse of ''

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'' praised the character designs and visuals. Writer GiovanH criticized the show for being hard to follow, especially for first-time viewers. He wrote at-length that several minute factors worked against each other to make the show confusing to watch, such as fast pacing, excessive humour and poor visual language. He blamed the "friction" on "fundamental trade-offs" that come with the indie setup of Glitch Productions, claiming that a limited budget likely caused a compression of the plot into eight episodes, but despite this, he praised the plot, CGI, voice acting and soundtrack, writing that "it really intentionally embraces the edgy random mid-2000s teen vibe, ..The whole show is really kind of a love letter not just to fandom, but that particular cringy dorky teenager version fandomhood".

Awards and nominations

In 2023 and 2024, the series earned a nomination for a

in the category of Best Animated Video and won it in the same category in the 2024 edition. It was also nominated for the Scripted (Series & Channels) category for the 2025 edition, later winning that category. Meanwhile, the voice actress for Uzi, Elsie Lovelock, won the 2023 edition of One Voice Awards UK in the Animation - Best Character Performance - Female category for her portrayal of the character. , - ! rowspan="2" scope="row" style="text-align:center;" , 2023 ,

, Animation (Series & Channels) Video , ''Murder Drones'' , , , - , One Voice Awards UK 2023 , Animation - Best Character Performance - Female , Elsie Lovelock - ''"Uzi - Murder Drones"'' , rowspan="3" , , - ! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" , 2024 ,

, Animation (Series & Channels) Video , ''Murder Drones'' , , - ! scope="row" style="text-align:center;" , 2025 ,

, Scripted (Series & Channels) , ''Murder Drones'' ,

Notes

References

Primary sources

In the text, these references are preceded by a double dagger (‡):

External links

* * * {{Glitch Productions Animated television series about robots Glitch Productions 2020s YouTube series 2021 web series debuts 2024 web series endings 2021 Australian television series debuts 2024 Australian television series endings Animated science fiction web series American animated web series Australian animated web series Australian English-language television shows Comedy horror web series Dystopian fiction Fiction about father–daughter relationships Independent animation Post-apocalyptic animated television series Television series about artificial intelligence Television series set in the 31st century Television series set on fictional planets Television series set in the future Web series about robots Works set on fictional planets Webby Award winners