Don't Come Back

The episode "Be Right Back" introduces the idea that electronic dolls can take on the same personality and roles as a person who has died. The main character, Martha, loses her husband, Ash in a car accident and tries to keep his spirit alive by ordering Ash 2, a humanized robot. I believe that Martha's choice to engage with the communication app and to order Ash 2 was a mistake because it did not allow her to grieve properly. And since Ash 1 and 2 are not identically the same person, I saw her actions as just a quick rebound from her loss and not a morally right action to take after such a tragic loss. Knowing that Ash 2 was not completely the same as Ash 1 just made her more upset that she could not fully experience Ash 1's presence anymore. She tried filling that void and emptiness with Ash 2, which was sufficient for a while, but in the end, she became more and more disappointed with the differences between Ash 1 and Ash 2. She first noticed that Ash 1 and Ash 2 were different when she saw that Ash 2 did not have the same mole on his chest that Ash 1 had. This was just a minute physical detail, but Martha began noticing that Ash 2 had several behavioral differences than Ash 1 as well. In the cliff scene, she realizes that Ash 2 does not feel everything that Ash 1 would feel and does not react in the same way. She is ultimately feeling angry towards Ash 2 because he will never fully mimic Ash 1. No matter how much Ash 1 put on social media, the programmed robot can't perfectly portray the dead person. I think that because Martha was so upset by the loss, her emotions caused her to have really high expectations for Ash 2 and an unrealistic idea of what Ash 2 would be like. Like we talked about in class, using the app to communicate with Ash 2 was beneficial to the extent that she was able to tell him goodbye one last time and she was able to tell someone about her pregnancy, but Martha became so obsessed with Ash 2 that it began affecting her normal lifestyle and she became addicted to it. Her addiction just caused her to be more upset and feel even emptier because she realized that no matter how much she tried, Ash 2 would never be the exact same as Ash 1 and she would never feel the same towards Ash 2. In conclusion, Martha should not have used the app to grieve her loss because she was just using technology as a means to feel temporary happiness and to deny reality.