Netflix’s animated series “Bass x Machina” takes the real-life story of U.S. Marshal Bass Reeves as its starting point, then builds a fantastical steampunk Western around him. Created by LeSean Thomas and produced by Studio Mir, the show features Brian Tyree Henry as Bass and draws on history chiefly through Reeves’ life and the recent Civil War. Much of what follows is invention, including Bass’s robotic arm.
The series’ frontier is populated by mechanical bull suits, unusual weapons and characters who can control the elements. Bass, once an escaped slave and now a bounty hunter, carries the trauma of the war and the memory of a brutal experiment conducted by Confederate General Rivenbark. Even as he lives with his wife, Glory, and their growing family, racism shapes life in the West: Black bounties pay half as much as white ones.
A final bounty job sends Bass into the Badlands with Dana Starr, a young aspiring engineer searching for her missing uncle. Along the way, the series brings Native characters and communities into its version of the American frontier, including Bass’s friend Lighthorse and the Holy People, a group of mystics who control the elements. Etta, a Native inventor, resists outsiders’ assumptions about her technology, insisting that it is science rather than magic.
The story also asks what it means to enforce laws in a society that does not treat everyone equally. A robbery aboard a high-tech monorail with segregated cars sparks a dispute over whether to obey rules that were not made to protect people like Bass. Ahni, a lightning wielder with ties to his past, condemns him for refusing to join her violent campaign, while Glory warns him not to let anger change who he is.
Those conflicts sit alongside the show’s action and visual spectacle, from a building that grows legs to a confrontation with former Confederate killers. All six episodes of “Bass x Machina” are streaming on Netflix.
Sources: Variety.