The plot of Netflix's The Electric State only adapts a few story details from the graphic novel of the same name, leaving the rest of the movie wholly original.
The Biggest Story Details from The Electric State
The Electric State arrived on Netflix on March 13. Based on the graphic novel by Simon Stålenhag, this adaptation follows Stranger Things' Millie Bobby Brown Bongiovi as Michelle as she searches for her brother.
Chris Pratt, an ex-soldier-turned-smuggler Keats, joins her as they travel through the Robot Exclusion Zone to stop Sentre.
Anthony and Joe Russo's The Electric State barely resembles its source material. It is no longer centered on a melancholy road trip through a decaying United States but an action romp in the aftermath of a robot war.
An Entirely New Backstory for The Electric State
In Netflix's The Electric State, Walt Disney developed robots in 1955 to promote the opening of his theme park before the world mass-produced and used them as the backbone of the global workforce.
Eventually, these robots would grow tired of servitude and rebel, demanding equal rights. Instead of a civil war between humans like the graphic novel, it's a war between humans and robots.
As the war tipped in favor of the machines, Sentre's Ethan Skates, played by Stanley Tucci, created the Neurocasters, winning the conflict by allowing humanity to control an army of drones remotely. A treaty was soon signed, forcing every robot into the Robot Exclusion Zone.
Michelle's Search for Her Brother
Brown-Bongiovi's Michelle is a ward of the state after her family dies in a car crash. A cynical and rebellious teen who refuses to use Neurocasters, even for classwork, eventually encounters a Kid Cosmo robot claiming to be her brother, Woody Norman's Christopher.
After running away with him, he convinces her that Sentre is holding his body at one of their facilities and that a doctor with glasses took him at the hospital after the crash. All the while, they're being tracked by Colonel Bradbury, played by The Mandalorian's Giancarlo Esposito, a prolific soldier during the height of the war.
The siblings secretly hitch a ride in the truck of Chris Pratt's Keats, a former staff sergeant during the war, and his robot partner Herman, voiced by an unrecognizable Anthony Mackie. After sneaking into Keats' bunker connected to the Robot Exclusion Zone, the smuggler catches the two.
Before Keats can kick Michelle and her brother out and dissuade them from venturing into the robot-infested desert, they're all driven out by Bradbury's drone and trapped within the zone's walls.
Meeting Mr. Peanut & Sentre's Pursuit
Avoiding scavenger bots, the four traverse the Robot Exclusion Zone until they come across a mall. However, robots occupying the mall quickly capture the group. The robots bring them before their leader, an animatronic Mr. Peanut, who was almost Kool-Aid Man instead, voiced by Woody Harrelson.
Mr. Peanut reveals that Loki's Ke Huy Quan is the doctor with glasses, Dr. Amherst, who told Michelle Christopher didn't survive. After some convincing, Mr. Peanut and a troop of other robots help Michelle reach this doctor in an abandoned amusement park infested with scavenger bots.
Dr. Amherst tells Michelle that he and the rest of Sentre recognized that her comatose brother was special and took him to use his brain to link the Neurocasters and drones. Michelle professes that they should have pulled the plug instead, but Dr. Amherst revealed that her brother woke up from his coma.
Bradbury soon arrives and captures Christopher, but not before Ethan Skates kills Dr. Amherst, to Bradbury's shame. He even allows Michelle to escape, only for her and the rest of the gang to return to the mall destroyed, ambushed by Sentre while they were away.
To War One Last Time
Michelle is at her lowest until she gets a pep talk from Keats that helps invigorate her resolve to save her brother. She goes to the robot, PC, whom Dr. Amherst saved and repaired with his voice, for access codes to leave the Robot Exclusion Zone and the Sentre facility holding her brother.
However, PC warns Michelle that removing her brother from Sentre would cause a system failure with the Neurocasters. Something that only pushes her desire to free him. An injured Mr. Peanut rejects fighting back, but Michelle convinces him that fighting is their only option.
Keats and Herman mount a frontal assault, distracting Sentre enough for Michelle and PC to sneak into the facility using his access codes. Just as Keats and Herman are overwhelmed, Mr. Peanut and the rest of the robot cavalry arrive to help.
As the battle tips in the favor of Sentre, Bradbury saves Mr. Peanut from being scrap, seeing Ethan Skates as even less human than a robot. As Mr. Peanut confronts Skates, Michelle puts on a Neurocaster to speak to her still comatose brother.
Pulling the Plug
Christopher tells Michelle that Sentre's bond is symbiotic, meaning he'll die with them if he's separated from them. The only solution is for Michelle to metaphorically pull the plug.
She mournfully does as her brother asks, ending Sentre's reign once and for all as their drones fall to the ground. Ethan Skates is arrested, Sentre's reputation is destroyed, and protests begin to mount in support of robots.
Michelle gives a speech, televised to the world, about how people will have to live on without the escape of the Neurocaster and that they'll have to find human connection again in the real world. However, if they're still alone, she invites them to the Robot Exclusion Zone to build a new world together.
Christopher's Survival
The movie ends with the Kid Cosmic robot Christopher had inhabited being thrown away into a garbage dump, only to turn back on, suggesting either the original consciousness of the machine remained or that Christopher survived.
While Christopher had told Michelle that his consciousness couldn't be moved to another robot, it wasn't explicit that he could return to the Kid Cosmic robot. Since Michelle's broadcast indicates that she'll be waiting in the Robot Exclusion Zone, Christopher has a long journey ahead.
The Electric State is streaming on Netflix.
