The Suicide Squad and upcoming star of Late Night with the Devil David Dastmalchian has been tapped to star opposite The Northman‘s Alexander Skarsgård on Apple TV+’s science fiction series Murderbot. The show hails from Academy Award nominees and About a Boy filmmakers Chris and Paul Weitz.

Based on Martha Wells’ bestselling book series The Muderbot Diaries (which won Best Series at the Hugo Book Awards in 2021), this 10-episode series follows a self-hacking security android who is horrified by human emotion yet finds itself drawn to its vulnerable clients. Murderbot must hide its free will and complete a dangerous assignment, when all it really wants is to be left alone to watch futuristic soap operas and figure out its place in the universe. A relatable protagonist, then.

The series hails from Paramount Television Studios, and has the Weitz brothers aboard to showrun, write, direct, and produce. Also on executive producing duties are Andrew Miano for D3epth of Field, David S. Goyer and Keith Levine for Phantom Four, and Skarsgård. Martha Wells serves as consulting producer. 

Dastmalchian will next be seen in the aforementioned SXSW hit Late Night with the Devil, which releases in cinemas on March 22nd and on Shudder on April 19th. He is also on aboard Mike Flanagan’s newest Stephen King adaptation, The Life of Chuck.