Show Name: Chrome Katya
Creator: Dmitry Glukhovsky
Country of Origin: Russian Federation
Style: live action
Genre: post-apocalyptic science fiction
Years: 2017 - present
The result of deal between Dmitry Glukhovsky and Netflix,
Chrome Katya marked first forays into film-making by the famed
Metro 2033 author. As with Glukhovsky's other works,
Katya delivers commentary on modern society wrapped in the package of a science fiction drama. The show centers on a woman called Katerina Mironova, an agent working for the "Ministry of Anti-Terrorist Reconnaissances & Investigation of the Central Army" (which makes the acronym "М.A.T.P.И.Ц.A." (aka "MATRIX") in Russian), an international military organization which includes forces from Armenia, Russia, China, India and other nations. In the premier episode Katerina wakes up in an army hospital suffering from amnesia and discovers that discovers much of her body has been rebuilt with cybernetics. She is told that she was injured on her last M.A.T.R.I.X. assignment where she had been given the identity of "Fatima Kara-Murza" and tasked with infiltrating the Prophet's Whisper, a notorious terrorist organization operating out of the war-ravaged "Islamic Republic". When her cover was blown and she was about to be apprehended & tortured for information, Katya requested that M.A.T.R.I.X. attack the P.W. base with an airstrike to ensure she would die and not spill any secrets. A subsequent recovery team found her barely-alive body and brought her over to the hospital where she had been turned into a cyborg.
After Katya gets used to her new body and robotic abilities, she is sent back to the Islamic Republic under her "Fatima" alias (her cover was blow with only one of the P.W. cells and M.A.T.R.I.X. belives the rest of the organization doesn't know about her duplicitous nature) to continue the mission. As the story progresses though Katya discovers more questions than answers -- not only about the P.W. but about M.A.T.R.I.X. & her own past with them too.
Chrome Katya had garnered a following online that loves to speculate on the show and its themes (which include: manipulation of perception & opinion by various organizations, augmented reality and the natural flaws of human memories). The online community loves to debate where exactly the unnamed "Islamic Republic" is located (the show often uses stock footage from across the MENA region to depict wide or areal scenes in the "Republic" while many of the extras hired to represent the local inhabitants on the show are Central Asians, Georgians, Armenians or Azeri; speculations on the "true" nature of the I.R. range from it being Pakistan, an ex-Soviet -stan, oil-rich Azerbaijan, Chinese Xinjiang, Syria, Iran or even Russia itself during a civil war (this theory argues that Katya (and by extension the viewers too) is being fooled into believing that the war is taking place in some far-away land thanks to her built-in cybernetic
augmented reality display)). Another popular theory states that there
is no Katya -- that her real identity
is Fatima Kara-Murza and that she was captured by M.A.T.R.I.X., turned into a cyborg against her will and implanted with false memories & beliefs to turn her against her Prophet's Whisper compatriots.
Show Name: Joe Chill's Chilling Adventures
Creator: Bruce Timm
Country of Origin: U.S.A.
Style: 8 episode animated miniseries
Genre: superhero fiction
Years: 1999
