''Genesis'' is an American animated

mini-series A miniseries or mini-series is a television series that tells a story in a predetermined, limited number of episodes. "Limited series" is another more recent US term which is sometimes used interchangeably. , the popularity of miniseries format h ...

of shorts created and produced by Blizzard Entertainment. Released on YouTube, the series is based on the '' Overwatch'' video game franchise and its characters. A three-part miniseries, ''Genesis'' premiered on July 6, 2023.

Premise

A company, Omnica Corporation, creates sentient robots called omnics, as a result of global research on artificial intelligence (AI). Technological advances over time lead to these omnics taking over many tasks, making life easier for the human population. Omnica later hires robotic prodigy Dr. Mina Liao to develop omnics further. These developments lead to the onset of the Omnic Crisis, a war between omnics and humans. In response to the Omnic Crisis, a global task force called Overwatch is formed.

Characters and cast

*Jeannie Bolet as Dr. Mina Liao * Fábio Azevedo as Lt. Gen. Ricardo Perez, a member of the Brazilian Armed Forces and UN Military Affairs *Camara Verne, a robotics engineer who worked with Dr. Mina Liao *Mathias Verne, a robotics engineer *Aurora, a sentient omnic created by Dr. Mina Liao's team at Omnica *Grant, an omnic author

Episodes

Development and release

Prior to ''Genesis'', Blizzard had released animated "

cinematic Cinematic describes anything related to ''cinema''. It may refer to: any movie updates, cinema nights, cinematic review Film-related * Cinematic cutscene, a sequence in a video game that is not interactive * Cinematic music, original music writte ...

" short films that often centered on the lore of a specific character. These shorts have been positively received from the game's fanbase and general viewers, with outlets comparing the production value of the shorts to that of Pixar's. Story elements are often noted by media outlets as being largely absent from the video games, with Blizzard having stated they intentionally sought to incorporate a transmedia storytelling method to the franchise, with such story elements previously disseminated through the aforementioned

animated shorts A short film is any motion picture that is short enough in running time not to be considered a feature film. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes ...

, but also through

comics a medium used to express ideas with images, often combined with text or other visual information. It typically the form of a sequence of panels of images. Textual devices such as speech balloons, captions, and onomatopoeia can indicate ...

and other literary media. Blizzard announced ''Genesis'' on June 30, 2023. The series employed an anime art style, with the series being one of the studio's first 2D animation projects to go "beyond" individual character backstories and instead focusing on the overarching narrative of the ''Overwatch'' franchise. ''Genesis'' is also presented as a documentary primarily from the human perspective. The series premiered on July 6, 2023, with the release of the first episode, "Dawn". It was released ahead of '' Overwatch 2''s "Invasion" update, which is set to introduce player versus player (PvP) modes and release in August 2023. The ''Genesis'' series also released shortly after Blizzard scrapped a long-time plan to implement a co-op player versus environment (PvE) mode that was intended to include many narrative elements; this PvE mode was often cited as a reason for Blizzard to release a sequel to '' Overwatch''. The second episode, "Innocence" was released on July 13. The third and final episode, "Rebirth", released on July 20.

Reception

Scott Duwe of '' The Daily Dot'' commented on the trailer for ''Genesis'', calling it "freakishly timely" due to the presence of "helpful AI that turned on humanity". Kenneth Shepard of ''

Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. History ...

'' wrote that he was "honestly surprised it took Blizzard this long to invest in an animated series," referencing how previous ''Overwatch'' animated projects told "disparate stories". Following the end of the series, Shepard additionally wrote that the series felt like a "glorified trailer", with its documentary formatting providing information on, but not exploration of the series' themes. Shepard opined that some parts of ''Genesis'' had a "gravitas" to them and also praised the "gorgeous animation and cinematography".

Notes

References

{{Overwatch 2020s American animated television series 2020s science fiction television series 2020s YouTube series 2023 web series debuts 2023 web series endings American animated web series Animated series based on video games American anime-influenced animated television series Overwatch Television series about artificial intelligence Television series about robots Television series set in the 2070s