Audiences may do a double-take upon reading the synopsis for the new movie starring Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun called Love Me. But it's true that Stewart plays a Buoy and Yeun plays a Satellite, and they fall in love while inhabiting an Earth devoid of all life. What's even more surprising is this hybrid animated and live-action film is moving, poignant and visually stunning. Love Me tells a surprising story about identity and that even the kind of human expression modern folks dismiss as vapid or valueless are, in fact, unexpectedly powerful.

In an interview with CBR, directors Andy and Sam Zuchero open up about why a love story about two robots couldn't be told without internet cat videos and reality vloggers. As if Love Me wasn't ambitious enough, Yeun and Stewart play the only characters in the film, unless one counts a completely simulated dog. The Buoy, played by Stewart, is an Earth-bound device floating in the ocean completely alone. The Satellite, played by Yeun, orbits the Earth looking for a lifeform. Technically, they are both artificial intelligence, but Love Me doesn't waste time with sci-fi explanations about the spark of sentience. The characters are able to access a massive digital record of human existence. With cinema, literature, art or music to choose from, the characters start their journey of self-discovery with social media. The below responses have been edited for clarity.

Andy Zuchero: It was a very analytical choice. We looked at what, when broken down, [makes up] the most content on the Internet. It is, you know, social media. Well, it's actually financial data, but that wasn't as dramatic. So we picked the [content] that were the most [prevalent]. We were trying to be very egalitarian about it, very, like, honest about what we're putting on the Internet.

And more so than A Tale of Two Cities, you're going to see a cat video. There are just more cat videos than [Victorian author Charles] Dickens' [books] out there. So, that's what the Internet is. It's a reflection of who we are. Or at least what we're drawn to.

Sam Zuchero: [It] also [reflects] how the [online] content is used to create technologies that then are implemented upon [users].

AZ: She discovers these two social media influencers, Deja and Liam [played by Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun, respectively]. And she begins [her life] as a lot of us do by trying to emulate an ideal that isn't the full scope of what it means to be a human being.

[Audiences] watch that all she's seeing is what these two characters are presenting of themselves online. And it's up to her to figure it out. Starting with this form [of human expression], who she actually is and what she can strip away. Ultimately sort of uncovering what's underneath that.

SZ: I mean. Is it even possible to see the real Deja and Lian online?

AZ: There are lots of pictures of me from probably my sixth birthday to my fourteenth birthday at Star Trek: TNG conventions. I actually shook hands with Brent Spiner, who played Data, of course. So, I feel like maybe that interpretation [of sentient AI] was my first touchstone of what artificial intelligence is.

Perhaps that's why some might say that this is a movie that humanizes artificial intelligence. Because of people like Gene Roddenberry and people like that who didn't perceive it as a malevolent force. Like, the AI computer on Star Trek [voiced by Majel Barrett-Rodenberry] as being instead one that is used for good.

SZ: It was a really amazing experience because we got to work with the actors, [Kristen Stewart] and Steven [Yeun], in motion capture suits. We got to shoot [the animated scenes] like a play. [Those performances] got us to a certain point. It gave us the intentions of Kristen and Steven, and the choices they were making as actors.

But then once you get the data, you then need to work with really talented artists, because the art of animation is a 100-year-old art that we've developed over all these years to interpret humanity. So, all their signals and signs that [actors] use. So, the [motion capture] technology got us to a certain point and allowed us to be able to animate. But, then ultimately, we had to work with really talented animators to bring [those scenes] home.

AZ: We're also really excited about the idea of making a movie where the actual medium of the movie was transforming as the characters transformed. And who they were dictated what you were seeing on screen.

SZ: Yeah, we were just interested in, like, playing with all of our perceptions. Of who we are and how much we can change. Because throughout history, throughout art, characters that change and that [undergo] morphosis are often dark or evil characters. And that's like something that we don't necessarily need and [a science fiction trope] that we could maybe break.

Love Me is in theaters now.