Wot, no Data?
As far as I'm concerned the result will be null and void unless you put Data in the list of candidates.
Vulture Weekend brings you this poll, after Reg reader Cassie got in touch to tell us about a really neat timeline depicting the evolution of robots in film. We couldn't help but wonder what other Reg readers would think about the robots that made it onto the list, as well as the ones that didn't make the cut. Naturally, this …
Day of the Doctor was a film - and certainly a lot more fun than the Peter Cushing films.
(Although Peter Cushing would have been an interesting choice for a real, not human, Doctor.)
Edit: a valid argument above that they are in fact cyborgs - so probably not applicable here.
Daleks are not robotic. They are biological. They once fought a civil war against a faction that wished to improve themselved with cybernetic enhancements - they lost.
The visible pepperpot is essentially just a very advance wheelchair. With a built-in supercomputer, ray gun, sensory augments, communication system and force field. Oh, and it flies. But it's still a wheelchair.
Moon: "Gerty"
And those Gynoids from Ghost in the Shell.
And the military Boomers from Bubblegum Crisis.
Plus all those insectoid robots maintaining the Matrix. These were great (plus the fact they were probably agents who didn't get a job inside the Matrix because of a lack of human-oriented soft skills)
yeah some of the others were ex crew cyborgs but vincent was a dustbin with cartoon eyes painted on and not even humanoid. Full robot i say, although i think he does introduce himself with some badly chosen technical words...
Anyway who said this poll wasnt open to TV shows / cyborgs / androids ?
ok , i now see it has "Movie" in the title... and robot.... but thats just splitting 2 hairs. If theres a picture moving on my tv I'm not going to give acrap if its a movie or a tv show.
I see an early surge in votes for Marvin, but I'm sure most of those are people thinking of the alternate, non-film, versions of Marvin. IMHO while Marvin was the best bit of the film, that's really not saying much ...
Also remember at the time the TV series was made it was common for TV production to use 8mm or 16mm film and telecine to create broadcast video for TX or tape archive.
I don't know if H2G2 was filmed or not but I think it likely given when it was made.
16mm, Keef - 8mm was looked upon with horror as a pale domestic thing unable to meet broadcast quality requirements (yes, we had them, a long time ago.)
HHGTTG had the titles and effects filmed, in particular the book animations. I don't recall whether the shot scenes were studio (and therefore electronic) but the exterior stuff was almost certainly 16mm.
I'd ask around, but I've lost the contacts these days...
(Since the only possible icon would be a painful diode, and there isn't one, I shan't attach one.)
I see an early surge in votes for Marvin, but I'm sure most of those are people thinking of the alternate, non-film, versions of Marvin. IMHO while Marvin was the best bit of the film, that's really not saying much ...
Too true, that....
I was going to vote for Marvin thinking of the TV series, then I realised that it was the film version being talked about. I hated the film. So, I voted for Johnny 5.
What about DARYL? Data Analysing Robot Youth Lifeform.
..but firstly, thanks for the mention of Dewey, Huey and Louie from the old school sci-fi epic Silent Running
These were the first "robots" I ever really paid attention to, seeing the movie as a young kid, I was mesmerised at their abilities, fixing the ship, gardening, playing cards and attending to Bruce Dern's left, or was it right[?]* leg in the movie (*Blooper alert) What I really enjoyed about them was the fact they were "tape driven" which was quite freaky for a 70's sci-fi movie, it added that little "limited RAM realism" when I think about it..
There are many worthy contenders in the poll, all legends in their own way, all worthy "candidates" too, but there was a missing candidate, an old school chap just called "Robot" from the late 60's TV show "Lost in Space".. how did Robot get forgotten?
The robot that got my vote was Sonny from I Robot. Why? Because he was the perfect mixture of intelligence, ability and form. If I were to ever own a home/work robot/droid, the "Sonny" appearance would be ideal, not too human (unlike Ash/Alien), very functional, intelligent and strong.
Thanks ElReg, another great survey and some great memories of the many electro-mechanical sidekicks that make us sci-fi fans smile
Because I think based on when the movie was released, right at the dawn of the golden era of B movie sci fi, he set the tone for the "evil robot" for decades to come. Granted, he wasn't evil, but was purely a robot that did what he was told without any silly "3 laws" or feelings or anything like that.
Many other robots, along with 'not really robots but pretty much the same thing to most people' like HAL 9000 and the terminator that were true robots in that sense, followed in Gort's (rather large) footsteps. They simply followed orders/programming without the typical shlock of having a machine that wasn't programmed to think or feel do so because "love overcomes all".
While the three laws make a lot of sense, those aren't the robots we'll end up with. You can require it legally, but people will root/jailbreak their robot to get it to commit crimes for them, guaranteed.
Twiki, a proper positronic brained Asimov robot (at least according to the series which also had Crichton (who wouldn't make this list being TV only, and not in the feature length film pilot - I guess this is also the reason for the ommision of the similarly named Kryton).
Possibly splitting hairs here, but isn't Gypsy Danger a mech rather than a robot, because it is piloted by humans (like a tank or an aircraft is) rather than being autonomous?
Still, at least the poll didn't fall into the trap of including cyborgs which is what usually happens with things like this.
#1: A robot may not injure a 'funky motherfukka' or through inaction allow a 'funky motherfukka' to come to harm.
#2: A robot must obey the orders given to it by a 'funky motherfukka' except where such orders would conflict with the funk.
#3: A robot must protect its own funk as long as such protection does not conflict with any other 'funky motherfukkas' funk.
With this kind of wisdom i don't think we have anything to fear in the future of AI development.
If you're going to throw in Lore, you probably have to add B4 and Data's mom (Juliana Tainer). Or just say "Soong Type Androids."
Also...what abotu the Exocomps?" Or M-5? V'Ger? The Robotic Repair Space Station from Enterprise? Automate Personnel Units? Flint, Mudd and Sargon Type Androids? The various nanites? Hell, the ship's computer?
Roy Batty. How could you even begin such a list without a Blade Runner reference. I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time... like tears in rain... But until now I hadn't seen such ignorance in print. Time to die.
>artificial humans, not robots
Well, there is a spectrum. Could you not have a silicon 'barined' robot that used mammel-like systems such fibrous muscles and circulatory systems, or would you dub it an 'artificial badger'? The artificial people Ash and Bishop appear gooey and biological, but Bishop alludes to something like Asimov's 3 Laws.
Was it Brian Aldiss who wrote of prosthetic body parts for humans giving would-be robot builders 'off the shelf' components?
I've got to go with Marvin. Let's face it, if you give a robot intelligence and personality the only way it will turn out is with an existentially depressed robot or a homicidal maniac. I prefer the former.
"Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and they ask me to take you to the bridge. Call that job satisfaction, 'cause I don't. "
the name R.U.R. has an excellent pedigree
R.U.R. is the pedigree!
It's the play by Karel Čapek where the word "robot" first appeared (in 1920). The name stands for "Rossum's Universal Robots". Čapek seems to have imagined organic androids, rather than mechanical robots, though that may have been mainly to simplify stage presentation.
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OK, movie robots - the *immediate* thought is surely The Terminator movie franchise? Which model you pick is up to you (I'm partial to the T800 cos that's the model number of my new Samsung Tab S 10.5" :-) ), but it's frankly a complete joke that The Terminator has been ignored here.
1) The various Terminators should be in the list, especially since the poll seems to be about androids.
2) Fembots from Austin Powers deserve at least an honourable mention...
3) Surely the movie called "Android" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083557/) should be mentioned for a) title, b) androids interested in sex?
What happened to Vicky from the TV series many of us watched as kids? Or is the Register desk staffed with kids too young to know the 80's and know the 70's era robots only because the came from such massive hit movies?
Vicky was great, a little girl who is actually a robot, every week I would wait for the scheduled broadcast of that show and it was a major high-lite of my TV time.
Has to be the best introduction into philosophy a teen could hope for:
"I have… seen things you people wouldn't believe… Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those… moments… will be lost in time, like [small cough] tears… in… rain. Time… to die…"
Brilliant storysetting - in a few words "attack ships" "c-beam" and "Tannhäuser Gate" you get the setting. Tell-don't-show wonderfully done.
Always liked the phrase Tannhäuser Gate - mind you it did make a return in Gunbuster!, (there was an anime with an epic ending) which may have coloured my memory.
Hector – Saturn 5 : An organic brian makes it a cyborg
Stitchpunks – 9 : Installed with part of a human soul so it's cyborg
Gypsy Danger – Pacific Rim : Human operators, strictly speaking it's a waldo
Atom – Real Steel : again remotely operated by a human
Honorable Mentions for...
the Horus Probes sent to Darwin 4: Da Vinci, Newton & Balboa