The Legion of Silly Dinosaurs: Dinobots Part 3???

 

It's the last day of the month, and I remembered that I had for the very first time missed an installment of this feature last month. So, I thought over what I had backlogged for a post. That brought me to the "dinobot" category, which got its own post a while back, plus a follow-up for quite possibly the worst toy I have reviewed in the entire history of this feature that I bought new. (And as a reminder, I started with the patchisaurs...) I still had to think over how much I had that I hadn't covered before, which still left me with the two items I usually aim for as a minimum. As a bonus, they had something more in common: They are both incarnations of an authorized Transformers subline, specifically a bot who had the distinction of being possibly the most annoying character in the (animated) Transformers movie. Without further ado, here's Grimlock!

Now this is, to my best recollection, the more recent acquisition of the pair featured here. It's one of a number of specimens I have sighted in the last two or three years that seem to form their own line. The unifying features are that they are all based on G1 characters (or versions thereof), and are all quite large despite a low price for an authorized Transformer. I finally bought this guy at a sale price to see if it was worth buying more. Here's a couple pics to give an idea of what we're dealing with.

"I may look like I'm only a T. rex made of metal, but I'm really also... a far less threatening humanoid?"

So, the first thing I have to say is that I actually like the underlying idea here. The very plastic they're made of screams cheap, and close examination and handling will show them to be even more so than they might appear in my pics. The upside is, they are much sturdier and more robust than their new or old counterparts of any size or price. As a bonus, they actually do a good job covering both the collectible and actual toy markets. If you want 1980s nostalgia, it's a good return for the money. If you want something to give to a kid, it won't be in pieces within a day. The real problem is, it demonstrates all the worst qualities that a G1 Transformer could have. It's awkward, overcomplicated and just plain clunky,  especially in the alt mode that is supposed to be the selling point. Here's one more closeup to show what I mean, with the second specimen for comparison.

Now for the second dino/ bot, I got him as another already cheap item at a reduced price, in a $5-10 range not much lower than what I got the big one for. What I got is in hindsight more streamlined and attractive than the one I got later. A few pics will show, however, that it shares most if not all of the same underlying problems.

"Small legs, smaller arms, what could possibly go wrong?"

What will be especially conspicuous are the stumpy legs of the dino mode. It is of further note that both designs have the tail of the dino folding back to form the legs of the humanoid bot, which is far from the most ungainly transformation step (at least the head isn't literally coming out of the pelvis...), but still a complication for both modes. A unique problem is that there is a very strange joint connecting the rib cage and head of the dino to the rest of the body (visible as the black panel on the back), which has repeatedly separated entirely when I do this. Here's a sequence to show this is supposed to work.

Hup, hup...

So far, so good...

Ta da!!!

Hmm...

Okay, this is not optimal.

Of course, the underlying problem is, what does a dino bot really do? In terms of camouflage, this is perhaps the single most egregious case of the transformer concept defeating itself. (Then again, there's also the one "disguised" as a flying saucer.) An obviously metal dino isn't really disguised as anything, which the authorized Dinobots did effectively admit. If you did make it look like an organic dinosaur (the simplest explanation for whatever the Hell the Walmart cyborg dino was), then it's still something regular humans will know is "supposed" to have been extinct for many millions of years. By comparison, even the Changeables disguised as things people eat make marginally more sense. (And, as I ranted in the Gobots movie review, looking like actual rocks would be close to ideal.) Then, even with disguise out of the picture, there's still the question of how the transformation improves on what you already have with the dinosaur, especially an already bipedal one like a tyrannosaur. A carnosaur has massive jaws, two arms and two legs that can all be further modified in size and functions. A humanoid robot has two arms and two legs. The real answer is that robot dinosaurs were both of the things '80s kids loved, and a Transformer that doesn't transform would have been admitting the jig was up.

And that brings us back around to the big bot. If you were wondering why I didn't show the humanoid bot before, the simple answer is, he's just too big to shoot without reorienting the camera. So, I waited till the end to try a pic, which required further experimentation with lighting on the Couch Mark 2. Here's the big guy with mini Grimlock, the reissue stego bot, the Marx Japanese officer and the Truckstop Queen. Behold, ye mighty, and despair!

That's all for now, more to come!

Robot Revolution: The one where the robot stomps Mexico

 

 

Title: Kronos

What Year?: 1957

Classification: Prototype/ Mashup

Rating: That’s Good! (4/4)

 

With this review, I’m back for more robot mayhem. After sacrilegiously starting with a movie still in theaters, I decided it was time to go the other way and look at an entry earlier than my usual 1970s-‘80s timeframe. That presented me with a wealth of material, but also some strange blind spots, especially when it came to the “killer robot” theme. That brought me to one particular film that has all the hallmarks that would usually draw my attention: Obscure, strange, difficult to classify and as it happens, quite good. I present Kronos, the definitive killer robot film of the B-movie era that very few seem to have actually heard of.

Our story begins with a mysterious object descending to Earth, observed by two scientists. When the object lands in Mexico, the proper authorities send them to investigate, unaware that one of them has been possessed by the energies of the strange object. Our hero, the younger and handsomer doctor Leslie Gaskell, goes south of the border with his spunky lady friend and a couple assistants who do the actual work. They discover a Godzilla-sized robot that is disconcertingly uninterested in the usual death and destruction. Instead, it mostly sits there, ignoring any attack and occasionally and incidentally flattening small swaths of civilization when it lurches from place to place.  In fact, it is a probe sent by an unknown civilization to absorb Earth’s energy supply by passive accumulation. To stop it, the doctor and his love interest must overcome the robot and the enemy within. But the Earth may already be doomed when the military feeds the enemy with an atomic bomb!

Kronos was a 1957 film by German director Kurt Neumann, produced by Regal Films, a company affiliated with B-movie produce Robert Lippert. The film’s story was credited to Irving Block, who also contributed to the film’s visual effects. Filming was reportedly completed within 3 weeks in early 1957. The film starred B-movie regular Jeff Morrow as Dr. Gaskell and Barbara Lawrence as the love interest Vera, with John Emery as the double agent Dr. Culver. The film received favorable reviews from contemporary critics as a superior low-budget science fiction film, and gained a following as one of the best genre films of the 1950s. Neumann followed the film with The Fly, released shortly before his death in 1958.

For the broader context, what really intrigued me going into this review was the counterintuitive role of the robot in 1950s science fiction films. On consideration, the subject of robotics and AI at this time offer an unusual case of cinema matching or even getting ahead of printed genre works. By the mid-‘50s, rebellious or purposefully warlike robots were no longer the rule or even necessarily a “norm”. In their place came the likes of Robby the Robot, who was if not entirely non-threatening at least clearly devoted to serving and defending his owners. The downside to this was that these robots usually got no further than supporting cast in their own stories. Like the zombie of the previous decades (see I Walked With A Zombie and for that matter my Revenant Review ebook), the robot was literally subordinate to its master/ creator, rarely if ever granted autonomy or motivation beyond killing the villain for the hero’s convenience. With all that in mind, the present film stood out very strongly, and as I have been saying, it had already been on my radar as an exceptionally good film for its own or any other time.

Moving forward, the obvious points to get out of the way all come down to the fact that this is a “formulaic” film that shows why the formula worked in the first place. Everything here is what you would expect to find, done anywhere between average and unusually good: The stoic/ generic authority-figure hero; the technobabble; the plans that either succeed immediately or fail never to be tried again; and the love interest who gets into just enough trouble to need rescuing. It is in the lady where the film comes closest to finding its own path. Sure, she doesn’t do much beyond setting up a confrontation between the hero and the possessed traitor. (Sorry, the statute of limitations on spoiler warnings expires at 50 years…) Still, there’s certainly no overt condescension in how she is treated or portrayed. If it comes to that, she does get through most of the film without falling into any more or less peril than the rest of the cast. Most intriguingly, the romance arc does show her willing and able to say what she wants, which I will get back to.

Meanwhile, what certainly is unique is the utterly implacable “monster”. Whether classified as bot, alien invader or kaiju, this antagonist earns its place in the highest ranks of B-movie creations. On paper, it’s so non-threatening that a case can be made that it would go away if simply left alone (intriguing enough in itself). When the giant is on-screen, however, any objections become moot. This truly looks as huge and menacing as it is meant to be. That it tends to ignore humanity quickly becomes unnerving in its own right, with a further note of indignity often missing in more conventional alien invasion spectacles. When the damn thing does move, there is no doubt that it is truly unstoppable. What gets the bonus is a slowly revealed cunning, which builds to a real payoff when it turns the usual nuclear counterattack to its own advantage. The movie never really resolves if this is by its own intelligence or the direction of its unseen masters. The difference from the usual subordinate killbot is that there are no easy or certain answers, only the blank wall of the unknown and unknowable. Of course, one more honorable mention is in order for the double agent, every bit as inscrutable as his master.

That leaves the “one scene”, and there was one I was definitely going to come back to. A little past the 30-minute mark, we find the hero and his lady friend running ashore at the end of a romp in the surf. They settle down to kiss. Things get really interesting when the lady says, “Dr. Gaskell, will you marry me?” What I went back to sort out was the doctor’s reply, which turned out to be, “Can you cook?” Of course, it’s clearly supposed to be obvious that they are both joking, which on consideration makes the entire exchange all the more intriguing. They go on with a playful yet thoughtful exchange about gender roles. Just when everything is settling down to above-average routine, the doctor quite casually admits making the “biggest boner” in science. Before one can try to sort out the etymology and nuance on that one, a light mercifully appears on the horizon. In the midst of that, the two lesser scientists race in, clearly indicating that they have been within sight and hearing. It’s everything you would expect from a “good” B-movie: It’s dated, it’s horrifying, and it’s smart enough to know it.

In closing, what I come back to is how I really feel about 1950s science fiction films. In the course of my reviews, I’ve been very sparing with the “B movie” era and genre(s). It’s been easy to say that they have simply been outside my areas of interest. (See my Plan 9 review way back when, which is also in an ebook.) But the underlying reality is that these were never a big part of my formative pop culture experiences. Sure, I had heard of the major ones, and I saw several of the very best and worst at a fairly early date. For me, however, I just didn’t get interested enough to put in the time and money it would have cost  to undertake a proper exploration in the days before online shopping and streaming, and to a significant extent, I never caught up. I would like to think that the upside is that I was able to go in with a truly neutral  perspective. I’m not nostalgic about the era, and I wasn’t one of the ones laughing at the low budgets and “outdated” effects (which, suppressed rant, were usually outmoded or rock-bottom cheap at the time) either. It’s the right perspective to appreciate the ones that truly rise above the rest. In those terms, the present film is a clever and creative offering that can hold its own against “classics” with actual budgets (see When Worlds Collide). That’s tribute enough for a film that had to wait a long time to get its due. With that, I can finish with a salute. Not bad, for a human.

Fiction: The Space Guys Adventure, Part 18!

 

It's the end of the weekend, and all I had is more Space Guys. This part is the kind of thing that usually overloads my stories. As usual, the table of contents is at the end.

The voyage continued. Uranus grew larger in the portholes, without a perceptible drift to the left or right. The grim feeling of the sideways planet and its rings mounted. The crew grew all the more restless, including the married couples. Arguments could be heard from behind partitions that were as often as not left open. Sometimes, they were quite audible even when the partitions were closed. Donald and Anatasia were the loudest and most frequent offenders. Alek remained happy with her math, and Jason was happy enough with his books except when Donald became unusually annoying.  He grew especially irritated when the engineer would begin repeating a strange pronunciation the planet’s name as if it was a joke in itself, usually at least once a day. A time came when Jason finally opened a partition he had pointedly shut. “It’s simple,” he said. “Yurr-ah-nuss. Is that so hard?” Donald just laughed as he closed the partition again.

“You are sweet,” Alek said.

 

A ceremonial occasion came when the captain announced a change among the pilots. “Command has decided that there is a need for additional leadership among the pilots,” he said. “To that end, they have approved the field commission of 2 new officers. In light of the promotion, we will issue two additional sidearms, strictly as a reflection of rank, of course.” Everyone laughed; only the captain looked amused. Jason smiled as Jax accepted his sidearm. He was less pleased when the second was given to Jackie, whom the captain called by his legal name of Jonathan Fitzhugh.

“You slipped a bit, farmboy,” Moxon said in a stage whisper. “Don’t worry; you’re still the genius’s favorite. That counts for something.” He stepped to the front, followed by Harrison and the decidedly reserved Sergeant Lazarevic. He held up a survival carbine from the ship’s hold. “Just so nobody else feels left out, we’re starting weapons training!”

Moxon started with a demonstration of his sidearm. The only thing new came when he connected a paddle-like charging holster as a stock for rapid fire. He promptly drilled Sparky the Squirrel between the eyes with a three-shot burst. He then unlimbered a larger weapon that looked vaguely like a Wild West rifle. “This is a Tesla carbine based on the same technology,” he said. “We have approval from Command to issue them to pilots, senior crew, and unescorted personnel on the basis of need. They have three settings. The first is a stun charge. The second is a cutting beam, effective to 400 meters. The third is a plasma bolt, like ball lightning. We don’t mess with that.” Of course, the gathered crew clamored for a demonstration of the third setting. They were given a video of a fist-sized bolt blowing a hole in an airlock.

Lazarevic and two of her troopers came forward to demonstrate their primary weapon, a rifle that could be fitted with a bayonet or a grenade launcher cup. “This is a Carl Gustaf Hero Sniper 8mm medium rifle, the most powerful semi-automatic firearm in the world,” she said. She handed the captain a specimen that had been stripped of a firing pin, which was soon passed around. “It is manufactured in Sweden to the specifications of the Patriotic Army. It generates a muzzle energy of up to 4400 kilojoules. It would be light for an elephant. Against any other target, it is lethal at 600 meters range. Of course, we expect to do more with that 3.7cm projector. It will fire all standard 2-gauge pyrotechnics, demolition and gas shells. With further modifications, it can launch an over-caliber 5cm engineering rocket. That can carry a cable, a heavy demolition charge or an anti-tank warhead. I don’t think we brought one of those along.” That drew laughs, some nervous.

Finally, she drew a revolver, clearly not for sharing. “Now this is a Nagant 95 revolver, over 100 years old and kicking,” she said. She held up a cartridge that looked like a blank. She turned it, revealing a slug seated deep in the casing. “It’s the first vacuum-sealed sidearm. The cylinder holds seven shots. They offered me a sidearm. I went with tradition.”

Donald raised a hand. “Excuse me, maybe I don’t understand,” he said. “It was a big deal when they thought they found protobacteria on Titan. So what do they expect you to use this stuff on? Heinz Himmelmann?”

The sergeant smiled. “They said we were to be prepared for the unknown,” she said. “If anyone did know, I suppose it would be classified.”

Harrison presented their more potentially lethal survival gear, starting with an assortment of knives. The largest looked like a sawed-off machete, with a leaf-shaped blade that swept forward.  Another looked less like a knife than an axe head repurposed as a knuckleduster. “The Martian crew may recognize these,” Harrison said. “This is a K20 survival knife. In the Corps, we called it a half-kukri, or of course, half-cocked for short.” He pointed to the knuckleduster. “And this is a Wusthof Esquimaux multi-purpose tool, based on the native ulu blade. A lot of people don’t know it wasn’t standard issue. They finally changed that for this mission. I understand this one was made on Mars. The manufacturer finally licensed it out, because Gaia couldn’t ship enough to meet demand.”

He got to the 2.6cm flare guns. They bore a range of attachments and modifications, including a version with a shoulder stock and what looked like a harpoon coming out of the muzzle. “These are 4-gauge survival projectors,” he said. “It’s partly interchangeable with the 3.7mm launcher, but it’s best not to fiddle either way. The standard rounds are flares and light percussive charges. There are shot cartridges available. Don’t worry about them. The carbine version will fire a range of over-caliber shells up to 7.5 cm, including the line-thrower you see here.”

Moxon stepped forward again. “I offered to do an extra demonstration,” he said. He picked up the half-K and the ulu. “Of course, these are issued to you for peaceful purposes as part of your duties as an exploration mission. However, there may be occasion to use them for other purposes. I have authorization to give lessons on their use in combat.” Donald raised his hand again, despite Anastasia's best efforts to discourage him. Moxon looked at him. “Are you volunteering?”

“Just another question,” the engineer said. “Before you teach us about knives, couldn’t you tell us something about that scar? Just, you know, to give us an idea of your qualifications?”

Moxon turned his head, bringing the scar on the left side of his face into stark relief. For the first time Jason could recall, he exposed his teeth as he smiled. “You should have seen the other guy,” he said. “So, would anyone like to take part in a demonstration.

“I will,” Jason said. “I use an ulu in the kitchen at home.”

Moxon smiled. “Experience never hurts,” he said. “Go ahead, show how you’d use it back home to start things off.” Jason stepped forward and accepted the native blade. He idly pictured driving the Eskimo blade into his mouth.

The demonstration proceeded without further comment. Jason used the ulu as the tool it was meant to be, chopping and dicing a radish and a piece of canned ham. When he was offered a block of ice, he carved it into the shape of a bear. That drew a cheer from Alek. “Oh, you are so coming to my bunk tonight,” she said. Moxon promptly chopped the same block in two with the half-K.

They took turns with the larger blade. Jason flayed a fish. Moxon split a piece of bamboo the long way. Jason used it to open a second tin of ham. Finally, the officer said, “Say, ever try combat moves?”

“On Mars, they teach us never to use a weapon on anyone,” Jason answered. “But we have a guy from Edo who teaches kukrijitsu. He said I was the best in his class.” Moxon handed him the knife and drew another.

They both practiced moves individually, then proceeded to sparring with sheathed blades. It became evident that Jason was faster, but not quite enough to outmatch Moxon’s skill. “The instructor who taught me said one thing before anything else,” Moxon said as he intercepted Jason’s blade a third time. “He said it was from Mark Twain. `The world’s best swordsman doesn’t fear the second best swordsman, he fears the worst, because he already knows what the second best is going to do…’”

“Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur’s Court,” Jason said. “My instructor quoted it, too. `The person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before…’” He caught Moxon’s wrist with the trailing edge of his blade. “I only ever got about halfway through.”

Moxon gave his barking laugh. “It’s not exactly true, though,” he said to the onlookers. “People who don’t know anything about edged weapons usually try one or two, maybe three things before anything else. The real trouble is, they don’t know how to hide what they’re going to do, or make it look like they’re going to do something else. If they try it at all, they usually do it with their hands, when the real tells are in the eyes…” Jason thought of unsheathing the knife and driving it into his face. Instead, he swung at Moxon’s neck. He felt a surge of euphoric surprise as the blade connected… just before the point of the officer’s trench knife tapped his throat. Moxon grinned again. “Of course, Mr. Freeman is a long way from the worst.”

 

That very night, Jason and Alek had what they both agreed to be their most memorable encounter to that time and for some time after. A while later, Jason emerged from the partition around her cabin, leaving Alek lying face down with a sheet draped indifferently over her hips. By then, she had put on her lower undergarment, but any bystander would have seen only her completely bare upper back. Jason froze in mid-step at the sight of Moxon playing the target game. As the other man turned, he found that he felt much as he had the time he had got up in the night at home and discovered the airlock had vented while they slept.

“Sorry,” Jason said instinctively.

“Don’t be,” Moxon said. “I remembered I had left a few things here, so I came back.” Jason saw that the box from the closet was indeed at his feet. “I decided to give the game another go while I was here. As a matter of fact, I just broke my high score.”

“I’ll talk to the captain, I’m sure he will move the cabinet wherever you want,” Jason said. In his peripheral vision, he could see Alek squirm as she tried to look over her shoulder without exposing any more of herself.

“Oh, there’s no need for that,” Moxon said. “Anyway, we’re all friends here, aren’t we?”

“Jason,” Alek said. When he looked, he found her shaking her head almost violently. “I want him to go. Make him go.”

“I’m here with my wife,” Jason said. “She wants you to leave.”

“Oh, I won’t make any trouble,” Moxon said. “I’m not that kind. She knows that. I’m not the other kind, either.”

Alek finally spoke directly. “I don’t no care,” she said. “Go.”

The officer only smiled. “What, are you making that an order?”

“If you don’t, I can call my people back home,” Alek said in her flattest tone. “You would be surprised what they can do!”

Jason shut the partition. “Was there something you needed?” he said.

“As a matter of fact,” Moxon said, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”

“About what?” Jason asked cautiously.

“There was talk that you were talking about, let’s say, history,” Moxon said. “Especially with Mr. Fitzhugh.”

“Was I not supposed to?” Jason said.

“To be honest, there are rules, as far as what goes back to Gaia,” the officer said. “There are things the Union designates `sensitive’, and the press and the networks mostly set their own guidelines so the Fed and the Administration don’t need to get involved. The ones people know about are the morals codes; I gather a few people talked to you about that. There’s also ones for religious, racial and ethnic relations. They were modelled on rules from Jugoslavia. Those are the ones that are followed most strictly. It’s not that people can’t talk about things, of course, on the air or in print or anywhere else. It’s just a matter of doing it the right way at the right places. The same goes with talking about it. Always think about how you ask, who you’re talking to, and especially where you are. For now, I’d say it’s better to talk to me or Yates. Harrison could tell you quite a bit, at that.”

“Okay, thanks for telling me,” Jason said. “Is there anything you wanted to tell me?”

“I was in the Intervention,” Moxon said. “I wasn’t at Baton Rouge, my team was further north. It went a long way north. I know, your father was, too. Just so it’s understood, we aren’t the ones who talk.”

Jason looked at him with real respect. “I can understand that,” he said. “Now, please go.”

 “No problem,” Moxon said. “I know when youngsters need privacy.” He walked out, carrying the box with him. Jason untensed as the steps receded. He opened the cabinet, and froze again.

On the top shelf, just above the line of sight for anyone but him, lay the flame knife from Moxon’s box.

Table of contents

Part 1. The demo!

Part 2. The villain!

Part 3. The world-building!

Part 4. The romance!

Part 5. The killer robot!

Part 6: The shuttle ride!

Part 7: Alternate universe pop culture!

Part 8: The launch!

Part 9: The girl talk!

Part 10: The domestic disturbance!!!

Part 11: The Space Nazis!!!

Part 12: The inevitable geography lesson!

Part 13: The wedding!!!

Part 14:  The spicy chapter!

Part 15: The bad guy backstory!

Part 16: The Dinner!

Part 17: The alternate history!

Robot Revolution: The one with a robot and Frank

 

 

Title: Robot And Frank

What Year?: 2012

Classification: Mashup

Rating: That’s Good! (4/4)

 

In the course of my reviews, the running theme has been that I don’t do “new”. For the most part, this really gives the wrong impression of my actual viewing habits. The kinds of movies I review are not necessarily representative of the movies I watch. Among other things, I do see plenty of movies that are “new”, and even many that are popular. The true flip side is that I seem to have an inerrant homing instinct for movies that are either openly dismissed in their time or simply ignored and forgotten thereafter. This is pronounced enough that my pop culture experience can feel like living an alternate universe, where the films I consider admirable and outright astonishing get so little discussion I might doubt their existence if I wasn’t me. For my second review of this brand-new feature, I’m going with one of the more notable if not egregious examples. I present Robot And Frank, nothing less than the very best of the niche genre of the robot movie, and it does indeed have Frank.

Our story begins with an introduction to Frank, an old man who picks locks and shoplifts for fun but has trouble keeping track of whether his milk is expired.  His grown children are concerned enough that his son brings in the Robot, a specialized butler/ caregiver AI that tries to take charge of the house. At first, Frank agrees with his technophobic daughter, who wants the machine returned or scrapped, but the man and AI reach an understanding as its regime of healthy eating and structured routines restore his mind. Along the way, we learn that Frank isn’t just a petty kleptomaniac, but a master cat burglar, and the robot is flexible enough to help when his small-time antics nearly get him caught. As his faculties return, he strikes up a romance with a librarian who introduces him to her wealthiest patrons. It’s enough to get him interested in a return to the big time. He sets out on one last heist, with Robot on board. But getting the loot proves to be the easiest part, and the bot may be the one who pays the ultimate price!

Robot And Frank was a 2012 science fiction/ drama by first-time director Jake Schreier. The film was based on a script by Christopher Ford, reportedly conceived in 2002. The film starred Frank Langella (see Masters of the Universe) and Peter Sarsgaard as the voice of Robot, with James Marsden and Liv Tyler as Frank’s children Hunter and Madison. The Robot was a practical effect created by Alterian, Inc. The film premiered at the Sundance Festival in January 2012, followed by a limited theatrical release in August. It earned a reported box office of $4.9 million, roughly twice its $2.5M budget. Critical reviews were positive. The film has been available on digital platforms, at one point including streaming on Netflix.

For my experiences, this was a movie I’m sure I first encountered on Netflix, probably at 9 PM or later, after seeing a positive review. It immediately impressed me as a good example of what “mainstream” talent can bring to a genre film, and one of the best robot movies within the current millennium at least. Over time, my thoughts haven’t changed, but there has been a growing frustration factor as it has become clear that this wasn’t on its way to being a classic, “cult” or otherwise. Now, it’s not completely obscure (see Two Evil Eyes); I do meet people who have seen and liked it, when I mention it. What I haven’t seen is genre critics and fans evaluating it as a definitive modern treatment of robotics and artificial intelligence that all others should at least examine, which is by all means the level where it belongs.

Moving forward, the obvious thing to say in hindsight is that it’s not hard to see why this failed to catch on in either genre or “mainstream” circles. The “star” talent here kind of cancels itself out, with the exceptions of Tyler, who makes an impression just for looking her age (I know, 10 years ago…), and Jeremy Strong as the obnoxious target of the heist. Similarly, the “thoughtful” story and its themes of aging and mortality, all of which follow paths that would be well-worn for the arthouse scene where the film would have made its first appearance. Fortunately, this is a case where the actual merits of the film make the obvious criticisms moot, especially when it comes to Langella’s performance. He is simply superb, and I must say again that he lives down his reputation as a so-bad-it’s-good ham. If anything, his greatest strength is conveying the sense a character whose strongest tendencies are held in check, in this case by his harrowingly credible disabilities. What will ring true for those with experience is that there is never a “switch” from good to evil. At his lowest moment, conspicuously his spiteful antics at a store that replaced a favorite restaurant, there is still cunning beneath the surface, and a resentment of society that might be triggered by a changing world or might have been there all along. Once his faculties return, it becomes clear that he is no thief with a heart of gold, yet like the most intriguing outlaws, he is constrained by a minimum standard of morality and a skewed sense of fair play.

That brings us to Robot, and what is most noteworthy is that the story is driven by the AI’s relationship with the human lead. The bot is strikingly functional, almost but not quite “retro”, enough that one might debate if it should be counted as an “effect” at all. Sarsgaard’s voice work is perfect, never “robotic” yet rarely if ever emotional. There’s a certain level of “meta” in his repeated insistence that he is not a “person”, which notably never draws Frank into argument or debate beyond the off-hand comment, “Stop telling me you don’t exist.” What becomes fascinating and increasingly horrifying is the Robot’s largely unexplained descent into crime. I find it akin to nothing so much as the strange story “Fondly Fahrenheit” by Alfred Bester, albeit without a body count. As in Bester’s tale, the straightforward explanation is that Frank’s mental deterioration and already gray-area morals have somehow corrupted the AI. The equally unsettling alternative is that the bot is simply committed to aiding Frank in his recovery at all costs, even as it becomes increasingly clear that restoring his old self is anything but desirable. It all serves to set up the moral dilemma of the finale, the outcome of which is never in doubt. As with many things here, the fact that it is predictable in theory does not diminish its effectiveness in execution. There is a further payoff in Robot’s telegraphed threat to self-destruct, matched by a perfectly indifferent response from Marsden.

That leaves the “one scene”, and I’m going with the one that does the most to define the film’s wider assumed universe. At a gathering of the library’s patrons, Frank and Robot encounter another AI, previously introduced by the librarian (I know, Susan Sarandon) as Mr. Darcy, in service at the small-town library and who knows where and for how long before that. Compared to Robot, Darcy is a pitiful and subtly puzzling anachronism, resembling a 1980’s vintage desktop computer on wheels and quite possibly similar in computing power. The two humans try to get the two AI units to interact, with the clear expectation that this will be a charming diversion. At first, the robots merely identify each other by manufacturer and model, with the significant implication that Darcy’s files have been updated often enough to recognize a more advanced machine. When they are still pressured to be social, they offer a hilariously anticlimactic exchange that, as usual, is better seen than described. What continues to fascinate me almost to distraction is Mr. Darcy. He/ it really does “look” like something that could have been made in the 1980s, complete with enough evident wear and tear that it truly might be decades old. So, is this a further future than most of the tech would suggest? Or have we wandered into a millennial equivalent of a steampunk universe, where the dreams of 1950s-‘60s sci fi became reality at some point further back? It’s the kind of question that’s clearly thinking further than the filmmakers did, and this is one time that over-analysis only adds to the fun.

In closing, all I can really add is how I would stack this movie against others I have either reviewed elsewhere or considered for this feature. I definitely consider it superior to M3GAN. In fact, it’s a major reason I didn’t rate that one even higher than I did, something I would have made explicit if I didn’t prefer to avoid name-dropping films I might review later. By the same “rules”, I’m not yet ready to say how I would compare it to certain other robot/ AI films of the last decade. (I genuinely haven’t decided on the most prominent example, which means I will probably get to it.) Its greatest significance is that proves the recent successes of the robot (sub)genre have been not just a revival, but a true evolution. In the last century, science fiction ran the from Robby the Robot to Terminator, with the 1970s anxieties of Westworld and Futureworld in between. By 2010, with artificial intelligence and robotics increasingly a reality as much as fiction, we were ready to revisit the subject with a new sense of nuance and maturity, and the present film was among the first to prove how far the genre had come. That’s more than enough to get it a place among the highest ranks. With that, I have made my peace.

Fiction: The Space Guys Adventure, Part 17!

 I'm back for what I'm counting as first post of the month, and naturally, I have nothing prepared but a Space Guys installment. This is easily the single biggest waste of time in this entire project, and that is really saying something. Still, it's done, and I am posting it so I never revise it again. The only thing I will say is, if you're trying work the civil rights movement into alternate history... don't. As usual, a table of contents is at the end.

The traverse from Saturn to Uranus was the longest of the voyage, and the bleakest. TV transmissions became infrequent and garbled by static. The game cabinets fell into disuse. Reading became perfunctory and repetitive outside of required technical material, mostly on their own equipment. The disc library still held hundreds of movies and thousands of songs, but it remained in regular use only by a handful who played their favorites almost continuously. Jason’s own collection was long since exhausted, though he was still pestered to loan out his choicest titles. Donald offered regular lessons with his telescope. There was little to see, however, except the slowly growing orb of Uranus, featureless except for its rings, which were turned at right angles to those of Saturn. Jason found the sideways planet and its vertical rings like a buzzsaw viewed head-on, as cold and baleful as the pre-Olympian god of myth.

In the midst of the trek, a day came when Jason and Alek lounged with Donald and Anastasia. Across the corridor, Jackie played chess with Jax. The player was running a disc nobody would admit putting on, about the adventures of Sheriff Buckner of Mars. The midpoint of the film found him chasing bootleggers through the foothills of Olympus. Anastasia was stretched out on the couch looking at a technical schematic, her feet and calves in her husband’s lap. Abruptly, he tried to pull her to him, without regard for the fact that she was taller than him. She pushed him back with a curse, forcibly extricating his hand from her fatigues in the process. It was as tired as it was brazen for both of them. She stretched out again, then grudgingly reversed herself. Alek, already in Jason’s lap as usual, looked up briefly, then went back to sketching.

Jackie looked up from the game as a speeding rover hurtled off a cliff. “Who the Hell came up with this, anyway?” he said.

“It’s a space western,” Donald said. “They were a thing in Italy, 15 or 20 years ago. It didn’t really catch on. I think they shot this one in Croatia, with a red filter.”

Alek took a closer look at the screen. “You are right,” she said. After a moment, she turned to Jason. “Did any of this really happen?”

He sighed. “Yeah, kind of,” he said. “We had trouble with smuggling, early on. It was all because of restrictions by the Agency. They prohibited any `nonessential’ payloads in shipments from Gaia. That meant no discs, no musical instruments, no toys, not even books that weren’t `informational’, which was anything they didn’t like. Of course, we looked for ways to get around it…”

“It was one guy,” Anastasia said. “Bootlegger Boris. He had already made a fortune on gray-market goods in the Federation, you know, stuff that was never banned but too `decadent’ for the state factories to make. He used his connections to do the same thing in Olympus Mons. He figured out that the ships carry extra fuel for emergency maneuvers, and that spacers were already cutting into the margin to carry personal belongings. So, he started paying them off to carry stuff for him. Later on, he started siphoning off the emergency fuel so he could replace it with merchandise and resell the fuel. Eventually, he just got too greedy. He couldn’t sell off what he had, then a passenger ship came down hard because it didn’t have enough fuel for an emergency maneuver. They say when they finally searched his dome, they found a whole room full of nothing but toy soldiers and unsold copies of The Outlaws.”

“What happened to him?” Alek asked.

“He surrendered,” Jason said, glaring toward an ongoing gun battle onscreen. “Where was he gonna go?”

“So are there police?” Alek asked.

“We have the Sheriffs,” Jax chimed in. He frowned as he sacrificed his queen for Jackie’s rook. “We call them that. The official title is Social Wellness Officer.”

“Yeah,” Jason said. “Their job is to visit every household at least twice a year. Three or four times in the outer settlements.”

That got Donald’s interest. “Then, what, they knock on an airlock door and ask to come in?” He laughed at that. “Now that would let Hollywood down.”

“It wasn’t any different in the Old West, really,” Jason said. “The movies talk about the natives and the outlaws, but the biggest problem was cabin fever.”

“Sure,” Anastasia said. “Why don’t you tell them about Jonah Johnson, farmboy? He was on your side. They never made a movie about him.”

Alek looked at Jason, her eyes wide in curiosity. “Come on, that was a long time ago,” he said, instinctively evasive. “It couldn’t happen now; it wouldn’t have happened then, if we’d known what we do now.”

“That is not no answer,” Alek said politely.

That was when Jackie spoke up again. “I can tell you about it,” he said. “It was on the Utopia Pipeline, halfway between Mons and the ice. They tried to have a manned outpost every thousand K’s. Somebody decided it was better to put the settlers with families on the line. Anyway, Jonah Johnson had been married 10 years, and they had three kids. He was moreno and she was Anglo, if it matters. Everybody said they were a model family, very enlightened.”

He took a bishop that had put him in check, only to lose his queen. “The first anyone knew there was trouble was when an automated sensor showed the safety on their air lock was burned out. Then there was no answer on the wire. It took 30 hours for a repair team to arrive,” he said. “Near as anyone could figure, Jonah took out a flare pistol. It was completely legal, though they wouldn’t have been issued one if they hadn’t been so far out. He made their oldest put her brothers to bed and tie up her mother before he shot her. Then he hotwired the lock and opened up the hab. It would have taken a while, maybe an hour, probably not more than two. Before it was halfway done, he loaded another shell and ate it.”

Alek only gaped. “I heard something about it,” she said. “What happened? What did they do, I mean?”

Anastasia shrugged. “They set up the Sheriffs, like Farmboy said,” she said. “There was a cover story for the press, of course. They couldn’t say it was an accident, but they made it out like the grownups were fighting for the gun and it went off by accident. It could have happened that way… except for where the girl was hit.”

By then, Jax had rallied and taken Jackie’s remaining rook. “They shouldn’t have been out there alone, no matter how long they had been together,” he said. “Couples need to stay part of their families, especially if they have differences.”

Jackie rested one arm on the table. “You think that puts you in line for saint?” he said. “You ask me, what happened to the Johnsons came down to one thing: Anglo women aren’t afraid to talk back.”

“Why shouldn’t they?” Jax said. He moved a rook. “Check, mate in two.”

“Of course they can,” Jackie answered. “But there’s a time when a woman needs to shut up or run for the door.”

“We’re leaving,” Anastasia announced abruptly. As she led Donald away, she called over her shoulder, “And being right doesn’t mean you aren’t full of kaka!”

Jax and Jackie played on in silence. It took four moves before Jax won, a fact neither of them mentioned. “Look, I want to know,” Jason said. “What’s your deal? Why don’t you get along with Jax? Why haven’t either of you talked to us?”

“Why does there have to be a problem?” Jackie said. “It’s not about his morena. It’s not about the Anglo woman, either. Folks are folks. Sometimes, they don’t mix.”

 “Jill and I are both Old Creole,” Jax said. “I’m probably as much colored as she is white. Jason is one-fourth Spanish Malay. We were all on the same side.

“That’s the thing about wars,” Jackie said. “There’s always people who chose the wrong side, even on the winning team.”

After a time of silence, Jax said, “Look, I asked Lana if she wanted to get married, when we get back to Mars. We could do it, if Jill consented, but she would have to file for divorce from her man back on Gaia. She said no. She has her reasons.”

“Yeah, I’m sure a lady like Jill would be open-minded,” Jackie said. “Except, she doesn’t have a lot of choice, does she? Sure, she could take the kid back to her folks. But then what? It’s hard enough getting a man in a free love sector in the first place. How do you think it would work trying to do it with a mixed baby in tow? I’ll be the first to admit, morenos aren’t saints.”

He abruptly pointed to Alek. “Bloody Hell, look at her. She and your friend are all mush for each other now, that’s fine. But she’s literally from another planet, she has more millions than his family has thousands, even if she is too wrapped up in her math to notice, and she can build an actual murder robot. If he wanted to leave and she wanted him to stay, would you want to be in the middle of it?”

Alek flushed, though it was clear she was not entirely displeased. “Of course, I would let you go,” she said. She stroked Jason’s knee. “I am an enlightened woman. But we both know you would come back.”

Alek hooked into one of old Yuri’s feed. They found a war movie that Alek immediately identified as her favorite. It was the tale of resistance fighters in Jugoslavia, bitterly divided between communists and nationalists even as they fought or hid from the Reich’s occupation forces.  The leaders of two such bands argued whether to intervene in a battle beyond their borders to the west, which proved to be American and British force in northern Italy that had been cut off from their own lines by a Reich counter-attack. Finally, the Jugoslavs banded together came to their aid. Every time Jason was ready to scoff, one of the others would confirm it.

“About half of them were from all-colored units,” Jackie said. The film represented a group of Americans from the southern US with a single moreno at the head of an assortment of obviously Latin actors. “Another 10% were campesinos…” That drew troubled looks from Jax, Jason and even Alek.

“Whoa, dude,” Jason said. “I don’t know about where you’re from, but in the Hellas sector, you don’t say that. Leastways not if you aren’t one of them.”’

That got a laugh from Jackie. “If you say so,” he said. He continued after a pause, “I had a great uncle who fought. He came home, but they say he never got all the way back.”

“What did happen, anyway?” Jason said. “I don’t mean during the Troubles, I mean between your folks and Jill’s.”

Jackie shook his head. “It wouldn’t matter now,” he said. He glanced toward Jax. “He could probably tell you more about it than me. His lady writes books about it.”

“It was the Fed’s fault,” Jax said. “Look, I’ve told you, morenos aren’t the same. It didn’t always mean all of them. It started as what the braceros in Texas called the ones who came west during the Wars. After a while, people got the idea that it meant something different from Creole. It probably wasn’t, but even braceros could tell the difference. When the Registry of African-Descended Citizens was started, the Fed wanted the same split. The Separatists in the communes went along with it, the Integrationists threatened to back out, especially the Creoles.”

“Okay,” Jason said. “So maybe you are different. What was the difference to the Fed?”

“Oh, that’s easy,” Jackie said. “The colored Creoles were enslaved by the French and the Spanish, not the Anglos. A lot of them were freed before the Louisiana Purchase, or leastways, their families said they were. That meant they weren’t taken for forced labor in a territory under United States authority… so their descendants wouldn’t be eligible for reparations.”

Jason puzzled over that a moment. He finally said, “They were talking about that, then?”

“Why not?” Alek said in her flat lecture voice. “The War Reparations treaties were supposed to apply to both sides. Some of the slaves from your war were still alive.”

Jason shook his head, but he did not protest. “So that split the colored rights movement?”

Jackie shrugged. “The law put a chisel where we were splitting ourselves, same as always,” he said. “The nice Integrationists in the big cities could say the Separatists were going the wrong direction, because they had gone their own way so far they couldn’t turn back if they wanted to. For us, once we were on our own, we didn’t have anywhere else to go when the Troubles started.”

“Damn,” Jason said.

“That’s us,” Jackie said. “Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.” As the credits rolled, he said, “Say, want to play chess?”

He beat Jason in 10 moves.

Table of contents

Part 1. The demo!

Part 2. The villain!

Part 3. The world-building!

Part 4. The romance!

Part 5. The killer robot!

Part 6: The shuttle ride!

Part 7: Alternate universe pop culture!

Part 8: The launch!

Part 9: The girl talk!

Part 10: The domestic disturbance!!!

Part 11: The Space Nazis!!!

Part 12: The inevitable geography lesson!

Part 13: The wedding!!!

Part 14:  The spicy chapter!

Part 15: The bad guy backstory!

Part 16: The Dinner!