Guillermo del Toro’s hyper-sized tribute to the often intertwined giant robots and kaiju genres is a master class in COOL-LOOKING GIANT ROBOTS!!! And it just goes to show Marvel Studios that Bonebreaker can be done on the silver screen! Rate 5 stars Rate 4 stars Rate 3 stars Rate 2 stars Rate 1 star . Played by: Robert Patrick M.O.G.U.E.R.A. A little bit Iron Giant and a little bit Harpo Marx, Baymax is all heart. She is, as LeBrock once famously said, “Mary Poppins with breasts.” —M.R. He is, rather, a hopelessly depressed and morose robotic being that seems to have been created with cruelty in mind—why else would you give a robot with a “brain the size of a planet” the ability to feel boredom and ennui? T-800 from Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991). —S.W. ), The Borg became time-traveling stealth-assimilators, and The Collective instead emerged in First Contact as the sexy, Machiavellian Borg Queen. ", 4. Sure, he’s a bit of a convenient swiss army plot device—that light saber’s got to be hidden somewhere, after all, and what, you expect a protocol droid to unlock detention cells and turn off trash compactors?! —S.W. There is, technically, no robot in this short film of the Silent Age. The endearing little “drones” of 2001: A Space Odyssey’s SFX impresario, Doug Trumbull’s, Silent Running are probably way more influential than you might think. A robot that only drinks and smokes, but is also the most foul-mouthed and ill-tempered anti-social character of the whole show - making Fox Network worried about the whole show when it … Played by: Douglas Rain (Voice) Because it can be so difficult to imagine yourself being as noble a soul as a giant machine. Chillingly so. In fact, he just may be the most human of the bunch, and a poignant example of an early onscreen identity crisis. (Never mind that simply rubbing out those two airheads would achieve that goal; the movie gets some great comedic mileage showing what an Evil Bill & Ted duo would be up to.) Got a thing for cartoon robots? This robotic concept came from building a robot that is working in industrial metal. Batty, more than any other character in this sci-fi masterpiece, embodies the sweeping philosophical and thematic underpinning—both subtle and gross—of Ridley Scott’s loose adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?. Peter Weller absolutely nails the patois and patter of a slaughtered cop resurrected as the newer, “friendlier” face of corporate-owned law enforcement. Rachael, Pris, Leon Kowalski & Zhora, 17. The character of the robot policeman, Elle, sports a country-fried drawl and a strange vulnerability to cavemen’s clubs, and there’s a 100-foot-tall Amazonian gynoid who menaces our constantly shouting heroes. How awesome cyborg justice machine Robocop fighting robot ninja could end up so boring is, perhaps, as big a mystery as how screenwriter Frank Miller could go from celebrated Daredevil writer and the guy behind The Dark Knight Returns and Sin City to paranoid, screed-based work like Holy Terror and director of the execrable adaptation of The Spirit. The character of Mansley is that man who will stand on that Earthly distinction. If you haven't seen Ridley Scott's sci-fi horror masterpiece, we won’t ruin the best moments involving Ash. Sure, Paul Bettany’s version has an Infinity gem on his forehead, but if there’s one thing the Vision’s always been, it’s over-powered. Suck it, all you other, inferior R2 units. Kill it! All you need to know about Samantha -- a dead girl who gets an evil robot microchip implanted in her head to bring her back to life -- is that she kills an old woman by throwing a basketball into her face so hard the old lady’s head explodes. And despite a nuanced, sympathetic group of humans at the film’s center, Gort is the ultimate cure to xenophobia (and selfishness in general). (He even gets the “almost killed in the line of fire” arc usually reserved for protagonists and their closest friends in the first film.) —S.W. And the Weyland-Yutani Corporation made certain Ash protected its dirty little hidden directive. Along with his trash-can-sized companion, C-3PO is probably among the most universally recognizable robot on this list. D&D Beyond —S.W. Created by AA Milne in the 1920s to amuse his son Christopher Robin, Winnie-the-Pooh, a … Not only was Maximillian a terrifying, whirling blade-brandishing robot Satan, but poor, innocent cutebot B.O.B. Gigolo Joe is a mechanical male prostitute on the run from authorities after being framed for murder. However, his innocent mind is being molded by gangsters and violent criminals. Why even debate one host vs. the other when the robots are MST3k’s most beloved and lasting contribution to pop culture? Fandom Apps Take your favorite fandoms with you and never miss a beat. Especially considering that he’s simply a palette-swap of the original Godzilla into a robotic form, one might think he’d be one of Big G’s less interesting foes, but the opposite is true. Robots are fascinating characters in many popular movies and TV shows. This list of fictional robots and androids is a chronological list, categorised by medium. He resembles nothing less than a metal demon or gargoyle. When Kusanagi battles an awesome spider-y tank, you really feel that battle damage accumulate on her lithe cyborg form. Famous Robot Cartoon Characters October 8, 2016 0 reza Famous robot cartoon characters cartoon robot names cartoonxcartoon com top 10 awesome robots in television your robot … © 2020 Paste Media Group. Built-in dialup modem included! Even inconveniencing him doesn’t work because, as we all know, he’ll be back. Robots may be constructed to take on human form but most robots are machines designed to perform a task with no regard to how they look. While the abrupt change did manage a couple fun moments—I admit, I got a kick out of Data’s delight at scanning for lifeforms—it still robbed him of the dignity of discovering his humanity on his own. Stop feeding it robot food by trying to destroy it! —S.W. And sea greens! The funniest robots in TV history are an eclectic bunch of disparate and nuanced personalities and designs, children of the mind of original host Joel Hodgson, who created most of their original designs from junk in his basement. Unfortunately for those who think they’re entitled to a second act in life, escaping to find out can get you killed by Sandmen like Logan 5. But the movie also succeeds to creating a palpable sense of dread, as the more liberated women of Stepford, Conn., are replaced with submissive, conformist housewife androids. He was made to look scary. was a potent allegory for the environmental and social dangers of over-consumption. Oh, and the UFOs aren’t just do-gooding Fix-Its, they’re fertile, family-minded Fix-Its at that. With sci-fi being as vogue in popular culture as ever—a seventh Star Wars and its adorable ’droids are but a few weeks away from theaters—now is the perfect time to reflect back on our favorite ’bots as represented in film. You’re just making it bigger and hangrier! —S.W. It has limited personality. Originally built by the military for use against Russia during the Cold War, this adorable robot is a mindless combat machine until a freak lightening strike erases his programming, allowing him to form free will and intelligence. The concluding chapter of Edgar Wright/Simon Pegg/Nick Frost’s Cornetto Trilogy may be its weakest overall entry, but that only means it’s better than 99% of all genre comedies out there. As much annoyance as I have in my heart for Spielberg’s indulgent, over-long mess of a movie, I did find some enjoyment in the Mecha robots that it featured, especially Gigolo Joe (Jude Law) and Teddy (voiced by Jack Angel). Speaking of creeptastic, rape-y robots, Demon Seed, based on the Dean Koontz novel of the same name, features Proteus, the advanced computer A.I. The mostly stalwart robots in this tongue-in-cheek cult favorite fall pretty solidly in the Rock ’Em, Sock ’Em Robot school of design, which, actually, makes them stand out from most of the other entries on this list. Hey, it could happen. His target is the mother of the future resistance leader, John Connor. You just need to cast him correctly … like, say, as a robot. Some of my favorites are the Japanese made, world famous Astroboy and the Iron Giant. —D.S. When he’s whisked away to a traveling cruise ship filled with the sloth-like human refugees from Earth it starts to feel a little more like a cartoon than a vision, but by then, we’ve already fallen for this mechanical janitor and his badass girlfriend EVE.—J.J. The robots of Interstellar, particularly the scene-stealing TARS, are evidence of how great limited characterization can be in film, even when the robot in question isn’t humanoid or even anthropomorphic. From his first appearance in Forbidden Planet on, Robby and its Robby>(It, yes. You will maintain the peace amongst yourselves, or we’ll do it for you savages. Joe is a highlight in the otherwise-disappointing sci-fi epic. Born of a hilariously forced acronym (“Canine HOMe Protection System”), C.H.O.M.P.S. They then let their zombies (monsters pre-dating Night of the Living Dead, just FYI) do the rest of the extermination for them. Based on Philip K. Dick’s “Second Variety,” this Peter “Robocop” Weller-led feature is riddled with clichés, sure, and borrows liberally from far better movies. She is short and looks similar to Gladia Solaria. This list will reveal that later on, but the first of their robots to show up on this list is Pathfinder. As for android hunter Decker (Harrison Ford)? Directed by Randal Kleiser (Grease, The Blue Lagoon) and featuring Howard Hesseman as a scientist and Sarah Jessica Parker as a purple-hair-sporting NASA intern, Flight of the Navigator is hella dated. This was a famous series produced in Japan on Osamu Tezuka, an atomic robot. But Chappie is unlike any robot you’ve ever seen, wrapping innocence and strength into one very interesting and fun package. Simply put, there’s no other movie robot so prolific. Lance Guest does double-duty in this “space opera” as Beta, an android dupe of human arcade champ Alex, who gets recruited by the titular video game’s designer and, in turn, entangled in space politics and foreign policy. Robots is beyond generic as far as cinematic stories go, and distractingly populated with the voices of top-tier A-list celebrities like Ewan McGregor, Halle Berry, Robin Williams, Mel Brooks, Paul Giamatti, etc. Sure, Batty is a little bit murderous, but you’d be the same way if you found out someone made you in a lab, gave you free will and a consciousness, and then only gave you a four-year lifespan. Sadly, only a fraction of this silent-era sci-fi film survived the near-century since its release, but there’s enough of it left to see that André Deed’s silver screen robots shaped decades of visual conceptualization for the very idea of “robots” in cinema, before the word “robot” existed. 'Data' of Star Trek, 'Anne Droid' of Dr. Who and 'Clank' of Ratchet and Clank are a few examples. I’ll be standing by with a smug, “You’re welcome.” —S.W. Should the spiders end up scanning his retinas, he will be permanently blinded. —S.W. This clumsy, heavily-armed Enforcement Droid is not exactly a genius. Smart, strong, agile, Roy Batty is the head of a group of rogue androids being hunted by Harrison Ford’s Rick Deckard. Robots and androids have frequently been depicted or described in works of fiction. And yes, A.I. In the end, though, it’s still mostly the Brent Spiner Data of seven years’ prior character growth. That is, until they incinerate the trespassers with military hardware lasers. —S.W. Played by: Peter Weller A “clockwork man,” Tik-Tok could rightfully be called one of the first fictional robots ever in L. Frank Baum’s original story. Then, they just walk around, looking for survivors. Roy Batty has seen things you people wouldn’t believe. I’ll accept that this Lindehoffian cinematic mess of half-formed, mostly terrible ideas has its fans. —S.W. That poor, war-orphaned kid? That is, until he feels what real loss is, when his fellow android (and lover) Pris is “retired” by hunter of renegade androids, Decker (Ford). It’s a good talent, sure, but one that probably doesn’t require anything intrinsically robot. In the film Deckard is a cop who hunts down and kills rogue androids (called replicants). Vasilia Fastolfe (also known as Vasilia Aliena) is a character from Isaac Asimov's Robot series. —S.W. As luck would have it, a pair of friendly flying saucers dubbed “the Fix-Its” are in town, and squat on the top of the building while repairing anything and everything there in miraculous time. Tobor may be capable of telepathy and piloting spaceships, but hell if he isn’t the most gullible robot ever made. In the comics, Baymax is an artificial synthformer with the ability to reconstruct his body into various battle modes, including that of a menacing reptilian creature. And he does so, almost admiringly, as his fellow crewmates, one by one, become xenomorph incubators or chow. Anthony Daniels’ voicework is, in its own way, as important to the film as James Earl Jones’—though, granted, “officious, prissy human” will never be as popular as “deep, threatening Sith lord.” Nonetheless, C-3PO strikes a blow for non-threatening robots everywhere with his role in the Star Wars films. With apologies to HAL, J.A.R.V.I.S., MOTHER and the like, no disembodied, purely A.I. Robots don’t get any more retro-cool than they do in Kerry Conran’s unjustly underappreciated sci-fi throwback, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. The robot must have some kind of body—typically humanoid in shape (though minor exceptions regarding shape for especially awesome robots may appear). But its titular robot monsters definitely make an impression—they start out, basically, as burrowing, lizard-shaped chainsaws, but their advanced A.I. ® & © 2020 CBS Studios Inc. © 2020 CBS Television Distribution and CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. It’s probably best remembered these days for its infamous basketball kill scene (this might be for the best), but Wes Craven’s robo-horror does have two fairly unforgettable ’bots: The adorable BB (well… until he’s not) and resurrected robot hybrid of the teenage leading lady, Samantha (Kristy Swanson) and BB (voice of Roger Rabbit, Charles Fleischer!). Instead of following his long-developed trajectory of attempting (and, generally, failing hilariously) to understand the human condition, Rick Berman and company decided to cheat and introduce emotion to the character via a physical upgrade. So it’s just a remake of Rocky by way of robot proxies, with an extremely annoying child actor. Evil. Which, in turn, places Necron 99/Peace in an interstitial category, somewhere between the two warring worlds—and when Peace sacrifices himself to save his friends, the cyborg (or whatever he is) represents maybe the purest being in the whole movie, and by extension he represents Bakshi’s belief that neither technology nor spirituality alone will ever save the planet from itself. Plenty of films have explored the question of artificial intelligence, but few have brought quite the human touch to their sentient robots than Ex Machina’s Ava, played by Alicia Vikander. Played by: Ian Holm Which is saying something. Thankfully, the police state of the future is evidently more incompetent than him. Like any other self-respecting murderous robot from the 1950s, these machines came equipped with pinchy hooks and face-mounted death rays. Simple: This film had no budget, it was 1954, and Chani’s not a costume. I’m afraid it’s the worst case scenario: You’re gonna have to call the U.N. —S.W. There is even a theory that Deckard himself is a replicant, which director Ridley Scott has all but confirmed. But the easily dismissible Dreamworks animated CGI movie can at least boast recommendation for its busy, colorful world inhabited by its delightful, energetic cartoon robot creations—all of them unique designs, rather than mass-manufactured. By design, they appear fairly unintimidating. The Mysterians of the title are an advanced alien race, demanding a portion of Earth to call home (and some women), or they’ll sic their colossal mole on us all to make that happen. (In First Contact, he could switch it on and off; in Insurrection, he could remove it; in Nemesis, it’s never even mentioned… speaking of which, let’s never, ever speak of Nemesis again.) And it’s because Brian Singer does such a terrifyingly good job at showing how brutally effective the adaptive, mutant-hunting giant robots are. itself is reasonably cool—if you happen to be a little kid who has a psychic bond with his big robot pal. Astro first appeared in a Manga series cartoon in 1952. But the amnesiac alien robot will take the high road. Sometimes they're the off-sider to the main character, sometimes they're the protagonist, sometimes they're the enemy. And they carry with them all the wonder, hubris, hope and dread that that drive compels. But there have been plenty of robot movies in the last 90 years. But that’s only because this hit theaters before the word “robot” existed. The film intended to portray Ro-Man as a more stereotypical-looking robot, but giant budgetary shortcomings, coupled with a 25-year-old first-time director, meant that things went just the tiniest bit astray. If you have seen it, you already know the best moments. We collected some of them to show you 10 of the most famous fictional robots. —M.B. —S.W. The young adventurers at a NASA camp accidentally get launched into orbit for real. The cast (which also includes Elizabeth Peña) is pitch-perfect, especially the sprightly Cronyn. It’s a robot appearing in a time period not known for its technology, so there’s that. But you don’t stay dead. !” introduced a mildly interesting wrinkle within the Terminator universe. “Thank you. T-1000 from Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991). There’s a lot of humor derived in the disconnect between the dog’s appearance and his cybernetic abilities—one wonders if it might not have worked slightly better if they cast a dog breed that weighed more than 10 pounds in the role. A cop who is killed in the line of duty and is resurrected as a mechanical peacekeeper begins to remember his past life, and discovers the men responsible for his death. Plus, it’s not as though Lisa exists solely as cheesecake, displaying both a vibrant personality and intimidating intelligence. It’s because he seems to be conscious of how he’s been programmed to behave… and happens to agree with it. startlingly good at rubbing out the “Supers”. The T-1000 is, basically, an over-evolved superpredator: a nigh-invulnerable, intelligently adaptive weaponsmith with perfect camouflage. gets his plug permanently pulled. —M.B. If you are like me, some of these characters you grew up with as a kid, others you will have gotten to know and love as an adult. But along with his markedly non-humanoid design comes a simple truth—R2-D2 is one of the more human characters in the franchise. (Unlike other robots who made the cut due to a novel look, this entry was done so with the greatest possible hesitancy.) One part affable family comedy, one part musing drama on the fragile nature of memory, the titular robot (impeccably voiced by Peter Sarsgaard) of Robot & Frank is the perfect pal to Frank Weld’s (Frank Langella) former cat burglar, now suffering from the early stages of dementia. C.H.O.M.P.S. So yeah, this guy. by SPRCLE_GOD Plays Quiz not verified by Sporcle . Rob the Robot (Character) Biographical information. And even if you make it past the human assassins, you could still wind up face-to-grill with Box, the magnificently melodramatic robot who ran out of fish! With WALL-E director Andrew Stanton, the creators of British sci-fi series Red Dwarf, and even MST3k mastermind Joel Hodgson counted amongst their big admirers (and it’s easy to side with Universal’s counter-lawsuit against 20th Century Fox’s Star Wars, alleging some droid-like similarities). An OG of movie robots, The Tin Man (or Tin Woodman of author L. Frank Baum’s Wonderful Wizard of Oz) set the bar for sentience-seeking beings. An Invasion of the Body Snatchers for the age of changing gender roles, The Stepford Wives manages to eke out a pretty decent amount of satire and commentary on the chauvinistic culture of the time.