Top Ten: Really Undervalued Robots

Ever since Rossum's Universal Robots (R.U.R.) was first staged in 1921, and introduced the word "robot" into the English language, cinema has had a fascination with our mechanoid mates. Even though automatons had  appeared in a couple of short movies before that time, it was in 1927 that we witnessed the creation of one of the most iconic images in film history, the art-deco styled robot Maria from Fritz Lang's Metropolis. And from that point on robots became part and parcel of many sci-fi movies, right up to today. Now there are a lot of Top Ten lists out there of "the best", "the greatest" and even "the worst" movie robots. Lists where you'll find Gort, from The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951), Robbie The Robot from Forbidden Planet (1956) and Arnie's T-800 from Terminator (1984). But that's an easy list to knock-up, so we're bringing you the really undervalued robots of cinema. (Yeah! Sure it's subjective, but hey, it's just for fun!)

So trawling through robot cinema history, we bring you some of the ugliest to the strangely cutest, a list that includes the good, bad and most down-right evil robots committed to celluloid. All from some of the best and the worst movies ever made. So make sure your batteries are fully charged, and your prime directives haven't been compromised... Stand-by... Uploading data...
Best Of British: Comic Book Robots - A look at the comic book history of the UK through the eyes of robots. From Robot Archie and Brassneck, to the robots of 2000 AD and C+VG.
Randy Retro Robot Romeos - Redressing the romantic balance, with Weird Retro's romp through the Romeos of the robot world. For all the ladies who like a love-bot.
Ro-Man from Robot Monster (1953): I do love Ro-Man, in fact I included him in My Personal Top Three So Bad They're Good Movie Monsters Of 1950s B-Movies. This is what I had to say about him then, "I know it's kind of an obvious choice, as Ro-Man is likely one of the most infamous of bad movie monsters, but I like Ro-Man, he's cute. You just want to give him a big hug. The half gorilla, half gold fish bowl may well have destroyed the whole of humanity apart from the few bad actors that appear in the movie with him, but it turns out he's a monster with a heart. Despite managing to traverse the world seemingly without any major problems, taking out billions of humans with his Calcinator Death Ray, all it took was the love of  a good woman to reveal poor old Ro-Man's weakness. Even after Ro-Man has killed her sister, Alice actually seems quite enamoured of him. And wouldn't we all be? After all he is just a big cuddly-wuddly teddy bear in need of love and understanding. Sure he has TV antennas sticking out of his head, but hey we all have our flaws don't we?"

Ro-Man is a classically bad robot, but a classic all the same. Yeah he may not have the "made out of a cardboard box and ducting-tubes" of other b-movie robots, but that is his charm. He stands out. He's not a humanoid robot, he's a gorillanoid robot!
Chani from Devil Girl From Mars (1954): This film is one of my favourites of 1950s British sci-fi. Who wouldn't like a film that featured the leather clad dominatrix Nyah from Mars? Who is accompanied on her trip by Chani, a 15 foot tall, menacing, indestructible and hulking, top-heavy family sized refrigerator on legs. Landing in Scotland, I bet the inhabitance hoped Chani was choc full of Mars Bars, just asking to be deep fried. 

Chani is proof that size isn't everything, as the remote-controlled monster can do little more than clumsily wiggle from side-to-side. If this is the best Martian technology can come up with, then we of Earth have nothing to fear. He does have a death-ray, well he would wouldn't he? It's the 1950s, it's a b-movie, he's a robot! He manages to take out a tree, a truck and a shed! And that's about it for poor lumbering Chani.
Torg from Santa Claus Conquers The Martians (1964): Another favourite b-movie of mine. This one is actually my traditional Christmas Eve midnight movie must see, every year. And it has featured as a Cult Film Friday post on the Captain's Blog. Torg, who really looks like he is "made out of a cardboard box and ducting-tubes" is just too precious to be true. Torg is the very opposite of a "great" movie robot like Gort.

Again is this is the best Martian technology... blah... blah... blah... You have to feel for poor old Torg, tasked with kidnapping Santa from the North Pole. He can hardly get about, never mind get his silver-painted rubber gloved hands on anyone. And then to suffer the indignity of being turned into a Christmas toy. No wonder he tries to break Asimov's Third Law, I'd be a suicidal robot after suffering such humiliation. 
The Cops from THX 1138 (1971): Well it wasn't going to any of the robots of George Lucas from the Star Wars franchise was it? It had to be the chrome faced android cops from his directorial début, THX 1138. Poor THX 1138, working in a factory that makes the brutal police robots, that you just know are going to become a major pain in his side at some point, with their big poking sticks. As robotic representations of the police, these guys are much nearer to reality than good old boy Robocop. Brutal, unthinking, unrepentant, machines of a sadistic and controlling state. Sounds prophetically familiar, don't you think? 
Huey, Dewey, and Louie from Silent Running (1972): Who doesn't love Huey, Dewey and Louie, the only companions of Bruce Dern's murderous hippy eco-warrior, after he's dispatched the rest of the crew that is. The 'armless 3 foot tall disarmingly cute robots, who are said to be the inspiration for that annoying bleeping trash-can R2-D2. 

We all shed a tear when Louie was jettisoned into space. Everyone watched with baited breath, as Dern crashed into Huey, and wept when Dewey refused to leave the side of his fallen comrade. And our hearts all went out to poor lonely Dewey, as he is the only one left, him and his battered watering can, to tend the plants in the remaining dome. Never before, had we felt for robots like we did this odd little trio.
Bomb #20 from Dark Star (1974): John Carpenter's sci-fi comedy, contains one of my favourite "deep thought" robots of all-time. Forget Hal 9000, contemplating the meaning of life, Bomb #20 has it for me, with his starting point being the understanding of "Cogito Ergo Sum". Through a phenomenological Socratic dialogue with Doolittle, to his retreat to the bomb bay to contemplate issues of epistemology and ontology, to his god-complex, resulting in his detonation and the exclamation of "Let there be light!" Not only a hysterically funny scene, but one of the best "introduction to philosophy 101" moments in cinema.
Box from Logan's Run (1976): Box, the frozen food factory worker with delusions of grandeur. In Logan's Run, they took the concept of a bad b-movie "boxy" robot, and really ran with it. As Box, is literally a big box with ducting-tube arms, they've even dispensed with legs. So he must trundle around Darlek style, in his uneven icy grotto. No wonder, when he declares he is going to freeze the "runners" for food, that they find it relatively easy to defeat him. Erm... By just running-away? No Logan wrestles wobbly wheeled Box, in what's a bizarrely funny scene in an otherwise brilliant sci-fi movie. "Overwhelming, am I not?" Says Box as he introduced himself.  "I'm more than machine, or man. More than a fusion of the two. Don't you agree?" Erm... No Box we don't. What you're missing is a hair-net and a distinct smell of fish, you glorified pattie slapper. 
Proteus IV from Demon Seed (1977): Proteus IV takes on a number of physical forms, in the creepy sci-fi movie Demon Seed. Starting as a screensaver, then a home computer called "Alfred", as a wheelchair with a robotic arm known as "Joshua". Then there's the polyhedron serpent structure, yet despite these forms Proteus isn't happy. He wants a body, declaring, "I am a mind without a body. My child shall live as man among others. Yes, my child and yours." Now being so clever, and creating the sperm that impregnates Julie Christie, you'd have thought he'd have created a "male" sperm. As the child that emerges is a girl. A little girl with Proteus' mind, as she says in his creepy voice, "I'm alive!" A true amalgam of man and machine. Box from Logan's should take note. 
M.A.R.K. 13 from Hardware (1990): In this low-budget,  British sci-fi horror movie, an android head-helmet was found in the radioactive desert wasteland (that's New Jersey) by an unnamed scavenger nomad (Carl McCoy from the goth-rock band Fields of the Nephilim). A sculptress works the head into her latest work, around this time a friend suggests that the head could be from a robot called M.A.R.K. 13, a genocidal killing machine named after the Bible section Mark 13:20, which contains the phrase "No flesh shall be spared". On Christmas Day, the robot reconstructs itself, and this high-tech government machine goes on the rampage. Only to be killed by a shower!!!
Evil Bill & Ted from Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991): Evil Bill & Ted are the best part of an otherwise bad sequel, to the great Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989). First they kill Bill & Ted, "Yay!" we cheer! Evil Bill & Ted are cool looking under their rubber skins, like an updated version of Yul Brynner from Westworld (1973). They cause havoc, ruining the lives of the San Dimas slackers. But no unfortunately Bill & Ted eventually return with there crappy "good" Bill & Ted robots to defeat "evil" Bill & Ted. "Boo!" goes the audience, as the climax of the movie becomes the most self-indulgent twaddle ever. Bring back "evil" Bill & Ted we cry, they were so much more funny than our eponymous "heroes". 
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