Todays evil robot is...

HAL 9000

HAL 9000 needs no introduction really but for those of you who aren't familiar with this little wonder he was the super computer aboard the Discovery One in Stanley Kubrik's masterwork 2001: A Space Odyssey. HAL was embued with human personality traits and a very soothing voice and for the most part was a kind of benign colleague of massive intelligence and friend to the other crewmembers Frank Poole & Dave Bowman. Unfortunately HAL wigs-out and starts bumping people off. What makes HAL's murderous streak so fascinating however is the fact that he's so lifeless in appearance (he's just a big red lens) yet his voice is so calm and soothing. HAL is so practical and methodical in his nastiness it's very disquieting. When he uses an empty EVA Pod to cut the oxygen tube on Frank Poole's spacesuit it's done in total silence and the image of Poole scrabbling around in desperation, trying to fix it before floating lifelessly off into space, has stayed with me ever since I first saw it.
Anyhow, Poole gone HAL now switches off the hibernation pods of the scientists on board and locks Dave Bowman out of the ship when he goes to retrieve Poole's body. Bowman forgot his helmet you see and therefore can't use the emergency airlock to get back in. Silly spaceman. He does get back in however by firing himself like a bullet into the airlock and bouncing around for a bit. After that he goes inside HAL to switch him off. Inside HAL is truly beautiful and one of the most memorable sets I've ever seen. He's all shiny and winkie-lighty inside and ickle Dave Bowman turns back and forth all floaty inside him buggering about with switches in a way that would definitely invalidate the warranty if it were my laptop for example. Apple 'aint gonna be taking HIM back now Dave that's for sure.
It's actually very moving as HAL 'dies' and reverts to his early programming singing Daisy Bell more and more slowly until. Pop. No more HAL. Bye HAL.

But wait a spacesuit popping, scientist killing, children's song singing minute, what's that coming over the horizon? Why it's that bloke from Jaws and Helen Mirren in 2010: Odyssey Two. There here to find out what happened to Dave Bowman & co. so they reboot HAL and it turns out HAL wasn't a naughty, naughty lens just a very confused one. You see his primary programming meant he had to divulge all important knowledge 'bout his mission to the crew but he'd been ordered to keep it quiet. This sent him into a bit of a lather and he'd reasoned (quite logically) that if there were no one to keep the secret from then everything would be alright. So he killed 'em. See, logical.

"I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."

Todays evil robot is...

Hector from Saturn 3

Kirk Douglas, Farrah Fawcett (why is she named after some trousers?) on a space-base with a dog. Harvey Keitel in a space suit and helmet straps himself into a chair and opens a big space ceiling thingie and a bloke gets sucked out into space where he explodes(?) upon hitting some bars. Harvey fancies Farrah. Kirk doesn't like Harvey. Harvey builds Hector. Hector is strange and has binoculars for eyes. Hector stamps on dog. Harvey puts his brain in Hector. Hector fancies Farrah. Everyone rushes about a bit. Farrah looks skinny (presumably 'cos of all the running). Kirk tries to destroy robot with his chisel-like chin. Blah, blah blah. Load of ol' rubbish. Good robot though.

Todays evil robot is...

Mark-13

This one is a little out of left-field I grant you as he's from a largely unseen British sci-fi/horror film called Hardware. Earth in the 21st Century is a desolate, pollution-choked, radioactive wasteland (isn't it always?) and a traveller with some kind of robot hand, finds some bits of old droid lying about the desert and take them home to his bird - as you do. (At this point I recall a cameo byLemmy from Motorhead as a river-cab driver, odd huh?) She's a sculptor you see and these bits o' dodgy looking robot (with a very scary head) would make a very nice ornament for the lounge wouldn't you agree? No, not really. They're all pointy and jagged and were clearly made to be up to no good not perching on a mantel piece. Anyhow missey the artist sets about painting the head, has a quickie in the shower with her fella and then pops off to bed while the obviously nasty robot sculpture sets about reconstructing itself utilising various household utensils. Surprise sur-bleedin-surprise.
It all gets nasty and MARK-13, as he's known, goes postal and it's original program activates. You see it's original job wasn't as a piece of crap artwork but a government built population control device designed to kill anything and anyone who gets in it's way. Nice. So, not being one to go against the grain, this is what it does. It chases the girl and butchers her pervy neighbour, then it does in her fella with the robot hand when he comes home. "Hi honey, I'm home. What's for NNNNNNNNNNNNYAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHH!" - Buzzzzzzzz, chop, kill, stab. Then it finishes someone off in a lift for good measure. Apart from that I can't really remember how it turned out. I'm pretty certain Jill (the sculptor) manages to escape but I've no recollection of how. All in all an odd film. Oh, and Iggy Pop was in it too apparently.

Todays evil robot is...

GORT from The Day the Earth Stood Still

Technically speaking this fella isn't evil as he was merely the robot bodyguard of space traveller Klaatu who, in 1951, came to Earth in the kind of shiny, shiny flying saucer that bugs rednecks in the 'Deep South', flees the scene of cattle mutilations and drags unsuspecting American idiots inside it's shiny, shiny interior to be anally probed. He'd come with one mission, to warn us against continuing on the path we'd chosen as a species. We were savage, we were warlike and aggresive, we were destroying our very planet and we refused to wear Baco-foil jumpsuits and colanders on our heads. Most of which is particularly apposite at the moment.
Now Klaatu, being a dude from outer space an' all, clearly hadn't been watching much Earth TV 'cos when he stepped out of his saucer and announced to the US Army gathered around that he came in peace, he got shot the silly spaceman.
Anyhow, back to the awsome GORT. He never said anything he just stood there behind Klaatu like a giant armoured sentinel looking all cool and immovable - which he was, until that is, Klaatu got shot. Then he got all vaporisey on their collective arses and lasered all the soldiers' guns. He didn't kill any of them, he just destroyed the weapons. Even the tanks. Brilliant. A pacifist destructo-bot.
I always loved the way his visor opened revealing a slit that pulsed brighter and brighter until 'whummmm...phzzzz'. Everything gets vaporised. Awesome. Go GORT!

"Klaatu barada nikto"

Fantastic Maximillian clip.

Refering back to my earlier 'Evil Robot' post about Maximillian from The Black Hole, I've found this brilliant clip of the tin-plated badass doing his drilly-death thing on Anthony Perkins.
Enjoy.

Todays evil robot is...

The Cylons from Battlestar Galactica

These evil, malicious and ruthless beauties graced our screens back in the late '70s & early '80s. As the backbone of the Cylon Alliance they battled humanity and pursued the Galactica (and it's rag-tag fleet of ships) across space with nothing but destruction on their tin-plated minds. As a kid these bad-boys were just the absolute best and I would've given anything to be one. (I had very simple ambitions as a child, I just wanted to be an awesome robot and kick ass.) They were brilliant in their super-shiny armour with their one red eye sweeping from side to side like K.I.T.T. in Knight Rider and their jarring, metallic, monotone voices were plain scary. They flew the second best enemy spaceships (after the Tie-Fighter of course) and they were lead by some kind of bobbly headed monster thing who sat on a huge chair in a massive, featureless vault. Brilliant.

Nowadys in the new Battlestar Galactica they're VERY different. Now they've been adapted to look and act like us so they can infiltrate the Galactica crew. This poses a very difficult problem. On the one hand the old Cylons were just amazing in everyway and by rights every red-blooded male fan of the original show should be spitting feathers at the mere idea of changing 'em. Trouble is, they now look like this.



Do you see the dilemma?


"By your command."

Todays evil robot is...

Box from Logan's Run.

For those of you out there that haven't seen Logan's Run it's essentially a film about mankind's future where we live enclosed in vast, domed cities. No-one is older than thirty (thanks to an accepted cull disguised as a spiritual ceremony of re-birth), but some seek to escape to the outside world and the mythical place known as 'Sanctuary' and these 'runners' are pursued by the Sandmen who police the city. Logan 5 (an ex-sandman) and Jessica 6 (Jenny Aguter) escape and run into Box in an ice cavern where food is frozen and stored for the city. Box is the robot who runs the 'freezer' and appears kindly at first. It soon becomes apparent however, that Box has malfunctioned and has been killing runners who come this way, he also wants to freeze Logan and Jenny into a permanent ice-sculpture for his collection. A fight ensues and Box is left trapped. Poor Box.

Richard's on the mend

BBC News. I hope he goes on improving. As co-presenter Jeremy Clarkson said, "He's lucky, he'll live." Thoughts to his wife & kids.

Woke up this morning

to some very sad news. BBC News. Richard Hammond, pint-sized presenter of BBC's Top Gear and perssonal favourite of the misses, is critically ill (but stable) in hospital after crashing in a rocket-car whilst filming for the show. A ROCKET CAR - Go Hammond! I sincerely hope he's okay.

Todays evil robot is...

Maximillian

To me the star of Disney's brilliant kids sci-fi film 'The Black Hole'. The silent, deadly killer loitered menacingly in the background of the mysterious space vessel the Cygnus until called upon by Dr. Hans Reinhardt to despatch Anthony Perkins with his spinning razor-claws. I'll never forget the way Perkins tries desperately to defend himself by holding his journals in front of him only for Maximillian to advance unhindered and drill through them, scattering shredded paper until Perkins screams and drops to the floor. Brilliant. The image of Reinhardt 'entombed' within the body of Maximillian standing in-front of a Hell-like, firey background is one of my favourite scenes from a sci-fi film.

Puzzling shops

There's a shop near me where I buy my milk, Saturday papers and, every-so-often, a Fry's Turkish Delight and it has a very unusual name. It's called 'Buy to Win'.



Now I've been going there on and off for six years and I've no idea what you have to buy to win or even what you would win. Beth keeps telling me I should ask but I kinda don't want to. I like the mystery. I hate it when the papers are full of new evidence that solves an old riddle like Jack the Ripper or The Loch Ness Monster and this, to me, is one of my life's great unsolved mysteries and, curious as I am, I don't want to know the answer.

Also, as a little partner to the 'Buy to Win' shop picture here's a piccie of the finest name you will ever see for a model shop.



'If Only.'