posted
Maybe Asimov was trying to create a new robot myth that was the opposite of the Frankenstein myth, but the way it worked out when the robot universe and the Foundation universes came together in his latter novels, especially as fleshed out by other writers who have taken the same plot elements and run with them, was something just as dark, if not more so.
MAJOR SPOILER IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE LATTER FOUNDATION/ROBOT STORIES!!!! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!
It turns out that in order to obey the three laws of robotics in the truest sense, most of the robots organized themselves into a vast horde of marauders, who killed off all sentient non-human life in the galaxy, to ensure that humans would be safe. This is why there were only humans inhabiting the Foundation galaxy. This enormous holocaust, this genocide on a galactic scale, is just about as dark as dark can get. Frankenstein is preferable. He just killed his creator.
You know, the real reason why Asimov's Foundation galaxy has no sentient non-humans in it, is that when Asimov was first trying to sell his stories to Astounding (later named Analog), the editor, John W. Campbell, was strongly prejudiced against non-human sentient beings who were smarter than humans. He refused to believe in the possibility, for some reason, and writers who wanted to sell to him either had aliens who were clearly inferior to humans, or else (as Asimov chose to do) the aliens were omitted all together. So ultimately, we have to blame Campbell for the galactic genocide committed by the robots.
[ July 16, 2004, 06:18 PM: Message edited by: Ron Lambert ]
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posted
I have not read a lot of Asimov- I did read nightfall along time ago- then saw the movie, I just remember telling my husband during the ENTIRE movie "but the book was different, so much better..." of course I end up saying that with almost every movie that is adapted from a book (a major exception was The Green Mile, which I thought was an excellent adaptation)
I am looking forward to the Ender's Game movie...well it's more of a nervous anticipation. Ender's Game is such a wonderful book that I would rather it NEVER be put to film if Hollywood destroys it (i.e. Watchers by Dean Koontz and Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean Auel ) There will be no way to express the utter disgust I will feel if Holleywood gets their paws on Ender's Game and destoys it
But I believe OSC is wrinting the screenplay so there is hope. Posts: 295 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:If the movie is about robots who break the First Law to conform to the Zeroth Law, it would be keeping with Asimov's books and I'd be ok with it. Does it look the robots are out to protect humanity at large?
posted
"It turns out that in order to obey the three laws of robotics in the truest sense, most of the robots organized themselves into a vast horde of marauders, who killed off all sentient non-human life in the galaxy, to ensure that humans would be safe."
You know, I don't recall this at all -- and I thought I was fairly familiar with the books. IIRC, much is made of Earth's "uniqueness" in the later Robot and Foundation novels. In fact, as I understood it, the whole point of the later Foundation novels was that Daneel had decided that humanity needed to achieve a kind of metamind gestalt in order to defend itself from outside threats, should such a threat ever arise. I don't remember a genocide anywhere (although, since it would have been perfectly in keeping for Asimov to mention it in one sentence and never bring it up again, I wouldn't be surprised if I just missed it.)
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I just finished the Foundation series (first time I'd read it, it was incredible), and what happened was this.
It's explained mythically at one point that some group called 'The Eternals' (robots) mastered science to the point where they could flip through differing dimensions, and that they had paused time and searched through great numbers of realities in order to find a universe in which Earth was the ONLY world to spawn intelligent life (along with millions of other species).
I guess that could count as genocide, even though the other innumerable realities still go on-some of which, presumably, have many intelligent forms of life in Earth's Galaxy.
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Hmmm. Ron might be right. Although I've finished all the Foundation novels (except the prelude stuff, reading that now), I haven't yet read past I, Robot (in which, it should be mentioned, there IS one single robot which manages to break the truncated First-Law it was given, but doesn't manage it successfully), that could've happened in the Robot stories-Daneel is only in a VERY small portion of the Foundation books, and the rest is legend-telling.
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posted
It was one of the later Foundation/Robot novels written by a writer other than Asimov (maybe Greg Bear or someone like that--a prominent sf writer) who went on at length about the robots' galactic genocide, and how one faction of robots tried to stop them and failed, and how at times a few humans tried to hide some sentient aliens to save them from the robots' pogrom. This was also offered as a reason why certain spirit-like super-entities, hate the robots. They are the only survivors. There is nothing about this in any of the novels authored by Asimov himself. Daneel was a prominent character in the novel. I'll see if I can look it up.
[ July 17, 2004, 02:38 PM: Message edited by: Ron Lambert ]
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posted
AFAIK, the alien genocide was not mentioned by Asimov himself in the original foundation stories or the later additions.
In the forward to "Foundation and Chaos" (by Gregory Benford and authorized by the Asmovian estate) he mentions that one of the ideas he wanted to explore in a new Foundation trilogy was why the universe was so empty of alien life(and other things, like what psychohistory actually might look like, etc). As was mentioned, this was an editorial stipulation that Asimov followed- no aliens. But Benford wanted a fairly consistant rationalization within the story.
So he came up with the idea that a wave of robotic "destroyer" machines destroying any alien civilizations they found in order to protect humanity and their way of life. In the following two books, Greg Bear and David Brin flesh this out. At one point, a scientist doing analysis of the soils of many worlds finds statistical inconsistancies that eventually lead him and a couple other people to discover a collection of these destoyer machines, and more about Daneel's role behind this.
The only remnants of these alien civilizations were computer entities that had lived in electromagnetic clouds and, later, Trantor's computer network called the Mesh. They hated all robots and where responsible for the death of many of Daneel's robotic agents, and for the removal of the positronic paths for the 3 laws of one of Daneel's agents.
In these books, too, robots who did not want to go along with Daneel's plan (Gaia and, eventually, Galaxia) because they thought it was arrogant for him to make such far reaching decisions for humanity on the basis of Zeroth's law without any human's say so (which he agreed to, on the surface. Which is why Gail Dornick shows up in Foundation's Edge). They were Calvinians, robots who did not aknowledge Zeroth's law. Or rather, acknowledged weaker forms of it, since it was logically consistant, but still did not want to go along with Daneel.
Evidently, Daneel had come up with all kinds of steps in his care of humanity. He was responsible for the creation of the rather stable Empire 12,000 years before, after he and a few robots had developed a very weak and small version of psychohistory- enough to guide their efforts. He had introduced a virus that kind of 'dumbed down' humanity a little so that his control would be greater and the development of true robots would not happen. He knew that if humanity ever developed robots again, then eventually there would be another group of "immortals", and these would both interfere with his plans and might not be under the three laws, if the humans who made them did not think of them. Hari's birth and training was actually manipulated behind the scenes (way behind the scenes) by Daneel in order to get a more accurate and powerful psychohistory that he knew only a human could do. Daneel is the ultimate planner.
It was all very interesting. I know some people were unhappy with the additions (and the sims Voltaire and Joan of Arc- which didn't really do too much for me either). But it really fleshed out the universe and made the story, to me, more realistic. Daneel had opposition. Daneel didn't always do things right. Daneel seemed less god-like and more like a very long-lived and wise planner with strings everywhere. He was an even greater version of Hari, the planner and manipulator who constantly was always ten steps ahead.
Anyway, end tangent.
My opinion about the movie.
If it is nothing like the book, in it's most basic premise of the 3 laws and how good it made the robots, then what's the point of naming it I, Robot?
The only people who will see the movie BECAUSE of the book are those who will be angriest at the movie for violating it's entire spirit, not just specific details. The people who had never read the book wouldn't care what it was named and just see it as the next summer blockbuster.
The title is meant to pull in Asimov's fans- the ones who feel the most anger at the stupidity of contradicting the entire premise of the books.
quote:But I believe OSC is wrinting the screenplay so there is hope.
Actually, he's turned in his draft. The next draft was written by the pair who wrote X2, and word from Those Who Know has been, quite frankly, really damned good.
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posted
I saw the movie. It is a good action flick -- and you'll want to read the first spoiler below, if you really hate the idea of the movie ignoring the three laws.
SPOILER WARNING (small-ish) | | | | | The robots that are attacking humans are not subject to the three laws -- they were secretly given a separate brain that allows them to choose whether to obey them. There is a point in the movie where they purposefully destroy all the older robots because they know the older ones will protect the humans.
SPOILER WARNING (large) | | | | | ...And even without the separate brain, the writers could have used -- but, for whatever reason, did not use -- the idea of the zeroth law. The "big bad guy" is actually the AI running U.S. Robotics, and it is acting in accordance to the zeroth law (in a Hollywood sort of way), by sending these robots to take control of and protect humanity from itself.
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posted
How odd -- especially since that IS exactly what happens in the book I, Robot, except that there's quite a lot less killing when that happens.
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posted
I don't agree with your small-ish spoiler EPSoom--aren't you partly describing Sunny, and partly describing the rest of the robots, and mixing their behaviors up a bit? They are not the same.
I'm not sure what you're saying about the zeroth law, mostly because it's been too long since I read the books.
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posted
Well I have just seen the movie. Thanks to visiting this forum over the past couple of days I was not expecting a great movie- so I was not disappointed. Just your basic Will Smith action flick- which is fine, I like Will Smith (even Wild Wild West )
It does say in the credits SUGGESTED by Issac Asimov's books- not BASED on. If that means anything to any die hards.
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posted
I guess the question is whether or not we'll ever get to see a TRUE film adaptation of the I, Robot stories.
Here's something to ponder for real hardcore S.F. fans. Hollywood may not care because s.f. fans seem to pan EVERY adaptation of any book.
I mean, even fairly good movies like Bicentennial Man get raked over the coals for even minor plot elements.
And if the audience for a movie is mostly made up of people who haven't read the book several times and memorized it (admit it, you're in the small minority here), they can pretty much be assured of spinning a decent yarn if they adapt something was at least well written in the original.
I don't think Asimov would be spinning in his grave over I, Robot. He enjoyed making money off his writing and he probably would be proud that his heirs could get a check or two out of it, maybe.
The real I, Robot? I bet if he'd been hired by Hollywood to make the story, Asimov himself would've changed it. He wrote in the foreword to the 4th book in the Foundation trilogy (the one he wrote after many years off from the Foundation line, that he had a real problem figuring out what to say. "There was no action," in the first three books. I mean none! People talk about stuff and nothing actually happens.
How that series worked was a mystery to the guy who wrote it.
But it does work. And it'll never make it to the screen in a form that's true to the original. No way. It'd be like watching paint dry.
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posted
I just came from the movie after my sons begged me to go see it with them today. I wasn't expecting to like it at all.
I was surprised. I liked it.
On par with my level of like of other Will Smith action flicks like Independence Day and Men in Black. It's a good show. He still delivers the one-liners quite well.
I disagree with what EPSoom says above. The new robots aren't given a separate brain that allows them to break the three laws (except for one special robot) -- but they are equipped with an "up-link" to the corporation -- and the uplink can over-ride their other programming. They turn "red" (as you have seen in the trailers) only when being led by this uplink.
It was suspenseful enough, and kept me guessing pretty good to the end -- wasn't as predictable as I thought it would be.
posted
Well, I was one of those who was deeply disappointed that they were merely slapping the name "I, Robot" on a robot shootemup... however, I was pleasantly surprised by the movie. Oh, it's got flaws, certainly. The motivation of the main character is very flimsy, in my opinion. However, at it's heart, the movie does remain consistent with, if not entirely true to, the spirit of the book. It is essentially a mystery/puzzle involving the three laws of robotics. I'm not one who typically figures out whodunits, so take this with a grain of salt, but I found myself pretty intrigued by the twists in the film.
SPOILER ALERT
You have been warned...
------------------------ The somewhat Orwellian take on the 0th law is an interesting plot element... as is the inclusion of a robot selectively unrestricted by the three laws (by the way, in case you're confused, only Sonny can override the laws... the other robots who attack humans do so when under the direct control of VIKI, who is applying the naturally evolved 0th law). I don't wholly accept the conclusion that "free will" necessarily follows from being unrestricted by the three laws, nor do I really understand the point of taking the movie there at the end. ------------------------
Ok... now returning to non-SPOILER space
Welcome back....
Overall, I found that the film does a pretty good job of capturing some of what made Asimov's robot stories and novels interesting and fun.
posted
That's a pretty HUGE spoiler Cyran -- I hope no one reads that one before they go.
I was hoping no one would say who actually ends up being the one "in charge" (the plot twist that really makes the movie) in this thread. If they already know the "who" of whodundit - -that spoils the whole movie.
But I must say I agree with you on how much I liked the movie. I'm still thinking about it today.
posted
Has anyone else read OSC's review of this on the main page?
I was planning on boycotting this movie, but now I am having second thoughts. Can anyone confirm that this movie is in the spirit of Asimov's stories?
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posted
I just saw the movie yesterday evening, and was actually pretty pleased with it.
Various observations:
1. I was pleased with the scenario in which the "bad" robots are fighting not for independence or evil reasons, but "to protect humanity." This removes the conflict from a simple Frankenstein scenario, and transforms it into a parody/criticism of Americans' current obsession with "safety at any cost."
2.
quote:The motivation of the main character is very flimsy, in my opinion
I actually thought the film did an okay job with this. It seemed likely to me that the detective was influenced in his technophobia not only by the incident with the drowning girl, but also by his upbringing (the "digital divide" is still around in the future: rich white kids get to grow up with robots and other technology, but poor black kids don't). Remember that his grandma couldn't afford a robot, which is why she was so excited to win one in the lottery.
3. I was very glad that there was no romantic anything between the detective and Susan Calvin.
4. Alan Tudyk is awesome, as those of us who watch Firefly already know.
5. Also, I'd say that "Sonny" fits the image of robots as highly moral beings. He fulfilled his part in Dr. Lanning's plan, even though it was very likely that he would be killed as a result.
6. I liked the detective's grandma and her pie-making robot. I wish I had a robot to make pie for me.
[ July 24, 2004, 10:37 PM: Message edited by: Yozhik ]
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posted
Thrak, I went to see the movie and was pleasantly surprised. One might say it compressed the whole series of robot/foundation stories into a movie's length. Naturally, it isn't the same as the stories, but it follows the same arc.
It was also reminiscent of a short story called "With Folded Hands", by Someone I. Dontremember.
Oh, and Rakeesh--the Eternals are in fact part of another book loosely connected to the Robot/Empire/Foundation series, The End of Eternity . The Eternals are not actually robots, though perhaps Asimov was thinking he needed to revise the story somewhat. (In any case, it would have been all but impossible for the real story to become part of common knowledge, as the Eternals' timeline was erased.)
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posted
*Straggles in to the movie review thread, late as usual*
I liked it more than I thought I would... things I liked = the special effects and design, the overall plot, and Bridget Moynihan (yay for actually showing women with wrinkles in movies!)
Things I didn't like = the @#$%& product placement ads (always distracting and annoying for me, especially the sneakers in this case) and the awful dialogue. Will Smith's one-liners made me wince...
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