#WHEN will giskard get any loving?

[greenvertumna]

Spoilers for The Robots of Dawn:

The revelation that Giskard can read both human and robotic minds is hilarious bc you realize that he has had to listen to 48+ hours of Baley and Daneel pining for each other.

[lacertae-dreamscape]

fave 10 characters from any media and why u like them?

oh um that's one i have to think about anon <3

in no particular order, let's see...

Tobias (Animorphs) - i like the sweet and kind and sensitive type who's forced to reassess where he is as a person when he's stuck in a situation that doesn't allow him many leeways + confronting the inherent bias and hypocrisies of being human while... well. not being in a human body. (Tobias in Animorphs is a kid who's given the power to turn into animals for 2 hours, but gets trapped in the body of a hawk. This book series is probably one of the first hyperfixations i've ever had.)

Bilbo (The Hobbit) - someone who'd grown complacent with his life as it was, without listening to the part of him who asked for something different finally is pushed into taking that step into the something new and ends up finding that the world is so much bigger and so much MORE than he ever could believe... and then loses it all, goes back home alone and full of regrets and memories and loss, stuck in a place that should be his coveted home but is restrictive and small and too little all the same but also safe, and until the very last, continues to listen for the sounds of foreign footsteps by the door of his house.

Zenyatta (Overwatch) - if he was just a monk, it wouldn't have been as compelling as the idea of a monk who is a robot -not a cyborg, but a complex AI robot with what counts as a soul. A robot with a soul who can touch and connect with a higher spiritual being in which he believes into, a role of semi-pacifist who faces his own brand of racism as he's not human and never will be, threading on a thin line for acceptation and respect and equality and who believes so strongly in change and carving your own path. The finer appeal of life and a soul in a robot's body.

Giskard R. Reventlov (Asimov) - feels weird to go directly for the jugular with yet another robot but. Giskard appeared in two books from the Elijah Baley saga written by Asimov. It takes place chronologically in-between his early robot books (growth of robot use by humans) and the Foundation setting saga (far future where Earth is the first of many planets colonized by humans). This robot can read minds, which binds him even more strictly to the Three Laws of Robotics. I love him to a point it's hard to define why i do. He freezes when faced with a conundrum over whether the possible destruction of Earth will be a positive or not for the advancement of humans by allowing them to expand into space, but not before admitting his own limitations and gifting Daneel (another robot) with the same power of reading minds, tasking him the herculean job of aiding humanity in its growth.

The Sandman (Rise of the Guardians/Guardians of Childhood) - fascinating character that i met with the movie first, but i found myself loving as a character from the book version too. I love the softness of his interactions with others, and i personally love that he does not speak, i find it opens so many new ways of interpretation. Also his design is top notch and there is so much strength in *dreams*

Natsume (Natsume Yuujinchou) - hello we got manga here. uh. I personally find myself gravitating towards characters who, despite everything else, choose to be strong and kind in the face of opposition. Kindness is a choice. Natsume's story is that he can see spirits, and finds purpose in an old journal his grandma, who also could see spirits but had a sad life, left behind. Seeing characters who were not loved and had a hard time trusting others choose to be kind and find their own family is probably my favourite trope and i'll always love the innate strength of characters facing of things that are bigger than them and discovering the depths of their own selves.

Watanuki (XXXHolic) - similar to the above, but different. a twist of fate of a character who was never meant to exist learning to not only crave life but want it, want to survive in spite of fate, wanting to live and experiment life as it was meant to be, day after day, even if. even if. even when. (but BOI was my boi watanuki done dirty) He also sees spirits, he's also unable to control his own fate, but he's taught, little by little, that his own life has a meaning and a purpose. He's taught that he's wanted. that people care. It is a very important teaching.

Wander (Wander over Yonder) - hello? absolute optimistic alien whose entire shtic is wander around the galaxy to see how amazing it is? making friends and being positive even when life drags u down? knowing that, again: kindness is a choice and its not a bad choice, and that little good deeds matter? you know how much these things mean to me? no? oh god they do so much. in bad times, i cling to this kind of message. there is strength in taking the little things and simply living for them.

Hercule Poirot (Agatha Christie) - how could he not be here? this is the one and only detective i will love. (sherlock holmes is good but like. he'll always be secondary but ill always always always love poirot). this also includes the only actor ive ever seen that was able to truly portray the essence of this man, David Suchet. no other actor. *hisses* i just really love me a short, polite gentleman with incredibly specific manners who has his own sense of justice and an amazing brain.

Saitama (One Punch Man) - i guess i can end this with him haha. there is. a lot i can say about subversion of like. typical shounen/seinen tropes and whatnot, but at the end of the day, saitama's just a person. he's depressed and clinging so hard to the one thing he thought would be able to help (and now its worse than before) and having a hard time feeling like he's welcome in a society like this. he finds no place for himself, alienated as he is. i can. relate a lot to this. and despite everything else - yes its coming u know its coming. he chooses to do good things. he chooses to be a hero. he's by no means perfect, nor would i like him if he was. but he fights every day and that's all that matters in the end.

[trashcanalienist]

More black people in robot fiction please!! My god, what I've been missing out on! What with: primarily, the Purpose of robot fiction; secondarily, the development of a world in which robots exist; and thirdly, black people existing in movies. Detective Del Spooner being a robot-racist is a fun spin cause he's black, but...come on man, you ain't tryna tell me racism's over because we invented a slave class. Like Harry Domin indirectly stated - as long as we are different, we will hate each other for being different. Robots are similar even if not identical, and thus do not - even cannot - hate each other. Y'all coulda kept the Elijah Bailey vibe...Lije wasn't too thrilled about robots, but he accepted them as part of the world and kept his dislike for them harmless and professional. Like Eddie Valiant with toons. Man, Roger Rabbit's a good movie.

Will Smith got his fuсkin Converse All-Stars and his sweet potato pie and he out to solve some murders! He's even got a god damn guitar wall in his little apartment. Bet your аss he don't play one of them in the movie. EVEN BETTER,, THE FIRST WHITE PERSON TO SPEAK IN THIS MOVIE (though he be the hologram of the dead roboticist, Alfred Lanning), IN HIS FIRST EVER LINE, CALLS DETECTIVE DEL SPOONER "son". YES! THAT IS WHAT I CALL...UH...well it's not exactly racial subtext, but also that's exactly what it is. R. Sammy and everything. I wish they'd've gone a little further with the "robot" designation used as a method of...not dehumanization because they're not living or humans, but...devaluing? It is obvious that Giskard Reventlov is a robot, so it is considered rude to distinguish him from other Aurorans with that R., whereas the Earthmen delight in devaluing their machines by insisting on that R, denying them last names, giving them names like "Sammy", and calling them "boy"...sound familiar? Anyways that's how it is in the novels, I wish it were the same here.

Del Spooner thinks a robot can do crime even though no robots have ever done crimes. He thinks this because he is prejudiced. This is the weakest facet of the movie. He's prejudiced because one time he and another car got shoved off a bridge into the water, and a passing NS-4 saved him but not the little girl in the other car. They say it's about percentages, and it is, but the robot should still have been positronically affected by not being able to save Sarah as well. Like those poor Solarians who couldn't save Dr. Delmarre. It should at the very least exhibit some cognitive dysfunction as a result of not being physically able to obey such a strong Law.

I think if a robot can commit a crime then the First Law must be strengthened. The definition of "harming a human being" would need to be expanded. It would lead to slight issues like Herbie and might make robots less useful, but the point of the Laws is to promote safety over usefulness. I am glad then to see that no robot who obeys the Laws has ever committed any crime.

Anyways Del's a cop with a "documented history of savage violence against robots" man come on, grow up. Get some god dаmn therapy

Aight so they put the Laws onscreen before the movie fully starts, but then Del asks Dr. Calvin some very basic questions genuinely and it's like...Del man how you live in this world and you don't know how the Laws relate to and conflict with each other?? I know USR is still in its relatively early days, but come on! Well, he's the type to endanger himself, his passenger, and every other motorist by taking manual control of a self-driving car. Spoon's the type of guy who opens the front door of a house that ain't his, LEAVES it open, and then gets spooked when the wind slams it shut. That's why he hates robots, man. He's just that kind of guy...the entitlement combined with the proud humanism.

They shoulda subtitled this movie "Will Smith Does Millions Of Dollars Worth Of Property Damage" bro even before the NS-5s start attacking him he's blowing their positronic brains out...man those things ain't cheap! Or maybe they are! I don't know! Del's grandma can't seem to afford one, but they're mass produced and their creator Alfred Lanning wanted robots in every household. Bet he'd love Solaria

On one hand I understand and agree with Del's reluctance to talk around what is in this film possibly corporate spyware. On the other hand the anticorporate subtext in this movie kinda muddles the whole robot racism thing. Like yeah I'd be polite to FedEx NS-4 but I'd also shoot down Amazon drones with a BB gun so

[wanda-seldon]

1, 4, 7, 13

1. What OTPs in your fandom(s) do you just not get?

For Asimov, I really don’t get Daneel/Giskard, idk. For Star Wars, Rey/Poe - they interacted like once and that didn’t even make it into the movie, and they don’t really seem compatible to me?

4. Do you have a NoTP in your fandom? Are they a popular OTP?

Luke Skywalker/Anyone is a NoTP for me. He doesn’t need a love interest and also I platonic-ship him with everyone. I don’t think any particular Luke pairings are terribly popular? But I know a ton of people on tumblr headcanon him as gay, and a ton of people also want Rey to be his daughter. I don’t care for any of it.

7. Is there anything you used to like but can’t stand now?

I used to like Ginny Weasley, back in the first few books, because she reminded me of myself. I stopped liking her when I stopped being able to identify with her. Can’t think of any ships that I started out liking and don’t anymore. 

13. Unpopular opinion about XXX character?

Luke Skywalker is asexual ;)

Ask me salt-filled fandom questions!