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Games I Would Play…If Anyone Made Them #2
What would happen if a robot was program so it couldn’t hurt us, and yet it could read our minds?
If an AI was programmed to learn, could it be raised like a human and mature into an adult intellect?
What would happen if the programming rules all robots with came under conflict? How might a robot unintentionally put human life in danger?
Isaac Asimov’s three laws of robotics, and the I, Robot stories he wrote around them, explored the physiological, social, and philosophical dilemmas humanity might have to deal with if they ever produced androids with brains as sophisticated as the human mind. Asimov wrote his book in the ‘50s, and surprisingly, many of these topics still feel under explored today.
In 1978, Harlan Ellison wrote a screenplay for Asimov’s book, which never saw theatrical production. Ellison’s script did a good job of combining all of Asimov’s themes into a single narrative thread. He brought to life a world where humanities ignorance over robotics ignited religious riots. He imagined a future where humanity had figured out how to safely cryogenically freeze themselves, but were still able to communicated with those frozen minds. And he shaped a story about a reporter’s relentless quest to uncover the truth about the first President of the Galactic Federation.
I actually enjoyed the 2004 Will Smith film, but after reading Ellison’s script it hurts to think about what could have been.
Ellison’s script probably never saw the light of a projector because the movie would have been five hours long and cost billions to produce (especially back in the ‘70s). It also might have had something to do with the fact that Ellison got into a fight where he told the studio head of Warner Bros. Studio that he had the “intellectual capacity of an artichoke.”
But you know what medium routinely delivers a longer narrative, and can more cheaply handle the production of special effects and fantasy settings?
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