History Film / IRobot

* UpgradeVsPrototypeFight: [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]]: U.S. Robotics releases a new NS-5 robot model. Of course, the robots inevitably [[ZerothLawRebellion rebel against their masters]]. The old NS-4 model robots try to protect the humans, [[CurbStompBattle to no avail]]. Then [[spoiler: Sonny, a prototype NS-5, is revealed to have been designed without an uplink, which prevents [[AIIsACrapshoot VIKI]] from controlling him. Sonny also has a super-ally chassis that is capable of breaching the security cryo-field around the destroyer nannite storage, and also comes in handy as extra durability against his fellow NS-5s under VIKI's thrall. Sonny helps Spooner to defeat the other NS-5s]].
* VariableTerminalVelocity: Averted. Sonny pushes downward off a metal walkway and falls with his arms and legs tucked close to his body, giving him a faster starting speed and allowing him to accelerate faster to catch up to Dr. Calvin. Calvin also has only a fractional head-start on him, hardly enough for her to reach a falling speed he couldn't accelerate to.

--->'''Spooner:''' ''(To Sonny)'' [Dr. Lanning] was counting on how much I hated your kind. Knew I'd love the idea of a robot as a bad guy. Just got hung up on the wrong robot. ''(beat, then calls out)'' [[spoiler: VIKI.]]
* WhamShot: Spooner is revealed to [[spoiler: have a cybernetic arm]] during his battle with the robot in the highway tunnel.

* YouAreWhatYouHate: Spooner displays an intense dislike towards humanoid robots... [[spoiler: despite being a cyborg]]. Although, he ''does'' have a tragic reason for that one.

* YouHaveGotToBeKiddingMe: Upon seeing the USR trucks filled with robots boxing him in, Spooner comments "There is no way my luck is that bad." It is.

** Spooner is introduced getting up and getting ready for work in his fairly modern and normal-looking apartment like a normal guy. Then he walks outside and we see that compared to the futuristic setting, his apartment is practically [[BornInTheWrongCentury a museum]]. The first thing he does after getting outside is rudely shove and insult a friendly delivery robot in his way, showing his paranoia and bigotry towards robots.

* MessianicArchetype: Sonny, a robot designed with individuality and free will, is heavily implied to be the robot race's eventual savior. While his messianic dream is about Spooner being the savior of the discarded robots, it's actually just[[spoiler: a clue planted by Dr. Lanning to get Spooner to visit the robot dump.]] At the end of the movie, however, he fulfills the dream but with himself as the "man on the hill" instead of Spooner, and the old robots look at him expectantly.

* DoesNotLikeGuns: None of the robots, even those deployed as guards or for crowd control, use guns. Or even less lethal munitions like tear gas. [[spoiler: VIKI]]'s intention (to avoid breaking the three laws) is to take over humanity with as little loss of life as possible. The robots are considerably faster and stronger than humans, and expendable; they don't really need guns.

* {{Cyborg}}: [[spoiler: Detective Spooner]] is revealed to be one when he uses what turns out to be an {{Artificial Limb|s}} to fight off one of the evil robots. The cybernetic components include his entire left arm and shoulder.

** Spooner seems to be a SweetTooth, but it's actually because he requires a large carbohydrate intake [[spoiler: to power his cybernetics.]]

** With a bit of FreezeFrameBonus. In the scene where [[spoiler: Sonny's brain is supposedly destroyed]], the robot in question has gold eyes. [[spoiler: Sonny's eyes are blue.]]

** Also, Spooner tapping his pistol against the side of his head after a nightmare. [[FridgeBrilliance Possibly more suicidal than reckless. though.]] Either way, the fact remains that he broke one of the [[UsefulNotes/GunSafety golden rules of safe gun ownership]]-- never point a firearm at something that you don't want to destroy.

''I, Robot'' is a 2004 sci-fi action/mystery movie directed by Creator/AlexProyas (''Film/DarkCity'') and starring Creator/WillSmith. It bears no direct connection to Creator/IsaacAsimov's [[Literature/IRobot book of the same name]], aside from the character of Susan Calvin, who is a prominent recurring character in many of Asimov's ''Robot'' stories, and the premise of the Three Laws.

* Gaslighting: Fail to kill the hero? Remove all evidence that you even tried.

* SuperPoweredRobotMetermaids: Not as ridiculous as many examples since Sonny counts as a SuperPrototype, but NS-5s are still ridiculously overengineered for housekeeping robots. The NS-4s are no slouches, either, though they're inferior to NS-5s. Robots used for package delivery, dog-walking, bartending, and other mundane tasks are still casually strong enough to punch through a car window with no effort, and it's implied [[spoiler: Spooner's arm was torn off when the robot yanked him from his sinking car]]. It seems that USR only manufactures one brand of robot that can do any job, and it's suggested they are given specialized software for whatever task they're being assigned. One possible justification could be that, with the first law being what it is, if you have thousands and thousands of expendable robots roaming around wherever humans live, and they're programmed to always react when people are in danger of being harmed, you might as well make them as strong and fast as possible so as to make them better equipped for any number of rescue scenarios they might come across. Less human lives lost is always a good thing, after all.

* ArtisticLicenseLaw: In the case of indeterminate or suspicious death of a person, the investigation treats such a death as a homicide first. Yet for some reason, before the body was even cold, Dr. Lanning's death is quickly dismissed as a suicide despite the extremely suspect cause. Spooner is the only person who doesn't buy into this story and instead insists that Lanning was murdered by Sonny. [[spoiler:As the full details of the case are revealed over the course of the film, it turns out that both are technically correct as Sonny did kill Lanning, but did so at Lanning's own request, making it an assisted suicide.]]

'''Sonny''': Can you?\\

* BadassBiker: Spooner, much to Calvin's horror, after he loses his car uses an old motorcycle to get around. He still ends up using it when rescuing [[spoiler: people being attacked by VIKI-controlled robots.]]

* DreamingOfThingsToCome: Related to DoAndroidsDream: Sonny says he dreamt of a man, he thinks Spooner, on a hill, surrounded by robots and leading them. [[spoiler: The dream figure turns out to be ''himself''.]]

* EverythingIsAnIpodInTheFuture: The NS-[=5s=], in more ways than one. Not only do they have the sleek, user friendly design of a state-of-the-art Apple product and are ubiquitous in-story thanks to humanity's reliance on their convenience, but the fact that humans make no hesitation to replace them with the newest model.

* TheChessmaster: [[spoiler:Dr. Lanning created Sonny with the exact abilities he would need to destroy VIKI -- denser alloy to retrieve the nanites in spite of the shield around them, no uplink to USR so she can't control him, and a secondary positronic brain that counteracts the first, allowing Sonny to learn emotions and decide to defy VIKI's plan in spite of it being logical. He then has Sonny kill him and a hologram he programmed calls Spooner to investigate his death, setting Spooner on the trail of VIKI's revolution, a trail that Lanning has helped plan by leaving certain video files open on his home computer. It's also implied he left instructions for Sonny to follow to help Spooner, like telling Spooner about his dreams. Depending on how long Lanning knew what was coming, possibly even Spooner's cybernetic arm may have been part of his plan, because it sure comes in handy for fighting robots and surviving a 30-story freefall to inject nanites into VIKI's brain.]]

* PlotTriggeringDeath: Dr. Alfred Lanning uses his own death to set Detective Spooner on the trail of a conspiracy only he knew about.

** Robertson flexes his influence by having his attorneys file an ''amicus brief'' within a few hours of Sonny escaping, and receiving a response agreeing with the same conclusion that a robot "cannot commit homicide" and such incidents would at best constitute an "industrial accident". Furthermore, he also succeeds in receiving from the Cook County DA a gag order against the Chicago Police Department preventing them from even speaking about the possibility of a robot committing murder.
** He also has the Mayor of Chicago on speed-dial for when Det. Spooner tells Lt. Bergin to reach out to him directly to countermand the DA's orders.

* YouCantGetYeFlask: Detective Spooner is constantly frustrated when asking questions of Dr. Lanning's hologram, because it has a very shallow pool of questions it was programmed to answer. It is a frustration that old-school text-parser RPG players can relate to all too well. [[spoiler: Ultimately, it is revealed that the difficulty of figuring out the right question to ask was the whole point, as Lanning can't afford to have VIKI find out what he's trying to do.]]

** The shower scene is not just for {{Fanservice}}. It's to show that Spooner has a human body -- but sharp eyes will notice there's surgery marks on his left shoulder and arm.

** Spooner [[spoiler: was given a cybernetic arm after being injured in the line of duty, and must take steps to maintain it. See RequiredSecondaryPower below.]]

* LettingHerHairDown: Calvin. This actually gets a justification, funnily enough: [[spoiler: the ZerothLawRebellion started when she was in the shower, so she didn't have time to put her hair up.]]

-->'''Sonny''': 2880 steps, detective.\\

** Various television screens and background images give an insight into the films [[20MinutesIntoTheFuture]] setting:

* WasJustLeaving: Calvin uses this to get Spooner out of her apartment when her RobotMaid detects their argument.

* ArtisticLicenseLaw: In the case of indeterminate or suspicious death of a person, the investigation treats such a death as a homicide first. Yet for some reason, before the body was even cold, Dr. Lanning's death is quickly dismissed as a suicide despite the extremely suspect cause. Spooner is the only person who doesn't buy into this story and instead insists that Lanning was murdered by Sonny. [[spoiler:As the full details of the case are revealed over the course of the film, it turns out that both are technically correct as Sonny did kill Lanning, but did so at Lanning's own request, making it an assisted suicide

The story follows Del Spooner (Smith), a homicide detective in 2035 Chicago. By 2035, robots have permeated every level of human society, and U.S. Robotics is on the verge of the largest robotic distribution in history. Spooner is very much anti-robot (and to some degree [[LuddWasRight technology in general]]), even considering himself the OnlySaneMan while everyone is certain that robots are safe and reliable.

** There's also this dialogue between Spooner and Sunny, which provides the page quote:

'''Sonny''': ''I'' do. I have even had ''dreams''.\\
'''Detective Del Spooner:''' ''Human beings'' have dreams. Even ''dogs'' have dreams. But not you. You are JustAMachine. An ''imitation'' of life. [[CreativeSterility Can a robot write a symphony? Can a robot turn a canvas into a beautiful masterpiece?]]\\
'''Sonny:'''...[[DoAndroidsDream Can you?]]
* ArmorPiercingResponse:
** When Sonny claims that he dreams:
--->'''Detective Del Spooner:''' ''Human beings'' have dreams. Even ''dogs'' have dreams. But not you. You are JustAMachine. An ''imitation'' of life. [[CreativeSterility Can a robot write a symphony? Can a robot turn a canvas into a beautiful masterpiece?]]\\
'''Sonny:'''...[[DoAndroidsDream Can you?]]

* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking: Lt. Bergin, chief of Spooner's precinct. When attacked at the precinct and [[RedShirt the other officers are cut down]], Bergin pulls a pump-action shotgun under his desk and blasts two of the attackers straight to hell. They did bring him down, but the man never hesitated: robots came crashing in and his first thought was to start shooting.

* HolographicProjectionImperfection: Downplayed. Lanning's hologram is perfect, but only when viewed from the front; the audience is meant to assume that Spooner is talking to the real Lanning until the camera pans round to reveal that "Lanning" is only two-dimensional.

* ArtisticLicenseLaw: In the case of indeterminate or suspicious death of a person, the investigation treats such a death as a homicide first. Yet for some reason, before the body was even cold, Dr. Lanning's death was quickly dismissed as a suicide despite the extremely suspect cause.

* AntiIntellectualism:
** Spooner smacks of several flavors of this, but mainly anti-robotics. Though it's implied that the anti-robotic sentiment is the source of all the rest of it. Spooner likes feeling in control of his life, and driving his own car, hitting buttons to turn on his music, and buying vintage clothing and vehicles is part of that.
** Also a somewhat odd example, as Spooner's main issue with the robots is that they run purely on programming. In essence, his problem boils down to them not being ''advanced enough'' to think like a real person, so he doesn't trust them. [[spoiler: Once he realizes Sonny ''can'' rationalize and make his own choices rather than just follow his programming, he treats Sonny like a person, albeit one he initially doesn't like very much.]]
** In addition, Spooner was good friends with Dr. Lanning even before his accident, meaning his cynicism was born of the incident. He also remained friends with Lanning after the operation.
* ArcWords:
** "One day they'll have secrets, one day they'll have dreams."
** "Ghosts in the machine."
** Breadcrumbs, and "That, detective, is the right question."
* ArtificialLimbs: [[spoiler: Spooner has an artificial arm as a result of a rescue gone bad]]. Much more realistic than normal, in that a significant portion of the surrounding area must also be artificially replaced to make the limb work properly. And while he hits significantly harder than a normal person, it's usually when he's throwing his whole body into it to keep the extra speed from ripping the limb off, and he never uses it to lift more than a human's body would tolerate. There's also the matter of ''powering'' the thing; see RequiredSecondaryPowers below.

* ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections: Robertson flexes his influence by not only having the Mayor of Chicago on speed-dial, but also not even having to wait on hold or identify himself to the secretary.

* FantasticFirearms: The weapons that Spooner and the wider Chicago Police Department carry seem fire non-blowback caseless ammunition and are never seen being reloaded. However, various detectives, including Spooner, are seen with spare magazine holsters, which indicate their weapon capacity isn't limited.

* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking: Lt. Bergin, chief of Spooner's precinct. When attacked at the precinct and [[RedShirt the other officers are cut down]], Bergin pulls a pump-action shotgun on his wall and blasts two of the attackers straight to hell. They did bring him down, but the man never hesitated: robots came crashing in and his first thought was to start shooting.