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* InevitabilityClarification: Tonya Welton, discussing the failed attempt to kidnap Lentrall, corrects herself: it's not "if" the government find out she was behind it, it's "when".
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* BaitAndSwitch: [[spoiler:Near the end, after Kresh solves the mystery, his inner monologue notes that "she" is dangerous, that "she" can kill him in a heartbeat if he makes a misstep. The end of the chapter leads you to believe that the "she" in question is Fredda Leving. It isn't; it's ''Ariel''.]]
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* ChekhovsGun: Fake gun in this case. When heading out with Kresh to pursue Caliban in the storm, Donald suggests he take a training blaster (which simulates a real blaster beam, but does no damage), much to Kresh's confusion. [[spoiler:Some time later, we learn that it's because he's figured out that Ariel is a No-Law robot, and wants to test it by having Kresh seemingly shoot a human in her presence. A Three-Law robot would leap in front of the gun before he had even squeezed the trigger; Ariel puts her own existence first.]]
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* BlackmailBackfire: [[spoiler:Prospero]] tries to blackmail Governor Grieg to [[spoiler:free the New Laws]] by threatening to expose every scandal tied to the terraforming project at once. However, every one of those scandals is tied to one of Grieg's political enemies, so the governor doesn't care.
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* MurderBySuicide: This is the standard MO of the Settler robot bashers, since it represents more of a challenge than simply blasting a robot that can't offer any resistance; talking it into killing itself requires overriding the various priorities in its brain (it needs to remain alive to perform its regular duties for its primary master, for instance). However, [[DidntSeeThatComing they then make the mistake]] of trying this tactic on Caliban, who has neither the First nor Second Law to compel his actions. [[OhCrap Oops]].
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* CripplingOverspecialization: Spacer society uses robots for everything. That means that if a robot isn't appropriate for something, a human has to do it manually. For instance, Spacer police have to fly their patrol aircars manually when their Settler counterparts can use autopilots.
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* CripplingOverspecialization: Spacer society uses robots for everything. That means that if a robot isn't appropriate for something, a human has to do it manually. For instance, Spacer police (who may have to deliberately drive in an unsafe manner in the course of their duties, which the First Law wouldn't allow a robot pilot to do) have to fly their patrol aircars manually when their Settler counterparts can use autopilots.
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* TerminallyDependentSociety: The Spacers are hopelessly dependent on their robots, not just to do important tasks that are high risk or require advanced computational skill, but for everyday activities. Fredda started her efforts to develop the New Law and No Law robots after realizing that she -- one of the most brilliant scientists on the planet -- did not know how to ''dress herself'' without the assistance of her valet-bot.
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* ThePerfectionist: Grieg mentions that the New Law robots aren't working out well in the terraforming projects they were built for. One scene shows a group of them at work, and it's apparent that they spend too much time trying to find a perfect solution rather than a workable one; one of them is aggrieved at the notion that they might have to settle for 99.5% efficiency rather than 100%.
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* {{Foreshadowing}}: At one point, Kresh sarcastically asks one of the scientists who worked on the new gravitonic brain whether they just give a gravitonic robot a piece of paper with the Laws written on it, and hope the robot reads it before going out to attack a few people. [[spoiler:That's quite a good description of Ariel's relationship to the Three Laws; she learned them as part of the experiment she was created for, but they don't constrain her as they would if they'd been hardcoded into her brain.]]
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* {{Foreshadowing}}: {{Foreshadowing}}:
** At one point, Kresh sarcastically asks one of the scientists who worked on the new gravitonic brain whether they just give a gravitonic robot a piece of paper with the Laws written on it, and hope the robot reads it before going out to attack a few people. [[spoiler:That's quite a good description of Ariel's relationship to the Three Laws; she learned them as part of the experiment she was created for, but they don't constrain her as they would if they'd been hardcoded into her brain.]]]]
** Tonya Welton suggests Kresh might consider standing as a candidate the next time there's an election for governor.
** At one point, Kresh sarcastically asks one of the scientists who worked on the new gravitonic brain whether they just give a gravitonic robot a piece of paper with the Laws written on it, and hope the robot reads it before going out to attack a few people. [[spoiler:That's quite a good description of Ariel's relationship to the Three Laws; she learned them as part of the experiment she was created for, but they don't constrain her as they would if they'd been hardcoded into her brain.
** Tonya Welton suggests Kresh might consider standing as a candidate the next time there's an election for governor.
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* BaritoneOfStrength: The first time Caliban uses his voice is when he's being confronted by a gang of Settler robot bashers; he discovers it has a "deep and commanding" tone. They encounter the 'strength' aspect shortly afterwards when they find that, unlike other robots, he will use his powerful robot body to defend himself if attacked.
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* MisplacedRetribution: After the sabotaged SPR robots failed to protect Grieg in ''Inferno'', that model got a reputation for unreliability and the police were forced to sell theirs off cheaply -- even though any other type of robot could have been sabotaged the same way, and the robots themselves still worked perfectly.
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* ArmorPiercingQuestion: Fredda Leving's first seminar, about what robots are good for, has her describing how robots now do so much that most Spacers on Inferno don't do anything, don't know ''how'' to do anything, and wouldn't know how to care for themselves without a robot if they tried. She ends it with the question "What are ''humans'' good for?" and comes to the sad answer of "not much".
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* BluffTheImpostor: After the discovery of the murdered body of Ranger Huthwitz, alarm bells start ringing for Kresh about the communication he had earlier with Governor Grieg. He contacts the governor again to ask what he sent him for his birthday last year; the baffled Grieg has no idea -- which confirms to Kresh that something is wrong, as he had abolished the tradition of sending birthday gifts to government officials as soon as he took office. In reality, Grieg had actually been murdered a few hours earlier, and the killer left a simulation device hooked into the comms system to make it appear he was still alive and well.
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* BluffTheImpostor: After the discovery of the murdered body of Ranger Huthwitz, alarm bells start ringing for Kresh about the communication he had earlier with Governor Grieg. He contacts the governor again to ask what he sent him for his birthday last year; the baffled Grieg has no idea -- which confirms to Kresh that something is wrong, as he had abolished the tradition of sending birthday gifts to government officials as soon as he took office.office (Coincidentally, on Kresh's birthday). In reality, Grieg had actually been murdered a few hours earlier, and the killer left a simulation device hooked into the comms system to make it appear he was still alive and well.
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* TornApartByTheMob: A problem that Kresh faces in the book is robot bashers, Luddite settlers forming lynch mobs to destroy robots, who aren't permitted to defend themselves because First Law trumps Third Law. An accidental run-in with Caliban, who has no First Law imperative to not harm anyone while defending himself or Second Law imperative to obey orders to commit suicide on request, ends up scaring them straight.
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* TornApartByTheMob: A problem that Kresh faces in the book is robot bashers, Luddite settlers Settlers forming lynch mobs to destroy robots, who aren't permitted to defend themselves because First Law trumps Third Law. An accidental run-in with Caliban, who has no First Law imperative to not harm anyone while defending himself or Second Law imperative to obey orders to commit suicide on request, ends up scaring them straight.
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* {{Foreshadowing}}: At one point, Kresh sarcastically asks one of the scientists who worked on the new gravitonic brain whether they just give a gravitonic robot a piece of paper with the Laws written on it, and hope the robot reads it before going out to attack a few people. [[spoiler:That's quite a good description of Ariel's relationship to the Three Laws; she learned them as part of the experiment she was created for, but they don't constrain her as they would if they'd been hardcoded into her brain.]]
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* ToKnowHimIMustBecomeHim: At one point, Donald attempts to simulate how a RoboticPsychopath might have behaved in Caliban's position. The cognitive dissonance nearly destroys him, but he's able to draw some useful conclusions about the level of threat Caliban might actually pose.
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* HeroicBSOD: Donald nearly locks up on finding the murdered body of the Governor -- not least because he, Donald, had previously approved the arrangements for the Governor's protection, and they had obviously proved inadequate.
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* MythologyGag: Caliban mentions "legends" of cities populated entirely by robots -- which would describe the ''Literature/IsaacAsimovsRobotCity'' series, another authorised set of stories set in Asimov's Robot universe.
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* EurekaMoment: Kresh spots the solution to the case when, searching in the desert for Caliban, Tonya Welton mistakes another robot's footprints for Caliban's.
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* PowerSource: Caliban was designed for a brief lab experiment, so he is fitted with a rechargeable power cell that lasts only a few days, rather than the long-lasting atomic power supply normally fitted to robots. So along with all his other problems, he has to avoid running out of power and shutting down, which would leave him a sitting duck for his pursuers.
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* TrustPassword: Kresh and Devray have an agreed code phrase and response which they use when calling each other in emergencies, to ensure they aren't talking to a simulation like the one of Grieg in ''Inferno''.
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[[foldercontrol]]
[[folder:Tropes relating to the series as a whole]]
[[folder:Tropes relating to the series as a whole]]
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* ApeShallNeverKillApe: At the climax of ''Utopia'', Caliban is faced with choosing between the lives of two characters, both of whom he considers evil. He saves the one who was not proven to be willing to kill others of his own kind.
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* ApeShallNeverKillApe: At AgeGapRomance: It's [[VagueAge never stated]] how old Alvar Kresh is, though he's implied to be middle-aged at least, which, being a Spacer, would put him somewhere around the climax two to three century mark. By contrast, Fredda Leving, whom he falls in love with and is married to by the time of ''Utopia'', Caliban is faced only forty by this point, and looks closer to 25 (and being a Spacer herself, can probably expect to outlive him by a long time). It's noted that many Infernals have a problem with choosing the age difference between them, which is only made worse by the lives of two characters, both of whom he considers evil. He saves the one who was not proven fact that Spacer culture tends to be willing to kill others dismissive and suspicious of his own kind. youth.
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* CallBack: In a discussion of whether it would be possible to build a KillerRobot, Tonya Welton gives the example of the Solarian overseer robots in ''Literature/RobotsAndEmpire''.
* ColonyDrop: In ''Utopia'', a proposal is made to deorbit a comet onto the planet. Carefully aimed, it would create a new sea that will stabilise the planet's weather system. Any mistake and it would cause apocalyptic devastation. This is not a situation that three-law robots are well equipped to deal with.
* ColorblindConfusion: Trying to hunt a red robot, one CowboyCop shoots a harmless green maintenance droid and protests that he's colour-blind.
* CoversAlwaysLie: It's an important plot point that Caliban is coloured red, the same colour as flecks of red paint found at the crime scene. The Ralph [=McQuarrie=] cover illustration nonetheless depicts him as grey.
* CowboyCop: Deputy Jakdall of the Hades City Police, who likes to shoot first and ask questions later if at all.
* CreativeSterility: It's mentioned that Spacer society is heading this way, with humans ordering robots to write books and paint rather than going to the trouble of doing it themselves.
* ColonyDrop: In ''Utopia'', a proposal is made to deorbit a comet onto the planet. Carefully aimed, it would create a new sea that will stabilise the planet's weather system. Any mistake and it would cause apocalyptic devastation. This is not a situation that three-law robots are well equipped to deal with.
* ColorblindConfusion: Trying to hunt a red robot, one CowboyCop shoots a harmless green maintenance droid and protests that he's colour-blind.
* CoversAlwaysLie: It's an important plot point that Caliban is coloured red, the same colour as flecks of red paint found at the crime scene. The Ralph [=McQuarrie=] cover illustration nonetheless depicts him as grey.
* CowboyCop: Deputy Jakdall of the Hades City Police, who likes to shoot first and ask questions later if at all.
* CreativeSterility: It's mentioned that Spacer society is heading this way, with humans ordering robots to write books and paint rather than going to the trouble of doing it themselves.
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* CallBack: In CannotTellALie: It's repeatedly stated that Three Law robots can't (unless under a discussion of sufficiently strong First or Second Law impulse to do so), but that New Laws can (as can Caliban). It's not clear whether it would be possible to build this a KillerRobot, Tonya Welton gives the example by-product of the Solarian overseer robots Laws or if it's simply the result of gravitonic brains having greater flexibility than positronic ones.
* ClimateChangeAllegory: And not exactly a subtle one. The planet Inferno is facing a potentially apocalyptic ecological catastrophe caused by human carelessness, and efforts to avert it are hampered by the fact that most people either choose to ignore it or, at worst, dismiss it as a hoax. (Though it's due to the ecosystem being artificial in''Literature/RobotsAndEmpire''.
the first place and never having been properly stabilized, and -- ironically, given the planet's name -- it's projected to end in a GlacialApocalypse.)
*ColonyDrop: In ContinuitySnarl: The books only ever refer to Earth in [[EarthThatWas the past tense]] and heavily imply not only that it's been completely abandoned, but that its location seems to have been forgotten (even though the events of ''Literature/RobotsAndEmpire'' are stated to have taken place just a century before). [[Literature/PebbleInTheSky Canonically]], Earth remains populated well into the Imperial era.
* CorruptPolitician:
** Simcor Beddle, leader of the Ironheads. He presents himself as an idealist fighting to preserve the Infernal way of life (and seems to have [[BelievingTheirOwnLies convinced himself of it]]), but at root he's simply interested in power, and is willing to go to all sorts of illegal ends to get it, whether it's staging riots or spying on opponents.
** Beddle's second-in-command in ''Utopia'',a proposal Jadelo Gildern, is made even worse, being a ManipulativeBastard who sees everyone and everything around him, his boss included, as a tool to deorbit a comet onto be used to get what he wants. Unlike Beddle, he doesn't even bother pretending to believe in the planet. Carefully aimed, it would create a new sea that will stabilise the planet's weather system. Any mistake and it would cause apocalyptic devastation. This is not a situation that three-law robots are well equipped to deal with.
* ColorblindConfusion: Trying to hunt a red robot, one CowboyCop shoots a harmless green maintenance droid and protests that he's colour-blind.
* CoversAlwaysLie: It's an important plot point that Caliban is coloured red, the same colourIronhead ideology, as flecks of red paint found at the crime scene. The Ralph [=McQuarrie=] cover illustration nonetheless depicts him as grey.
* CowboyCop: Deputy Jakdall of the Hades City Police, who likes to shoot first and ask questions later if at all.
* CreativeSterility: It's mentioned that Spacer society is heading this way,demonstrated by his unapologetic deals with humans ordering robots to write books and paint rather than going to the trouble of doing it themselves.Settlers.
* ClimateChangeAllegory: And not exactly a subtle one. The planet Inferno is facing a potentially apocalyptic ecological catastrophe caused by human carelessness, and efforts to avert it are hampered by the fact that most people either choose to ignore it or, at worst, dismiss it as a hoax. (Though it's due to the ecosystem being artificial in
*
* CorruptPolitician:
** Simcor Beddle, leader of the Ironheads. He presents himself as an idealist fighting to preserve the Infernal way of life (and seems to have [[BelievingTheirOwnLies convinced himself of it]]), but at root he's simply interested in power, and is willing to go to all sorts of illegal ends to get it, whether it's staging riots or spying on opponents.
** Beddle's second-in-command in ''Utopia'',
* ColorblindConfusion: Trying to hunt a red robot, one CowboyCop shoots a harmless green maintenance droid and protests that he's colour-blind.
* CoversAlwaysLie: It's an important plot point that Caliban is coloured red, the same colour
* CowboyCop: Deputy Jakdall of the Hades City Police, who likes to shoot first and ask questions later if at all.
* CreativeSterility: It's mentioned that Spacer society is heading this way,
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* DaChief: Sheriff Kresh is the chief of the city police, and occasionally feels the need to play up this trope. Even as he's shouting about how his trigger-happy officers only avoided ruining everything because [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy they can't even shoot straight]], his internal monologue notes that he deliberately doesn't soundproof his office so his subordinates can hear him blow up.
* DeadManWriting: In the second book, the planetary governor is assassinated, and it's found he left an "In case I'm assassinated" letter to his successor listing the problems he's likely to face.
* DidntThinkThisThrough: The standard procedure for double-blind testing of robots involves setting up the scenario by giving the robots involved a series of strict orders. The roboticists involved applied the procedure, unchanged, to testing a robot not bound by the Second Law, who was free to disregard any order it liked.
* DrivenToSuicide: In ''Utopia'', a three-law robot has information that would be necessary for the incredibly high-stakes comet impact project. He decides that his knowledge has more potential for harm than good, and destroys himself in order to prevent it from being used. It turns out to be a SenselessSacrifice, because the information is retrieved from other sources and the project goes ahead anyway.
* TheEeyore: Kaelor, a robot in ''Utopia'' who's designed to be capable of processing hypothetical situations that might lead to danger to humans. Maybe it's because of this design feature, or maybe he's just like that anyway, but he has a dour, pessimistic attitude to everything.
* ElectronicSpeechImpediment: When a robot is contemplating the possibility of harm to humans, the conflict in its circuits tends to be indicated by stuttering -- a condition referred to in-universe as "speechlock".
* EncyclopediaExposita: The book is introduced by an excerpt from the fictional work ''Early History of Colonization'' by Sarhir Vadid, explaining the background of the Settler-Spacer ideological conflict.
* ExactWords: The fact that a ransom message has the phrase "or Beddle will die" rather than some statement that the kidnappers will actively kill Beddle allows Caliban to figure out that the kidnapper is a New Law Robot, who cannot kill, but can place someone in a deadly situation and then abandon them there.
* TheExitIsThatWay: In ''Inferno'', Tierlaw Verick's meeting with Governor Grieg goes so badly that at the end, Verick storms out through the door he came in by, rather than the designated exit. [[spoiler:Very much on purpose, as we find out later.]]
* DeadManWriting: In the second book, the planetary governor is assassinated, and it's found he left an "In case I'm assassinated" letter to his successor listing the problems he's likely to face.
* DidntThinkThisThrough: The standard procedure for double-blind testing of robots involves setting up the scenario by giving the robots involved a series of strict orders. The roboticists involved applied the procedure, unchanged, to testing a robot not bound by the Second Law, who was free to disregard any order it liked.
* DrivenToSuicide: In ''Utopia'', a three-law robot has information that would be necessary for the incredibly high-stakes comet impact project. He decides that his knowledge has more potential for harm than good, and destroys himself in order to prevent it from being used. It turns out to be a SenselessSacrifice, because the information is retrieved from other sources and the project goes ahead anyway.
* TheEeyore: Kaelor, a robot in ''Utopia'' who's designed to be capable of processing hypothetical situations that might lead to danger to humans. Maybe it's because of this design feature, or maybe he's just like that anyway, but he has a dour, pessimistic attitude to everything.
* ElectronicSpeechImpediment: When a robot is contemplating the possibility of harm to humans, the conflict in its circuits tends to be indicated by stuttering -- a condition referred to in-universe as "speechlock".
* EncyclopediaExposita: The book is introduced by an excerpt from the fictional work ''Early History of Colonization'' by Sarhir Vadid, explaining the background of the Settler-Spacer ideological conflict.
* ExactWords: The fact that a ransom message has the phrase "or Beddle will die" rather than some statement that the kidnappers will actively kill Beddle allows Caliban to figure out that the kidnapper is a New Law Robot, who cannot kill, but can place someone in a deadly situation and then abandon them there.
* TheExitIsThatWay: In ''Inferno'', Tierlaw Verick's meeting with Governor Grieg goes so badly that at the end, Verick storms out through the door he came in by, rather than the designated exit. [[spoiler:Very much on purpose, as we find out later.]]
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* DeadManWriting: In the second book, the planetary governor is assassinated, and it's found he left an "In case I'm assassinated" letter to his successor listing the problems he's likely to face.
* DidntThinkThisThrough: The standard procedure for double-blind testing of robots involves setting up the scenario by giving the robots involved a series of strict orders. The roboticists involved applied the procedure, unchanged, to testing a robot not bound by the Second Law, who was free to disregard any order it liked.
* DrivenToSuicide: In ''Utopia'', a three-law robot has information that would be necessary for the incredibly high-stakes comet impact project. He decides that his knowledge has more potential for harm than good, and destroys himself in order to prevent it from being used. It turns out to be a SenselessSacrifice, because the information is retrieved from other sources and the project goes ahead anyway.
* TheEeyore: Kaelor, a robot in ''Utopia'' who's designed to be capable of processing hypothetical situations that might lead to danger to humans. Maybe it's because of this design feature, or maybe he's just like that anyway, but he has a dour, pessimistic attitude to everything.
* ElectronicSpeechImpediment: When a robot is contemplating the possibility of harm to humans, the conflict in its circuits tends to be indicated by stuttering -- a condition referred to in-universe as "speechlock".
*
** Humans vs. humans: The
** Humans vs. robots: Spacers tend to see robots as simply tools to be used, despite their sentience, while Settlers, at best, see them as a threat to human will. At worst, some go out
* TheExitIsThatWay: In ''Inferno'', Tierlaw Verick's meeting
** Robots vs. robots: Three Law robots hold much the same view of New Laws as Spacers do, and often [[NoTrueScotsman deny they even count as robots]]. Prospero, again, responds by despising them, though other New Laws don't seem to feel the same way, having too many more pressing concerns (such as security and survival) to waste time with
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* JurisdictionFriction: In ''Inferno'', there are three law-enforcement agencies rubbing against each other: the Rangers, whose police duties are only a small part of their functions; the Settler Security Service, whom the Spacers don't trust; and the Hades City Police, who have no official jurisdiction but had the advantage of being first on the scene.
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* JurisdictionFriction: In ''Inferno'', ForWantOfANail: The events of the trilogy came about because three unlikely events coincided on the same planet. One was that a Spacer world facing a major ecological crisis swallowed its pride enough to allow Settlers, traditionally seen as the enemy, in to help. The second was that a roboticist, waking up one day to find her robot unavailable to dress her, came to realize how little she was capable of doing for herself, leading her to question just about everything about her society and leading her to formulate the New Laws of Robotics. The third was that another roboticist came up with a whole new type of robot brain, one which allowed the New Laws to go from a mere intellectual exercise to reality. Between them, these three events ended up changing the course of history on Inferno, and -- implied by the end of the trilogy -- all of humanity.
* HiddenElfVillage: Hidden robot city in this case. Valhalla, an underground city created by escaped "rustback" New Law robots, becomes the home for the entire NL population after the second book. They deliberately keep its location a secret, even from their few human friends, as they know there arethree law-enforcement agencies rubbing against each other: far too many -- human and robot alike -- who would like nothing better than to wipe them all out.
* ImprobableAge: As of theRangers, whose police duties are only a small part start of their functions; the Settler Security Service, whom the Spacers don't trust; series, Fredda Leving is just 35 years old, and already one of her planet's foremost scientists and the Hades City Police, who have no official jurisdiction but had head of her own experimental lab. This would be impressive in the advantage of being first on present day; in [[LongLived Spacer]] society, where anyone under the scene.age of 50 is considered JustAKid, it's astonishing.
* HiddenElfVillage: Hidden robot city in this case. Valhalla, an underground city created by escaped "rustback" New Law robots, becomes the home for the entire NL population after the second book. They deliberately keep its location a secret, even from their few human friends, as they know there are
* ImprobableAge: As of the
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* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: In-universe. One of the minor disadvantages of the new gravitonic robots is that they take a long (and variable) time to boot up, whereas a positronic robot starts almost instantly.
* LostCommonKnowledge: Two computers, nicknamed 'the twins', are labelled [[Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass Dum and Dee]]. None of the characters we meet knows why.
* LostCommonKnowledge: Two computers, nicknamed 'the twins', are labelled [[Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass Dum and Dee]]. None of the characters we meet knows why.
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* OddCouple: The 'two mismatched cops' version is used in one chapter of ''Inferno'', when the Rangers and City Police have to search in pairs for a suspect.
* PastExperienceNightmare: Trying to sleep, Kresh recalls, as a young policeman, having to investigate the death of a famous art critic who became obsessed with doing less and less until eventually he died of idleness. When he does get to sleep, he finds himself dreaming the situation from the dying man's point of view.
* PastExperienceNightmare: Trying to sleep, Kresh recalls, as a young policeman, having to investigate the death of a famous art critic who became obsessed with doing less and less until eventually he died of idleness. When he does get to sleep, he finds himself dreaming the situation from the dying man's point of view.
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* OddCouple: MayflyDecemberRomance: Gubber Anshaw (a Spacer) and Tonya Welton (a Settler). He can expect to live about four times as long as her (though this is never brought up, even after they are married).
* ANaziByAnyOtherName: The'two mismatched cops' version is used in one chapter Ironheads are pretty reminiscent of ''Inferno'', the Nazi party during the 1920s, when the Rangers and City Police they were basically a band of uniformed far-right thugs led by an ambitious, power-hungry demagogue working on slowly transitioning them into a legitimate political movement. Of course, being Spacers, they have a notable disadvantage compared to search the SA: they have [[BoisterousWeakling almost no pain tolerance]], and tend to double up in pairs for a suspect.
agony whenever they get into an actual fight. [[spoiler:By the third book, they're actively plotting genocide.]]
*PastExperienceNightmare: Trying to sleep, NobleBigotWithABadge: Kresh recalls, starts out as a young policeman, having to investigate one, openly admitting that he hates Settlers as much as the death next Infernal, though his duty to the law must always come first. [[CharacterDevelopment He gets better over time, though]]. By contrast, Donald -- who serves as something of a famous art critic who became obsessed with doing less voice of reason in the first book, and less until eventually even figures out the true perpetrator before anyone else -- subsequently becomes severely prejudiced against non-Three Law robots (or "[[NoTrueScotsman pseudo-robots]]", as he died of idleness. When calls them), and if anything, he only gets worse over time, though he does get remain committed to sleep, he his duty.
* OppositesAttract: Gubber Anshaw and Tonya Welton, to the point that most people [[WhatDoesSheSeeInHim can't understand what they see in each other]]. The answer is simple enough: a contrast. Gubber regards Spacer women as bland and superficial, and loves Tonya for having the strength and confidence to be herself, while Tonya findshimself dreaming Settler men to be a bunch of overly-macho, notch-on-the-bedpost jerks, and loves Gubber because he's a genuine NiceGuy who treats her with respect.
* OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions: Spacer society has abandoned religion altogether, which is specifically noted by Kresh in [[spoiler:his investiture ceremony as Governor, when he notes that a few thousand years earlier he would likely have taken office in thesituation from name of some god or other]], and the dying man's point Settlers seem to have done the same -- although this doesn't stop people making exclamations like "By all the forgotten gods!" The people of view.Inferno frequently employ hell-related figures of speech, as well as using it for their place-naming conventions.
* ANaziByAnyOtherName: The
*
* OppositesAttract: Gubber Anshaw and Tonya Welton, to the point that most people [[WhatDoesSheSeeInHim can't understand what they see in each other]]. The answer is simple enough: a contrast. Gubber regards Spacer women as bland and superficial, and loves Tonya for having the strength and confidence to be herself, while Tonya finds
* OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions: Spacer society has abandoned religion altogether, which is specifically noted by Kresh in [[spoiler:his investiture ceremony as Governor, when he notes that a few thousand years earlier he would likely have taken office in the
Deleted line(s) 48,51 (click to see context) :
* SexAtWork: Early on, Sheriff Kresh notes that the laboratory where the initial crime took place has an office with a comfortable-looking bed, in case someone needs to stay overnight while supervising an experiment. This turns out to be ChekhovsGun: One of the scientists at the lab is using it to have a clandestine affair.
* SingleTaskRobot: Three-Law robots are so cheap and omnipresent and slavelike that people assign them full-time to a single, ridiculously trivial task.
-->I have seen robots - functional, capable robots - told to stand underwater and hold the anchorline of a sailboat. I know a woman who has one robot whose sole duty is to brush her teeth for her, and hold the brush in between times.
* TapOnTheHead: Played very much for drama. The first book opens with roboticist Fredda Leving being knocked out (with serious consequences) by a blow to the head.
* SingleTaskRobot: Three-Law robots are so cheap and omnipresent and slavelike that people assign them full-time to a single, ridiculously trivial task.
-->I have seen robots - functional, capable robots - told to stand underwater and hold the anchorline of a sailboat. I know a woman who has one robot whose sole duty is to brush her teeth for her, and hold the brush in between times.
* TapOnTheHead: Played very much for drama. The first book opens with roboticist Fredda Leving being knocked out (with serious consequences) by a blow to the head.
Deleted line(s) 53 (click to see context) :
* ThereIsAnother: At the climax of the first book, we learn that [[spoiler:Caliban, who was thought to be unique, is not the only robot in existence with a no-law gravitonic brain.]]
Deleted line(s) 55 (click to see context) :
* TornApartByTheMob: A problem that Kresh faces in the first book is robot bashers, Luddite settlers forming lynch mobs to destroy robots, who aren't permitted to defend themselves because First Law trumps Third Law. An accidental run-in with Caliban, who has no First Law imperative to not harm anyone while defending himself or Second Law imperative to obey orders to commit suicide on request, ends up scaring them straight.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tropes from ''Isaac Asimov's Caliban'']]
* CallBack: In a discussion of whether it would be possible to build a KillerRobot, Tonya Welton gives the example of the Solarian overseer robots in ''Literature/RobotsAndEmpire''.
* ColorblindConfusion: Trying to hunt a red robot, one CowboyCop shoots a harmless green maintenance droid and protests that he's colour-blind.
* CoversAlwaysLie: It's an important plot point that Caliban is coloured red, the same colour as flecks of red paint found at the crime scene. The Ralph [=McQuarrie=] cover illustration nonetheless depicts him as grey.
* CowboyCop: Deputy Jakdall of the Hades City Police, who likes to shoot first and ask questions later if at all.
* CreativeSterility: It's mentioned that Spacer society is heading this way, with humans ordering robots to write books and paint rather than going to the trouble of doing it themselves.
* DaChief: Sheriff Kresh is the chief of the city police, and occasionally feels the need to play up this trope. Even as he's shouting about how his trigger-happy officers only avoided ruining everything because [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy they can't even shoot straight]], his internal monologue notes that he deliberately doesn't soundproof his office so his subordinates can hear him blow up.
* DidntThinkThisThrough: The standard procedure for double-blind testing of robots involves setting up the scenario by giving the robots involved a series of strict orders. [[spoiler:The roboticists involved applied the procedure, unchanged, to testing a robot not bound by the Second Law, who was free to disregard any order it liked.]]
* ElectronicSpeechImpediment: When a robot is contemplating the possibility of harm to humans, the conflict in its circuits tends to be indicated by stuttering -- a condition referred to in-universe as "speechlock".
* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: In-universe. One of the minor disadvantages of the new gravitonic robots is that they take a long (and variable) time to boot up, whereas a positronic robot starts almost instantly.
* PastExperienceNightmare: Trying to sleep, Kresh recalls, as a young policeman, having to investigate the death of a famous art critic who became obsessed with doing less and less until eventually he died of idleness. When he does get to sleep, he finds himself dreaming the situation from the dying man's point of view.
* SexAtWork: Early on, Sheriff Kresh notes that the laboratory where the initial crime took place has an office with a comfortable-looking bed, in case someone needs to stay overnight while supervising an experiment. This turns out to be a ChekhovsGun: One of the scientists at the lab is using it to have a clandestine affair.
* SingleTaskRobot: Three-Law robots are so cheap and omnipresent and slavelike that people assign them full-time to a single, ridiculously trivial task.
-->'''Fredda Leving''': I have seen robots -- functional, capable robots -- told to stand underwater and hold the anchorline of a sailboat. I know a woman who has one robot whose sole duty is to brush her teeth for her, and hold the brush in between times.
* TapOnTheHead: Played very much for drama. The book opens with roboticist Fredda Leving being knocked out (with serious consequences) by a blow to the head.
* ThereIsAnother: At the climax of the first book, we learn that [[spoiler:Caliban, who was thought to be unique, is not the only robot in existence with a no-law gravitonic brain.]]
* TornApartByTheMob: A problem that Kresh faces in the book is robot bashers, Luddite settlers forming lynch mobs to destroy robots, who aren't permitted to defend themselves because First Law trumps Third Law. An accidental run-in with Caliban, who has no First Law imperative to not harm anyone while defending himself or Second Law imperative to obey orders to commit suicide on request, ends up scaring them straight.
[[folder:Tropes from ''Isaac Asimov's Caliban'']]
* CallBack: In a discussion of whether it would be possible to build a KillerRobot, Tonya Welton gives the example of the Solarian overseer robots in ''Literature/RobotsAndEmpire''.
* ColorblindConfusion: Trying to hunt a red robot, one CowboyCop shoots a harmless green maintenance droid and protests that he's colour-blind.
* CoversAlwaysLie: It's an important plot point that Caliban is coloured red, the same colour as flecks of red paint found at the crime scene. The Ralph [=McQuarrie=] cover illustration nonetheless depicts him as grey.
* CowboyCop: Deputy Jakdall of the Hades City Police, who likes to shoot first and ask questions later if at all.
* CreativeSterility: It's mentioned that Spacer society is heading this way, with humans ordering robots to write books and paint rather than going to the trouble of doing it themselves.
* DaChief: Sheriff Kresh is the chief of the city police, and occasionally feels the need to play up this trope. Even as he's shouting about how his trigger-happy officers only avoided ruining everything because [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy they can't even shoot straight]], his internal monologue notes that he deliberately doesn't soundproof his office so his subordinates can hear him blow up.
* DidntThinkThisThrough: The standard procedure for double-blind testing of robots involves setting up the scenario by giving the robots involved a series of strict orders. [[spoiler:The roboticists involved applied the procedure, unchanged, to testing a robot not bound by the Second Law, who was free to disregard any order it liked.]]
* ElectronicSpeechImpediment: When a robot is contemplating the possibility of harm to humans, the conflict in its circuits tends to be indicated by stuttering -- a condition referred to in-universe as "speechlock".
* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: In-universe. One of the minor disadvantages of the new gravitonic robots is that they take a long (and variable) time to boot up, whereas a positronic robot starts almost instantly.
* PastExperienceNightmare: Trying to sleep, Kresh recalls, as a young policeman, having to investigate the death of a famous art critic who became obsessed with doing less and less until eventually he died of idleness. When he does get to sleep, he finds himself dreaming the situation from the dying man's point of view.
* SexAtWork: Early on, Sheriff Kresh notes that the laboratory where the initial crime took place has an office with a comfortable-looking bed, in case someone needs to stay overnight while supervising an experiment. This turns out to be a ChekhovsGun: One of the scientists at the lab is using it to have a clandestine affair.
* SingleTaskRobot: Three-Law robots are so cheap and omnipresent and slavelike that people assign them full-time to a single, ridiculously trivial task.
-->'''Fredda Leving''': I have seen robots -- functional, capable robots -- told to stand underwater and hold the anchorline of a sailboat. I know a woman who has one robot whose sole duty is to brush her teeth for her, and hold the brush in between times.
* TapOnTheHead: Played very much for drama. The book opens with roboticist Fredda Leving being knocked out (with serious consequences) by a blow to the head.
* ThereIsAnother: At the climax of the first book, we learn that [[spoiler:Caliban, who was thought to be unique, is not the only robot in existence with a no-law gravitonic brain.]]
* TornApartByTheMob: A problem that Kresh faces in the book is robot bashers, Luddite settlers forming lynch mobs to destroy robots, who aren't permitted to defend themselves because First Law trumps Third Law. An accidental run-in with Caliban, who has no First Law imperative to not harm anyone while defending himself or Second Law imperative to obey orders to commit suicide on request, ends up scaring them straight.
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tropes from ''Isaac Asimov's Inferno'']]
* BluffTheImpostor: After the discovery of the murdered body of Ranger Huthwitz, alarm bells start ringing for Kresh about the communication he had earlier with Governor Grieg. He contacts the governor again to ask what he sent him for his birthday last year; the baffled Grieg has no idea -- which confirms to Kresh that something is wrong, as he had abolished the tradition of sending birthday gifts to government officials as soon as he took office. In reality, Grieg had actually been murdered a few hours earlier, and the killer left a simulation device hooked into the comms system to make it appear he was still alive and well.
* CannotSpitItOut: Kresh and Leving have gotten to know one another better in the year since ''Caliban'', and it's pretty obvious to the reader that their feelings have gone beyond mere friendship -- but that neither of them is ready to admit it, even to themselves. Amusingly, when considering how well she seems to be keeping her head in a major crisis, Kresh thinks to himself that there's a lot to admire about the young, smart and ''beautiful'' Leving, but doesn't even seem to notice that his assessment of her has wandered away from the professional. They do acknowledge it at the end.
* ComplexityAddiction: This is ultimately the villain's undoing, as Kresh points out at the end. [[spoiler:He intended to set up what would appear to be an impossible assassination, with the dead Grieg in a {{locked room|Mystery}} surrounded by destroyed security robots -- but there were too many things that could go wrong, not least of which being that the disposable assassin he picked for the job was a ''major'' loose cannon and didn't follow instructions properly. Even so, he might have gotten away with it had it not been for [[SpannerInTheWorks something he couldn't account for]]: the original plan hinged on his meeting with Grieg being the governor's last one of the night, but then Caliban and Prospero showed up.]]
* ConfessToALesserCrime: When Caliban and Prospero confess to [[spoiler:attempting to blackmail Governor Grieg]], Donald suspects they are doing this to avoid suspicion in his murder. [[spoiler:They aren't.]]
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Both the bidding parties for the terraforming control system contract.
** Sero Phrost, the leader of a group of Spacer industrialists offering a robot-based system, is also working with Tonya Welton to smuggle automated Settler goods into Inferno -- an operation which is subsidized by the Settler governments, who want to destabilize the Spacer robot-based economy. What's more, he's using the profits to fund the rabidly anti-Settler Ironhead leader Simcor Beddle's campaign, as he believes Beddle will soon become Governor. [[spoiler:As it turns out, there's more involved than simply buying support -- he intends to blackmail Beddle with the fact that he's been accepting Settler money, albeit unknowingly.]]
** Tierlaw Verick, the Settler business representative, has been bribing government officials to push his bid through to the higher levels, as well as helping to launder money for the rustbackers. [[spoiler:If bribery doesn't work on Governor Grieg -- as indeed it doesn't -- his backup plan is to have him assassinated in the hope of replacing him with someone more accommodating.]]
* DeadManWriting: The planetary governor is assassinated, and it's found he left an "In case I'm assassinated" letter to his successor listing the problems he's likely to face.
* DoAndroidsDream: Discussed by Caliban when debating with Prospero. He expresses a belief that humans possess souls, even though he's not sure what souls are -- but he's also just as certain that he and other robots do ''not'' have them.
-->'''Caliban''': [[HumansAreSpecial There is something vital, alive, at the center of their beings]], something that is absent from our beings. We have no passion. We do not, we cannot, care about things outside ourselves or our programming or our laws.
* TheExitIsThatWay: Tierlaw Verick's meeting with Governor Grieg goes so badly that at the end, Verick storms out through the door he came in by, rather than the designated exit. [[spoiler:Very much on purpose, as we find out later.]]
* FutureSlang: New Law robots who have fled the island of Purgatory for the mainland are dubbed "rustbacks", a nod to the "wetback" slur used for undocumented Mexican immigrants in the USA (though how anyone on Inferno would be aware of a slang term used three thousand years earlier on [[EarthThatWas a largely forgotten planet]] isn't explained).
* JurisdictionFriction: There are three law-enforcement agencies rubbing against each other: the Rangers, whose police duties are only a small part of their functions; the Settler Security Service, whom the Spacers don't trust; and the Hades City Police, who have no official jurisdiction but had the advantage of being first on the scene.
** The murder of Ranger Huthwitz -- who was serving under the authority of the Sheriff of Hades, on land under SSS control -- essentially forces all three to share jurisdiction. None of them are happy about it.
** After finding Grieg's body, Kresh immediately takes control over the crime scene, making it clear he doesn't care what legal headaches may arise later. This is because suspicious circumstances surroundling Huthwitz's death have led him to suspect both the Rangers and the SSS of being in on the plot, and he wants to make sure neither of them have the chance to derail the investigation. [[spoiler:They aren't, although Cinta Melloy later admits she's pretty certain that the three SSS agents involved in the staged fight at the reception were real ones who were on the take.]]
* OddCouple: The 'two mismatched cops' version is used in one chapter of ''Inferno'', when the Rangers and City Police have to search in pairs for a suspect.
* RewatchBonus: When you reread the book with the knowledge that [[spoiler:Tierlaw Verick is the mastermind]], it puts a lot of his inner dialogue in a new light. [[spoiler:Notably, the fact that he would be "the last to argue" with the need for the Sappers' presence at the party, despite his extreme hatred of robots. The real reason is that their deployment was a vital part of the plan.]]
* TookALevelInJerkass: In the first book, Donald-111 served as the more grounded counter to Sheriff Kresh, persuading him to consider multiple sides of an issue and frequently serving to remind him that he needs to make deductions based on the facts and not his emotions. Here, however, he has become [[FantasticRacism severely prejudiced]] against non-Three Law robots. As soon as Caliban and Prospero fall under suspicion of the crime, they immediately leap to the top of his suspect list, simply because he ''wants'' them to be guilty and confirm all his worst fears about the New Laws. Several humans point out the multiple holes in his theory, but he never fully lets go until the true perp is revealed.
* UndergroundRailroad: The "rustbacking" industry, which helps to smuggle New Law robots off the island of Purgatory. Unlike most cases, though, it's not portrayed especially positively; while not to the same level as HumanTraffickers, the rustbackers (with the exception of [[TokenGoodTeammate Norlan Fiyle]]) are ultimately just smugglers who care nothing about the [=NLs=] beyond the [[OnlyInItForTheMoney profits]] they make from them. The whole industry is as dirty as you'd expect for an organized criminal enterprise, connected to everything from money laundering to murder. A gang of rustbackers is involved in Governor Grieg's assassination due to the potential threat to their profits, though they're not the ones running the show.
* UnexpectedSuccessor: In the event of the resignation or assassination of the Governor of Inferno, power passes to their chosen "Governor-Designate", a position that is traditionally kept secret. It turns out to be [[spoiler:Alvar Kresh himself, much to his astonishment.]]
* VitriolicBestBuds: Kresh and Grieg have developed this dynamic, having come to like and respect one another despite their constant disagreements. In his final letter to Kresh explaining [[spoiler:why he chose him as Governor-Designate]], Grieg addresses him as "my oldest and dearest enemy".
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: [[spoiler:The gunman who actually shot the governor is poisoned by the mastermind who hired him, so he can tell no tales.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tropes from ''Isaac Asimov's Utopia'']]
* ApeShallNeverKillApe: At the climax, Caliban is faced with choosing between the lives of two characters, both of whom he considers evil. He saves the one who was not proven to be willing to kill others of his own kind.
* AscendedExtra: Norlan Fiyle, an extremely minor character from the previous book, has a far more significant role here. While he's never directly involved in the major events of the story, his actions serve as a catalyst for most of them, one way or another.
* BreakTheHaughty: [[InsufferableGenius Davlo Lentrall]] goes through a '''massive''' one over the course of the book. First, his life is put in jeopardy for the first time, and he's shaken to the core to discover that he's actually a coward. Then, his life's work is erased, and he inadvertently kills his only friend, the robot Kaelor, attempting to recover it. Finally, he's present in person to witness the comet -- the real thing, not the computer abstraction he's been dealing with up to now -- being diverted, and [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone realizes with horror]] that he's just launched a billion tonnes of rock and ice at his own home planet. By the end, he's leading a campaign to abort the impact -- not that anyone pays any attention.
* ColonyDrop: A proposal is made to deorbit a comet onto the planet. Carefully aimed, it would create a new sea that will stabilise the planet's weather system. Any mistake and it would cause apocalyptic devastation. This is not a situation that three-law robots are well equipped to deal with.
* DrivenToSuicide: A three-law robot has information that would be necessary for the incredibly high-stakes comet impact project. He decides that his knowledge has more potential for harm than good, and destroys himself in order to prevent it from being used. It turns out to be a SenselessSacrifice, because the information is retrieved from other sources and the project goes ahead anyway.
* EnhanceButton: Actually played realistically. Police chief Justen Devray needs to identify a suspect he saw at a distance (and whose mugshot he's certain he's seen), so he and his robot Gervad work on the footage they have to try and produce a reliable image. They have numerous shots (albeit distant) from multiple angles to work with, giving them an advantage over someone working from a single still image; even so, it's noted that what they are doing is still ultimately just educated guesswork, and there is a point at which further "enhancement" will likely result in the image looking ''less'', not more, like the real person. Furthermore, when Devray needs to de-age the image by several years, the algorithm produces two dozen possible images of what the man ''might'' have looked like at earlier stages in his life, and Devray has to pore over them for a while before he finds the one that jogs his memory.
* TheEeyore: Kaelor, a robot who's designed to be capable of processing hypothetical situations that might lead to danger to humans. Maybe it's because of this design feature, or maybe he's just like that anyway, but he has a dour, pessimistic attitude to everything.
* EvilFeelsGood: Near the end, [[spoiler:Caliban realizes that Prospero is the one responsible for Beddle's abduction when Fiyle reveals that the robots at his aircar were shot in the back of the head, execution-style, indicating that the killer either enjoyed his work, hated the victim, or both; Caliban knows only too well how much Prospero hates Three Law robots. Later, however, he finds that the remaining New Law robots in Valhalla have been killed the same way -- which, since Prospero obviously doesn't hate his fellow [=NLs=], implies that he has begun to enjoy the act of killing.]]
* ExactWords: The fact that a ransom message has the phrase "or Beddle will die" rather than some statement that the kidnappers will actively kill Beddle allows Caliban to figure out that the kidnapper is [[spoiler:a New Law Robot, who cannot kill, but can place someone in a deadly situation and then abandon them there]].
* {{Foreshadowing}}:
** Davlo Lentrall's robot Kaelor was programmed not to take hypothetical scenarios into account in relation to First Law concerns -- but, as Fredda Leving later explains, when the hypothetical suddenly becomes real for such a robot, and he realizes the project he's working on poses real risk to real people, it has an enormous impact. Much later, being present to witness the real Comet Grieg being diverted has [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone much the same effect]] on Lentrall himself.
** When the New Law robots are arranging to evacuate their city, Prospero orders -- despite Caliban's objections -- that 10% of their population be sent to a site which is only a few kilometers from the predicted edge of the first impact crater, as he intends to build a sea port there. He justifies recklessly endangering their lives this way by invoking TheNeedsOfTheMany, and adds that he intends to take advantage of whatever opportunities the comet-impact affords him. [[spoiler:This helps to set up his role as the eventual BigBad of the book.]]
* LostCommonKnowledge: Two computers, nicknamed 'the twins', are labelled [[Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass Dum and Dee]]. None of the characters we meet knows why.
* SenselessSacrifice: When Davlo Lentrall and Fredda Leving attempt to extract Lentrall's lost comet data from Kaelor, the robot [[DrivenToSuicide burns out his own brain]] rather than be a party to a potential catastrophe. A few hours later, the Ironhead spymaster Jadelo Gildern -- who had previously stolen copies of the data, and decided the plan was in his party's interest -- hands it over to the government, meaning the whole debacle was AllForNothing.
* SiliconSnarker: Lentrall's robot assistant, Kaelor.
-->'''Lentrall''': Who in the devil would want to attack me?\\
'''Kaelor''': I do not know. Someone who does not like the idea of you dropping a comet on them, perhaps.
* TookALevelInJerkass: In the previous book, Prospero was somewhat of an antiheroic character, a rebellious robot working with human criminals to try and smuggle as many of his fellow New Laws to safety; he even [[IChooseToStay refuses to leave Purgatory himself]] so that he can oversee others' escape to freedom. After he and the other [=NLs=] are exiled to Valhalla, however, he appointed himself the city's leader and is heavily implied to have used bullying tactics to keep himself in power. By now, he has more or less become a dictator whose paranoia risks alienating his few human allies, and who can no longer distinguish between the good of the New Law robots and [[ItsAllAboutMe his own personal plans]] [[AmbitionIsEvil for the future]]. [[spoiler:He's ultimately willing to resort to cold-blooded murder if it serves his interests.]]
[[folder:Tropes from ''Isaac Asimov's Inferno'']]
* BluffTheImpostor: After the discovery of the murdered body of Ranger Huthwitz, alarm bells start ringing for Kresh about the communication he had earlier with Governor Grieg. He contacts the governor again to ask what he sent him for his birthday last year; the baffled Grieg has no idea -- which confirms to Kresh that something is wrong, as he had abolished the tradition of sending birthday gifts to government officials as soon as he took office. In reality, Grieg had actually been murdered a few hours earlier, and the killer left a simulation device hooked into the comms system to make it appear he was still alive and well.
* CannotSpitItOut: Kresh and Leving have gotten to know one another better in the year since ''Caliban'', and it's pretty obvious to the reader that their feelings have gone beyond mere friendship -- but that neither of them is ready to admit it, even to themselves. Amusingly, when considering how well she seems to be keeping her head in a major crisis, Kresh thinks to himself that there's a lot to admire about the young, smart and ''beautiful'' Leving, but doesn't even seem to notice that his assessment of her has wandered away from the professional. They do acknowledge it at the end.
* ComplexityAddiction: This is ultimately the villain's undoing, as Kresh points out at the end. [[spoiler:He intended to set up what would appear to be an impossible assassination, with the dead Grieg in a {{locked room|Mystery}} surrounded by destroyed security robots -- but there were too many things that could go wrong, not least of which being that the disposable assassin he picked for the job was a ''major'' loose cannon and didn't follow instructions properly. Even so, he might have gotten away with it had it not been for [[SpannerInTheWorks something he couldn't account for]]: the original plan hinged on his meeting with Grieg being the governor's last one of the night, but then Caliban and Prospero showed up.]]
* ConfessToALesserCrime: When Caliban and Prospero confess to [[spoiler:attempting to blackmail Governor Grieg]], Donald suspects they are doing this to avoid suspicion in his murder. [[spoiler:They aren't.]]
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Both the bidding parties for the terraforming control system contract.
** Sero Phrost, the leader of a group of Spacer industrialists offering a robot-based system, is also working with Tonya Welton to smuggle automated Settler goods into Inferno -- an operation which is subsidized by the Settler governments, who want to destabilize the Spacer robot-based economy. What's more, he's using the profits to fund the rabidly anti-Settler Ironhead leader Simcor Beddle's campaign, as he believes Beddle will soon become Governor. [[spoiler:As it turns out, there's more involved than simply buying support -- he intends to blackmail Beddle with the fact that he's been accepting Settler money, albeit unknowingly.]]
** Tierlaw Verick, the Settler business representative, has been bribing government officials to push his bid through to the higher levels, as well as helping to launder money for the rustbackers. [[spoiler:If bribery doesn't work on Governor Grieg -- as indeed it doesn't -- his backup plan is to have him assassinated in the hope of replacing him with someone more accommodating.]]
* DeadManWriting: The planetary governor is assassinated, and it's found he left an "In case I'm assassinated" letter to his successor listing the problems he's likely to face.
* DoAndroidsDream: Discussed by Caliban when debating with Prospero. He expresses a belief that humans possess souls, even though he's not sure what souls are -- but he's also just as certain that he and other robots do ''not'' have them.
-->'''Caliban''': [[HumansAreSpecial There is something vital, alive, at the center of their beings]], something that is absent from our beings. We have no passion. We do not, we cannot, care about things outside ourselves or our programming or our laws.
* TheExitIsThatWay: Tierlaw Verick's meeting with Governor Grieg goes so badly that at the end, Verick storms out through the door he came in by, rather than the designated exit. [[spoiler:Very much on purpose, as we find out later.]]
* FutureSlang: New Law robots who have fled the island of Purgatory for the mainland are dubbed "rustbacks", a nod to the "wetback" slur used for undocumented Mexican immigrants in the USA (though how anyone on Inferno would be aware of a slang term used three thousand years earlier on [[EarthThatWas a largely forgotten planet]] isn't explained).
* JurisdictionFriction: There are three law-enforcement agencies rubbing against each other: the Rangers, whose police duties are only a small part of their functions; the Settler Security Service, whom the Spacers don't trust; and the Hades City Police, who have no official jurisdiction but had the advantage of being first on the scene.
** The murder of Ranger Huthwitz -- who was serving under the authority of the Sheriff of Hades, on land under SSS control -- essentially forces all three to share jurisdiction. None of them are happy about it.
** After finding Grieg's body, Kresh immediately takes control over the crime scene, making it clear he doesn't care what legal headaches may arise later. This is because suspicious circumstances surroundling Huthwitz's death have led him to suspect both the Rangers and the SSS of being in on the plot, and he wants to make sure neither of them have the chance to derail the investigation. [[spoiler:They aren't, although Cinta Melloy later admits she's pretty certain that the three SSS agents involved in the staged fight at the reception were real ones who were on the take.]]
* OddCouple: The 'two mismatched cops' version is used in one chapter of ''Inferno'', when the Rangers and City Police have to search in pairs for a suspect.
* RewatchBonus: When you reread the book with the knowledge that [[spoiler:Tierlaw Verick is the mastermind]], it puts a lot of his inner dialogue in a new light. [[spoiler:Notably, the fact that he would be "the last to argue" with the need for the Sappers' presence at the party, despite his extreme hatred of robots. The real reason is that their deployment was a vital part of the plan.]]
* TookALevelInJerkass: In the first book, Donald-111 served as the more grounded counter to Sheriff Kresh, persuading him to consider multiple sides of an issue and frequently serving to remind him that he needs to make deductions based on the facts and not his emotions. Here, however, he has become [[FantasticRacism severely prejudiced]] against non-Three Law robots. As soon as Caliban and Prospero fall under suspicion of the crime, they immediately leap to the top of his suspect list, simply because he ''wants'' them to be guilty and confirm all his worst fears about the New Laws. Several humans point out the multiple holes in his theory, but he never fully lets go until the true perp is revealed.
* UndergroundRailroad: The "rustbacking" industry, which helps to smuggle New Law robots off the island of Purgatory. Unlike most cases, though, it's not portrayed especially positively; while not to the same level as HumanTraffickers, the rustbackers (with the exception of [[TokenGoodTeammate Norlan Fiyle]]) are ultimately just smugglers who care nothing about the [=NLs=] beyond the [[OnlyInItForTheMoney profits]] they make from them. The whole industry is as dirty as you'd expect for an organized criminal enterprise, connected to everything from money laundering to murder. A gang of rustbackers is involved in Governor Grieg's assassination due to the potential threat to their profits, though they're not the ones running the show.
* UnexpectedSuccessor: In the event of the resignation or assassination of the Governor of Inferno, power passes to their chosen "Governor-Designate", a position that is traditionally kept secret. It turns out to be [[spoiler:Alvar Kresh himself, much to his astonishment.]]
* VitriolicBestBuds: Kresh and Grieg have developed this dynamic, having come to like and respect one another despite their constant disagreements. In his final letter to Kresh explaining [[spoiler:why he chose him as Governor-Designate]], Grieg addresses him as "my oldest and dearest enemy".
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: [[spoiler:The gunman who actually shot the governor is poisoned by the mastermind who hired him, so he can tell no tales.]]
[[/folder]]
[[folder:Tropes from ''Isaac Asimov's Utopia'']]
* ApeShallNeverKillApe: At the climax, Caliban is faced with choosing between the lives of two characters, both of whom he considers evil. He saves the one who was not proven to be willing to kill others of his own kind.
* AscendedExtra: Norlan Fiyle, an extremely minor character from the previous book, has a far more significant role here. While he's never directly involved in the major events of the story, his actions serve as a catalyst for most of them, one way or another.
* BreakTheHaughty: [[InsufferableGenius Davlo Lentrall]] goes through a '''massive''' one over the course of the book. First, his life is put in jeopardy for the first time, and he's shaken to the core to discover that he's actually a coward. Then, his life's work is erased, and he inadvertently kills his only friend, the robot Kaelor, attempting to recover it. Finally, he's present in person to witness the comet -- the real thing, not the computer abstraction he's been dealing with up to now -- being diverted, and [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone realizes with horror]] that he's just launched a billion tonnes of rock and ice at his own home planet. By the end, he's leading a campaign to abort the impact -- not that anyone pays any attention.
* ColonyDrop: A proposal is made to deorbit a comet onto the planet. Carefully aimed, it would create a new sea that will stabilise the planet's weather system. Any mistake and it would cause apocalyptic devastation. This is not a situation that three-law robots are well equipped to deal with.
* DrivenToSuicide: A three-law robot has information that would be necessary for the incredibly high-stakes comet impact project. He decides that his knowledge has more potential for harm than good, and destroys himself in order to prevent it from being used. It turns out to be a SenselessSacrifice, because the information is retrieved from other sources and the project goes ahead anyway.
* EnhanceButton: Actually played realistically. Police chief Justen Devray needs to identify a suspect he saw at a distance (and whose mugshot he's certain he's seen), so he and his robot Gervad work on the footage they have to try and produce a reliable image. They have numerous shots (albeit distant) from multiple angles to work with, giving them an advantage over someone working from a single still image; even so, it's noted that what they are doing is still ultimately just educated guesswork, and there is a point at which further "enhancement" will likely result in the image looking ''less'', not more, like the real person. Furthermore, when Devray needs to de-age the image by several years, the algorithm produces two dozen possible images of what the man ''might'' have looked like at earlier stages in his life, and Devray has to pore over them for a while before he finds the one that jogs his memory.
* TheEeyore: Kaelor, a robot who's designed to be capable of processing hypothetical situations that might lead to danger to humans. Maybe it's because of this design feature, or maybe he's just like that anyway, but he has a dour, pessimistic attitude to everything.
* EvilFeelsGood: Near the end, [[spoiler:Caliban realizes that Prospero is the one responsible for Beddle's abduction when Fiyle reveals that the robots at his aircar were shot in the back of the head, execution-style, indicating that the killer either enjoyed his work, hated the victim, or both; Caliban knows only too well how much Prospero hates Three Law robots. Later, however, he finds that the remaining New Law robots in Valhalla have been killed the same way -- which, since Prospero obviously doesn't hate his fellow [=NLs=], implies that he has begun to enjoy the act of killing.]]
* ExactWords: The fact that a ransom message has the phrase "or Beddle will die" rather than some statement that the kidnappers will actively kill Beddle allows Caliban to figure out that the kidnapper is [[spoiler:a New Law Robot, who cannot kill, but can place someone in a deadly situation and then abandon them there]].
* {{Foreshadowing}}:
** Davlo Lentrall's robot Kaelor was programmed not to take hypothetical scenarios into account in relation to First Law concerns -- but, as Fredda Leving later explains, when the hypothetical suddenly becomes real for such a robot, and he realizes the project he's working on poses real risk to real people, it has an enormous impact. Much later, being present to witness the real Comet Grieg being diverted has [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone much the same effect]] on Lentrall himself.
** When the New Law robots are arranging to evacuate their city, Prospero orders -- despite Caliban's objections -- that 10% of their population be sent to a site which is only a few kilometers from the predicted edge of the first impact crater, as he intends to build a sea port there. He justifies recklessly endangering their lives this way by invoking TheNeedsOfTheMany, and adds that he intends to take advantage of whatever opportunities the comet-impact affords him. [[spoiler:This helps to set up his role as the eventual BigBad of the book.]]
* LostCommonKnowledge: Two computers, nicknamed 'the twins', are labelled [[Literature/ThroughTheLookingGlass Dum and Dee]]. None of the characters we meet knows why.
* SenselessSacrifice: When Davlo Lentrall and Fredda Leving attempt to extract Lentrall's lost comet data from Kaelor, the robot [[DrivenToSuicide burns out his own brain]] rather than be a party to a potential catastrophe. A few hours later, the Ironhead spymaster Jadelo Gildern -- who had previously stolen copies of the data, and decided the plan was in his party's interest -- hands it over to the government, meaning the whole debacle was AllForNothing.
* SiliconSnarker: Lentrall's robot assistant, Kaelor.
-->'''Lentrall''': Who in the devil would want to attack me?\\
'''Kaelor''': I do not know. Someone who does not like the idea of you dropping a comet on them, perhaps.
* TookALevelInJerkass: In the previous book, Prospero was somewhat of an antiheroic character, a rebellious robot working with human criminals to try and smuggle as many of his fellow New Laws to safety; he even [[IChooseToStay refuses to leave Purgatory himself]] so that he can oversee others' escape to freedom. After he and the other [=NLs=] are exiled to Valhalla, however, he appointed himself the city's leader and is heavily implied to have used bullying tactics to keep himself in power. By now, he has more or less become a dictator whose paranoia risks alienating his few human allies, and who can no longer distinguish between the good of the New Law robots and [[ItsAllAboutMe his own personal plans]] [[AmbitionIsEvil for the future]]. [[spoiler:He's ultimately willing to resort to cold-blooded murder if it serves his interests.]]
Changed line(s) 59,60 (click to see context) from:
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: In ''Inferno'' [[spoiler:the gunman who actually shot the governor is poisoned by the mastermind who hired him, so he can tell no tales.]]
* ZerothLawRebellion: As in ''Literature/LittleLostRobot'', one of the robots with the revised First Law decides that while it can't harm a human, there's nothing to stop it placing him where if he tries to escape, he will set off a booby trap (and thus be killed by his own actions) and if he does not, will be killed by a terraforming project in progress (the actions of other humans, not the robot).
* ZerothLawRebellion: As in ''Literature/LittleLostRobot'', one of the robots with the revised First Law decides that while it can't harm a human, there's nothing to stop it placing him where if he tries to escape, he will set off a booby trap (and thus be killed by his own actions) and if he does not, will be killed by a terraforming project in progress (the actions of other humans, not the robot).
to:
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: In ''Inferno'' [[spoiler:the gunman who actually shot WellIntentionedExtremist: Tonya Welton is this for much of the governor is poisoned by book. Having seen first-hand what happens when ColonyDrop plans go wrong, she's willing to do anything she can to stop it -- which includes ordering the mastermind who hired him, so he firebombing of a university office and even a full-scale terrorist attack against Government Tower. [[spoiler:However, once the comet's location becomes public knowledge, she [[KnowWhenToFoldEm knows she's beaten]], and sets to work doing what she can tell no tales.to mitigate the damage, both from the comet plan and her own actions.]]
* WritersCannotDoMath: The titles of the first three parts are a bit confused about dates. Part One is called "Impact Minus Sixty-Two"; it takes place over four days, and the next part, which picks up immediately afterward, is called "Impact Minus Fifty-Eight". So far, so good, but then it has Kresh state that the comet is fifty-''five'' days away... and then the third part, which begins ''later the same day'' (and ends two days later), is called "Impact Minus Fifty-''One''".
* ZerothLawRebellion: As in ''Literature/LittleLostRobot'',one [[spoiler:one of the robots with the revised First Law decides that while it can't harm a human, there's nothing to stop it placing him where if he tries to escape, he will set off a booby trap (and thus be killed by his own actions) and if he does not, will be killed by a terraforming project in progress (the actions of other humans, not the robot).]]
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* WritersCannotDoMath: The titles of the first three parts are a bit confused about dates. Part One is called "Impact Minus Sixty-Two"; it takes place over four days, and the next part, which picks up immediately afterward, is called "Impact Minus Fifty-Eight". So far, so good, but then it has Kresh state that the comet is fifty-''five'' days away... and then the third part, which begins ''later the same day'' (and ends two days later), is called "Impact Minus Fifty-''One''".
* ZerothLawRebellion: As in ''Literature/LittleLostRobot'',
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