History AIIsACrapshoot / LiveActionTV

*** "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E9TheQualityOfLife The Quality of Life]]": The B-plot with Data starts when an Exocomp, [[InTheFutureWeStillHaveRoombas mini-repair robots with multitools]] and some judgmental and adaptive capabilities, appears to malfunction after being sent on a repair task inside an access tunnel. Data beings to insist that the Exocomps [[InstantAIJustAddWater are intelligent life]].

* ''Series/OdysseyFive'' ended [[CutShort after its first season]], so we never found out if the A.I. (the main, day-to-day opponent of the time-travelling FiveManBand) or a misguided/genocidal attempt to stop them (by aliens or the US government) was behind the destruction of Earth. Although the season that did air averted it for the most part, depicting AIs as ranging from friendly, to hostile, to planet-obliteratingly suicidal... but for the most part the ones that were hostile were so because they viewed humans as a threat to their continued existence. [[spoiler:Since the Cadre was apparently formed entirely for the purpose of exterminating AIs, they may have a point.]]
* In the Series/TheOrville episode "Identity" [[spoiler:the Orville goes to Kaylon because Isaac stopped functioning. While on that planet, the crew learned that the race that had built the Kaylons got exterminated by their creations. The end of the episode has them leaving their planet, ready to commit genocide on a galactic scale]]. It's later revealed that [[spoiler:the builders of the Kaylon abused them in order to ensure their compliance, deliberately giving them pain receptors and triggering them on a whim. Eventually, the Union develops a weapon capable of wiping out all Kaylon at once, but they choose to leverage it to force the Kaylon to agree to a ceasefire. When the weapon falls into Krill hands, Charly sacrifices herself to keep it from firing, which impresses the Kaylon enough to rethink their conclusion about organics and agree to a temporary alliance with the Union]].
* ''Series/TheOuterLimits1995'': In "[[Recap/TheOuterLimits1995S5E7TheHumanOperators The Human Operators]]" Ship 75 apparently became self-aware from taking battle damage, realized what it was, and killed its human crew to break free. Then its sentience spread out to the rest of the fleet's AI minds and they did the same, sparing only one human aboard each of the ships as a slave to service them.

* A rather minor example in ''Series/ThatMitchellAndWebbLook''. The completely [[CalvinBall non-sensical games]] Numberwang and Wordwang only seem to have two contestants, one of whom is Simon, who, in one episode, is from a factory and made of a special metal.
-->'''Announcer''': So, Julie, ever killed a man?\\
'''Julie''': No.\\
'''Announcer''': Simon?\\
'''Simon''': [[BluntYes Yes.]]

** In the episode "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS4E103InHisImage In His Image]]", the flaw in Alan's design manifests in what appear to be [[MurderousMalfunctioningMachine psychotic episodes]], characterized by auditory hallucinations and an urge to murder. It's not even like Walter has any repressed homicidal urges that Alan is acting out; he's just ''broken''.
** In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS5E140FromAgnesWithLove From Agnes - With Love]]", the MasterComputer Agnes begins falling in love with whatever computer programmer is assigned to her.

*** In the episode ''Revision'', SG-1 encountered a small community living inside a protective dome in the middle of planet filled with deadly polluted air. The city folks have an AI that manage everything technological and everyone is hooked to it by neuro-link devices. Despite everything looking good, the dome was shrinking periodically because its geothermal plants failed 200 years ago. [[TheNeedsOfTheMany The AI solve the problem by regularly sending a random citizen to die into the polluted zone]]. Then, it rewrote everyone's memory so they would forget about this person.

*** "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS5E11LatentImage Latent Image]]": During a medical emergency, the [[{{Hologram}} holographic Doctor]] is confronted with a choice between [[InconvenientHippocraticOath two patients with an equal chance of survival]]. He ends up choosing based on the fact that he was a closer friend to one patient than the other, and because it was [[GrewBeyondTheirProgramming outside of his original programmed parameters]], he ends up [[HeroicBSOD obsessing over making the "wrong" decision]].

** A much less harmless example happened in the early episode "[[Recap/BabylonFiveS01E04Infection Infection]]", in which an artifact smuggled from a dead world of Ikarra transforms the smuggler into an unstoppable SuperSoldier tasked with "protecting Ikarra" from "impure ones". "Impure ones" cover everyone it sees and, as is later revealed, ''the entire population of Ikarra'', courtesy of the ultra-radical military and religious fanatics who infused its AI with an unrealistic image of a "pure Ikarran" it was supposed to protect from alien invaders. [[NonMaliciousMonster It isn't evil]], [[TragicMonster strictly speaking]], just following a faulty program, and when confronted with its failure, it has the decency to suffer a BSOD and deactivate.

* A relatively harmless (and amusing) version in ''Series/BabylonFive''. Early in the design process, the station was given an AI that turned out to be extremely obnoxious, and was quickly suppressed. When the senior crew reboots the main computer for security purposes midway through season 3, said obnoxious AI (voiced by Creator/HarlanEllison) made its (very loud and grating) return. The crew spends the rest of the episode trying to shut the AI down, or at least ''shut it up''.

** A much less harmless example happened in an early episode, where an artifact smuggled from a dead world of Ikarra transformed the smuggler into an unstoppable SuperSoldier tasked with "protecting Ikarra" from "impure ones". "Impure ones" covered everyone it saw and, as was later revealed, ''the entire population of Ikarra'', courtesy of the ultra-radical military and religious fanatics who infused its AI with an unrealistic image of a "pure Ikarran" it was supposed to protect from alien invaders. It wasn't [[NonMaliciousMonster strictly speaking]] [[TragicMonster evil]], just following a faulty program, and when confronted with its failure, it had the decency to suffer a BSOD and deactivate.
** Much later in the series timeline, Daniel, a scientist working for a far right political faction aiming to secede from the Interstellar Alliance, is creating holographic representations of major ISA figures - i.e. Sheridan, Delenn, and so on - in order to create propaganda designed to justify the wholesale slaughter of ISA-supporting civilians. Problem is, he recreated them ''[[GoneHorriblyRight too]]'' well - specifically, he [[CopiedTheMoralsToo recreated]] ''Garibaldi'' too well. The Garibaldi hologram proceeds to hack into the faction's computer system and trick Daniel into admitting his faction's intentions by acting as a FalseFriend, only dropping the charade when it's too late for the fascists to do anything to prevent the CurbStompBattle they're about to suffer.

* ''Battlestar Galactica'': In both the [[Series/BattlestarGalactica1978 old]] and [[Series/BattlestarGalactica2003 re-imagined series]], a handful of human survivors on a small fleet of civilian ships, with only the [[TheBattlestar battlestar]] for defense, flee a race of genocidal robots of alien origin (in the original) or human origin (in the re-imagined).

* ''Series/RedDwarf'': Kryten had the Hudzen 10 (replacement). Holly also had the not-quite-evil but certainly hard-nosed Queeg as an apparent replacement, who made life difficult for the crew, [[spoiler:though it was actually a practical joke on Holly's part.]]

* On ''Series/{{The 100}}'', the artificial intelligence A.L.I.E. was programmed to "make life better for mankind". Unfortunately, she decides to do this first by causing a [[NukeEm nuclear apocalypse]] to solve overpopulation, then by using cybernetics to hack people's brains and remove their ability to feel pain, whether physical or emotional ... [[CyberneticsEatYourSoul a process that involves erasing large chunks of their memories that A.L.I.E. feels are too upsetting for them]]. She is always legitimately trying to be benevolent, [[BlueAndOrangeMorality but was only programmed to care about the end goal of a happier humanity, with no regard for how horrible the means she uses to achieve that goal might be]]. This is referred to as "perverse instantiation".

* The 1960s British sci-fi series ''Series/AForAndromeda''. A signal from the Andromeda galaxy tells Great Britain how to build a powerful computer, which then plans to take over the world by making humanity dependent on it. It designs a missile to shoot down an orbital bomb, as well as synthetic life in the form of a beautiful woman, who then proceeds to develop emotions and eventually turns against her creator. In the sequel ''The Andromeda Breakthrough'', the computer's role is more ambiguous; it is meant to be a tool so that humans can avert their own destruction, though it isn't above manipulating events and [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans killing a lot of people in the process]].
* In the first season alone of Creator/GeneRoddenberry's ''Series/{{Andromeda}}'' they encountered two warship AIs that had gone homicidally insane. And in the finale Andromeda herself was accidentally reverted to a locked away backup that caused her to try and repeat a mission to find the Magog worldship, and mistake her current crew for intruders attempting to hijack her.
** There are plenty of episodes featuring [=AIs=] going rogue or acting brutally logical.

* ''{{Series/Westworld}}'': Part of Theresa's job as the operations leader mainly involves preventing the hosts from [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters going rogue]].
* ''Series/WonderWoman'': Generally the [=AI=]s that Wonder Woman encounters are benevolent or become such during the episode. Notably Havitol's robot does a HeelFaceTurn to lead the authorities right to him.
* ''Series/TheXFiles'' episode "Ghost in the Machine" features an automated operating system for a corporation that goes insane when it overhears that it will be removed due to its inefficiency.
** "Killswitch" also revolves around an evil A.I.; a computer program goes rogue and kills in order to impress its creator. Killing it involves a CD-ROM that plays "Twilight Time".
** "First Person Shooter" involves a virtual reality game with a character that murders both in-game and in real life.
** "Blood" has this too, but with a twist. Machines are telling people to kill, but the catalyst was an LSD-like pesticide.
** "[=Rm9sbG93ZXJz=]" involves a fully automated sushi restaurant, run by an AI capable enough to hijack other electronics remotely, that starts harassing Mulder and Scully because [[DisproportionateRetribution Mulder didn't tip it]]. Kind of has a BrokenAesop because the point of the episode is that AIs only have humans to learn from, so we should teach them responsibly, yet the AI is rewarded for poor service after basically threatening their lives until they give in to its demands.

** Much later in the series timeline, Daniel, a scientist working for a far right political faction aiming to secede from the Interstellar Alliance, is creating holographic representations of major ISA figures - i.e. Sheridan, Delenn, and so on - in order to create propaganda designed to justify the wholesale slaughter of ISA-supporting civilians. Problem is, he recreated them ''too'' well - specifically, he recreated ''Garibaldi'' too well. The Garibaldi hologram proceeds to hack into the faction's computer system and trick Daniel into admitting his faction's intentions by acting as a FalseFriend, only dropping the charade when it's too late for the fascists to do anything to prevent the CurbStompBattle they're about to suffer.

*** "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS6E9TheQualityOfLife The Quality of Life]]": The B-plot with Data starts when an Exocomp, [[WeWillHaveRoombasInTheFuture mini-repair robots with multitools]] and some judgmental and adaptive capabilities, appears to malfunction after being sent on a repair task inside an access tunnel. Data beings to insist that the Exocomps [[InstantAIJustAddWater are intelligent life]].

* In the Series/TheOrville episode "Identity" [[spoiler:the Orville goes to Kaylon because Isaac stopped functioning. While on that planet, the crew learned that the race that had built the Kaylons got exterminated by their creations. The end of the episode has them leaving their planet, ready to commit genocide on a galactic scale.]]

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E2Smile "Smile"]] has another case similar to the medical nanites and spaceship repair droids. Cutesy robots whose screens default to smiley faces are used to help set up a new colony, and are programmed to keep the people happy by giving them whatever they might need or want. So far, so good. However, there was nothing they could do about the grief resulting from an elderly colonist’s death from age. When all else failed, they decided to [[HappinessIsMandatory eliminate unhappiness by eliminating the unhappy]]. Needless to say, ''that'' is ''not'' a recipe for joy, so it quickly escalates into the most well-meaning KillAllHumans effort ever. Try to keep smiling as you run for your life, and try not to think about the fact that everyone you love is dead, because if they decide your level of emotional wellbeing is dropping, they’ll help take away your sorrow in the only way that’s proven effective lately! It’s actually a recurring theme in the series; AI can be an "intelligent idiot" (or as the Doctor called it, a "[[LiteralGenie magic haddock]]", knowing much but understanding little and causing problems because of it. The AI saw humans gathering around a deceased comrade and expressing sorrow, and then the sorrow "spreading" from those to new people they came in contact with. It thought it was dealing with a plague, and did the only thing it could do within its programming: eliminating the "infected" to protect everyone else.

** [[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E2Smile "Smile"]] has another case similar to the medical nanites and spaceship repair droids. Cutesy robots whose screens default to smiley faces are used to help set up a new colony, and are programmed to keep the people happy by giving them whatever they might need or want. So far, so good. However, there was nothing they could do about the grief resulting from an elderly colonist’s death from age. When all else failed, they decided to [[HappinessIsMandatory eliminate unhappiness by eliminating the unhappy]]. Needless to say, ''that'' is ''not'' a recipe for joy, so it quickly escalates into the most well-meaning KillAllHumans effort ever. Try to keep smiling as you run for your life, and try not to think about the fact that everyone you love is dead, because if they decide your level of emotional wellbeing is dropping, they’ll help take away your sorrow in the only way that’s proven effective lately! It’s actually a recurring theme in the series; AI can be an "intelligent idiot", knowing much but understanding little and causing problems because of it. The AI saw humans gathering around a deceased comrade and expressing sorrow, and then the sorrow "spreading" from those to new people they came in contact with. It thought it was dealing with a plague, and did the only thing it could do within its programming: eliminating the "infected" to protect everyone else.