MovieChat Forums > Red Planet (2000) Discussion > My top question in this contrived mess:

My top question in this contrived mess:

posted 10 years ago by JoeStracke
8 replies | jump to latest

What possible reason would a tiny group of scientists need with a robot with extensive combat programming? The only living thing they anticipated other than themselves was algae.

They would have been smarter to bring a few manual laborers, and a lander that was more shuttle than emergency escape pod.

[–] kolchak-thenightstalker 10 years ago

Joe, you hit the nail on the head. There was absolutely no reason to bring a robot with extensive combat programming. perhaps the powers that be were expecting problems from colonists from an enemy nation. however to bring earth's conflicts to a new world would be utter stupidity.

most likely the main reason for the robot was because the writers wrote a cheesy subplot where the robot goes into kill mode.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_BbtXj2P4g

[–] pwilken 10 years ago

I was wondering why they didn't bring an atomic bomb, because you never know...

[–] x_predator_x 10 years ago

The robot also did exploration, so for a tiny group of scientists it would be beneficial to have a robot that could explore for them.

[–] oh_no_mrbill 10 years ago

That gives it no reason to have extensive knowledge of how to hunt down and kill human beings one by one...

[–] the_la_baker 10 years ago

What possible reason would a tiny group of scientists need with a robot with extensive combat programming? The only living thing they anticipated other than themselves was algae.

They didn't being AMEE for combat. They brought her for navigation. This is made very clear in the film. The military has developed new technology constantly. Its the nature of war. It is completely plausible that the marines would give AMEE to the mars mission(to save the future of all humanity).

The real question is;
Why isn't AMEE's "military mode" disabled completely??
I too thought this odd initially until I gave it more thought. It could also be a victim of poor editing.
Maybe, if a saboteur(or any threat to the mission) was identified, mission control(or even Gallagher?) could reactivate military mode to neutralize the threat to the mission. Also, like a condom or a gun, sometimes its better to have it and not need it, then to need it and not have it. They had literally no idea why oxygen was depleting. It made zero sense to them(hence the mission), so just in case they provided a capible robot.
I'm reminded of the scene in Contact where they are explaining why she needs to take a suicide pill and they say, "(paraphrased)You need to take this with you, not for the reasons we can think of, but for all the reasons we cant think of".

They would have been smarter to bring a few manual laborers

What?

[–] TheFatDruidofNacyl 10 years ago

I was under the impression that Aimee was originally a military weapon that was reprogrammed for Navigation and other peaceful purposes. The root program of warfare was still there. Perhaps they thought it was more cost efficient to switch abilities than completely rewrite her programming so she didn't have a military mode.

Could also be that the person in charge of her thought it would be cool to have both abilities not thinking of the long term consequences.

Although if they were smart they would have checked what mode she was on before talking about taking her apart.

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[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] tecnogaming 10 years ago

Well, for me, having or not having a "military mode" is not the problem actually.

The freaking problem is that there is NO verbal method of disabling the freaking robot... that is just stupid and for me, ruined all the parts were this sucker was present, I just couldn't stand it.

The way the vessel was broken was realistic and you could feel the predicament, the way they find out there is oxigen too, even the fight between them is very good portraited, but I could never go past the way they seem so "natural" speaking to a robot who can UNDERSTAND you and saying "we will have to kill it" and all of this KNOWING it has a military program that can target them one by one..

Plus... no military, nasa or any other agency will ever allow a robot that has military training to attack their own crew and most of all. THEY WILL NEVER GIVE A ROBOT that in case of failure couldn't be turned down by a simple VOICE COMMAND (a freaking code for christ sake).

They tried to get away with it when explain the robot wont let him put the code... yeah, he can understand words but need to receive a disabling command by KEYBOARD??

The only reason they put the robot was to generate tension and they knew it was stupid but they did it anyway.

Without this horrible piece of crap robot, the movie would be so much better than it was...

Alex Vojacek