Plot device

[3113]

When a serial rapist is captured and convicted, instead of imprisoning the perp at great expense, the authorities sentence him to sex with a bot that eventually gives him such a horror of sex that he never touches another person.

Alternately, a pleasure bot could be used to help someone with an inability to relate to humans because their uncanny valley is shifted oddly in such a way that the patient is repelled by real people but develops an affection and a relationship with the bot.

I don't think either of these do the job, VM, of making the best use of this idea. The rapist idea won't work because we won't identify with the rapist, we'll want him to be creeped out and punished and won't feel what he's feeling and understand it. Besides, if society is that advanced to have a sex robot, it's not going to waste it on a rapist. There are other ways to punish a man impotent that cost a lot less.

As for helping someone relate to people, already done in "Lars and the Real Girl" with a doll. Again, it wastes the fact that there is this creep-out if the person involved doesn't creep out. The idea here is that people *think* they're going to want a robot lover that looks human, but when faced with one that is only almost human, get creeped out.

For that you need a story about a guy who is excited to get his new doll--maybe to replace the girl who broke his heart, etc. But when she arrives, all eager to please, he finds it too weird to handle--and maybe breaks her heart (so to speak) as she learns that she can't please this guy she was designed and programed to please. She is not machine enough (people have no trouble using various machines that look like machines for sex), but not human either.

The idea is in the disconnect, the uncanny valley phenomenon, which you want your readers to feel. To do that, they have to identify with your human there--he can't be someone they don't want to identify with (rapist) or can't identify with (doesn't relate to people). Otherwise you just have a typical man-meets-robot story. So the question becomes, what story will make the readers tap into the protagonist's desire for a robot lover, and then make those readers understand how this could go wrong not because the robot is a bad lover, but because the robot elicits that phenomena in the protagonist?

 

[rgraham666]

This idea was the basic plot of Bladerunner. There were genetically engineered beings who were biological constructions, including a few designed to be prostitutes.

In the end, the ultimate product did not even know she was not a true human being.

Still one of the most moving scenes in cinema.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Still one of the most moving scenes in cinema.

I knew which scene that would be before I even clicked on it

 

[voluptuary_manque]

I don't think either of these do the job, VM, of making the best use of this idea. The rapist idea won't work because we won't identify with the rapist, we'll want him to be creeped out and punished and won't feel what he's feeling and understand it. Besides, if society is that advanced to have a sex robot, it's not going to waste it on a rapist. There are other ways to punish a man impotent that cost a lot less.

As for helping someone relate to people, already done in "Lars and the Real Girl" with a doll. Again, it wastes the fact that there is this creep-out if the person involved doesn't creep out. The idea here is that people *think* they're going to want a robot lover that looks human, but when faced with one that is only almost human, get creeped out.

For that you need a story about a guy who is excited to get his new doll--maybe to replace the girl who broke his heart, etc. But when she arrives, all eager to please, he finds it too weird to handle--and maybe breaks her heart (so to speak) as she learns that she can't please this guy she was designed and programed to please. She is not machine enough (people have no trouble using various machines that look like machines for sex), but not human either.

The idea is in the disconnect, the uncanny valley phenomenon, which you want your readers to feel. To do that, they have to identify with your human there--he can't be someone they don't want to identify with (rapist) or can't identify with (doesn't relate to people). Otherwise you just have a typical man-meets-robot story. So the question becomes, what story will make the readers tap into the protagonist's desire for a robot lover, and then make those readers understand how this could go wrong not because the robot is a bad lover, but because the robot elicits that phenomena in the protagonist?

I think you're right. This would be a very difficult story to write, especially for me as I am not creeped out by the animation in Polar Express and Beowulf. I rather like the former and the scenes I saw of the latter were merely disappointing. Probably you would need someone more capable of empathy that I (unfortunately) am to do this properly. As Stella pointed out, it's would be an intriguing idea to write it from the robot's POV but one probably better left to a more skilled writer than I.

I think I'll go back to intrigue and sexy older women.

 

[lance gt]

The biggest challenge would be in writing it descriptively from the robot's POV, when it doesn't have emotion as input. It would be purely observational, unless the robot has some data to use in regards to what emotions are and how they're used in human inter-action sexually. I could see it ending up in the humour section than sci-fi on that point alone.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

I don't know about that. It could, I suppose, but the robot's analytical view of a human who started off horny and then loses his desire to fear and loathing doesn't sound funny to me. Especially if the robot tries to reassure the 'client' and it doesn't work.

 

[lance gt]

I don't know about that. It could, I suppose, but the robot's analytical view of a human who started off horny and then loses his desire to fear and loathing doesn't sound funny to me. Especially if the robot tries to reassure the 'client' and it doesn't work.

Now take that scenario you gave and add Mr. Bean as the protagonist. "Now I don't care who you are, that's just funny."

 

[Verdad]

Okay, I checked out a few scenes from Beowulf. I'm not creeped out. Basically, they're disappointingly false. Now, if Grendel's mama were to show up on my doorstep . . . that would be creepy!

I just had a look at some scenes from Beowulf, too. I didn't find it uncanny, but I did find it boring. The technique gives a whole new meaning to "lifeless characters". Final Fantasy, some years ago, employed a different kind of animation, but I recall feeling the same about the result: dull, rather than creepy.

Polar Express, on the other hand, I did see in theater and enjoyed, though I'm pretty sure it would have given me nightmares if I'd been a kid. The uncanny impression is the strongest in that movie, imo. It fits the dreamy-horrorish story beautifully, but I'm really not sure who was supposed to be the target audience.

 

[Verdad]

OMG, I've totally missed that Lars movie. I didn't even know it existed. But the moment I googled the plot, I knew I've read something very similar a few years ago, except it wasn't fiction!

Here it is: Technosexual: One Man's Tale of Robot Love

This dude is more than a little weird—which I guess goes without saying with a doll lover, but he seems to think his, uh, girlfriend passes the Turing Test and has quite a mind of her own. You really can't be sure if it's some kind of a spoof ("if gays can marry, I can marry my doll, too"—an argument he actually makes), but then again, with the number of people into Real Dolls, he seems only marginally creepier than the rest.

From the same site, here's a brief article on Aiko, the next step in fembots.

And here's a very good article about Real Doll owners. There seems to be a whole culture built around the thing.

And for good measure, while I googled that, I stumbled upon this obscure historical fact: The Nazis Invented the Sex Doll.

Some of this should be creepy enough for inspiration!

 

[bronzeage]

But this is a very different theme from what VM is discussing. Bladerunner is all about the question of what is human and how can you tell what's real (a running theme in all of P.K. Dick's works as he was a paranoid schizophrenic and drug user).

What VM is discussing is when you can tell that you're with a machine, yet it comes very close to being real. As in movies like the Polar Express, where they don't use live action, but the cartoon isn't cartoon-like, it's a mimic of live action. This would be, if you will, the robots that were made along the way to getting to the Bladerunner world. Robots twenty years earlier which the company hadn't managed to get real enough to actually fool people. Close but no cigar.

This is what creeps people out--creates that effect. And it makes sense. You expect something like a movie to be one thing or the other. Live action or cartoon (including Pixar cartoon). But when it's not either, when it's a cartoon pretending to be live action, that we find disturbing. And that, I think, is what VM is suggesting. A robot that is trying to fool you, but both you and the robot know it isn't the real thing. It's not a stiff doll--it moves and tries to act human--but it's not so good that, as in Bladerunner, it can fool you unless you give it an elaborate test that takes hours and special machines. The robot is clearly not human, yet its eerily close.

That turns it from being a science fiction thriller into a sci-fi horror story, IMHO.

Okay.

Any sex toy that requires more maintenance than being rinsed under hot water is creepy.

Or in the least, a video of of someone using one certainly is.

Starting with the Fleshlight, all the way up to Real Dolls. They don't have to approach human to be creepy.

 

[voluptuary_manque]

OMG, I've totally missed that Lars movie. I didn't even know it existed. But the moment I googled the plot, I knew I've read something very similar a few years ago, except it wasn't fiction!

Here it is: Technosexual: One Man's Tale of Robot Love

This dude is more than a little weird—which I guess goes without saying with a doll lover, but he seems to think his, uh, girlfriend passes the Turing Test and has quite a mind of her own. You really can't be sure if it's some kind of a spoof ("if gays can marry, I can marry my doll, too"—an argument he actually makes), but then again, with the number of people into Real Dolls, he seems only marginally creepier than the rest.

From the same site, here's a brief article on Aiko, the next step in fembots.

And here's a very good article about Real Doll owners. There seems to be a whole culture built around the thing.

And for good measure, while I googled that, I stumbled upon this obscure historical fact: The Nazis Invented the Sex Doll.

Some of this should be creepy enough for inspiration!

Indeed. A Nazi pleasurebot should be enough to give a statue the creeps!

 

[jomar]

OMG, I've totally missed that Lars movie. I didn't even know it existed. But the moment I googled the plot, I knew I've read something very similar a few years ago, except it wasn't fiction!

Here it is: Technosexual: One Man's Tale of Robot Love

This dude is more than a little weird—which I guess goes without saying with a doll lover, but he seems to think his, uh, girlfriend passes the Turing Test and has quite a mind of her own. You really can't be sure if it's some kind of a spoof ("if gays can marry, I can marry my doll, too"—an argument he actually makes), but then again, with the number of people into Real Dolls, he seems only marginally creepier than the rest.

From the same site, here's a brief article on Aiko, the next step in fembots.

And here's a very good article about Real Doll owners. There seems to be a whole culture built around the thing.

And for good measure, while I googled that, I stumbled upon this obscure historical fact: The Nazis Invented the Sex Doll.

Some of this should be creepy enough for inspiration!

I should have titled my suggestion for a VM story as "Lars and the Real Real Doll."

But you referenced a fascinating documentary about a few guys who buy the Real Dolls. Poignant and quite sad these guys who can't form relationships with women.

The real dolls are lifeish-like but not so the uncanny valley concept has a good shot if one were to come alive. On the other hand they might all act like Chelsea Handler. It could be worse.

(just for fun, anyone remember Cherry 2000?)

 

[Stella_Omega]

..
(just for fun, anyone remember Cherry 2000?)

That was a better movie than i was expecting-- or maybe the drugs were better than I was aware of that night.

 

[Verdad]

Indeed. A Nazi pleasurebot should be enough to give a statue the creeps!

Ha, isn't it? Really hard to tell sometimes whether a story is Onion-style or not. On a quick search, all articles about Nazis inventing the first sex doll seem to come from one source, so I wasn't even sure if it's true. But the name of the designer turns up some more results, so apparently it is. Apparently Himmler thought Wehrmacht suffered unnecessary loses due to diseases picked up from prostitutes, so a safer way of, um, maintaining the troops' morale had to be found. Efficiency above all. Honest, I'm still not sure if it's a joke!

I should have titled my suggestion for a VM story as "Lars and the Real Real Doll."

But you referenced a fascinating documentary about a few guys who buy the Real Dolls. Poignant and quite sad these guys who can't form relationships with women.

The real dolls are lifeish-like but not so the uncanny valley concept has a good shot if one were to come alive. On the other hand they might all act like Chelsea Handler. It could be worse.

(just for fun, anyone remember Cherry 2000?)

Heh, missed that Cherry business too. Quite some stories of these guys, though. Sad, and funny, and creepy, all rolled into one. There seems to have been another movie this year, Air Doll, appearing on Cannes. It got good reviews. And here's a book by a photographer who made a name photographing Real Dolls: Still Lovers. Plenty of plot bunny material, it appears.