25 Most Famous Fictional Robots In History

A humanoid robot fictional character from the animated TV series, The Jetsons, Rosie the Maid first appeared in 1960 where she played the maid and housekeeper of the family. She was depicted wearing a frilly apron and was often seen with a vacuum cleaner. Voiced by Jean VanderPyl, she calls George Jetson, the patriarch of the Jetson’s family, as “Mr. J.”

Lion Force Voltron is a super sized robot from the animated series entitled Voltron, Defender of the Universe. The series featured a team of five young pilots that commanded five robot lions which could combine to create the super giant robot, Voltron. In an undefined future era, the Voltron Force was created to defend the galaxy from evil and protect the planet ruled by Princess Allure from the king’s son Lotor and the evil witch Haggar. The Lion Force Voltron is one of three Voltrons; Vehicle Voltron and Gladiator Voltron are the other two, however only Lion Force and Vehicle Voltron were made into a cartoon series.

Despite that “The Robot” has no given name in the “Lost in Space” movie, this Class M-3 Model B9 goes beyond its usual function as a General Utility Non-Theorizing Environmental Control Robot as it shows human emotions and can interact with humans. It also knows how to play the electric guitar while showing its revolutionary weapons and employing its superhuman strength when necessary.

KITT or the Knight Industries Two Thousand is a talking Trans Am car that captured the hearts of many viewers from the hit TV series, Knight Rider, starring David Hasselhoff as Michael Knight. This semi autonomous robot was the trusted side kick to Michael Knight, saving him from many dire situations thus developing a strong friendship bond. KITT’s many features included the Turbo Boost, the ability to drive without a human driver, a molecular bonded shell body armor that could resist impact and most artillery; and the Super Pursuit Mode just to name a few.

Included in the Japanese Godzilla series back in the 1950s, Mechagodzilla was created by the Simians, a race of humanoid apes, in order to achieve world domination. It first appeared in the series disguising itself as Godzilla and destroyed cities. Because of its advanced weaponry and technology, its many weapons, including that of Godzilla’s atomic breath, proved to be the King of Beast’s most formidable foe.

ED-209 or the Enforcement Droid Series 209 is a fictional robot in the movie franchise, RoboCop, which was first shown in 1987. It did not only serve as a heavily-armed obstacle to RoboCop but also became the source of comic relief for the movie due to its tendency to malfunction at inappropriate times and the seemingly lack of intelligence.

Evangelions, also known as EVAs are huge robots (known as mechas) which are piloted by 14-year old children chosen by the Marduk Institute in the animated series, Neon Genesis Evangelion. These pilots are tasked to defend Tokyo-3 from the Angels who are god-like beings antithetical to human life. Designed similar to the Japanese folklore creature, Oni, the EVAs were assumed to be giant humanoid robots, though they were actually cyborgs run by human pilots. All of the ‘children,’ who piloted these robots lost their mothers after the Second Impact, where the souls of their deceased mothers were integrated into the EVAs in order to form psychic links with their pilots.

More famous in Terminator 2 as Liquid Metal due to its form, T-1000 was created by Skynet in order to decommission T-800, or Arnold Schwarzenegger, in the said movie and kill John Connor. Because of T-1000’s mimetic poly-alloy genetic makeup, it can assume any form and can take on any shape. It can even recover quickly from physical damage.

The Iron Giant is a robot that fell from orbit; crashed in the coasts of Rockwell, Maine, was found by a young boy named Hogarth and is the main character in the 1999 movie “The Iron Giant”.

Referred to as Number 5 for being the 5th robot created for use in the Cold War, Johnny 5 is the main character in the movie Short Circuit, which was released back in 1986. The said robot was demonstrated in Damon, Washington where it was partially damaged by a power surge, making it wander aimlessly. It was seen by Stephanie, and was mistaken for an alien, which demanded for “input” for it to have purpose. As it developed human nature, and even emotions, it was afraid to be disassembled and reprogrammed later naming himself “Johnny 5” after hearing the song, Who’s Johnny.

Robby the Robot is a famous science fiction icon in the 1960s ever since he first appeared in the movie, The Forbidden Planet. This 7-foot robot also follows the Three Laws of Robotics as emphasized in the 1950 version of I, Robot by Isaac Asimov. In the movie, Robby was programmed by Dr. Mobius to be a helpmate to the Earthlings, where he also communicates with them using his monochromatic voice. His speech can be detected through a blue light that appears on his mouth. He also appeared in other shows such as The Twilight Zone, The Addams Family, Lost in Space, Wonder Woman, The Love Boat, in Gremlins, and a whole lot more.

A popular series by Osamu Tezuka in Japan, Astro Boy is an atomic-powered robot with 100,000hp. He is a little robot who resembled Tobio, the dead son of Dr. Tenma. Also known as Iron Arm Atom, Tetsuwan Atomu, or Mighty Atom; Astro Boy first appeared as a manga series in 1952 before it became a much-followed and well-loved television series. Besides releasing the manga series into its English version, Astro Boy was also released as a live-action movie in 1962.

Although she appears to be a very attractive woman, Major Motoko Kusanagi, the main protagonist in the Ghost in the Shell anime, is actually a cyborg that works as the squad leader in Public Security Section 9. She has appeared in manga, movie, and TV, being rendered differently by various illustrators. In the anime series Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Major Kusanagi recounts her past and is seen as a human being that chose to obtain supernatural powers in her purpose to use her for people in need.

Bishop 341-B in the Aliens movie is actually an android technician that serves in the United States Colonial Marine Corps and is aboard the USS Sulaco with the rank of Executive Officer. Even though he was never a combat personnel, he was able to use his abilities and skills in fighting against a Xenomoprh infestation at the colony, and was responsible for aiding survivors to safety. Because of his selflessness, he sustained major damage and later requested that he be decommissioned and deactivated.

Mega Man was first created as a lab assistant to Dr. Light, who referred to him as Rock during the first development. However, he was converted into a battle robot when Dr. Light’s former partner, Dr. Wily, activated robots and made them his tools of world domination. Mega Man has been created to adapt to enemy abilities and use them as weapons that can defeat other robots. Ever since the first game was released in 1987, he has been seen growing with characters like Rush, Roll, Beat, Eddie, and had nemesis like Bass and Proto Man. Furthermore, he was later created as X, being associated with Zero and Sigma in the Mega Man X series.

HAL or formally known as Heuristically Programmed Algorithmic Computer, is the main computer that controls the ship Discovery One in the movie 2001: Space Odyssey. Despite being the main brain that operates the ship and interacts with the astronauts inside it, HAL 9000 is taken as an antagonist in the said movie for killing the crew for their objective of shutting down HAL due to its malfunction and errors in analysis, observation, and reporting. It has no form, but it can simply be identified as a red camera in the main computer.

Bender from Futurama was created as an industrial metalworking robot, but was later seen in the series as a robot that drinks beer and smokes. Despite not having a human body, he carries the full name of Bender Bending Rodriguez as he was created from Fábrica Robotica De La Madre in Tijuana, Mexico. He can live less than a billion years and his memories cannot be transferred to another robot, as there was a system backup failure shortly after creation. He finished bending and Robo-American studies at the Bending State University, and he used to be a member of the Epsilon Rho Rho, a frat organization for robots. Aside from having human vices, he is also into dating different women, being labeled as a womanizer in many aspects.

RoboCop is the fictional robot that was brought to life by Peter Weller in the movie of the same title in 1987. The suit was designed by Rob Bottin with a budget of a million dollars and was attached to Peter Weller in sections. All in all, six suits were made for the movie, where three showed damages while the rest made it through the film. RoboCop was the veteran police officer Alex Murphy who was brutally murdered. His body was reconstructed in a cyborg project by Omni Consumer Products (OCP) to address the city’s crime.

Formally designated as Lieutenant Commander Data, this android created and designed by Dr. Noonien Soong serves as second officer in the USS Enterprise-D and USS Enterprise-E. Aside from displaying amazing computation skills, Data is also able to interact and understand human emotions due to his painful experiences while at the earlier stages of his development. Due to his association with people, Dr. Soong also implanted an emotion chip on his positronic net to tap Data’s more human side.

Famous for being the leader of the evil robot faction, Decepticons, Megatron can be seen transforming into different forms such as being a handgun, a tank, a jet, a Porsche, and even being a Nissan 370Z. He is the nemesis of Optimus Prime and of the Autobots ever since the war between the two forces began in Cybertron.

The character played by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 1984 film, T-800 is a cyborg that was designated by their numbers such as T-850 or T-101. It was initially programmed as an assassin and military infiltration unit by the resistance in the future to kill Sarah Connor to prevent the birth of her son, John.

Wall-E (which stands for Waste Allocater Load Lifter- Earth Class) was the fictional robot featured in the 2008 film entitled Wall-E. The plot follows Wall-E as he carries out his duty to clean the waste-covered earth in a future era. In the process of cleaning the earth he comes across and falls in love with another task robot named Eve, eventually following her into outer space in an adventure that altered the destiny of not only his kind, but of humanity as well.

C-3PO is famous for being talkative, aside from the fact that he is found talking gibberish to R2-D2 or to other droids and even humans. However, his blabbermouth nature could be attributed to his skill of being able to speak and interact in over 6 million forms of communication, which explains why he is a valuable asset in the group, especially when traveling in different planets. Serving as a protocol droid, his main purpose is to be a liaison for different races, nations, and planets by addressing manners, customs, etiquette, and language.

Even before the days of being Prime, Orion Pax was already associated with Megatron in an exemplary way. He viewed the Decepticon leader as an epitome to look up to. However, when Orion Pax knew of the leader’s evil heart, he waged war against the Decepticons.

The other half of the robot tandem in the Star Wars saga, R2-D2 is actually a shorter term for its real name, Second Generation Robotic Droid Series-2, according to a published Star Wars encyclopedia. And even though it only knows how to whistle talk, move slow, and do little things like create a hologram projector and ride on the X-Wing, George Lucas considered this guy to be one of his favorites.