Robot Wars
Tags: non fiction

Plot synopsis:
By 2041, North America has been ravaged by "the great toxic gas scare of 1993": large swaths of land have been turned into inhospitable desert, where bands of raiders called "Centros" attack transports. The former United States have been assimilated into a Western bloc called the North Hemi. The opposing Eastern bloc is known as the Eastern Alliance, and the North Hemi is planning to salvage its economy by manufacturing defense robots called "mini-megs" for the Eastern Alliance. These robots would be smaller offshoots of giant "mega-robots", once ubiquitous in warfare but now reduced to a single specimen, the MRAS-2 (which looks like a mechanized scorpion).
MRAS-2 conducts tours for civilians, and carries laser assault weapons to defend itself. It is operated by Drake (Don Michael Paul) and his copilot Stumpy (James Staley). During a transport run, Drake's mech is ambushed by Centros. Drake opts for a defensive strategy, but his boss Rooney orders him to attack so he can show off the robot to general Wa-Lee (Danny Kamekona), a visiting dignitary from the Eastern Alliance sent to negotiate the purchase of the mini-megs. The violent rocking motions of the mech during the battle cause an archaeologist passenger, Leda (Barbara Crampton), to drop and break her valuable specimens. When Drake brings the robot to port, Leda angrily confronts him about the specimens, but he dismisses her with flirtatious remarks.
Drake is summoned to Rooney's office, and shows him a recovered Centro weapon which appears to be of Eastern alliance origin. Drake deduces that the Eastern alliance is conspiring with the Centros, but Rooney disbelieves him. Drake pressures Rooney to stop the MRAS-2 tours to avoid risking more lives, and when his boss refuses, Drake vows to quit piloting the robot. Meanwhile, Leda has met with her journalist friend Anne, and exposes some suspicious activity going on in Crystal Vista, a perfectly preserved 20th-century town that survived the toxic gas scare: the town is built on a layer of 21st-century materials which are impenetrable to satellite imaging, and she has found components similar to those of the old MEGA-1 robot, which was supposedly dismantled.
Later, Wa-Lee holds a traditional fighting ceremony and invites Drake, who apparently has long-standing animosity against him, to fight. Drake accepts, and knocks Wa-Lee down before the battle begins proper, cementing the tension between them. Drake then makes good on his promise to Rooney and gives up pilot duty to volunteer for a special op against the Centros; there he recovers more Eastern-manufactured equipment. Despite Drake's insistence that the MRAS-2 is under threat from Centros, Rooney allows the tour to proceed, and even has Wa-Lee taught how to pilot the robot as a courtesy. At a bar later on, Stumpy tells Drake that his grandfather was part of an effort to hide MEGA-1. Meanwhile, Leda and Anne have ridden the MRAS-2 to Crystal Vista. There, they go underground through the basement of a schoolhouse, and find the micron transponders of the MEGA-1. Anne returns to catch the MRAS-2 return trip, while Leda stays behind to continue the investigation.
Suddenly, Centros appear and chase Leda. She escapes for a while, and the rest of the Centros head for the Crystal Vista robot port. There, they join Wa-Lee's officers in a mutiny and kill the North Hemi security, proving Drake right about the Eastern alliance's duplicity. Wa-Lee hijacks the MRAS-2, taking the passengers hostage, and begins destroying strategic targets. Rooney pleads with Drake and Stumpy to retake the robot, and they agree upon learning that the Centros have captured Leda. The general heads for Crystal Vista to kill Drake, who has freed Leda, found the MEGA-1 intact, reactivated it and is now piloting it.
The two robots meet in the desert and begin fighting. Drake removes the MRAS-2's cabin, saving the passengers, and eventually manages to subdue the general. The film ends happily as he and Leda admit their attraction to each other.

Review: supremely enjoyable!.
A truly excellent and enjoyable piece of entertainment!A battle of skill, design, tactic, intelligence and raw robot power.
Very fast-paced and dynamic, with no useless and vulgar theatrics typical of american "wrestling" shows..
American TV Execs take note.
I managed to catch an episode of this wonderful show purely by accident.
We decided to stay home one Saturday afternoon, and as we were flipping around the channels, we happened across it.
The first thing I heard was the voice of the host, Craig Charles, that I immediately recognized from another wonderful show, Red Dwarf.
My girlfriend was ready to keep on going around the dial, but I wanted to watch, mainly because I like Craig so much.
He's just plain cool!
So we watched the show, and it was amazing!
It's like...as we Americans talk about how it'd be cool to do this or that, and it's usually just talk, the Brits are getting out into the garage, and actually building this stuff, and finding their way onto international television, as well!Hey, I'm gonna have to subscribe to TV Guide so I can find out when and where this shows going to be on again.Peace!.
Great show about Robots.
It's a great show, robots fighting each other.
Then there are the house robots...
very strong robots.
All robots have to move through a course and fight each other, at the end of the show there's a finale.
The best robot's are fighting each other and the house robots are also there..
Do we get a different announcer in th USA?.
I've watched a couple episodes on the Science channel in the USA and have given up on it because the announcer is horrible.
Way way too much fake excitement.
I suspect we get an "Americanized" version and the UK original broadcasts have a better announcer.
I also agree with other reviewers that the arena is too busy.
Too many matches are decided by one robot ending up in the pit.
Robot battles should be decided by how the robots stack up against each other not which one falls in a hole first.
I enjoy the creativity shown by some of the builders but I can't stand the lame announcer and it doesn't work to have the sound off either.
My wife suggestes they should have one of the British or Scottish golf announcers do the fight commentary.
Obnoxious.
Confusing and un-entertaining..
The hype of Battlebots turned up to 11.
At least with Battlebots you can fast forward to the interesting parts.
Namely the fights.
With Robot Wars the obnoxious "radio voice" announcer never shuts up and the fight is not so much operator skill and builder creativity as random metal boxes running into each other with other stuff happening.
A classic example of not understanding what makes a show entertaining and turning up every other factor.
The producers should be taken out and beaten with a pneumatic cylinder..
Fantastic entertainment!.
At the moment in Australia we are in the non-ratings period so all kinds of unfamiliar shows are showing up at odd times.
Most are dreck, 'Robot Wars' isn't.
It's actually one of the most entertaining TV shows I've seen in quite a while.
The basic idea is that contestants build their own "robots" (remote controlled fighting machine on wheels) which then battle each other in a ring.
The ring contains obstacles, "house robots" which can attack at certain times, and a pit in which you must attempt to push your opponent's robot.
Simple concept, but highly addictive viewing!
Maybe I'll get sick of it after a few more weeks, but right now I'm hooked.
Great fun.
Great fun.
They don't make shows like this any more - and that's a great pity.
This is a game show where people bring in the robots they have made and fight them while trying to not get killed by the house robots.
It's kind of like boxing or pro-wrestling when nobody actually gets hurt so the robots fight violently and then everyone is quite civilized after.
It's entertainment for the whole family.
In fact, whole families often run their teams including grandparents and little kids.
It's also inspirational to get kids interested in engineering and computers.
They have a really funny announcer too.The USA versions are fun but this is more fun.
They haveIf you can catch this on reruns, try it.
You may well like it.Oh, my fav's are Razer (of course) and Bigger Brother..
Too much "candy" taking away from the real fun.
Robot Wars (2016) has a lot of potential but the biggest problem is they fill the arena with entirely too much extra stuff with, what I assume is, the intent of making things more dramatic.
The problem is that this show is about a battle between two robots and some hazards are desired but when the arena has as many as this one has it really takes away from the actual function of the robots themselves and it forces the robots to not have room to get away and use strategy.
I'm also not a fan of the constant replays and edited battles....
The cameras simply don't follow the action the way they should and this also takes away from the actual battle going on..
I was at the original Robot Wars at Fort Mason San Francisco.
This show angered me from the start, and the only reason I'm coming out of retirement to review this thing was because it took an all inclusive event started by an ILM employee, and turned it into this faux kid friendly event, complete with three or four supermassive "arena bots" that you could never beat because of the restrictions on design parameters.I was at the 1995 Robot Wars, I was also at the 1997 Robot Wars where Bio Hazard took out everyone, even the much feared La Machine.
I remember Joel Hodgson from Mystery Science Theatre 3000 as the Master of Ceremonies, being freaked out by the 300 pound Snake-bot build by the guy who had built "the Master" the previous two years.
I remember Joel Hodgson taking a dollar from the guy sitting next to me and trying to auction it off to the audience during down time between matches.
I remember San Francisco's fire inspector looking none-too happy as he quite literally was inspecting the place (at some point it was SRO).
None of the energy, none of the excitement, none of the engineering creativity that was at Fort Mason San Francisco from 1995 to 1997 was in this TV show.
It simply wasn't.What this TV show had was "Dave Lister" popping off smiles and kid friendly witticisms in a venue that was so restrictive as to be obnoxious.
You had no chance of taking on the in show arena bots, even though that was part of the challenge.
And you couldn't use any of the more effective techniques that were developed by the Fort Mason participants.I'm sorry the creator of the event lost creative control.
I'm sorry his idea got sold to some outfit in the UK that did a half baked high-restrictive version of the San Francisco competition.
I'm sorry all that creative Bay Area and American energy got truncated in what seems like a revenge plot for the Revolutionary War. And, worse yet, I'm sorry the show got revitalized last year much to the chagrin of all.If you see blurays or DVDs of this thing for sale, pass them up, and check out the American Robot Wars videos on YouTube.Avoid this trash..
Astonishing!.
When I was about 5 or 6 my dad told me about a TV show he'd seen that he thought I might enjoy.
So we sat down to watch Robot Wars; it was love at first sight and it's remained my favorite TV show ever since.The show presents some amazingly designed machines and we get to see them all destroy each other in some truly spectacular battles.
In addition to the contestant robots, there are also the legendary house robots.
All Hail Sir Killalot!I was absolutely gutted when Robot Wars was taken off the air but those 12 years were worth the wait to see the brand new series.It was quite different to the original series but I don't think that was necessarily a bad thing.
It would definitely have not been the same without the watchful eye of judge Noel Sharkey or the enthusiastic commentary of Jonathan Pearce.
If you have an interest in engineering, then Robot Wars is definitely a show you would enjoy.Sadly this programme has once again been pulled from our screens but we can only hope that it'll return again one day.......
Find a skip.
The new series (2016/17)is now compered by Dara O'Brian (or is that NO'Brain) complete and utter rubbish.
The original premise for this show was brill but i think they should have left this in the skip..
The US show Battlebots makes this show look cheap and tacky.
it's pretty hard to do a review, because they insist on ten lines or more.
Thats a pretty tall order for this show.
The robots are basically crap, i mean come on guys ....
MDF robots in 2016.
Five seconds and it was in the log pile.
what i have seen so far, most of the machines (use the word loosely) have large pneumatic tyres, well exposed and easily damaged and the Christmas special with celebrities (again use the word sparingly) was even worse..
As i said find a skip :0).
Trash.
The first battle starts 30 minutes in.
This turd fest lived too long..
Great Show.
Great Show.
'Robot Wars' was a highly entertaining piece of TV.
It was actually a serious sport of sorts, but hyped into very provocative entertainment.Contenstants pitted their designing skills and combative wits against each other with contraptions that they had lovingly crafted and built.
For most it was a short, shredding debacle.
The hours and hours of time and ingenuity all too often ended in peremptory and almost heart-rending destruction.We saw some amazing machines, each employing a preferred asset: armour, speed, weapons, or a combination, and some mighty conflicts took place.
Sometimes victory was to no avail.
The programme employed a variety of extremely robust 'house' robots that were not above trashing the winner.I think the series reached its own natural, evolutionary conclusion.
In the arms-race, machines became so potent and well-designed that they could safely progress no further.A sadly-missed and highly entertaining effort, though - largely courtesy of Joe Public.
These were Britons who really did had talent..
Destruction at it's best.
For me this was part of my schedule on a Friday, I was only nine or ten and this show excited me and my brothers.Contestants design robots and well, fight..It's full of rage and anarchy as robots slice, chop, and blow through each other to get go the finals, but the contestants not only have to worry about their opponents and the trap's within the arena floor, but the infamous 'House Robots', the worst of the worst.
How, we jumped in joy if a contestant accidentally entered the space of Matilda, Shunt, Dead Metal (My personal favourite) or Sir Killalot.Great memories...
Good entertainment.
A very short summary.Granny's revenge is trash.Razer is the ultimate robot, it seems to be able to go through anything with it's lethal injections.
The way it lost against tornado was a travesty.
Without the shielding tornado would have been torn apart.
Whoever built razer is a genius.Wheelie big cheese was a good robot, never really seen a robot blasted out of the arena before.
Wish it would have settled under grannys revenge and hand shanked it right through the roof.
Sick of that crap robot.9/10 for entertainment.
Good series.