Mobots

"**Mobots**" is the sixth episode of the second series of *Wellington Paranormal*, and the twelfth episode overall. It aired on 20 November 2019.

## Synopsis

Out-of-date phones start forming into robots and terrorising the neighbourhood! Game of Snake anyone?

## Plot Summary

Sergeant Maaka informs the Paranormal Unit that hundreds of thefts have occurred around Mount Victoria over the last two nights. Only technology dating between two and twenty years has been taken, and all the disappearances have occurred in two concentric circles, with the potential third area covering O'Leary’s childhood home in the centre.

O’Leary heads to her former home with Minogue and they meet her mother, who recalls fond memories of O’Leary playing with her first mobile phone, which she has kept in a draw. Mrs. O’Leary gives a tour of the house and points out the radio communications tower visible from O’Leary’s former bedroom window.

That night, the officers hold a stakeout, leaving multiple outdated phones on the kitchen floor as bait. The phones start lighting up, ringing and vibrating, before forming a large “snake” on the ground, taking Minogue’s Taser and escaping through the cat flap. The officers discover multiple robots outside, all formed from phones and other gadgets. As Maaka arrives, the officers struggle to apprehend the robots as they disperse across the area and O’Leary is tased by the snake robot, which has now increased in size to become a scorpion robot.

Maaka brings Ben, a member of the technological crimes division of the police force, to help investigate. They cannot agree on the cause of the robots, but suspect the tower may be to blame and set up plans to hack the tower’s mainframe from a nearby van. The officers go into their car to try and find the robots, only to be smoked out of the car by a small robot made of vape pens. They exit at the base of the tower and witness all the robots gathering to make up one large humanoid ‘mobot’.

The mobot speaks to the officers, explaining that it is primarily run from the cell phone O’Leary has not used since 2004. It expresses dismay at being made of parts that have been resigned to draws, insisting that it is just as capable as new technology. An “update” appears on the screen of the mobot and it asks O’Leary to activate it since it has vape pens for fingers. Feeling sorry for it, O’Leary agrees, and the mobot declares itself free – to erase the human race and replace it with super-intelligent robots. It starts to climb the tower so it can transmit to all available technology, but stalls halfway and falls to pieces.

In the van, Ben admits to Maaka that he hadn’t sent the virus yet and theorises that the mobot simply couldn’t handle the new updates. O’Leary tries to help Minogue down from the base of the tower.

## Cast

* Mike Minogue as Officer Minogue
* Karen O'Leary as Officer O'Leary
* Maaka Pohatu as Sergeant Maaka
* Thomas Sainsbury as Constable Parker
* Lynda Topp as Mrs. O'Leary
* Benjamin Teh as Ben
* Jemaine Clement as Mobot (voice)
* Ben Fransham as Mobot Movement Specialist

## References

1. ↑ "New Zealand Television: Wellington Paranormal: episode guide" - Australian Television Information Archive