Video: Japan's oldest robot reanimated -- writes poetry, hits on your girlfriend

Japan's oldest "modern" robot -- the 10-foot, 6-inch GakuTenSoku -- has been awakened in Japan. Gone are the inflatable rubber tubes of the original 1928 android build by biologist Makoto Nishimura. The bot now tilts its head, moves his eyes, smiles, and puffs out his cheeks thanks to a $200,000, computer-controlled, pneumatic-servo makeover. While nothing compared to his modern offspring, GakuTenSoku still manages to creep us the hell out. On display at the renovated Osaka Science Museum starting July 18th. Video after the break.

[Via Impress]

[Weyland-Yutani @ Apr 25th 2008 4:43AM]

"...GakuTenSoku still manages creep us the hell out..."

I'll say! That thing is disturbing! Didn't anyone ever see "Chucky"?

[gad get @ Apr 25th 2008 4:59AM]

Unfortunately.

[Esat Dedezade @ Apr 25th 2008 6:00AM]

Damn right its disturbing.

I don't even want to know what he's so happy about in the bottom right panel.

Anyone would think another female robot was giving him a....

.... present. Like a new microchip.

What? What did you think I was gonna say? Not my fauly you have a dirty mind.

:)

[ssloniowski @ Apr 25th 2008 6:30AM]

shhhhh... he can hear you !!

[Fred @ Apr 25th 2008 4:45AM]

So, wait... They spent $200,000 to turn it into something that isn't nearly as realistic or impressive as your average theme park animatronic?

Wouldn't it have been more interesting to just keep it the way it was in 1928 and put in in the museum as an example of early animatronics?

[gad get @ Apr 25th 2008 4:57AM]

I suppose while they wanted to keep it visually pretty much indistinguishable from how it was originally (because an original work of art can't be duplicated, and this thing, creepy as it is, is definitely a work of art as much as it is a machine), because the machinery was antiquated and maybe showing its age, they wanted to give it a refit so that people everywhere could continue to admire it and be creeped out by it for decades or centuries to come. This thing is truly a piece of history, after all.

*Shiver*

[Fred @ Apr 25th 2008 5:04AM]

@gad get:

Yeah, but.. by refitting it, they destroyed the original work of art. I'd have preferred it if they had just replaced the rubber tubing et cetera so that it works just like it worked back in 1923, so that you could actually learn something about the history of how these things used to work back in the day.

Now it is just a crappy animatronic in the shell of what was once a work of art.

[gad get @ Apr 25th 2008 5:39AM]

Yeah, I'm inclined to agree. I was just saying that's probably their reasoning.

[kaztm @ Apr 25th 2008 1:41PM]

The original was lost after it was sold to Germany (before WWII, I suppose).
This was a reconstruction project, so that there would be something to put in the museum.

[marty.com.au @ Apr 25th 2008 4:51AM]

Where is the frikkin' lasers?

[Nokia SUX @ Apr 25th 2008 4:58AM]

........

[wang83113 @ Apr 25th 2008 5:02AM]

??

[Hraefn @ Apr 25th 2008 5:14AM]

Well, I for one am glad this thing is no longer a potential robotic overlord.

[r3loaded @ Apr 25th 2008 5:22AM]

I, for one, welcome our poetry-writing robotic overlords

[swingin' dick hero @ Apr 25th 2008 5:25AM]

Um yeah.. I'll be in the other room.

[gad get @ Apr 25th 2008 5:37AM]

Those presumably innocent but often strangely unsettling facial expressions.... The not-so-innocent implement he happens to be writing with [soaked in blood?].... The strange and threatening device he's holding in his left hand.... The exquisite garments, aura of authority, the position behind a desk, and the sheer height of him.... It all induces an image of a grand robot overlord whom you have had the great misfortune of being forced to come before for judgment, doubtfully ever to see the light of day again.

But no, I wouldn't call it creepy.

[kev @ Apr 25th 2008 6:35AM]

Wink wink nudge nudge say no more!

[reg @ Apr 25th 2008 6:49AM]

Extreme right picture makes me belive the robot is on dope...lol

[shapey @ Apr 25th 2008 6:50AM]

since when did engadget readers have girlfriends?..

[ugg.tryptophan @ Apr 25th 2008 8:05AM]

since they stopped reading engadget

[ugg.tryptophan @ Apr 25th 2008 8:08AM]

that didnt make sense

[Gaz @ Apr 25th 2008 3:38PM]

That robot looks like an alien, doesn't do much tho and theres some strange noises in the video.

Since when did Engadget readers have boyfriends toooo! Don't forget us gays!!!

[iptydafu @ Apr 25th 2008 8:13AM]

Thomas Ricker--me love you Godzilla-style.

[Zeek @ Apr 25th 2008 10:21AM]

That thing bungee jumps in uncanny valley.

[Davd @ Apr 25th 2008 11:22AM]

Offensive image, i never post I always read but this looks like something I wouldn't wanna wake up to find in my room

[ZeroCorpse @ Apr 25th 2008 2:12PM]

Quick. Someone retire this thing before it poses a threat to us!

[D-Zyner @ Apr 25th 2008 7:16PM]

May the Schwartz be with you!