Love, Death and Robots. Volumes 2 & 3

But wait, there’s more! Where previously I was only answerable to myself in writing a story, now I had notes, from Tim Miller, from LD+R supervising director Jennifer Yuh Nelson, and from others engaged in putting LD+R together. An initial treatment went through three revisions, with entire segments dropped and replaced and others tweaked. Then came the screenwriting process, with more tweaks and bits added and removed.

And then, when we were putting together this book, I was asked to do the “prose” version! Which meant creating yet another take -- a version more like the original lean and mean story, where instead of touring end-of-the-world human habitats, the robots were making a report, commenting on what they saw and felt, with some of the sight gags and dialogue replaced and changed to make everything work better in that original short story format.

And so we thought it might be fun for you to see how the two iterations of this story -- the final script, and the short story -- differ in scope and intent.  So we put them both in here for you to compare and contrast the different writing styles which reflect the different goals of the different mediums.

But the one thing that stays the same is this: I love writing these three robots. I hope I get to do it again sometime, in whatever format I can. In the meantime: Enjoy!

-- John Scalzi

TURN THE PAGE TO READ THE PROSE VERSION

THREE ROBOTS REPORT BACK ON THE HABITATS IN WHICH HUMANITY CHOSE TO SEE OUT ITS FINAL DAYS

John Scalzi

HABITAT ONE: A SURVIVALIST ENCAMPMENT

X-Bot 4000: Before we begin, I want it noted for the record that K-VRC should not have been trusted to drive the shuttle.

K-VRC: What are you talking about? I’m an amazing pilot!

X-Bot 4000: When we visited the survivalist camp you landed us in their minefield.

K-VRC: Pffft. Barely.

11-45-G: A bird that landed in front of us exploded.

K-VRC: Only a little! And also cleared a path for us to the encampment!

11-45-G: You can’t claim that was planned.

K-VRC: Whatever. Look, this isn’t about me. It’s about science.

X-Bot 4000: It wasn’t science that was going to blow our shiny metal butts to smithereens.

K-VRC:

I hardly ever endangered us after that one time. Anyway. Let’s talk about the survivalist camp.

X-Bot 4000: It confused me. They were called ‘survivalist camps’ but they were just full of dead people. That’s just false advertising.

K-VRC: Right? And according to my thorough historical research—

11-45-G: You did research?

K-VRC: I found a human archive called Wikipedia.

11-45-G: And you read it.

K-VRC: I skimmed it very meaningfully. And it said that the survivalists were actually looking forward to the end of civilization!

11-45-G: Yes. Many humans thought that with freedom from government-sponsored medical attention and enough bullets and venison jerky, they could found a utopian society.

X-Bot 4000: Well, I saw the bullets. The casings, anyway. The venison jerky, not so much.

11-45-G: Humans quickly hunted deer to extinction, along with every other animal larger than a cat—

K-VRC: Humans were snackish.

11-45-G: —and when the deer ran out, they started raiding each other’s encampments. Which explained the minefield.

K-VRC: And that blood pit!

11-45-G: It wasn’t a blood pit. It was just a primitive booby trap.

K-VRC: It was a pit, right? With spikes? Which the invading survivalists fell on, piercing their skin, thus releasing the blood, into the pit?

11-45-G: ...Fine. It was a blood pit.

X-Bot 4000:

Those dudes made it through a minefield and a bunch of barbed wire, dodged a bunch of bullets, and still ended up being survivalist cult kebabs.

11-45-G: But at least they died free of governmental constraint.

X-Bot 4000: On a spike!

K-VRC: On two spikes in some cases.

X-Bot 4000: It just amazed me that the whole of humanity would try to make it through the end of civilization with guns and spikes.

K-VRC: Not all of them. Just the poor ones!

11-45-G: The survivalists had few economic or social advantages and even fewer options. The wealthy, however, had a variety of more sophisticated survival strategies. Which brings us to the next destination on our list.

K-VRC: Ooooh! And it was my favorite!

HABITAT TWO: A REFURBISHED OIL RIG OFF THE COAST OF A FORMER GLOBAL POWER

K-VRC: It was the unsinkable libertarian dream that was seasteading!

X-BOT 4000: It was just an old oil rig.

K-VRC: Technically, yes, but also, a fully sovereign nation state on the high seas!