Number 2089: The robot with AI and ESP

Martin Chesterton has worked for years to build a robot with artificial intelligence. It works, but not in the way he intended. “The Robot” is a story where the robot not only has AI, but the ability to read Chesterton’s thoughts: a personal mechanical genie granting an unwitting master’s wishes.

Not withstanding the ESP elements, this is a fairly well thought out story. Sometimes when ACG had stories like these they were inspired by other sources, so if it is swiped from a science fiction story by someone else I’d like to know. To me it does not have typical Richard E. Hughes elements. The script may be by someone other than editor Hughes, who eventually he took over all the writing at ACG.

Art is credited to Mike Suchorsky, based on an interview with the artist. Quoting from the Grand Comics Database: “Art credits from Suchorsky in an interview with Hames Ware and Jim Vadeboncouer, Jr. in the pages of Alter Ego #27 (August, 2003), which reprinted a page of this story.” Cover is by Ogden Whitney.

The story appeared in Adventures Into the Unknown #67 (1955).

Posted in: Pappy Comics