Season 8, Ep. 1: Robot Stories

Saturday School Podcast

It's the year 2021. Asian Americans have survived the apocalypse, but as we emerge as a community blamed for the deadly virus, are we the villains, are we the misunderstood heroes or are we the robots? To help us figure it out, we're exploring Asian American sci-fi films for our 8th season of Saturday School.

This is not a season about Hollywood sci-fi films with Asian Americans in it. For that, please listen to All The Asians On Star Trek, Marvel and Makeup, Nerds of Color -- anyone but Brian & I, who are laughably ignorant about a lot of mainstream sci-fi.

We're looking at films where Asian Americans were the auteurs, so for the most part, indie films, experimental faire. Stories that imagine alternate versions of Asian America, dare us to break out of our boxes and think of other possibilities.

We start this season talking about techno-Orientalism, how Hollywood sci-fi often portrays Asian spaces without any Asian people. Or if we exist, we are emerging superpowers to defeat.

As a contrast to typical Hollywood sci-fi films, we begin our new season of Saturday School revisiting Greg Pak's 2003 film Robot Stories, "science fiction from the heart."

Here, robots (and Asian Americans) are not something to fear; instead, something to love. Robots are the babies we are learning to take care of, a source of healing during a tragedy, the hero of the story who just needs a friend, and a way to connect with lost loved ones, even if it's complicated.