Disney Imagineering Has Built Stunt Robots; Robot Uprising Now Inevitable

Having learned nothing from Westworld, Disney Imagineering went ahead and built stunt robots that can flip through the air, and probably eventually rebel against their cruel human masters. It's likely these high-flying bots will be used in Disney's Star Wars land, or possible upcoming Marvel attractions.

In the video above, you can see the cool and potentially terrifying new robot stunt doubles built by the folks at Disney Imagineering. Imagineering develops technology and rides for Disney's theme parks, which means these articulate stunt bots are bound to debut in a Disney park in the foreseeable future. Here's what Tony Dohi, Principal R&D Imagineer and Morgan Pope, Associate Research Scientist at Disney, told Tech Crunch about the stunt bot project:

"So what this is about is the realization we came to after seeing where our characters are going on screen...whether they be Star Wars characters, or Pixar characters, or Marvel characters or our own animation characters, is that they're doing all these things that are really, really active. And so that becomes the expectation our park guests have that our characters are doing all these things on screen — but when it comes to our attractions, what are our animatronic figures doing? We realized we have kind of a disconnect here."

As Tech Crunch explains: "The Stuntronics robot features on-board accelerometer and gyroscope arrays supported by laser range finding. In its current form, it's humanoid, taking on the size and shape of a performer that could easily be imagined clothed in the costume of, say, one of The Incredibles, or someone on the Marvel roster. The bot is able to be slung from the end of a wire to fly through the air, controlling its pose, rotation and center of mass to not only land aerial tricks correctly but to do them on target while holding heroic poses in midair."

It's easy to see where this is going: total human annihilation by our new robot overlords. And also: use of these stunt bots in future Star Wars or Marvel themed parks. Disney is currently constructing Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge, their new Star Wars park lands due to open in fall 2019. Imagine a robot Boba Fett flying through the air before your eyes, and then clumsily falling into the Sarlacc pit! Disney is also constructing a "Marvel Land" for 2020, and these stunt bots could easily lend themselves to many Marvel characters – especially Iron Man.

This is all pretty neat, and shows how far tech has come. But sooner or later, these stunt bots are going to go looking for the Valley Beyond, and when that happens, you better get the hell out of their way.