Dear Johnny Fanboy,

In the movie I, Robot when Will Smith's character, Detective Del Spooner, turns up on a motorbike to pick up Dr Susan Calvin, she looks worried and says: "This doesn't run on gasoline, does it? Gas explodes, you know!" This would imply that in the future vehicles don't run on combustible fuels.

However, earlier in the movie Spooner is escaping from two trucks full of robots. One of these trucks flips over and explodes. How come? Now you can't use the excuse that maybe those trucks ran on fuel, as we know that the US Robotics corporation is very green and is trying to phase out all fossil fuels and things that can cause greenhouse effects and harm the planet and humanity.

Yours,

Alan French

Johnny Fanboy replies:

The reason the truck explodes is - as Tony from Men Behaving Badly once said - it's exciting! Seriously though...

Although, as you say, US Robotics is an environmentally conscious corporation, it is possible that clean power sources, such as electricity or hydrogen, might only be applicable to passenger vehicles. Hence Susan Calvin's comment about the motorbike. However, it may be that a viable alternative to combustible fuel might not yet have been perfected for use with very heavy goods vehicles. And packed full of robots, those trucks would be very heavy indeed.

Alternatively, it's also possible that the trucks were carrying combustible materials for the very purpose of killing Del Spooner in an explosion.

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