"Be Right Back"

          As we enter into a discussion about how advancing technology can be used to help us in not only our physical aspects of our life but our mental and emotional aspects as well. However, these aspects can lead to more morally questionable circumstances such as the one presented in the short movie “Be Right Back” in which a young woman who loses her husband becomes attached to a robotic manifestation of him. Throughout the movie, we see the progression of wonder to excitement to disgust at him and herself. While it is normal for her to be experiencing a strong sense of loss and desperation right after his death, this is sensations is sharpened infinitely once she discovers that she is pregnant with his child. If this had not happened, then perhaps she would have been able to cope.
Her attachment begins with just having conversations with a voice that has the same tone and mannerisms that her late husband, Ash, had. The voice can pick up and learn new phrases. This kind of technology is not unbelievable considering we have such services in our society today in the form of Alexa or at home Google services. They can speak to us and recognize our voices and faces. They can pick up on new bits of information like when we leave the house, who we live with, and our daily habits. However, where her attachment stop being as believable is when she brings a robot that embodies Ash’s appearances and some of his personality. At once, she is no longer as comfortable around him as she was with the voice that she was speaking to earlier. She ends up having sex with him but there is no emotion involved. He has no natural thoughts or actions; all of them are calculated and automated and she quickly begins to realize this. It is no longer enough for her because it is not enough of Ash.
          When she can no longer stand his presence, she tries to make him jump of a cliff. When he almost does it without any kind of argument, she tells him that the real Ash would have fought and been terrified and like a switch, he was begging her for his life. In this instance, a robot was able to manipulate her into doing what he wanted even though that is what she wanted from him. This is dangerous because “robots” and other technology is designed to be helpful and make life easier. This robot, instead, seemed to take control over her life which calls into question the morality of her relationship with robotic Ash.