It weighs in at 1 hour and 17 minutes of Dali time with a score of 5.2/10 from 476 of the demographic.
The schizophrenia in the production is indicated in the lobby card reproduced below.
The usual misleading lobby card.
Is it a creature feature. the creature being the robot, or is a kiddie feature? The lobby card draws the creature fans, but the film is more for ages 7-12, making it perfect for the fraternity brothers. It features a precocious and tiresome boy know-it-all. At no time does the robot scoop up a babe. ‘Our client is innocent!’ declared the fraternity brothers from the sofa. There is far more brat than babe in slow moving ooze.
Mr Handsome is Charles Drake, one time sheriff of Sand Rock Arizona where ‘It Came from Outer Space’ in 1953. He must have moved on and gone to grad school in the intervening year to become a scientist in this gig.
It has a thick Cold War patina because ‘the enemy’ is out to get Tobor. The party chiefs have ruled and they must be obeyed or else, exile to New Jersey!
‘Tobor’ is, yes, bright eyes, ‘Robot’ spelled backwards. Toby is a bot but the gossip on the street-web is that someone made a stencil to spell R o b o t for a title card but sprayed it wrong way around and there was no budget, not even in those expansive Ike years, to do it again and so Tobor was christened. There is an explanation of the name in the film, nor of the sobriquet ‘the Great’ except that Robot is mighty big.
The Prof and Sheriff Drake want Tobor to ride rocket into space rather than human monkeys because of the dangers, and the unfunded pension plans. Hmm, that makes sense. Two problems that no one notices: Tobor is a giant at 9 feet tall and weighs as much as a four sumo wrestlers. He will not fit into a rocket capsule! He barely fits into Rhode Island.
Tobor the Big
In addition, the Prof has endowed Tobor with emotions be inserting a sponge in his brain box. Hmm, just the thing for space flight, a moody, home-sick, lonely scrap heap.
Just to ensure things go wrong, the Prof has also called a press conference proudly to demonstrate his bot. He might have done this to embarrass the rocket men into using Toby and not more pilots but then he asks the journalists to keep Toby secret. Sure. Tell the press all and then say, pretty please, do not use it. They broadcast all details immediately to make the job of THE ENEMY easier.
The brat plays with Toby, while the adults are Einstein-napping, and nearly destroys the house. The adults declare the brat to be a genius. Hands up all parents who would react that way. ….. Thought so.
The Enemy is led by Istvan Gyergyay better known, if known at all, as Steven Geray. Like Drake, Geray did much duty in B Land with that accent he made a perfect Commie in more than one feature, with or without a creature. He was born in the Ukraine to Magyar parents when the Hapsburgs held sway
Mr Pomfritt is there, as a journalist, before he went into teaching Dobie, who blabs all. He is a B Sy Fy stalwart. But he went straight after his malfeasance in ‘The Man from Planet X’ (1951).
Skip to content