Superboy's kryptonian robot teacher

[dave]

Superboy meets his robot teacher from Krypton when it tracks him down from their doomed planet and see if he passes several tests designed by Jor-El. The robot then leaves for another planet that utilizes robot teachers. Adventure Comics Vol 1 #240 September 1957.

I could see all sorts of stories coming from this

[DocQuantum]

There were two sequels to this story. One was a controversial Superboy story taking place I believe in his final semester of grade 12 and features his girlfriend called Misty (though we discover that’s not her real name by the end). The other is a Supergirl story that displays the Robot Teacher being very sexist. Either Jor-El programmed a sexist robot or something happened to it over the years since Krypton’s destruction.

[redsycorax]

Perhaps the EMP from Krypton's detonation produced some cumulative damage to its circuits? Was it sent in the same refugee starship as Kal-El? If not, and it was closer to the detonation than Kal-El when Krypton was destroyed, that may be why.

[dans]

The robot teach showed up as the Eradicator later on, I think?

I like the idea that teacher was damaged in the explosion of Krypton, because its behavior in the Misty story was totally repugnant and showed a total lack of ethics involving people. It gave Misty the mental equivalent of a date rape drug and manipulated Superboy to take advantage of her.

[DocQuantum]

Another option is that the Robot-Teacher was programmed to act like a drill sergeant, which means using any weakness it might perceive in its subject to "motivate" them more.

I really don't like the random damage idea, personally.

[dans]

I like it a lot better than I like considering the morality of a Jor-El who thought it was OK for his robot to induce a high school girl to have sex with someone - and then wipe out the memory.

[DocQuantum]

I suspect that there may have been some reprogramming involved that enabled the Robot Teacher to defy the typical Asimovian “do no harm to humans” rule, as I’d rather not besmirch Jor-El’s reputation.

That said, there may be more to the story than we are told. My pet theory is that “Misty” (real name unknown as yet) was a superfan of Superboy and was asked by the Robot Teacher to volunteer for the role of Superboy’s perfect girlfriend, knowing in advance what *might* happen and that her memory would be wiped after her assignment. It’s not a perfect solution but better than what we got. Superboy/Superman later learned who she really was since he recognized her as a flight attendant in the present day portion of the story, and there are story possibilities there too. Perhaps Superman secretly acted as a “guardian angel” in order to help her out of whatever problems she might have at the moment, without showing himself.

[dans]

I agree with the part about Jor-El. I would rather think this was something he not only didn't expect but would have stopped instantly if he had been able to... It seems more likely to me that the robot was damaged during the explosion than reprogrammed by someone other than Jor-El, but either is way more palatable to me than that Jor-El's original programming allowed his robot to behave unethically.

I guess I'm wrong about the Eradicator being the robot teacher though. I don't know where I got that idea, but it must have been hanging around in my head for at least 25 years...

[DocQuantum]

Well, the Eradicator is probably the closest Post Crisis equivalent to the Robot Teacher. Both harsh taskmasters, but in different ways.

Poor Metallo the robot is forgotten by almost all, though.

[redsycorax]

As the father of a daughter, I strongly agree with dans on this one. The morality of what that teaching robot did to Misty would be considered repugnant to contemporary moral sensibilities otherwise and I cannot believe that someone with the strong moral sensibilities of Jor-El (who did warn the Science Council about the impending destruction of Krypton in a vain attempt to save more of its population than members of his own immediate family, remember) would condone that behavioural programming within that robot. Given that, it would be more logical to suspect that the teaching robot was partially damaged by the electromagnetic pulse from Krypton's explosion. Clearly, it wasn't in sufficient proximity to be destroyed, or have its circuitry wiped completely, but it may well have been at sufficient distance to be partially affected.

As for the electromagnetic pulse rationale, it is also logical. Krypton had a uranium core and perished from its escalating chain reaction, resulting in a thermonuclear detonation, therefore when it exploded, there must have been a considerable EMP generated from its destruction.