12 items
The 21-inch doll that learned your voice, called you Mommy, asked to be fed and pouted when she didn't get her way. Playmates put her on shelves in August 2005 at $99.99, and she turned out to be the surprise of that Christmas, with supplies running low in December.
Tim reads a letter, Moby beeps, and a few animated minutes later the whole class is shouting answers at the quiz. BrainPOP was the website teachers — and especially substitute teachers — put on the projector for any subject under the sun, hosted by a teenager in a topic-appropriate T-shirt and an orange robot who speaks entirely in beeps.
The mysterious French duo who hid their faces, invented the robot identity, and detonated dance music into the mainstream. Their chrome-and-gold helmets became one of pop culture's enduring enigmas. Two guys, a sampler, and a myth they refused to break.
Nickelodeon's art-deco superhero cartoon about XJ-9 — 'Jenny,' please — a world-saving robot who would rather be at the mall. Rocket fists, gorgeous retro-futurist design, and the eternal struggle of being both Earth's protector and the weird new kid.
A white plastic rabbit from Paris that connected to your Wi-Fi, wiggled its ears, lit up its belly and read your email out loud. Violet launched it in France in 2005, had sold 50,000 across Europe within a year, and then watched its servers buckle at Christmas 2006 under the weight of new owners trying to register.
![Video thumbnail — WowWee Robosapien Demo [Chrome Gold] (2004 Model)](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Jj2Sk9hQ1ew/maxresdefault.jpg)
The 14-inch robot that kicked, punched, belched, and did karate chops — all on command. Designed by a Los Alamos robotics physicist and demoed endlessly at mall kiosks, Robosapien was the "future is here" toy of the mid-2000s.
The 1999 Disney Channel movie where a kid wins a computerized house and teaches it to be his mom from old sitcoms, until PAT the house becomes a 1950s-housewife hologram and locks the family in. Entertainment Weekly has twice ranked it the best Disney Channel Original Movie ever made.
A $2,500 robot dog that learned, played, and had moods — and people loved theirs like family. Sony's AIBO was the actual future, briefly for sale — Japan's entire first batch sold out over the internet in twenty minutes.
A fifty-foot robot from space crash-lands in 1957 Maine and befriends a nine-year-old boy, who teaches him he can choose who he wants to be. Brad Bird's feature directorial debut was adored by critics and ignored at the box office — then a second life on home video and cable turned it into the cartoon that makes grown adults cry at one word: "Superman."
Giant photoreal robots that turn into cars, Michael Bay explosions, Steven Spielberg's name over the title, and Shia LaBeouf motor-mouthing his way through the end of the world. Bumblebee became a Camaro, Optimus Prime kept his original voice, and summer 2007 belonged to the Autobots.
A trash-compacting robot alone on a garbage planet, a cockroach for a pet, a tape of Hello, Dolly! watched on repeat and a sleek white probe named EVE. Pixar's 2008 film barely speaks for its first act, cost a then-record $180 million, won the animated-feature Oscar and was called the best film of the decade by Time's critic.
Galoob's inch-high robots, sold three to a pack and split into two warring camps: Z-Bots, Designed to Defend, against Voids, Made to Menace. A Micro Machines spin-off scaled down to the size of a thumbnail.