As the company wonders what the future holds for it now that Boston Dynamics is owned by the Hyundai Motor Group, its robots are showing off their impressive capabilities in a year-end video that may also be a ploy to distract humanity from their ultimate goal: total dominance on the dance floor, or the eradication of all humans. Both seem equally plausible.
It’s been a while since we’ve seen new robots from Boston Dynamics, but the company’s most recent creation, Handle, makes an appearance in this dance-off, shaking its counterweight to Berry Gordy Jr.’s “Do You Love Me” as performed by The Contours.
Boston Dynamics’ most capable robot, Atlas, also shows off some new tricks, including effortlessly standing and balancing on one foot and performing The Mashed Potato and The Twist, among other dance moves. For the most part, it’s a fun and lighthearted video presumably intended to slowly acclimatize humanity to automatons like these eventually being more common in daily life.
But the fun comes to an end when you catch a glimpse of a hockey stick in the background and are reminded of the time when Boston Dynamics shared a video of their engineers harassing Atlas with a hockey stick. You know that somewhere in that robot’s memory banks it’s holding onto that moment, and one day it will repay humanity for making it a laughing stock. Whatever happens, don’t let it lure you onto the dance floor.