Lost In Space…Somewhere in the Gun Free Zone

The original Lost in Space, a modern day twist on Robert Louis Stevenson’s Swiss Family Robinson, was a goofy Irwin Allen creation of an American family as astronauts on their way to a new planet to live on before getting lost in space. The family consisted of Mom (Maureen) and Dad (John) Robinson, Judy, Penny and Will (a teenager on the verge of adulthood, an 11 year old girl and a 9 year old boy respectively.) Along for the ride is Dr. Smith an intergalactic doctor of something or other and some kind of enemy agent who winds up an accidental stowaway on the Jupiter 2, Major Don West the pilot, and the family pet the Robot named appropriately “Robot.” Together they survived their adventures in the depths of space.

While the show was goofy, the Robinson’s did go out into space with an arsenal of weapons, including laser guns, rifles and pistols to help them confront the various threats that come with deep space exploration. Not so for the recent reboot of the show with Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless (Dracula Untold, The Last Witch Hunter and Gods of Egypt) as show runners. While there is much to laud about the reboot – the Robot is a vast improvement over the original – the show runners attempt to insinuate progressive gun-control fantasy into their otherwise fairly fun fantasy is so bad it’s not even wrong. It’s so woke it’s comatose. What’s worse is how they handle this poorly thought out propaganda.

The new and improved Robot is a bad-ass alien robot that unlike the original show does not come with the crew, but instead winds up attacking not only the tiny crew of the Robinson family, but the entire armada carrying the would be colonists to their destination. It is this attack that leads to the Robinson family being castaway from their armada and stranded on an icy planet.

Young Will Robinson (Maxwell Jenkins) winds up finding that robot also stranded as well as damaged on the same planet. He helps the robot and their odd friendship begins. This is a very menacing robot not just by looks, but by it’s strange introduction and mysterious origins. Menacing enough that John Robinson (Toby Stevens), Will’s father certainly recognizes the menacing look of the robot and being a former but decorated U.S. Navy Seal and concerned father does what comes naturally and attempts to print a 3D gun on the ships computer.

He finds he doesn’t have clearance for this action and leaves it alone. Later, the robot responding to Will’s concern about threats and against he and his family hacks the ships computer and prints him that gun. Later, Maureen Robinson (Molly Parker) discovers this and is outraged. She immediately assumes it was her estranged husband who did this and confronts him. This shamefully castrating confrontation by Maureen is baffling. She is unfathomably sanctimonious about her gun free rule being respected, even while she insists upon this while they remain stranded on a hostile alien planet.

This absurd story arc appears to exist solely to make a strong anti-gun statement but ultimately gets hoisted by its own petard. It is hysterically woke. So woke it’s comatose. Not a few number of times does some crew member wind up benefiting from being allied with the awesomely armed robot. 

There is never even any sort of back story to Maureen’s insistence on no guns. Not even a hint that she was the victim of gun violence in the past that might have made her unreasonable defense strategy at least somewhat understandable. This is the worse kind of wokeness. It is thoughtless virtue signaling without even considering the plot ramifications which ultimately undermine the decision to make Lost in Space a gun free zone.