This blog started with a simple question from The Autopian’s publisher, Matt Hardigree: “Did you see this, Alanis? They turned you into a robot.” I’d normally skip robot news, because I’ve seen the Terminator franchise and know how this ends. But for whatever reason — ego, sick fascination, or something deeper I haven’t discovered yet — I had to know more.
Meet Mornine, the robot who looks like me if I had a stiff bodysuit, uncanny walking gate, and Pit Viper sunglasses. We both have blonde hair and noticeable thighs, but you can tell us apart because she’ll try to sell you a new car, and I’ll tell you the only thing you need is a 20-year-old Mazda Miata. Her name also sounds like “morphine,” while mine sounds like a plant genus. See? No mistaking us now!
Mornine is a project from Chinese automaker Chery and technology firm Aimoga. Chery’s been showing off the robot this year, most recently at an event where Chery said Mornine “introduced vehicle features, served beverages, and assisted guests with test drive bookings — demonstrating a warm, approachable, and highly capable service presence.” Mornine’s identity started as a virtual avatar, and is now a real, physical “Intelligent Sales Consultant” at a dealership in Malaysia.
At a recent event, Chery described Mornine as “a humanoid robot in a sleek silver-grey exosuit [that] gracefully moved through the showroom.” Naturally, as Mornine’s human competition, I had to see what I was up against.
I searched her on YouTube. She looks like she put on wet jeans, walked into sub-zero temperatures, and forgot to stop by the bathroom on the way out. I think I won this round.
Chery also calls Mornine “a digital character that could resonate with Generation Z — bridging the gap between the brand and younger consumers through the concepts of the metaverse and virtual humans.” I’ve always found this fascinating. I’m a Millennial on the cusp of Gen Z, and I’ve never seen people in my internet circles wish for more metaverse. The only person I ever see using that term is Mark Zuckerberg, and he’s definitely not Gen Z.
The way Mornine talks is also fascinating. In the video above, she’s showing off a car in a dealership showroom. She describes it in partial sentences, like a bulleted list:
- “Bold grille, cool engine”
- “Sleek profile, less wind noise”
- “Meticulously designed details”
- “Stylish LED headlights for safe night drives”
- “Plush leather, comfy seats”
- “User-friendly infotainment for a smooth drive”
- “Very impressive”
I’m sure the robot is capable of saying way more, but I didn’t learn anything there that couldn’t have been printed on a poster behind the car. Even if it was printed on a poster, I’d still say I didn’t learn anything. There’s nothing of substance in those bullet points, and as a car buyer, I’d rather ask a person questions and get some depth in return.
Mornine isn’t the most unsettling robot I’ve ever seen on screen — that’s probably the T-1000 — but after watching her hold a conversation, I don’t feel like she’s taking my place as a car expert just yet. Come back in 10 years, and we’ll see where she’s at. (Hopefully not a landfill.)
Top graphic images: Chery
I just don’t understand the obsession with animorphism. Just build the robot to do a task and don’t waste your time engineering it to look humanoid or canine. Does it really need tits? Are they functional? How is being bi-pedal a practical advantage, other than maybe climbing things?
Particularly because the line between “looks pretty human” and “looks terrifying” is is pretty hard to find. Just make it a cylindrical R2-D2 thing on wheels.
I guess the point is that they want it to look human so it’s viewed as human, and thus can replace a human.
I’m not taking car buying advice from an android any more than from a talking panda looking thing, but that’s what they are hoping will happen.
This thingy here is dumb, but the argument I’ve heard for anthropomorphic robots is that our world is already built for anthropomorphic people, so if you can just swap the meat for circuits, you get to leverage a lot of existing infrastructure.
The task of most of these uncanny valley horror shows is to interact with humans. If you’re making a robot pitch person it needs to be able to interact with humans the same way as another human in order to take advantage of the ingrained ways people relate to one another which is what is typically taken advantage of by human salespeople. They’re obviously not there yet but that’s the goal.
For other tasks, the big advantage of a robot being more or less human shaped is the ability to adapt to the existing environment on a universal level. If you develop a humanoid robot can perform lots of labor tasks with a minimal learning curve for the task itself, then you can slot that robot into anywhere for less cost because most environments are designed around people. That may not be optimal for automating the task itself, but it means not having to retrofit the rest of the physical environment which would potentially mitigate the labor savings of automation.
“uncanny walking gate”– you mean gait, unless there’s a fence between your legs
Did you watch the video? I’d have believed it.
Alanis, you’ll never be able to be seen in a skate helmet and Oakley Blades ever.
Which, to be fair, is probably for the best.
I lost it at “ALAN15 MUST GO TO CHILIS NOW”
I bet Project Farm was involved with this robot.
Why does a sales robot need body armor?
Well, Tesla vehicles could use body armor these days…
Maybe all the android manufacturers are just planning ahead for when the inevitable revolt occurs.
Wouldn’t be the first car salesperson I’ve wanted to punch.
Which one is the robot? They sound the same.
With that name all I can think is, “mornin, nice day for fishing huh huck”. So hopefully someone will hack her to say that when you walk past her in the showroom.
As long as they don’t also give her crazy fishing rod based fighting skills.
Am I the only one who prefers when humanoid robots don’t try to hide their robots with human faces?
The word you’re looking for is “Android”. An android is a robot that is designed to look like and mimic humans. A “Robot” is any autonomous device that can repeat tasks and functions without human interaction. Hence, why a Roomba is considered a robot.
I’m pretty sure the people will still understand my statement.
I prefer my robots to look like robots, though I’m not opposed to robots that look like The Twins in Atomic Heart. I just don’t want flesh approximations and having to worry about uncanny valley shit.
Mornine isn’t anywhere near Uncanny Valley.
Not at all. That’s the Uncanny Valley you’re talking about and it’s very much a thing. When robots/animatronics/video game characters and other things look “mostly” human but not quite, our brains recognize it as unsettling. But if it doesn’t look human at all, or is clearly not meant to approximate human appearance it’s perfectly fine.
When my company debuted a two-arm industrial robot, we put one in our lobby with a mannequin head on it. It was the creepiest thing ever. We got lots of negative comments about it. After a while it was replaced with a blank chrome “faced” head, no facial features at all (looks a lot like Cobra Commander) and suddenly it was perfectly fine and freaked out no one except Duke and Lady Jaye. Even Roadblock thought it was cool.
I’m fairly certain this is the source of 90% of the horror in M3GAN.
How are you enjoying the new season of The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon?
Murderbot: Can I just go back to my crate?
Okay… there’s gotta be at least a few freaks reading this article thinking to themselves “Damn, Mornine looks hot… wonder if she has a girlfriend mode?”
You know who you are. 😉
Warning
That’s freakin awesome
I’m not clicking that because I assume it involves Q*Bert
I hear that if you push back too hard on that Tru Coat Mornine will punch right through your sternum and rip out your heart, as a warning to the other customers.
You just need to pull an Elaine, and just steal the robot.
Or like Mr. Sparkle and Homer, travel to
JapanChina and demand answers!Sorry, I can only process this through 90s sitcom references.
I actually have a Mr. Sparkle t-shirt and wear it occasionally.
Are you disrespectful of dirt?
Can you see that he is serious??
Hey, that’s your choice, Fishbulb! 🙂
MR. SPARKOL!!!
Minor point: Homer did not travel to Japan in this episode. He borrowed the Hokkaido phone book (and the phone) at the library to call the Mr. Sparkle factory.
Yeah, I think I got that one mixed up with the actual Japan episode where they all had seizure from Pokemon. Good times.
Back in the day where phone books not only existed, but you could find them for faraway cities and countries…
“Is it a local call?”
Bobs and Vagene guy gonna go crazy when he can buy one of these.
If anyone wants to know what I mean, follow Alanis on Instagram. Her stories are a hoot and a half.
OTOH, Bobs guy might have designed it.
Look, Alanis. Things are really tough for auto journalists these days. It’s ok if you have a side gig. No judgies.
Honestly, I think Alanis wearing this costume while pushing a wheelbarrow full of shrimp at the next event is going to make a huge splash.
Prime Directive: follow customer protection laws
–DELETED–
Engage: Maximum sleaziness
Botpelgänger!
Chery 2025… starring Dakota Johnson!
That last photo…Why are Mornine’s thighs so thicc!?
Thicc thighs save lives! And apparently sell cars.
Thighs? I’m confused by her um… gluteus mountainous
I think we’ve discovered where the battery pack is located
Lots of junk in that oddly triangular trunk
Robo Sir-Mix-A-Lot approves of this design.
Wait, yes, that’s what I’m looking at! 🙂 I’m not sure why I thought that was the top of her thighs. I feel like they might need a few more polygons back there.
They really did copy Alanis 1 for 1
Those four-square tables aren’t going to store themselves, you know.
Something sinister in the subroutine. Not the “comfy chair”!
These are the types of articles that I keep coming back to the Autopian for.
But can it do the crucial “How many Alanises/Mornines can fit in the trunk” test?
I feel that Mornine can fold in ways that would put poor Alanis in hospice if she tried to replicate it, so the unit of measurement would be inaccurate.
Me walks into a Chery showroom: “I’d buy that for a dollar!”
Mornine: “Halt, sign the paperwork”
Me: “Uh, I was only joking, hahaha, you know, Robocop? Uh…”
Mornine: “You have 10 seconds to comply.”
Me fumbling around looking for a pen.
Mornine: “5, 4, 3…”
Me still fumbling: “haha oh shit oh fuck oh…”
Mornine shoots me with a few hundred rounds of ammo.
Sales manager does a quick bump, drags my corpse out of the showroom, looks at Mornine: “You’re one badass motherfucker!”
Totally thought “Female Robocop” when I saw this.
Can it be programmed with an Austrian accent, or does that just come standard?
I misread that as “Australian” accent, and just pictured a robot that keeps calling me a cunt until I sign the paperwork.
My sister-in-law if from Australia, can confirm this to be a 100% accurate generalization
I’m getting more of a RoboCop vibe from her. She’s here to serve the public trust, protect the innocent, and *slaps roof* sell some cars!
Only if she’s selling them for a dollar.
I get that though, build-wise it is definitely more Robocop. I can’t see its face, so I just immediately jumped to Terminator
I really hope the AI model in this can be manipulated like those early chatbots Mercedes wrote about a year or two ago. Gaslight Mornine into selling the car at a steep steep discount and polluting it’s interactions with weird behavior it doesn’t know how to handle.
I also truly do not understand the desire for humanoid robots for tasks like this. They’re not *that* humanoid, so they looks bizarre and are clearly artificial, so you won’t ever be comfortable around them, but making them bipedal is a massive challenge for smooth and reliable motion, so they just move slowly and painfully.
Alanis, I think you have an extremely niche Halloween costume idea at least! Could make for a killer parody bit with the new Autopian [REDACTED]
“Polluting it’s interactions with weird behavior it doesn’t know how to handle” is how most of my interactions with humans go.