History Main / ManVersusMachine

%%* ''Franchise/{{Terminator}}''

* The ''WesternAnimation/TaleSpin'' episode "From Here to Machinery" has an inventor introducing the Auto-Aviator, a robot pilot. To much fanfare, Baloo competes with the Auto-Aviator in a race; unfortunately, he loses to the tireless machine, with devastating results as the successful demonstration puts the Auto-Aviator in the limelight and many pilots out of a job. However, it turns out that the Auto-Aviator has a crushing weakness: its inability to deviate from its flight plan under any circumstances, ''even when the plane is in danger'', and Shere Khan's own plane, piloted by one of the machines, ends up flying right into an Air Pirate attack. In the end, Baloo saves the day, and Shere Khan sees that the inventor is left peddling his robots in [[ReassignedToAntartica the frozen]] [[GrimUpNorth wastes of]] [[{{Ruritania}} Thembria]].

* The ''WesternAnimation/TaleSpin'' episode "From Here to Machinery" has an inventor introducing the Auto-Aviator, a robot pilot. To much fanfare, Baloo competes with the Auto-Aviator in a race; unfortunately, he loses to the tireless machine, with devastating results as the successful demonstration puts the Auto-Aviator in the limelight and many pilots out of a job. However, it turns out that the Auto-Aviator has a crushing weakness: its inability to deviate from its flight plan under any circumstances, ''even when the plane is in danger'', and Shere Khan's own plane, piloted by one of the machines, ends up flying right into an Air Pirate attack. In the end, Baloo saves the day, and Shere Khan sees that the inventor is left peddling his robots in [[GrimUpNorth the frozen wastes of]] [[{{Ruritania}} Thembria]].

* ''Literature/LegendsOfDune'' in the Butlerian Jihad humanity was enslaved by the Thinking Machines, they overthrew the machines and banned anything similar to an AI. Later in [[Literature/HuntersSandwormsOfDune the sequels]] the Thinking Machines are back and their out for revenge against the humans.

* "WesternAnimation/JohnHenryAndTheInkyPoo" is a stop-motion version of the John Henry legend in which John Henry takes on a steam hammer. This animated short departs from the most common versions of the legend by making John Henry a giant Myth/PaulBunyan-style, and by having him hammering railroad spikes instead of steel drills.

* Gary Kasparov versus Deep Blue in TabletopGame/{{Chess}}. Though as someone noted, humans programmed Deep Blue and Kasporov had electronic assistance himself and it might be more accurate to call it [[TheChessmaster Chessmaster]] versus TechnoWizard.

* And now, [[https://blog.openai.com/dota-2/ OpenAI]] has bested Danil "Dendi" Ishutin, widely considered to be ''the'' best professional ''VideoGame/{{Dota2}}'' player, and inarguably the best midlaner, in a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92tn67YDXg0 One-on-one Shadow Fiend]] MirrorMatch.

* The classic John Henry story is what pioneered this trope. While he won in the end, he died from exercian while the machine could do it all over again the next day.

* Flash forward to [[TheNewTens 2017]], and Google's [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo AlphaGo]] program, designed to play TabletopGame/{{Go}}, defeated Ke Jie, the world's No. 1 ranked player with 3 wins and 0 losses, after defeating the European champion in 2015 and the Korean champion in 2016. As a result, [=AlphaGo=] was awarded an honorary professional 9-dan rank, the highest rank in Go, by the official Go associations in Korea and China.

* The classic John Henry story is what pioneered this trope.

And in this corner, we have the automaton. Perfect in every conceivable way, invulnerable to the wear and tear so common in humans, working tirelessly as long as it can maintain a power source. The machine has no sense of remorse or mercy and will do whatever is commanded of it to the bitter end. Alas, the machine lacks one thing- [[ThePowerOfLove Love]].

Who will win? Well, that's a question for the plot. Given that good guys almost always succeed, bet on that horse first- but more often than not [[MostWritersAreHuman it's the human we're supposed to be rooting for]]. Since God help us if the robot revolution comes and they really are better than us.

->''Look at you, hacker. A pathetic creature of meat and bones, panting and sweating as you run through my corridors. How can you challenge a perfect, immortal machine?''

* The John Henry legend is spoofed in ''DaveBarry in Cyberspace'', which tells a story of the first computer ever built that Dave Barry was definitely making up:

-->--Shodan, ''VideoGame/SystemShock''

* ''Film/TheMatrix'' shows this as the aftermath of the RobotWar. The humans firmly believe that the use of their own human spirit is the only thing separating them from the machines, and is the only real advantage they have.
* ''Film/{{Terminator}}''
* In ''RockyIV'', Rocky trains by doing [[NatureHero manual labor in the snow and exercising in a barn.]] [[BigBad Ivan Drago]] trains in a lab surrounded by high-tech devices and monitored by scientists. Rocky wins the fight since he has "[[HeartIsAnAwesomePower heart]]".

* Myth/PaulBunyan and Babe the Blue Ox get in on the act, too, when they go up against the mechanized saw in a tree-cutting contest. Interestingly, Paul loses (by a quarter of an inch, in WaltDisney's version).

* ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'''s August 2012 update introduced a cooperative game mode [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin aptly titled]] "Mann Vs. Machine" where the RED team squares off against robot knockoffs of the game's classes (except the Engineer, who was added in a later update), created by Redmond and Blutarch Mann's [[LongLostRelative long lost brother]] Gray Mann.

* Spoofed in ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'' episode ''TimeChasers'': Near the end of the film, the protagonist is climbing down a tree to get away from a crashed light aircraft that's threatening to fall on him[[note]]Very reminiscent of ''Franchise/JurassicPark'', which is indeed [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]][[/note]]. The ''MST'' crew identifies this as an example of Man Versus Machine - and immediately begin cheering "Goooo machine!"

[[AC:{{Comics}}]]
* ''MagnusRobotFighter'' provides the trope image, and its premise is ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin.

* PaulBunyan and Babe the Blue Ox get in on the act, too, when they go up against the mechanized saw in a tree-cutting contest. Interestingly, Paul loses (by a quarter of an inch, in WaltDisney's version).

* ''Series/BattlestarGalacticaReimagined'' has this as an explicit ongoing theme, with humans relying on chunky old-fashioned machines with a lot of manual controls. The Cylons, by contrast, are robots with incredibly sexy starships.