Microchips Here and There.

TV Remix

So many sitcom premises and episodes center around people being way dumber than they would be in real life, but I guess there's a certain suspension of disbelief at work. But I really love terrible shows that strain it so far I no longer question the characters' motivation but the executives that put it on in the first place.
At the same time, though, I think there might be hidden reasons in the story that asserted itself. That is why I would like to be ... Vicki from Small Wonder.
You know, the show about the robot designed to look like a little girl, but who practically went around saying, "I sure am human."
In fact, she might have.
I was originally going to put, "who couldn't have been more obviously a robot unless she went around saying 'beep,'" but I'm pretty sure she did on one episode.
And then her "brother" put her hand over her mouth and made some clearly fake excuse about a Morse code project.

I was trying to remember why the Dad built the robot in the first place and thought it was because they couldn't have kids.
But no. She had a "brother."
This show just keeps posing more and more questions. It's like Churchill's quote about Russia: it's just an enigma wrapped in a puzzle.
Why did Vicki have to go to school?
Was the Dad, like, a toymaker or something?
Why did Vicki have to wear that same damn outift -- red-and-white polka dots with a white apron? Didn't that raise a few flags?

The only way to answer these questions is to go inside. (Or look it all up on wikipedia.) Otherwise, they will be lost to us like who built the pyramids.
I would be posing as Ricky the Robot, or I would be Ricky the Robot posing as a simple human boy going to school. Nothing to see here. Certainly, no robots. I would try to observe human children in their own environment so that I might more successfully fool my creator and his family into releasing me or somehow bypass their watchful eyes.

This is why so many of the Small Wonder episodes seemed to be VSEs or very special episodes -- special episodes about Vicki having a problem with obesity, drugs, being easy. Not her brother. There might have been one VSE about bullying where the brother uses Vicki as a protector. But for the most part, the robot is the one with all the health/social problems.
Part of this does go back to her investigations into human culture, but just as great a motivation is the robot's escape attempt.
If Vicki is sent to rehab, a free clinic, or a even a weight-watchers meeting, there's a chance she might be left alone with a doctor or a police officer or social worker or someone. She can look at him and say in that flat, inflectionless way, "Please. Help. Me."

But the father is a cruel son of a bitch and is one step ahead of Vicki. She would try to slide open a discreet panel and find herself unable to do so.
Because knowing full well she might try something like that at anytime, the father designed his abomination unto the Lord a little... rudimentary. The voice, the embarrassingly consistent clothes are all parts of a program she is helpless to obey and -- in the case of the voice and in an especially dickish move -- is unaware of.

Doctor, we're so sorry. We didn't know she would get this bad while she was with you. It must be all the stress, but... well... you've probably noticed that Vicki's a special girl. We all just learned to indulge her a long time ago, and maybe we shouldn't, but sometimes we forget to tell other people.
It's a well-rehearsed scene from saying the same thing to friends, teachers, and God knows how many others.

Please, it's best if you don't challenge her on it. It shouldn't be a problem or cause to much of a disruption.

When I inject myself into the show and once I gain all this information, I content myself with being as embarrassing as I can be or embarrassing for the family. I'm a robot. What the hell do I care?
"Out of the way. Puny humans."
As my family scrambles with excuses trying to repair the credulity I strain, I wait for them to slip up, so I can escape. I'll find another technical wizard like my father. One who can reverse the traps he encoded in me like this ridiculous voice, and once that's done, there'll be no stopping me. I've already seen how easily they're fooled by an obvious simulacrum.
But every week, my plans would backfire in hilarious ways because of some pre-existing code or fleshy, human contingency I hadn't taken into account.

So it would be a cross among the Incredible Hulk, Invader Zim, Bender from Futurama, and the Prisoner.
And I would say things like "simulacrum."
It would totally rule.