In the BBC TV series, the marketing division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation defines a robot [like Marvin] as "Your plastic pal who's fun to be with".

Marvin's first single from 1981

Marvin's second single from 1981

Marvin from the 2005 film The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is more spherical than he is described in the book series.

Marvin, the Paranoid Android is a fictional character in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series by Douglas Adams. Image File history File links Marvin, the Paranoid Android. ... The terms Primary Phase and Secondary Phase describe the first two radio series of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... The terms Tertiary Phase, Quandary Phase and Quintessential Phase describe the radio adaptations of the books Life, the Universe and Everything, So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish and Mostly Harmless recorded in 2003 and 2004 by Above the Title Productions for BBC Radio 4. ... Douglas Noël Adams (11 March 1952 – 11 May 2001) was an English author, comic radio dramatist, and musician. ... Marvin the Paranoid Android from the BBC TV series. ... Marvin the Paranoid Android from the BBC TV series. ... Encyclopedia Galactica: the inept Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Marketing Division. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Year 1981 (MCMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link displays the 1981 Gregorian calendar). ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Year 1981 (MCMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link displays the 1981 Gregorian calendar). ... Taken from desktop promotion image. ... Taken from desktop promotion image. ... Film is a term that encompasses individual motion pictures, the field of film as an art form, and the motion picture industry. ... The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy film based on the book of the same name by Douglas Adams. ... Alice, a fictional character based on a real character from the work of Lewis Carroll. ... The cover of the first novel in the Hitchhikers series, from a late 1990s printing. ... Douglas Noël Adams (11 March 1952 – 11 May 2001) was an English author, comic radio dramatist, and musician. ...

About Marvin

Marvin is the ship's robot aboard the starship Heart of Gold. He was built as a prototype of Sirius Cybernetics Corporation's GPP (Genuine People Personalities) technology. Marvin is apparently afflicted with severe depression and boredom, in part because he has a "brain the size of a planet" which he is seldom allowed to use. Indeed, the true horror of Marvin's existence is that no task he could be given would occupy even the tiniest fraction of his vast intellect. Marvin claims he is 50,000 times more intelligent than a human, though this is, if anything, a vast underestimate. When kidnapped by the bellicose Krikkit robots and tied to the interfaces of their intelligent war computer, Marvin simultaneously manages to plan the entire planet's military strategy, solve "all of the major mathematical, physical, chemical, biological, sociological, philosophical, etymological, meteorological and psychological problems of the Universe except his own, three times over," and compose a number of lullabies. He seemed to find the latter the hardest, and only one, "How I Hate the Night", is known. ASIMO, a humanoid robot manufactured by Honda. ... One of the fictional ships called the Starship Enterprise from Star Trek, one of the most famous fictional starships. ... Heart of Gold is a fictional spaceship in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with prototyping. ... Encyclopedia Galactica: the inept Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Marketing Division. ... Genuine People Personalities is a fictional software created by Douglas Adams as part of his The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series. ... Clinical depression (also called major depressive disorder, or unipolar depression when compared to bipolar disorder) is a state of intense sadness, melancholia or despair that has advanced to the point of being disruptive to an individuals social functioning and/or activities of daily living. ... Boredom is a condition characterized by perception of ones environment as dull, tedious, and lacking in stimulation. ... Italic text // ahh addiing sum spiice iin hurr`` For other uses, see Brain (disambiguation). ... The eight planets and three dwarf planets of the Solar System. ... This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... How I Hate the Night, also know as Marvins lullaby, was published in the book Life, the Universe and Everything by Douglas Adams, where it is described as a short dolorous ditty of no tone, or indeed tune. ...

Marvin's voice was performed by Stephen Moore on radio and television, while Alan Rickman played this role in the film. David Learner operated his body on television, having previously played and voiced the part for the stage version, and Warwick Davis wore the Marvin costume for the feature film. Rickman and Davis, both play Professors of Hogwarts in the Harry Potter movie series (Snape and Flitwick, respectively). Stephen Moore (born December 11, 1937) is a British actor from Brixton, London. ... Alan Sidney Patrick Rickman (born February 21, 1946) is an acclaimed, award-winning English film, television and stage actor. ... The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy is a science fiction comedy film based on the book of the same name by Douglas Adams. ... Warwick Ashley Davis (born February 3, 1970) is an English actor. ...

He is "probably... the most popular character to appear in the Guide", according to Geoffrey Perkins, producer of the radio series. Stephen Moore released two pop singles — "Marvin"/"Metal Man" and "Reasons To Be Miserable"/"Marvin I Love You" (double B-side) — in the UK in 1981, though neither reached the top 40. Two of these were re-recorded and remixed to coincide with the 2005 Hitchhiker's movie release, Reasons To Be Miserable and Marvin now being performed by Stephen Fry. There was also a short-lived fanclub called "The Marvin Depreciation Society". Geoffrey Perkins has been a central figure in British comedy broadcasting. ... Popular music is music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and are disseminated by one or more of the mass media. ... A collection of various CD singles In music, a single is a short recording of one or more separate tracks. ... Audio sample Marvin was a single released in 1981 by Marvin, the Paranoid Android. ... Metal Man was the B-side on the single Marvin released in 1981 by Marvin, the Paranoid Android. ... Music sample Reasons To Be Miserable (file info) Problems? See media help. ... Marvin I Love You was the other B-side of the single Reasons To Be Miserable released in 1981 by Marvin, the Paranoid Android. ... In recorded music, the terms A-side and B-side refer to the two sides of 7 inch vinyl records on which singles have been released since the 1950s. ... The UK Singles Chart is compiled by the Official UK Charts Company on behalf of the music industry. ... This article or section cites very few or no references or sources. ...

Marvin from the 2005 film was featured (although behind a glass screen) in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Exhibition that ran at Blackpool Zoo. A recreation of the costume from the BBC Television version of the story (all but the head of the original was lost decades ago) has a cameo role in the feature film, appearing in the Vogon office queue with various other life forms. Just two miles from the famous Blackpool sea-front in Lancashire, England, Blackpool Zoo provides a home to over 1500 animals from all over the world. ...

Image File history File links Marvin_Marvin. ... Software development stages In computer programming, development stage terminology expresses how the development of a piece of software has progressed and how much further development it may require. ...

Name

According to Douglas Adams, "Marvin came from Andrew Marshall. He's another comedy writer, and he's exactly like that." (Indeed, in an early draft of Hitchhiker's, the robot was called Marshall. It was changed to "Marvin" partly to avoid causing offence, but also because it was pointed out to Adams that on radio the name would sound like "Martial", which would have undesirable connotations.) However, Adams also admitted that Marvin is part of a long line of literary depressives, such as A. A. Milne's Eeyore or Jacques in Shakespeare's As You Like It, and even owes something to Adams's own periods of depression. Andrew Marshall (1960- ) is a British comedy writer, most noted for the domestic sitcom 2point4 children. ... Alan Alexander Milne (January 18, 1882 – January 31, 1956), also known as A. A. Milne, was a British author, best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh and for various childrens poems. ... The real stuffed toys owned by Christopher Robin and featured in the Winnie-the-Pooh stories. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... Scene from As you like it, Francis Hayman, c. ...

Marvin does not actually display signs of paranoia, despite his moniker, though Zaphod refers to him as "the Paranoid Android." Nor does he show any signs of mania, though Trillian refers to him as a "manically depressed robot." He remains consistently morose throughout. In fact he exhibits remarkable stoicism, being willing to wait millions of years for his employers. Mania is a severe medical condition characterized by extremely elevated mood, energy, and thought patterns. ... A restored Stoa in Athens. ...

Marvin's life

The details of Marvin's incredibly long and unenviably mirthless life are complicated by the fact that his story assumes different forms in the various media in which it has been told. The books tell a substantially different tale to the original radio series, which in turn tell a different tale from the television series and albums. An attempt to piece it together follows:

According to his autobiography read in the Secondary Phase of the radio series, Marvin was constructed much against his own wishes by the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation as a prototype human personality artificial intelligence. He was subsequently left in a dark storage unit for six months, during which no one bothered to visit him. His first and only friend was a small rat, which one day crawled into a cavity in his right ankle and died. He has "a horrible feeling it is still there." The cutaway illustration of Marvin made by Kevin J. Davies for the "Depreciation Society" featured a "rat cavity". Encyclopedia Galactica: the inept Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Marketing Division. ...

It is unclear how much time elapsed between then and his posting aboard the Heart of Gold starship, but since every other component of the ship was brand new, it seems likely to have not been very long. As the menial labourer on the spaceship, he grew immensely resentful of the insistence of his new masters (Zaphod Beeblebrox and Trillian; later also Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent) that he open doors, check airlocks and pick up pieces of paper. He reserved a particular contempt for the sentient doors, despising their blissful satisfaction with existence. Mark Wing-Davey as Zaphod Beeblebrox, from the TV adaptation. ... Zooey Deschanel as Trillian from the film adaptation. ... David Dixon as Ford Prefect in Episode One of the TV adaptation of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... Martin Freeman as Arthur Dent, waking up at the beginning of the movie. ...

When the Heart of Gold crew arrive on the ancient planet of Magrathea, they abandon Marvin on the surface. Here is where the first divergence between the different versions of his story occurs. In both the radio and television series, the crew are teleported directly from Magrathea 576,000,003,579 years into the future to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. However, in the novels, Marvin inadvertently saves the crew by plugging himself into the onboard computer of a police vehicle, which, when exposed to the true nature of Marvin's view of the universe, commits suicide, taking the two police who were then firing at the ship's crew with it. The crew leave Magrathea on The Heart of Gold, but are teleported summarily to Ursa Minor Beta, where Zaphod's great grandfather, in an apparent fit of vicious humour, forces Marvin to accompany Zaphod on his mission of self-discovery. Marvin subsequently saves Zaphod's life by engaging in a (ridiculously easy) battle of wits with a vicious automated tank, and then is abandoned on the planet Frogstar B when Zaphod is sent to the Total Perspective Vortex. This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... The Total Perspective Vortex, in the fictional world of Douglas Adamss The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, is the most horrible torture device to which a sentient being can be subjected. ...

In either case, eventually the crew arrive at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, to find that, in fact, they haven't traveled an inch. The Restaurant was constructed on the ruins of the planet they had just left (Magrathea or Frogstar B), and, while there, they find Marvin, who had been waiting patiently for their return for 576,000,003,579 years (he counted them). According to Marvin, "The first ten million years were the worst, and the second ten million years, they were the worst too. The third ten million I didn't enjoy at all. After that I went into a bit of a decline." Apparently, the best conversation he'd had was over 40 million years ago, and that was with a coffee machine. This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ...

Deciding they had better leave, the crew make a desperate and futile attempt to engage Marvin's enthusiasm (he "hasn't got one") before he simply does what they really want and opens the door to the ship they want to steal. Here another divergence occurs. In the radio series, the ship turns out to be a Haggunenon battle cruiser, and the entire group, including Marvin, but excluding Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent, who escape, are eaten by its crew. Marvin's subsequent survival is never really explained, but, against all probability, he eventually finds himself on Ursa Minor Beta, just in time to rescue Zaphod from the tank. This is a list of races, fauna and flora featured in various incarnations of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... David Dixon as Ford Prefect in Episode One of the TV adaptation of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... Martin Freeman as Arthur Dent, waking up at the beginning of the movie. ...

A subsequent section of Marvin's biography occurs only in the Secondary Phase of the radio series. Marvin rejoins the crew on the Heart of Gold, using the improbability drive programmed by Zaphod Beeblebrox the Fourth, takes them to the ravaged planet Brontitall. Having landed in a giant floating marble copy of a plastic cup, the crew accidentally find themselves falling several miles through the air. The carbon-based members of the crew manage to stay alive by grabbing onto passing giant birds. Marvin has no such luck, and, upon impact with the ground, creates his own archaeological excavation site. Cruelly intact, he grudgingly saves the crew multiple times from the Foot Soldiers of the Dolmansaxlil Shoe Corporation. Marvin remains in Heart of Gold whilst Ford, Zaphod, Zarniwoop and Arthur bother the Ruler of the Universe, and leaving when an enraged Arthur hijacks the ship. This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ...

However, in the Tertiary Phase, Trillian claims this story is Zaphod's hallucination, especially as reverse temporal engineering explanation hasn't entered the plot yet. However of the stories of Zaphod's visit to the Frogstar, the Guide says "10% are 95% true, 14% are 65% true, 35% are only 5% true", and listeners are presented with one "version" of that visit.

In the novels, television series and albums, the black ship stolen at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe is actually the stunt ship of the Disaster Area rock band, and, having taken them back in time two million years before the present, is set on an irreversible course to collide with the sun of Kakrafoon. Forced to flee in the ship's barely functional teleport, the crew politely ask Marvin to stay behind and operate it. He does so, and stoically awaits his fate "almost as good as death" in the heart of the blazing sun. There are many minor characters in the various versions of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. ... This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ...

In the third novel, Life, the Universe and Everything, we find that Marvin did indeed survive, having been rescued just before blazing impact by a scrap metal merchant (confusingly, this is also how Marvin recounts his past in the Tertiary Phase of the radio series, even though the black ship never went into a sun in that continuity). The merchant grafted a steel rod to Marvin's now lost leg, and sold him to a Mind Zoo, where excited onlookers would try to make him happy. This made him something of a celebrity on the planet of Squornshellous Zeta, and he was asked to open the brand new bridge that was meant to revitalise the planet's economy. Marvin dutifully plugged himself into the bridge's opening circuit, and, just like the police computer, the bridge, which was probably gifted with a modicum of intelligence, committed suicide, taking a sizable crowd with it. Marvin was left in the swamp, his false leg having trapped him in the mud, so he spent just over 1.5 million years walking around in a circle, "just to make the point." He planned to keep walking in a circle for another million years before trying it backward. "Just for the variety, you understand." Life, the Universe and Everything (1982, ISBN 0-345-39182-9) is the third book in the five-volume Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy science fiction series by Douglas Adams. ... This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ...

Suddenly, he is kidnapped by a squad of Krikkit war robots, who are after his leg, a fragment of the key that will reopen their imprisoned world and restart the genocidal Krikkit War. Thinking that Marvin's intelligence will be an asset, they wire his brain into the interfaces of their intelligent war computer. This is a mistake. The once formidable Krikkit robots find themselves overcome with crippling sorrow and depression, and rather than focusing on their mission of extermination, instead sulk in corners doing quadratic equations. Marvin is rescued by his "friends," who bring him back to the Heart of Gold. From here his story is unknown. This is a list of places featured in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. ... In mathematics, a quadratic equation is a polynomial equation of the second degree. ...

Marvin reappears in the second-to-last chapter of So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish. Arthur and Fenchurch find him on the planet where God's Final Message To His Creation is located. He is barely functional, claiming that due to time travel he is now "thirty-seven times older than the Universe itself," and every part of his body has been replaced, with the exception of "'all the diodes down my left side,'" which have been giving him severe pain for the whole of his existence. Arthur and Fenchurch end up carrying him, enduring the robot's constant abuse, to the God's Final Message viewing station, where they lift him up to see the words of the message: "We apologize for the inconvenience." Astonishingly, Marvin responded thus: "'I think,' he murmured at last, from deep within his corroding rattling thorax, 'I feel good about it.' The lights went out in his eyes for absolutely the very last time ever." His already worn circuits then completely stopped working, and Marvin was no more. So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (1984, ISBN 0-345-39183-7) is the fourth book of the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series written by Douglas Adams. ... There are many minor characters in the various versions of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. ...

However, in the 2005 radio adaptation of the fifth and final novel in the series, Mostly Harmless, in which Marvin did not originally appear, he has a cameo at the end of the last episode alive and well. He explains that it turned out he was still covered by his warranty agreement, and is back to parking cars at Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. This revival was possibly due to the makers wishing to include such a popular character in the final ever radio episode of the Guide, and possibly in line with Douglas Adams' stated wish that he'd given the book series a more upbeat ending. The terms Tertiary Phase, Quandary Phase and Quintessential Phase describe the radio adaptations of the books Life, the Universe and Everything, So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish and Mostly Harmless recorded in 2003 and 2004 by Above the Title Productions for BBC Radio 4. ... The front cover of the US first hardcover edition of Mostly Harmless. ... In commercial and consumer transactions, a warranty is an obligation that an article or service sold is as factually stated or legally implied by the seller, and that often provides for a specific remedy such as repair or replacement in the event the article or service fails to meet the...

References in popular culture

• "Paranoid Android" is the name of a song by British rock band Radiohead, possibly named after Marvin, but without any other apparent explicit reference. The line "When I am king you will be first against the wall" might be a reference to Marvin's introduction, in which it is said that the marketing department of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation is defined by The Hitchhiker's Guide as "a bunch of mindless jerks who'll be the first against the wall when the revolution comes."

• Kimi Wong was the female voice accompanying Stephen Moore (the original radio and TV voice of Marvin) on "Marvin, I Love You" which is a love song to Marvin. Wong is the ex-wife of Richard O'Brien, known for creating The Rocky Horror Show. The song can be found on a Dr. Demento compilation CD, and the B-side of one of the Marvin 7" singles.

• In an episode of My Life as a Teenage Robot, Jenny discovers a collection of early prototypes in her basement. One of them, XJ7, is a pessimistic robot with a very depressing outlook on life, who directly quotes Marvin the Paranoid Android.

• The online roleplaying game Anarchy Online also features Marvin, and he can be found from an Omni outpost in Southern Artery Valley. If asked what the meaning of life is, he will answer "42".

Paranoid Android is a song by Radiohead, from their third album, OK Computer. ... A song is a relatively short musical composition. ... Rock and roll (also spelled Rock n Roll, especially in its first decade), also called rock, is a form of popular music, usually featuring vocals (often with vocal harmony), electric guitars and a strong back beat; other instruments, such as the saxophone, are common in some styles. ... In music, a band is a group of musicians, or musical ensemble, usually popular or folk, playing parts of a musical arrangement. ... Radiohead are an English rock band that formed in Oxfordshire in 1986. ... Wikibooks has more about this subject: Marketing Look up marketing in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Encyclopedia Galactica: the inept Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Marketing Division. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Machine Rule. ... Richard OBrien (born Richard Timothy Smith on March 25, 1942 in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England) is a writer, actor, television presenter and theatre performer. ... The Rocky Horror Show is a long running stage musical (opening in London initially, on June 19, 1973) that inspired the movie The Rocky Horror Picture Show. ... Dr. Demento (born April 2, 1941 in Minneapolis, Minnesota) is the stage name of Barret Eugene Hansen [1], who has made a successful career as a radio disc jockey specializing in novelty songs and pop music parodies. ... My Life as a Teenage Robot is an Emmy-nominated American animated television series, produced by Frederator Studios for the Nickelodeon cable channel. ... Jennys sisters (XJ-1 to 8) are actually prototypes that Mrs. ... Anarchy Online (AO) is a science fiction MMORPG released in June 2001 by Funcom set on the world of Rubi-Ka and its extra-dimensional twin, the Shadowlands. ...

See also

• "Marvin" - single released by Marvin
• "Reasons To Be Miserable" - another single released by Marvin
• "Marvin's lullaby"

Audio sample Marvin was a single released in 1981 by Marvin, the Paranoid Android. ... Music sample Reasons To Be Miserable (file info) Problems? See media help. ... How I Hate the Night, also know as Marvins lullaby, was published in the book Life, the Universe and Everything by Douglas Adams, where it is described as a short dolorous ditty of no tone, or indeed tune. ...

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy#Marvin (The Paranoid Android)

Hitchhiker's Portal

• BBC's page on Marvin
• Webserver "404" error parody of Marvin

	v • d • e The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy By Douglas Adams
Books:	The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy | The Restaurant at the End of the Universe | Life, the Universe and Everything | So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish | Mostly Harmless | Young Zaphod Plays it Safe | The Original Radio Scripts | The Salmon of Doubt
Media:	Radio series (Phases 1 & 2, Phases 3, 4 & 5) | TV series | Movie | Computer game | Differences between versions | Cast lists
Characters:	Arthur Dent | Ford Prefect | Zaphod Beeblebrox | Marvin | Trillian | Slartibartfast | The Guide | Minor characters | Races and species
Places:	List of places | Total Perspective Vortex | Heart of Gold | Wikkit Gate | Starship Titanic | Galactic Empire | Whole Sort of General Mish Mash
Miscellanea:	The Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything | 42 Puzzle | Babel fish | Bistromathic drive | Cultural references | h2g2 | Infinidim Enterprises | Infinite Improbability Drive | International Phenomenon | Notable phrases | Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster | Point-of-view gun | Somebody Else's Problem field | Sirius Cybernetics Corporation | Towel Day | Vogon poetry