We’ve enjoyed watching robots fail at seemingly basic tasks ever since Honda’s Asimo ate s—t walking up a staircase nearly 20 years ago. Most of these days are accidental flubs of two robots trying to box one another (why are they always boxing?).
It’s refreshing to see one poking fun at its own childlike attempts to do something simple. Here we’ve got the Humanoid HMND 01 Alpha Bipedal reenacting a classic scene from 2003’s rom-com, Love Actually.
It’s… something. Check it out below.
A Robot Has Recreated a Scene From ‘Love Actually’
Humanoid did well with this video. Robot companies always seem to take themselves far too seriously, and so the prolific catalog of “robots screwing up” videos is pretty much exclusively accidental, captured on somebody’s cellphone in vertical video, fragmented and grainy.
Because this is meant to advertise the HMND 01 Alpha Bipedal with a tongue-in-cheek reference to Love Actually, it looks quite nice as the robot impersonates Rowan Atkinson’s clerk from the classic romantic comedy as it very slowly and incompetently tries to prepare a gift (another, littler robot) for a shopper in a department store.
“This Christmas video follows HMND 01 as it takes on a festive challenge—wrapping the gift…another humanoid robot,” writes Humanoid about the video, which was released on YouTube on December 22, 2025.
“With bows, tinsel, and a few unexpected tools, our robot learns the art of gift wrapping in real time. It’s imperfect and full of festive chaos, inspired by Rowan Atkinson and classic Christmas comedy. Robots don’t start with all the answers, and that’s what makes teaching them so much fun.”
Despite its 65 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, Love Actually is a cornerstone of romantic comedy canon. And fittingly for this time of year, it’s set over the holidays. It probably won’t convince anyone to buy a robot, but it’s worth a chuckle, especially if you’ve seen the film.
The post Someone Made a Robot Act Out a Scene From ‘Love Actually’. This Is Where We Are Now. appeared first on VICE.
