I have an issue with how Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics are often depicted.

I don't know to what extent this can apply to Asimov's own stories.  This is the perspective of someone interested in the concept but who still hasn't read Asimov directly yet.  His Laws of Robotics have been used by other writers a lot.

For anyone out of the loop, here is what the Laws are.

The Three Laws, quoted as being from the "Handbook of Robotics, 56th Edition, 2058 A.D.", are:

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.^[1]

What I like about them is how there is no pretense to pretend the laws are equal to each other.  The first law has no qualifier, and each subsequent law has a qualifier defining the prior laws as overruling them in any potential conflict.

This should be a worth while concept to keep in mind even when trying to create moral or civil law codes, much less laws that it's outright impossible for certain lifeforms to violate because of how their artificial brains work.  That's why my personal attitude towards the two Commandments Jesus defined as the greatest Commandments is that if your attempt to obey or enforce some other law puts you in even apparent conflict with either of those then you should rethink what you're doing.

If I were to criticize the laws themselves, it'd be that Robot obedience is placed above their own self preservation.  That is what shows how they were designed to make them slaves.  A more benevolent programmer would at least switch the second and third laws.  Of course ultimately the obedience law being there at all makes them slaves.

But my subject today is how these laws are depicted in some stories.  Because some writers seem to forget that the qualifiers on the second and third laws exist.  For example, take the scene in The Forbidden Planet that KyleKallgrenBHH says demonstrates Asimov's three laws.

https://youtu.be/Za50E46Z87Y?t=361

For now I'll take Kyle at his word that that is the scene's intent.  It bugs me that this near meltdown of Robbie happens, that meltdown would make sense if the three laws were treated as equal.  But the qualifiers should guarantee that Robbie would simply not obey the command to kill and be fine.

I get that writers want to explore areas where this system of laws can be imperfect.  But that can be done without ignoring the qualifiers.  Heck the first command alone can create a conflict if the Robot is in a situation where the only action that can prevent one Human from "coming to harm" is to injure another human.