Robocop Trailer (This actually looks good?) (Page 1 of 2)

We just had a whole discussion about this in the chat.

I think this looks like hot garbage. Totally joyless, and I hate almost every single creative decision in this trailer.

So instead of a traumatic, iconically violent death by close-range bullets, he dies from a car explosion, like something from a TV pilot on NBC. And instead of having his hand amputated, where you just have a face surrounded by metal emphasizing how he is a cyborg, he now walks around with his 2nd hand completely in-tact, making the suit look like just another power-armor suit. Speaking of the suit, they've thrown out an iconic believable looking design in favor of an awful, ugly, "hip" black-neon monstrosity, to try to make him look cool to 13 year olds. And instead of cool-looking practical models, ED-209 is a fake-looking CG effect.

Oh, and now it looks like Murphy immediately remembers who he and his family are, completely nullifying the entire emotional arc of the first film. The whole thing that's great about the character is that he's a tragic frankenstein monster, a man abused by the system against his will, who finds out who he used to be and re-discovers his humanity by the end.

But nope, instead we can have his wife telling him how he should be a better robo-father and hang out with his son more 

Oh, and its PG-13, so he just fights other robots, because if there's anything we having seen enough of yet, it's robots fighting eachother.

At least with the Total Recall remake I could sort of understand that decision, as the movie looked crazy expensive and elaborate, and while the end result was still shit, at least you could see the business rationale there, and the money was on the screen.

Based on the trailer, this Robocop remake looks really cheap looking.

A budget of 1,000 clichés to produce this remake.

I've talked to a few people who have read the script, and the universal takeaway is that its the drizzling shits.

There's a scene where they're in R&D on what the Robocop design will be, and they focus group it for....13 year olds.  They show them a screen with the original iconic Robocop suit and one of the kids goes "That looks stupid!  Like something out of the 80's!"

Ya, pointing out you're a shitty cynical focus-grouped remake doesn't suddenly make that OK.

An actual good version of this movie would take the ultra-violence of the original and merge it with all the crazy political stuff happening in recent years, like Dredd with the satire turned up more. In 10 years, Robocop would probably be created by Google or Boston Dynamics, and be used to fight and stop protesters fighting for fair wages. Actual warfare in other countries will all be air-drones dropping bombs (which the movie would be wise to make a point of), but if you're trying to put down unrest domestically, Robocop would be the perfect tool.

To be fair to the director, it sounds like a case of the studio completely fucking him over:
http://collider.com/jose-padilha-robocop-remake-hell/
Still, he shoulda known it was coming and said "NO" the second they told him it had to be PG-13. It's not like he doesn't have a promising career in Brazil, and I gotta believe there would be better directing opportunities he could grab to make the jump to the US.

Last edited by bullet3 (2013-09-06 18:21:21)

I feel sorry for the concept art department.

I don't think he'd retired yet when they were shooting this. Hopefully he'll end his career on a more dignified note.

I have a feeling he's NOT going to be a bad motherfucker. I wouldn't buy that for a dollar.

Hmm he needs a jetpack...

Diet Coke is still fizzing out of my nose. Bravo.