Prediction: RoboCop

Shiri’s Prediction: When I first heard about this particular reboot, I was instinctively robophobic, Mr. Jackson.  How many people of a certain age (by which I mean my age or thereabouts) had their sci-fi violence cherry popped by RoboCop? Probably as many of us as had our vulgarity and penis-joke cherry popped by Coming to America, which, if my completely random, not even close to scientific poles are accurate, and I’m quite sure they are, is most of us.  RoboCop holds a very special place in my animal brain, almost as special as the one MaxHeadroom holds in my geek brain.  It was definitely the first time I ever saw a guy take a toxic waste bath and then get hit by a car and explode (just mentioned that scene to the hubs and he said, “Yeah, that still freaks me out”).  A girl never forgets her first toxic waste-car-explosion and she doesn’t want to see it sanitized, or redone in CGI, or prettied up.  I want it to remain enshrined in my memory in all its disgusting glory and on my death bed, I shall say, “Come closer.  I want to tell you about this scene in RoboCop.  Man, was that gross.”

And then, SciFi Now had to go do an interview that made the reboot sound maybe kinda cool and, in their most recent issue, a cover feature that makes it sound really cool, and I watched the trailer and now… now, Hades forgive me my disloyalty, Peter Weller, but I want to see it and I’m pretty sure I’m going to like it.

Here’s the thing: if indications are correct, the new Robocop is not a remake.  It’s a a reboot, which is a completely different animal.  This is not a recreation of the 1987 movie; it’s a new use of the original concepts.  And the concepts were cool.  They were very cool.  If they hadn’t been, the violence would simply have been violence and I wouldn’t feel so strongly about the original or the disservice a reincarnation could do it.  And Michael Keaton is a good idealistic asshole.  And Samuel L. Jackson is an awesome asshole asshole.  And the tech looks cool and there appears to be a decent plot and…

I’m giving up time with the kids and getting a baby-sitter for this one, friends.  I will pay for tickets and I will get my snacks and I will sit in a theatre with a bunch of other thirty/forty-somethings and be cynical and snarky and then I’ll shut up and enjoy.

RoboCop 1987, you’ll always be my first.  But you’re going to have to shove over and share.

Luke’s Prediction: Hmmm…all the parts are there. Though updated for a new generation. We asked this question before, and given Hollywood we will re-visit it again I am sure, but was there a good reason to revisit RoboCop? I would say yes, but only because of the last two horrible films. The first RoboCop is a seminal action film of the 80’s up there with Die Hard and Terminator. What it was sort of weak on was anything other than action. It had some style going on, and some cute bits, but the depth of the setting and science behind the plot, were weak at best. Funny, hells yeah, in-depth, not really.

Now, this new RoboCop looks like there is more going on, the Corp. might be evil or might be mis-guided (hard to tell how Mr. Keaton is playing it) and Mr. Jackson is a politician (I think) and Mr. Oldman as the man scientist, all seem like good ideas. Though, what I cannot tell is if the partner is not really in the preview or Mr. Williams (a.k.a. Omar) is the new partner {ed. after looking at IMDB and seeing his character’s name, I think he is the partner}, so that could be interesting to see.

Long and the short of it, this could be a lot of fun and looks like they are trying to add some interesting depth to the story. I am in. Gonna try to catch this one in the theater.