I actually only just saw Robocop 2 this week. I fucking looooove Robocop and even though I'd heard 2 wasn't anywhere near as bad as 3, it still didn't have a good reputation at all, so I'd avoided it. But then www.redlettermedia.com used the remake as an excuse to talk about Robocop 1 and 2 and their positivity towards 2 made me finally check it out.
It's inferior to Robocop, but that's none too surprising, as Robocop is a god damn masterpiece. I would probably put it somewhere between good and great, I ended up voting 'great' because it seems underrated - I, myself, had been avoiding it for years when it really does deserve better treatment.
So the story is kind of messy. It kind of has a lot of really great ideas that suffer for being poorly structured. An example, and one raised in the redlettermedia discussion, is when Robocop is rebuilt by OCP with his whole host of committee-designed new directives that render him utterly ineffectual. Rather than be something that Robocop has to overcome before the final confrontation, they just play it for some laughs and then it's dealt with about 10 minutes later. From this point on, there isn't really anything more to Murphy's story arc, even though there is still a decent way to go to get to the end of the film.
I would also say that it really misses the mark in trying to recapture the satirical nature of the first film. The scene in Robocop where it cuts from the news story about the orbital laser platform misfiring and killing over 100 people, including two former presidents, to an ad for a fun-for-the-whole-family boardgame simulating nuclear war is fantastic. Paul Verhoeven used this juxtaposition really effectively in Robocop and even in other films like Starship Troopers and the message he attached to these scenes is very concise and biting. Similar scenes in Robocop 2 have the exaggerated nature, but lack the point as far as I can see. The ad about the sunscreen you need to slather on to go out in the California sun, with the surgeon generals warning that the sunscreen causes cancer is good for a laugh, but there's really not much more to it. It's silly and over the top, but it doesn't really say anything. Maybe a feeble environmental message?
So it's not at all on the same level as Robocop, but it's crazy and fun enough and I guess steals enough tricks from Robocop to still be pretty great. Robocop never needed a sequel and in making more movies, it kind of ends up becoming part of what the original was satirising, but it was also just a lot of fun to be back in that world. If you just go in to it to watch a decent action movie, it can really be a lot of fun. The footage of OCP developing Robocop 2 is obviously a highlight, maybe up there with ED-209 in the boardroom. It's another great performance from Peter Weller and some fun performances from other cast members, such as Tom Noonan. There's some really pretty top notch stop-motion animation in there. I think there's really quite a lot to like about it. Also, I have to make mention of the fact that in Robocop 2, the new robotic police officer that OCP make is called Robocop 2. I think that's fantastic.
As for Frank Miller's involvement, I looked in to it after to watching the film and the way it went was that he wrote the initial script and then another screenwriter was brought in to rewrite it. Quite a lot changed and Miller was obviously displeased about it, but his original vision was later released as a comic series. I found a... review, I guess... that went through the issues of the series, detailing the plot and showing the occasional page. Man. MAN. It was awful in a pretty amazing way. Lewis' clothes get burnt or blown off in basically every scene she was in.
Basically, if you don't go in expecting it to be as good as Robocop, there's potentially a lot of fun to be had.
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