Some of you would rather not be reminded that 2024 marks the ten-year anniversary of the failed RoboCop remake with Joel Kinnaman, Gary Oldman, and Michale Keaton. However, a piece by Giant Freakin Robot brought up the topic and the issue of what went wrong.
Its star Kinnaman who stepped in for Peter Weller thinks he knows, opening up a little while back his feeling that the film didn’t effectively recognize the fans’ needs. “It didn’t fully take into account what RoboCop was for the fans,” he said, though making his version was a positive experience.
“It was a cool experience. I think if I would have done it now, I think I would have inserted myself more into it. I love [director] José’s [Padilha] concept into it,” Kinnaman told ComicBook.com late last year. But he knows the remake missed the mark by departing from the original as much as it did.
“The one thing, I think, was lacking in that film, I like to be self-critical. I think that it was one of those films where, I think, we who made it didn’t fully take into account what RoboCop was for the fans”, he continued.”Tonally, that sort of [Paul] Verhoeven satire, because it’s so ingrained in the RoboCop franchise and its being.”
Kinnaman explained Padilha was clear about adapting Alex Murphy’s story with an anti-Imperialism theme that was tone-deaf to what diehard fans wanted. “I think that movie would have done better if we had listened more to the fans beforehand,” the actor shared.
He then added, “I almost think the RoboCop film we did would have been a better movie if it wouldn’t have been named ‘RoboCop.’” GFR writer Jason Collins wondered in turn how a rebranding would’ve worked in the film’s favor.
“Perhaps the production studio could have named it Cyber Policeman (sounds like a translation of a Japanese anime) to disenfranchise it from RoboCop, and perhaps its anti-imperialistic message would have been better received had the studio done so,” wrote Collins.
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The RoboCop of 2014 sits at a subpar 49 percent score with both critics and audiences on Rotten Tomatoes while its performance and reception stalled any hope of a sequel.
The prospect of a follow-up of any kind was put on hold even more when Amazon bought MGM – the studio with the rights – and announced their plans for a new movie and series. Progress on either front is slow, but like Murphy once said, “Your move, creep!”
