Robocop 3
1987’s Robocop remains one of the great sci fi action classics of all time, a raw, gritty epitome of badass that took a chancey premise and, in the hands of visionary director Paul Verhoeven, achieved greatness with a surprising amount of simplicity in its own story as well. 1990 would see the release of Part 2 from the directing hand of Irvin (Empire Strikes Back) Kirshner and with Peter Weller back in the suit to provide emotional continuity, proved many of the naysayers wrong by actually upping the gore, nastiness and violence not only in order to heighten the levels of evil that Robo was facing off against, but also keeping in mind that Robo / Murphy’s “personal” story arc had been more than successfully played out in Part 1 (with the exception of one very key scene between Murphy and his wife that actually saw him doing the right thing even if it meant breaking her heart) and now he could focus his attention on taking down bad guys whose intentions had threatened to have catastrophic results on the city. Flash forward to 1993 and the production of Part 3 in the series. The first and most ruinous aspect in this whole production was in the failure to secure the services of Peter Weller to come back and reprise the title role. Two stories arose out of this casting problem, one being that Weller had hated wearing the suit so much and was so sick of playing a character that seemingly had nowhere else to go that he ignored all calls and inquiries about coming back and had made it VERY clear that no matter what they had to offer, his answer would always be no. The second and more intriguing story that was told was that Weller had been involved in a sitdown meeting with new director Fred (Night Of The Creeps) Dekker and told him that YES, he did want to do Part 3 but first, the script needed more work and secondly, he had just been cast in the lead role in David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch, an opportunity that was very important to him as an actor and that he would be more than happy to consider doing Robocop 3 after he was finished filming that. Unfortunately, the producers found themselves unable to accommodate Weller, hastily recasting the role with one Robert Burke, a guy who was partially cast because he had the same sizes as Weller did since they were reusing the same suits from the previous films and also because he possessed actual genuine mime training which couldn’t have hurt his performance either. But at the same time, it might have been a better idea to allow Weller to finish filming his other high profile project just to get him onboard since him not being there actually diminishes the Murphy / Robocop character, making it feel like a random actor in a suit with a passing resemblance to the original, the kinds like you see at The Universal Studios Theme Park attractions or at mall openings when it’s just the living embodiment of an action figure that all the kids are coming out to see. Certainly the fans of the first two films and Weller rebelled, quickly branding it the worst of the series (and in many cases one of the worst sequels and sci fi films ever) which is pretty unfair considering that the film has a number of good ideas on hand and the storyline itself resolves the basic overall elements that have dominated the entire series (OCP, cops on strike, the streets being a warzone) with the main idea being that since it is implied that the “Old Man” who ran OCP in the previous films (Dan O’Herlithy, also said to be unavailable due to other projects) has been taken out of the picture (killed?), OCP is now controlled by Rip Torn as a character who is only referred to as “The CEO” and Torn (having a lot of fun here but not really putting a definitive stamp on the performance) is negotiating a merger / takeover with a Japanese company led by the legendary Mako. Their plan is to sweep and clear all the poor, rundown neighborhoods in order to make way for their shiny, sterile new community for the future known as Delta City. Using special tactical mercenaries dubbed REHABS, the poor and homeless people are being rounded up and taken to detention camps (and possibly exterminated) while the REAL threat to the city, a freaky, drug crazed band of lunatics known as Splatterpunks remain left alone and relatively unscathed. To this end, the (let’s call them nice) homeless people being oppressed have banded together to form their own rebel movement and ultimately where Robocop figures into all of this is when he runs up against the leader of the REHABS who resembles an Imperial Officer from Star Wars complete with officious British accent (John Castle). The confrontation (hampered by Robo’s mandate not to open fire on an OCP officer) results in the death of his best friend and partner Anne Lewis (Nancy Allen returning and not at all happy with the scripted fate for her character which is understandable since she is one of the more appealing and underrated movie sidekicks of all time). Once he is framed for her death (widely reported on all of the Media Break segments throughout the film) and other massacres of poor, oppressed people being attributed to him, Robo winds up teaming with the rebels which turns out to be a not so bad proposition for the film since the rebel group consists of such good actors as CCH Pounder, Daniel Von Bargen and Stephen Root. There’s also a cute little girl (Remy Ryan) who happens to be a computer genius in her own right and once Robo’s inventor / maintenance scientist (Jill Hennessey whose role was possibly played by a different actress in the earlier films although it’s hard to tell for sure) comes on board with her loyalty to the well being of Robo as her foremost concern (plus her one of a kind ability to make repairs on him in the field), this means that the battle lines are drawn for a confrontation that might destroy OCP once and for all along with finally deciding the fate of the city and the various faces of good and evil that reside inside of it. With the script (as it was for Part 2) being written by Frank Miller (and incorporating ideas that were rejected for Part 2), Part 3 actually features some good ideas and scattered moments that feel right in line with the overall feel of the series even as the over the top violence that had defined the first 2 Weller entries was considerably toned down enough to purposely warrant a PG-13 rating (which in turn reins in the dark, mean spirited tone that had also defined the series) and along with the death of Allen’s Lewis, we also have series regular Robert DoQui as the embattled desk sergeant lead a number of other cops (who are all portrayed as sticking together and always standing behind Murphy) in turning rogue and joining forces with the rebels to take on the Gestapo like REHABS who in turn recruit The Splatterpunks (best described as being the lowest forms of life on the planet) to fight alongside them all while putting high tech weapons into their jittery, drug addicted hands. The contrast between the two factions is jarring and that (along with the nature of The Media Break Segments) surprisingly come across as being elements that can still be relevant today. But the most fascinating subtext is in what can perhaps be described as being Murphy’s dependency in the series on females as his closest and most beloved allies (whether it be his widowed wife who reappears here in some more Wellerless flashbacks, Lewis or the beautiful female scientist whose name unironically enough is Lazarus) and the ones who have truly enabled his progress from one life to another, from being an actual human being to that of a cyborg whose original humanity is questioned by many but not by Lewis who had never treated him as anything other than his old self from day one. The film gets carried away with its Japanese manga / cyberpunk connections when Mako’s character winds up sending some kind of a ninja cyborg (Bruce Locke) to America to do battle with Murphy, but the character just winds up feeling like one villain too many when the REHABS and their leader do just fine for themselves, professing their desire to clean up the city but yet having their own red light district all to themselves where they screw drug addicted prostitutes and attempt to grab teenage girls off the street so that they can rape them. But still, there is the awkwardness of the new actor as Murphy where if even the most barely remote possibility of signing up Weller was still in reach, then that should have been the priority rather than rushing this into production just so this character’s adventures could continue in lockstep formation…
7/10