RoboCop 2 (1990)

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Overview

RoboCop 2 is the sequel to 1987's RoboCop directed by The Empire Strikes Back director Irvin Kershner.

Creation

Due to the success of the first film, studio executives immediately green lighted a sequel. Ed Neumeier & Michael Miner wrote a rough draft titled: Corporate Wars. The story had RoboCop destroyed at the very beginning, and then rebuilt and awakened 25 years later in an even more futuristic Detroit. Orion executives also tasked Neumeier & Mner with writing an Oliver Stone film called Company Man at the same time, a film that was also never produced. For various reasons Orion opted to pass on their script. Paul Verhoeven was interested in directing, but left the project after Neumeier & Mner's treatment was discarded and directed Total Recall instead.

Left without a writer or director, Jon Davison hired writer Frank Miller fresh off the massive success that was The Dark Knight Returns comic series. However he and Irvin Kershner would deem Miller's script unfilmable and had it rewritten and drastically changed by Walon Green. Despite his dissatisfaction Miller was still present on set every day to learn more about filmmaking and returned to co-write RoboCop 3 with Fred Dekker.

Plot

Nuke is overrunning the Country distributed by the evil cult leader Cain. The cops are still striking, Crime is rampaging through Detroit but RoboCop is still on duty. Still coping with his new life, Alex Murphy faces the harsh reality of not being able to be with his family again.

With the city in debt to Omni Consumer Products and on the brink of having all city assets taken over by the giant corporation, OCP plans on recreating RoboCop for their new Delta City. With numerous failed attempts at building competent cyborgs, The Old Man Turns to Doctor Faxx who seems willing to do anything to make the program succeed, just what OCP needs.

With RoboCop on a stake with Lewis, he discovers that there has been a corrupt cop feeding Cain information about the police. After interrogating him, RoboCop finds out where Cain is hiding and goes to try and capture him. After being attacked and disabled. Cain and his gang capture him and start to torture him tearing him into pieces.

Dumped at the police station, he is brought in for repairs at OCP under the supervision of Dr. Faxx. Along with bringing him back online, the company has written several thousand new directives into his programing. Not wanting to live like this he risks killing himself by running several thousand volts through him wiping the programing. Still determined to get Cain he talks the striking officers to join him in getting Cain. After he raid on the hide out the cops manage to kill most of Cain gang but the leader tries to escape before being hunted down by RoboCop and stopped. Alive but in a crucial state Cain is taking into hospital.

Dr. Faxx pays Cain a visit but eventually kills him to use his brain for the next RoboCop project. After successfully incorporating Cain's brain into the cyborg body, he is sent to kill the mayor and the people behind the funding for the city: the remains of Cain's gang.

During the an OCP presentation of the new Delta City, the Old Man presents the audience with RoboCop 2. After the Old Man shows a vile of Nuke and states he will rid the streets of it, RoboCop 2 goes on a murderous rampage. Murphy abruptly interrupts the towering menace and battles him throughout the complex. After the fight spills outside, RoboCop retrieves a canister of Nuke. Distracting Cain with the Nuke, Murphy leaps his way onto his updated counterpart's back, tearing out his brain and smashing it on the street.

With Cain's destructive spree stopped, the Old Man looks for a scapegoat to blame for the disaster, instructing the lawyers to put all the blame on Dr. Faxx.

Marketing

To tie in to the film, Orion Pictures hired writer Ed Naha to write a novelization of the film. The book entitled RoboCop 2: A Novel was published by Jove Books. Naha had also written the novelization to Paul Verhoeven's RoboCop. To tie into the film, Marvel Comics hired writer Alan Grant to write a monthly RoboCop comic. The series was only intended to run a few issues but sales were high enough for the comic become a full series. The series ran from May 1990 to January 1992 with 23 issues printed. The film also received a second tie in comic series lasting three issues called RoboCop 2 adapting the film.

A third comic, a color reprinting of the original RoboCop comic was also published in 1990. To further tie into the film, video game developers Ocean and Data East released a tie in video game based on the film for various consoles of the era. The versions released on the Commodore 64 were side scrolling platformers while the versions for the ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC allowed for both horizontal movement and vertial as well.

The game released in 1990 was released for eight different video game systems including the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, NES, Atari ST, the Nintendo Game Boy, the Amiga, and arcade version was also put out. MobyRank which ranks reviews from various video game critics has RoboCop 2 at a 74 out of 100 points meaning the game was positively received.

Music

Composer Basil Poledouris who scored the first film did not return to score RoboCop 2 so composer Leonard Roseman was hired to score the film instead. Roseman opted not to retain any of Poledouris' score for the first film and composed all new music himself. The film's score like the film was negatively received by both fans and critics; mainly for it's use of a choir singing the name RoboCop. The soundtrack, under the label of Varese Sarabande was released in 1990 with ten tracks on cassette and vinyl instead of on CD which by that time had nearly caused cassettes and vinyl records to become obsolete.

Reception

Unlike the first film, RoboCop 2 opened to mainly mixed reviews for its focus on violence instead of the characters of RoboCop and Anne Lewis. It was also widely criticized for not focusing the theme of man versus machine like the first film instead opting for more action scenes. Variety Magazine's critic gave a negative review of the film saying: "This ultraviolent, nihilistic sequel has enough technical dazzle to impress hardware fans, but obviously no one in the Orion front office told filmmakers that less is more". Noted Chicago Sun Times critic Roger Ebert also gave a negative review of the film saying: "The movie's screenplay is a confusion of half-baked and unfinished ideas". However the film is not without its' defenders as critic Brian Orndoff said "While entertaining, the sequel just isn’t sneaky enough, barreling forward where Verhoeven peacocked impressively".

On review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes, RoboCop 2 holds a "rotten" 34% approval rate from critics out of 32 reviews. From audiences, the film holds a 37% approval rate out of 85,881 ratings on the site.