Starring: Page Fletcher, Maurice Dean Wint, Anthony Lemke, Maria Del Mar, Leslie Hope, Kevin Jubinville, and Geraint Wyn Davies
Grade: B
After all these years, there’s still a scene where Abby tries to punch RoboCop in his armor with her bare hand and is surprised at how much it hurt. It’s titanium! Where the fuck have you been?
Summary
To begin the first episode “Dark Justice“, RoboCop/Alex Murphy’s (Fletcher) prime directives are listed. For the record, this caption opens every episode of the miniseries.
- Serve the public trust
- Protect the innocent
- Uphold the law
In Delta City, we open with news program MediaNet with female anchors Ashley St. John Smyth (Leslie Ann Coles) and P.J. Flinders (Sara Sahr). They detail a story about terrorist Bone Machine (Richard Fitzpatrick) recently decimating a low-income housing project. No major injuries are reported but damage is estimated to be $17 million. As Flinders states this, a graphic racks up Bone Machine’s total statistics as $90.8 million in damages, 114 kills, and 729 injured. They go to a Security Concepts Spokesperson Sara Cable (Del Mar) where she is sure that Bone Machine’s actions are not indicative of the state of Delta City as a whole. Going back to Flinders, she comments that Delta City Security has officially instituted its revolutionary “Zero Fatalities” policy, which prohibits the use of lethal force in the apprehension of suspects. They cut to Dr. Lester Worth (Francois Klanfer) who argues that criminals only respond to lethal force when they themselves feel threatened. If the police don’t provoke them, they won’t act in that manner. Smyth talks about how supporters are confident the new policy will ensure Delta City remains the safest place on Earth. In other news, RoboCop is celebrating his tenth year of operation. OCP (Omni Consumer Products) threw a celebratory party for him. After a clip for recently released home video movie RoboCop’s Greatest Moments, Smyth looks to the camera and thanks RoboCop for making Delta City the safest place on Earth. Following this, there’s a man in a bank shooting at police officers stationed outside. He’s the leader of a terrorist group known as “DaBombs”. Using a megaphone, negotiator and representative of OCP’s legal affairs division Sandra Smiles (Ellen Dubin) says she’s authorized to take any demands they may have. The man sends one of his cohorts outside with a bomb strapped to his chest to show them all they mean business. The guy does and blows himself up in front of everyone. Even so, Sandra persists on a “mutually favorable exit strategy”, so the man goes on about how he wants a news crew there immediately. The cop next to Sandra suggests they shoot him, but Sandra reminds him how this would be a violation of OCP policy and it won’t happen under her watch.
Hearing this, Delta City Security Commander John T. Cable (Wint) steps out of his car to tell Sandra this isn’t her watch, it’s his. Cable takes the megaphone from Sandra and tells the man inside he has two minutes to state his demands. Sandra tries to protest, but he shuts her up quick and takes control of the situation.
The cop next to Sandra tells Cable how OCP has suspended all lethal ammunition, and he’s shocked. Sandra tells Cable this isn’t Los Angeles, and they have rules, but Cable tells her to shut up again. Cable is told they have pepper spray, tasers, and rubber bullets. The man sends another one of his bomb-strapped people outside, so Cable uses his own guns and fires them at the guy before he explodes. Right after, RoboCop appears and asks rather smugly if they are having trouble. Cable assures him it’s nothing he can’t handle. Seeing him, RoboCop gets a quick flashback to a criminal putting a gun to a younger Cable’s neck. Regardless, Cable says he doesn’t need a machine to do a man’s job, but RoboCop moves forward anyway. Sandra yells at RoboCop to not use unnecessary violence, knowing he still has regular ammunition in his gun. However, RoboCop goes to the steps and headshots one of the bad guys immediately. As RoboCop breaks the doors to the bank down, Cable tells Sandra that she doesn’t need him or any of the cops before sadly leaving. RoboCop threatens the bombers until they are interrupted by Bone Machine. He’s about to shoot, but RoboCop shoots his left arm cannon to the point where it malfunctions. With the exception of the leader of the bombers, everyone else runs out of the bank. RoboCop demands Bone Machine identify himself, but he uses his other arm cannon to shoot down RoboCop, launching him into the window. The main bomber fires his machine gun at Bone Machine, but Bone Machine shoots the guy and his vest explodes, killing him. As Sandra continues to shout about a negotiation, RoboCop malfunctions on the ground and Bone Machine disappears in the smoke of tear gas he has go off. The one cop goes to check on RoboCop, and it shows that he’s on the verge of a systems shutdown. In the midst of static clouding his vision, he also gets flashbacks of the younger Cable with that criminal pointing a gun at him again, with Cable asking, “What are you prepared to do?”. Soon after, his screen goes black.
At OCP Headquarters, all the executives have a meeting where the CEO or “The Old Woman” (Tedde Moore) details how OCP is close to a complete financial collapse. The privatization of Delta City has gone over budget by $700 billion, which makes them the sole owner of the single largest money pit in history. They have a 30% decrease in shareholder confidence and increased competition overseas. Without immediate action, she says OCP’s days are numbered. She wants solutions and new ideas. No one says a word until junior executive Damian Lowe (Jubinville) chimes in with a presentation on the spot. He talks about how they are being left in the dust when it comes to cybernetics and artificial intelligence. His idea is “SAINT” (Sentient Artificial Intelligence NeuroNet Terminus), developed by himself and his team in the New Technologies Division. He then shows an animated video to the board about the profit potential of the SAINT project and the financial benefit to OCP. He goes on about the possibilities of a computer thinking for itself, how its capable of automating the day-to-day activities of the building and the people at work within it, and how they can control it. After a successful trial run at OCP, they can expand the project outward, giving them control over Delta City and its citizens at their fingertips. As soon as his presentation is over, Sara points out how risky it is to put all your eggs in one basket. Lowe sees it as streamlining and increasing efficiency and control, which he subtly insults Security Concepts for failing to do. Sara counters with how their focus in Security Concepts is to worry about reality, not a magic box that will fix all their problems. The CEO tells Lowe that OCP isn’t interested in abstractions, but he explains that this isn’t the case. He has a working prototype of SAINT in the lab currently. It was built with presently available components, so there were no additional costs involved in its creation. With a modest commitment of resources, they could test SAINT on the OCP building in 10 days. Hearing this, the CEO greenlights SAINT, but she wants results. Lowe promises there will be. Lowe sits down while Sara coughs and he tells her to choke on it, prompting her to call him an asshole in-between more coughs.
At Precinct 1, RoboCop is sitting in his special chair while Dr. Colleen Frost (Meg Hogarth) works on him. She tells him that she had to rig some of his existing components, so he may feel a bit delicate. The replacement parts she requested are back ordered and they might not be in for another month. Some of them aren’t even made anymore, which makes Alex Murphy feel older. He asks Frost why she takes care of him, but she just says someone has to. He questions if she has family, but she explains that a lot of them died. The people that are still alive, she doesn’t care too much for. Plus, she finds it peaceful there. RoboCop brings up how he thought that when he was originally brought back from the dead, he assumed it was for a reason. Frost assures him that he was. She used to live on Cadilliac Heights and said it was a warzone before he came along. Murphy explains that he was talking about in a “higher sense”, prompting Frost to joke that she didn’t realize he was a philosopher. Back at OCP, Lowe goes to technician Ed Hobley’s (David Fraser) office and tells him the good news that he got SAINT approved. Hobley excitedly says he can have it ready in 6 months, but Lowe tells him he has 10 days and needs full building automation in that timeframe. Hobley replies that it’s not possible, but Lowe has confidence in him. Hobley argues that even if he had the staff that he was promised and never got, he would still need to finish constructing the NeuroNet. Lowe chalks it up to a confidence problem. He goes to a computer and sees it hard at work by itself processing files. Hobley explains how he’s teaching it three-dimensional thinking. You can’t program the NeuroNet like a computer. It has to learn. Moving on, Lowe goes on about how long they’ve known each other, how he’s looked after Hobley, and how he started Lowe Technologies for him. Hobley points out that Lowe still sold it to OCP, but Lowe argues that this was so Hobley would have access to the resources he needs. Hobley scoffs and brings up how Lowe said he wouldn’t have to work in a basement anymore. Lowe says this is Hobley’s ticket out of the basement and walks away before Hobley can protest further.
In the bathroom, Lowe tells a skeptical executive how they’ll all be working for him next month. Another executive James Murphy (Lemke) walks into the bathroom and says Lowe’s idea makes sense. Lowe notes how James is new, so James admits he just graduated from the executive training program. He tries to shake Lowe’s hand, but he declines. James takes it in stride and exits. That night, James is in his office and gets an anonymous email from “A Friend” with a message stating, “There are two types of people – Those who truly listen, and those who wait to speak. Be aware of new allies, and new enemies”. James tries to trace it to find out who it is, but nothing comes up. Before he leaves, he runs into Sara who strikes up a conversation with him about how things are going. He goes to use the elevator, so Sara uses her executive card to activate it, commenting about the privileges her position allots her before leading him inside. James mentions that he likes to think rewards are earned through hard work. Sara sarcastically asks if he thinks it will get him to the top before bringing up how people start rumors about a fresh face rising up the ladder. James asks if she’s implying he slept his way to the top, prompting Sara to mention how he does manage to have the right information at the right time and obstacles conveniently disappear from his path. She says he must have one hell of a guardian angel looking over him. James tells her that he doesn’t listen to gossip and doesn’t believe in angels. He just says it’s possible he’s a good executive. Sara tries to goad him into saying more by questioning if he thinks things could be better. James concedes this because things can always be better, so Sara asks what he’s prepared to do to change the situation. He says he would do “whatever it takes”. OCP practically raised him. After his parents died, if it weren’t for the corporate orphanage, he would probably be living on the streets in Old Detroit. This is why he feels he has an obligation to protect the company. Sara questions if this means protecting OCP from itself or if it violates official company policy. James confirms. Regarding the latter in a hypothetical situation, he clarifies if the policy was damaging that he would. Sara says she’s glad to hear it, and the two exit the elevator.
Back at Precinct 1, Frost tells RoboCop that he’s going to be fine, but he may want to think twice before crossing paths with Bone Machine again. She wonders aloud where someone would get the type of firepower he has, prompting RoboCop to go through his playback video of his encounter with Bone Machine. He zooms in, but the image is still blurry. He gets up from his chair, stabs his data spike into the computer, does some extra enhancing on the image, and finds that the weapons come from OCP. He puts on his helmet and storms out to find Cable. In the hallway, he gets another flashback memory of Cable getting the gun pointed to his neck. He tells Murphy to take the shot, as this is from a decade prior when Murphy was still his full human self and him and Cable were partners. Murphy continually tells the criminal he’s under arrest. The criminal swears he will kill Cable, and Cable is adamant Murphy take the shot. He asks Murphy, “What are you prepared to do?”. Going back to the present, Cable is in his office playing chess by himself for some reason. On the wall, he has a framed picture of him and the former Alex Murphy, and his award for “Policeman of the Year” for his work in Detroit. RoboCop enters Cable’s office and asks who his opponent is in chess. Cable admits it’s no one and that it’s just an old game he seems to come back to, whatever that means. RoboCop calls out the next few moves and proclaims, “Check mate”, so Cable asks him what he wants. Using his data spike, RoboCop uploads the picture of Bone Machine and how his weapons come straight from Security Concepts at OCP. Cable realizes it’s from the inside, and both men discuss how it’s a cop taking the law into his own hands, something which RoboCop tells Cable directly, “It happens”. If RoboCop is so sure it’s a cop, Cable wonders why he would risk giving it to him. RoboCop comments that Cable has a good reputation before grabbing a chess piece and making a move. As he walks towards the door, Cable tells him to keep this new information between them for now.
In a flashback a decade prior, Murphy and Cable sneak in a game of chess in the locker room a half hour before they’re on shift. Cable wins with a move that Murphy didn’t see coming, which he calls his signature, the “Cable maneuver”. Murphy accuses him of cheating, but Cable explains, “In the end, it all comes down to what you’re prepared to do to win”. Cable comes out of his flashback and looks at Alex Murphy’s files on his computer. His death certificate is there and everything, but there is a section that is classified. When he clicks on it, the OCP logo shows up and a warning signal that says, “The data you have requested is restricted to OCP Gold level or higher. Access from remote terminals is denied. Please consult your Security Concepts supervisor”. On MediaNet, Flinders details a top story where radical militant group “The Sons of Santa Anna” has destroyed The Alamo at a belated attempt at retribution for General Sam Houston’s defeat of the Mexican Army 200 years ago. The group released a statement commenting, “Better late than never”. Smyth details how Malcolm X-Plosion (Rogue Johnson) of gang DaBombs has filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against OCP for injuries sustained at the hands of Delta City security. A video is shown of Malcolm X-Plosion’s lawyer talking about how his client’s rights were grossly violated by the police department and if they want a fight, they will get one. As soon as he’s done talking, Malcolm unveils a bomb strapped to his chest and blows them all up. The feed is cut. After an interlude from Archie Nemesis (Mark Breslin) of The Archie Nemesis Show, where he advocates for the weapons to go from the cops to the citizens to maximize damage potential, they go to Smyth who is at the crime scene of another Bone Machine appearance. Three were killed and dozens more were injured. The establishment that was destroyed used to be for the offices of the former Detroit Police Department in the years preceding Delta City Security taking over. The cameraman notices RoboCop coming to the crime scene, but Smyth tells the cameraman to forget about him because he’s old news. RoboCop gets word on what happened from a cop, and RoboCop wonders if Bone Machine’s motives were personal.
In a flashback, we see the Detroit Police Department back when Alex Murphy was still himself. Murphy exits the building and sees a newspaper with a headline talking about the Motor City Mangler claiming another victim. He goes over to Cable who’s waiting in the car. Cable doesn’t know what’s worse about the Mangler, the way he kills them or what he does to the body afterwards. Officer Albert Bixler joins them on the sidewalk and says the Mangler better watch himself if he gets in his line of fire, prompting Cable to respond, “I’ll buy that for a dollar”. Later, Cable and Murphy drive, and Cable talks about how the city has turned into a cesspool. Murphy agrees but notes the possibility of OCP intervening could lead to more money for the department, which may get more cops on the street. Cable asks if he would really trust his life to a conglomerate. Murphy isn’t sure but saw one of their representatives on Media Break and said he had some pretty good ideas. Cable tells him that his wife Sara works for them in some new recruitment program and apparently got word she may be executive material down the line. Either way, Cable doesn’t care. Finally, Murphy asks him what’s wrong, so he admits that Sara wants to go through with the divorce. Apparently, she couldn’t see herself as a cop’s wife anymore and she had her own future to worry about. Just then, they get word on dispatch about a dog, so they go to some neighborhood. As Cable knocks on the door, Murphy talks to some neighbors. Someone shuts the blinds when Cable knocks. With this, Cable and Murphy go around the house, jump the fence, and take a look at the dog. To their shock, they see the dog eating human flesh. Then, they hear movement in the house. There’s a chance the Motor City Mangler is in the house. They go to the back of it, and Murphy reminds Cable they have to get a warrant. Cable sarcastically tells him to get one but wonders about the possibility of another person being in the house. Cable breaks the window of the basement and enters with Murphy reluctantly following. They investigate the basement and see vials, bloody weapons, weird statues, and a lot of meat. They open one meat freezer, and it’s as bloody as expected. Then, they hear movement from the other meat freezer. Cable takes the lock off and a woman pops out with her hands bound and her mouth duct taped.
Murphy calms her down, and Cable goes upstairs. He finds a young girl murdered in her chair watching TV. Immediately after, the Motor City Mangler puts a knife to Cable’s neck. The Mangler starts shouting for Murphy to show himself, so he leaves the girl to go upstairs. He has his gun on the Mangler while the Mangler now has Cable’s gun pointed at Cable’s neck. Cable tells Murphy to take the shot. Then, he asks, “What are you prepared to do?”. Murphy puts his gun on the ground. The Mangler reaches over to shoot Murphy, which allows Cable to knock the Mangler against the wall. However, once the Mangler stands back up, Cable shoots and kills him. Murphy can’t believe it. He then tells Murphy he was right about the warrant. In the present, James works another late night at OCP and gets a confidential email. It’s from Sara. She wants him to meet her at the loading dock at 8PM, so he agrees. When the time comes, she talks about how she was his age when she joined OCP, how they were young and hungry back then, and how they believed in their hype a little too much and got relaxed, which is why the company is where it’s at now. She uses her clearance card to turn off a laser-protected room and they go in. It’s a room where OCP buries all its failures in big boxes. Sara goes on about needing people of vision and strength to help OCP. She thinks James is one of these people and she backs up into several other young executives who appear in the room. She welcomes James to “The Trust”. Back at Precinct 1, Cable does a search on Bone Machine’s weapon and finds a match in OCP’s stock. It’s a phalanx bio-booster armor prototype. After further typing, an error message says that research material is classified, and he needs a security code to access the files. He enters one but it says it’s not valid. He’s denied access. The same warning message from earlier pops up on the sceen right after. He’s able to print the screen, but he tosses the image to the side once James enters his office to greet him. He asks Cable if he remembers him, and Cable does, assuming correctly they have stopped calling him “Jimmy” by now. They discuss how he’s the first person from OCP that has shown up since he came here, how James got assigned to Security Concepts, and how that technically makes James his boss.
James downplays it and considers himself more of a liaison. Even so, he was just there to introduce himself, though he brings up Cable’s reputation for being difficult. He tells Cable he doesn’t want any personal concerns to interfere with his business. As RoboCop stands at the doorway, Cable tells James he wouldn’t expect anything less from Alex Murphy’s son. James calls it a small world, turns to face RoboCop, and goes in the opposite direction to leave. Cable tries to tell RoboCop he has something, but RoboCop leaves the room too. He only stops to look at him when Cable tells him to watch his back. RoboCop finds James in the hallway, so James asks if he wants something. RoboCop doesn’t say anything and leaves. Later, RoboCop is on his special chair, and Frost wonders why he didn’t tell James that he is his father. RoboCop argues that it’s better this way. That night, Cable breaks into Sara’s office and waits for her. He shows her the printed-out image of Bone Machine’s weapon and armor that was made 6-7 years ago in OCP. She says they were developing a lot of urban pacification hardware but most of it didn’t work. Cable asks if this is one that did, but she denies knowing the details, inviting him to look into it himself. Cable counters by pointing out how though he’s the head of Delta City Security, he doesn’t have full security clearance. She tells him Gold Clearance is only for executives. They can’t hand out this type of clearance to “civil servants”. Cable asks his ex-wife why she hired him. Sara leans in and implies she could allow access to the archives, prompting Cable to tell her to do so. The next day, Sara tells James that Cable has opened up an investigation that can be damaging to them. James questions what she wants him to do. She wants him to think of Cable as a competitor and then asks what he would do. James said he would remove him and do “whatever it takes”. With this, Sara gives him the assignment. Before she leaves, James asks Sara if she knew his father. She didn’t and leaves. James notes that he didn’t know his father either. A suspicious Lowe tells Hobley that he thinks Sara has something planned while Hobley works on the computer. Sara knows that when SAINT is in charge, Lowe will be the guy, which is why Lowe is sure she is going to try and sabotage the entire project.
Hobley thinks he’s just paranoid, but Lowe wants eyes on Sara 24/7. Moving on, Hobley says they’re on schedule, but he had to use sections from the NeuroNet prototype, which allowed him to fill certain gaps. The next morning, Frost goes to RoboCop’s room and sees an unknown technician scurry out the door. She wakes up RoboCop to check on him and asks who the technician was. However, he didn’t know the guy was there because he was dreaming. Frost just chalks this up to a guy looking for the bathroom, which is stupid because he was carrying a toolbox. She asks how he’s feeling, and it looks like all systems are functioning good. However, there’s one notable difference with his prime directives when they come up on his screen.
- Serve the public trust
- Protect the innocent
- Uphold the law
- Terminate John Cable
RoboCop becomes fixated on his new fourth directive, and he drives out. He gets a video transmission from Cable who tells RoboCop he is going to Security Concepts’ bunker on the west end and how he needs RoboCop to meet him there. He thinks there’s something there RoboCop will want to see. While there, Cable uses his security codes to get the cell unlocked which had the weaponry Bone Machine used. He opens the cell and it’s empty. He presses in a code, and a voice states that the content was signed out by John Cable himself. Cable realizes that Sara is framing him. Just then, RoboCop shows up and tells Cable he’s under arrest before pulling out his gun (“Dead or alive, you’re coming with me”.). A confused Cable runs to the upper deck but is shot in the leg and falls back down to the lower level. In a last-ditch effort, he calls him “Alex”. After seeing his face turn, Cable realizes his hypothesis that Murphy is RoboCop is correct. Cable reminds RoboCop how he was the one who came to Cable for help, and that’s why he’s here. He pleads with RoboCop that someone is playing the both of them while RoboCop states the Miranda Rights. When Cable reminds him of the oath he took as a police officer as Alex Murphy, RoboCop runs through his directives and gets confused on what to do. RoboCop gets a nosebleed and starts to short circuit, but he tells Cable to run in the middle of it because he’s fighting his programming, so he does. RoboCop has a flashback of Cable getting an award for valor following the fallout from the Mangler incident and Murphy is present at the ceremony. Cable and Murphy share an uneasy glance before Cable begins his speech talking about how this is one of the proudest days of his life. Back in the present, MediaNet‘s Smythe says Cable has been positively identified as Bone Machine, is at large, and is considered to be extremely dangerous. However, Delta City Security has said RoboCop is hot on his trail. A commercial is shown for a TV special called When Good Cops Go Bad: The Hunt for John Cable. That night, Lowe sits in Sara’s chair in her office. He types up an email to the Old Woman acting as if he’s Sara and how she has concerns for the senior board members because they smell. Sara enters and questions what he’s doing, and they trade subtle insults. Lowe then mentions her “No Fatalities” policy being great PR but how it coincidentally crippled the city’s security as soon as Bone Machine appeared.
He thinks the fallout will lead to the entire executive board resigning. This will lead them to get younger, so he assumes it will be Sara since this is her plan. Just then, Sara walks over and deletes the email Lowe typed up before he could send it. Lowe points out how her ex-husband in Cable being Bone Machine makes it seem like she’s involved and it won’t be long before the Old Woman finds out. Sara implies that Lowe is just going to lie and tell her this made-up story. Lowe changes the subject by saying they know where the future lies and how the Old Woman doesn’t like him. Sara assures Lowe that she doesn’t like him either. He doesn’t care. Actually, he wants in on her plan. Whatever she’s into, he wants a piece of it. He then blackmails her with security camera footage of Cable speaking with Sara in her office yesterday. She tells him to leave, but he responds by telling her to think it over. Following this, Sara meets with Albert Bixler, the real Bone Machine. He’s pissed that Cable is taking credit. Sara plainly tells him to not believe everything MediaNet tells him. Changing the subject, Bixler says that Bone Machine was supposed to be Delta City’s top cop. Sara says he has to be more flexible than that. RoboCop is tracking Cable as they speak. She gives Albert the tracker implanted in RoboCop. If he finds RoboCop, he will find Cable. She promises she will keep up her end of the bargain if so: Albert will be reinstated as Delta City’s top cop, not Bone Machine. There are big changes, and he can be a part of them. All she needs from Albert is one more job. As RoboCop travels through the night, he gets another flashback. This time, it follows the ceremony where Cable was celebrated. In private, Cable finds Murphy packing up his locker. Murphy’s transfer got approved. He’s going to Metro West. Cable notes how rough it is, but Murphy just says OCP is sending a lot of new guys there. Finally, Cable says to Murphy that the Mangler would have gotten away if he didn’t do anything. He asks Murphy what he expected him to do, prompting Murphy to get in his face and telling him to be a cop. Cable says he is, but Murphy doesn’t know what Cable is anymore. Cable questions why he didn’t snitch then, so Murphy admits that he owes Cable and that he is still a cop.
Before Murphy leaves, Cable tells him that he can always come back and to watch his back in general.
In the present, RoboCop shows up to what is left of Metro South. It’s where he used to work with Cable, where it all began. He follows the wounded Cable, as Cable shouts and pleads with Murphy. Murphy is still trying to fight his directives, especially once he’s across from Cable in the same room again. He says he doesn’t want to kill Cable. Hearing this, Cable realizes he doesn’t have a choice either. He stands across from RoboCop without anything in-between them and invites RoboCop to shoot him. RoboCop tries to refuse, but Cable says he’s destroying himself. The only way out is to shoot. Cable doesn’t want to die at the hands of a machine, so he tells Murphy that he makes sure the man does the killing. He says Murphy owes him that much. Again, Cable asks what he’s prepared to do. Suddenly, Bone Machine blows a hole through the wall and starts firing at them both. Cable goes to take cover. Eventually, Bone Machine makes it all the way to Cable’s hiding spot and is about to kill him until RoboCop starts shooting at Bone Machine. They go back and forth until Cable rejoins the fight, but Bone Machine punches him with his armor and then holds a gun to his head in an effort to threaten RoboCop. It mirrors what Murphy and Cable went through all those years ago with the Mangler. Cable tells him to take the shot and asks, “What are you prepared to do?”. RoboCop’s targeting system is having trouble because his directives are still going back and forth on who to stop first. RoboCop apologizes to Cable, so Cable knows it’s coming. He tells Murphy to do it. RoboCop shoots and kills Cable. Next, he goes straight for Bone Machine and continuously fires. He shoots so much he knocks Albert’s mask off. Once he gets up close, RoboCop gets a flashback to Albert commenting how the Mangler better watch it if he were to get in his line of fire. It’s the same guy! Once RoboCop realizes it, Albert asks if they know each other. He denies it. Albert goes to shoot him in the face, but RoboCop uses his data spike to brutally stab Albert to death.
Afterwards, RoboCop goes to check on Cable. He says they did what they had to do. He tells Cable to not die, but he responds that everyone does. On MediaNet the next day, they reveal Albert Pixler as Bone Machine and how RoboCop was able to take him out. Albert was fired years ago following allegations surrounding the shooting and killing of a suspect. They also talk respectfully about Cable getting killed in the shootout. Smythe says that false news breaking of Cable being Bone Machine was part of a plan to lure the real Bone Machine out. It succeeded, but it cost Cable is life. They show a video of Sara’s comment on the matter. She talks about it being a sad day for all of them at OCP and how Cable was a symbol of everything good about law enforcement. James is watching this on TV. Then, he gets an anonymous email again. This email states, “Your father has been dead for ten years. Don’t you think it’s time you learned the truth?”. At Precinct 1, Frost is working on RoboCop, and he’s tearing up, as he is playing back Cable’s death over and over. In some laboratory, Dr. Hill (Jack Duffy) is nervous about this surgery because he hasn’t done “one of these” in a while. Sara chimes in to say she has faith in him. Still, Hill doesn’t guarantee it will work, as many still think the first one was a fluke. Sara calls Cable exceptional. We turn to see the new RoboCop helmet. That’s right. Sarah is turning her ex-husband Cable into a new version of RoboCop.
In “Meltdown“, we open with MediaNet, with Flinders detailing how RoboCop has been taking out the remaining cells of the anarchist group Da Bombs. Smyth chimes in to say some have called RoboCop’s actions excessive and questions if he’s become too violent. Dr. Lester Worth says the question can’t be reserved for RoboCop because he’s not human. In other news, Smyth says Cable was laid to rest officially after his firefight with Bone Machine. She gives him credit for coming back to Delta City and working in bringing DaBombs to justice. Sara comments and talks about how Cable was a role model for all citizens of Delta City and what they can and should be. An advertisement is shown for TV special The John Cable Story: Death of a Hero. At OCP Headquarters, Hobley is hard at work in the late hours of the night working on teaching the computer program. It works and sounds like a child, and information is put on the screen with the holographic image of the childlike program literally consuming the data. Just then, Anne R. Key (Hope) breaks into the building with her two cohorts Abby (Marni Thompson) and Lexx (Francoise Yip). They take out Hobley and start stealing files from the computer. The transfer will take about ten minutes. Unfortunately, Hobley hits the alarm attached to his belt, and the alarms go off. Lexx throws Hobley to the ground again since she knows he’s responsible. They can’t just leave because they will lose everything, but they are only at 16% with their download. Trying to buy them some time, Anne accesses the building security system. Meanwhile, Division Commander Carl Buck (Bobby Johnston) pulls up with Delta City Security and calls it in. Immediately after, Sandra shows up and assumes control, telling Buck to take a team inside OCP right away. Buck sends a team in, but they don’t find anyone on the first floor. The automated security system however notes that they have entered the building illegally. It gives the team five seconds to leave. The team leader rushes everyone out of the door safely, but he doesn’t make it out himself, as the security system shoots out lasers that cut him in half. Seeing the message that the “trespasser” was exterminated, the two women yell at Anne for what she did. Anne tries to shut it down, but she can’t because it’s locked into security mode.
Outisde, the lasers from the security system are activated and it slices through the rest of Buck’s team, so Buck calls for backup. While Sandra pleads for no unnecessary violence, RoboCop drives in and takes his car straight through the glass wall of OCP to break in. As soon as he steps out of the car, the lasers attack him, but he fights through it to find the subbasement Anne, Abby, and Lexx are at. The girls see on the security camera footage how he’s headed their way. At the same time, the data transfer is still only at 75%. RoboCop enters, but everyone is hiding. It turns out that the women have stealth technology that allows for them to be temporarily invisible. They use weapons to shock RoboCop until they reveal themselves. When they do, he easily dispatches of Abby and Lexx. Anne pulls out a blue electricity infused staff-like weapon, kicks RoboCop through some glass, and shocks him to the ground. She uses her other weapon to electrocute him further, and the women escape by again using their stealth technology to become invisible on their way out. Hobley checks on RoboCop as he malfunctions. Next, an advertisement is shown for the Z.F.A. (Zero Fatality Act), and it’s led by Officer Down (John Jay Herbert). He details how safe everyone is because this new act has “cut down crime related casualty statistics by almost 47%”. He then gives credit to all the law enforcement officers who have lost their lives while enforcing this act and making Delta City the “safest place on Earth”. Ironically, this list of slain officers shown next to Down is rather extensive. At the grave of Cable, James stands alone to pay his respects since he missed the funeral. Sara approaches him and questions whether he regrets things, but James replies by saying not to confuse honoring a man’s memory with a character flaw. She wonders if he will be at the next man’s gravesite as well, so James points out how she’s there too. She just says they did what they had to do. Following this, James puts flowers on his mother Ellen’s grave. He looks over at his father Alex Murphy’s grave but walks away.
At Precinct 1, Frost tells RoboCop how he can’t keep going places guns blazing. His internal cooling system has ruptured, and half his processers melted, among other things. Frost notes how if it wasn’t for his insulation, they might have been selling him for scrap instead of putting him back together. RoboCop is ignoring her because he keeps replaying Cable’s death in his head. Finally, he gets up from his chair with the intention of locating Cable. Back at OCP, the Old Woman tells Sara that Security Concepts really dropped the ball, considering the timing of the “No Fatalities” policy and how it allowed for the Bone Machine incident to happen. On top of that, she mentions the security breach too. Sara concedes that the timing sucks, but she argues how no one could have predicted the existence of Bone Machine. Lowe chimes in and comments how he doesn’t know about that. The Old Woman admits Cable dying is the only reason why she hasn’t asked for Sara’s resignation. The Old Woman asks if she has assessed the security breach, so Sara reveals they have heard rumors about well-equipped tech thieves operating. The Old Woman wonders if they were looking for the SAINT prototype, so Lowe interrupts to say there was minor damage to the system. Sara scoffs at this because the profile of the tech thieves suggests they steal technology that only people can use. The Old Woman asks Lowe if it will affect their automation schedule, but he doesn’t see how. On the other hand, he says the damage wasn’t caused by thieves. It was actually RoboCop, which allows Lowe to blame Security Concepts even more. The Old Woman doesn’t want to hear it, pointing out to Lowe that RoboCop is the only reason any of them still have a job. Without him, OCP and Delta City would be in complete chaos. Sporting a neck brace, Hobley is cleaning up his office from the glass on the ground. Lowe enters because he wants to know how their schedule is. A distraught Hobley isn’t confident, but Lowe demands results and still thinks they can deliver it on time. Hobley turns on SAINT and asks it what its current operational status is. In a low voice, it replies that it’s at 41%. Lowe is impressed over the fact that they can communicate with SAINT directly. Lowe finds it weird that Hobley talks about SAINT like it’s a person, but Hobley says that it is in a way. He invites Lowe to speak to it. So, he asks SAINT how it is.
It replies that it’s NeuroNet is incomplete, but it thanks Lowe for asking. SAINT goes on talking about how it’s been learning at an exponential rate and it will be fully operational by the deadline. Meanwhile, RoboCop is at the grave of Cable, and he goes over to see Ellen’s grave right after, noticing the flowers laid there by James earlier. He stops by his own grave and recalls his son’s voice when he was a kid. He gets angry and punches his own grave, breaking the stone. At the same time, Dr. Hill working on Cable says that every attempt to create the original has been a disaster. He was involved with the first procedure, but he wasn’t doing everything himself like he is with Cable. Still, Sara reiterates the confidence she has in Hill. Cable is turned on, so Sara asks Hill if Cable remembers anything. Hill says the organic components of Cable’s brain serve primarily as reasoning and cognitive centers, the kind of thing they can’t effectively simulate with a computer. Hill adds that RoboCop contained some measure of instinct. However, this isn’t the case with RoboCable. There is no memory or personality. He’s just “meat”, a gelatinous aggregate of neurons and synapses, nothing more. Picking up his coffee cup, he has RoboCable test his targeting system. Hill continues by saying they have taken the opportunity to upgrade some of the initial systems. Apparently, RoboCable will be able to anticipate a target’s next move and beat it to the punch. They have also added an additional sidearm and targeting system. To test it, Hill pulls out a pen while still holdng the coffee cup. RoboCable does lock on to the pen, but it’s system does move on to target Sara for a moment, unbeknownst to her and Hill. Something to the side distracts them, and Sara yells for it to be shut off. Following this, Sara turns RoboCable back on and has added something to him, though it’s not revealed. Still, she wants to put him to some use. That night, the Old Woman goes to her car. Just as her driver is about to take her home, RoboCable approaches the car. They both mistake him for RoboCop and wonder what he wants. Then, RoboCable pulls them both out of the car, attacks them, and shoots the car up for being illegally parked. He destroys the car and leaves.
At the next board meeting, the Old Woman calls RoboCop a menace because she assumes that’s who did it. She demands to know why Security Concepts didn’t anticipate this. Sara does say that they have had reports of more aggressive behavior, but there was not enough to indicate something this terrible. The Old Woman doesn’t want to hear excuses. She demands RoboCop be taken off the streets immediately. After James points out how difficult this could be, Lowe mentions Systems Support or their nickname of “Robo Hunters”. All of the executives anxiously murmur. The Old Woman gets angry and tells Lowe they are not to discuss Systems Support in an open meeting again. He tries to protest, so she tells him to shut up in front of everyone. Sara uses this pause to accept full responsibility on behalf of Security Concepts. The Old Woman invites Sara to come up to the front of the room to speak to her in private, so Sara goes over and doubles down. However, she also wants the chance to clean it up, mentioning a radical contingency plan she has. Without hearing the details, the Old Woman gives Sara her full authority to go through any plan that will get RoboCop off the street. Sara looks over at James, and they smile at each other because they know it’s on. That night, James goes into Cable’s office to clear his hard drive on orders from Sara. Upon turning on his computer, he sees that Cable didn’t close anything out. The first thing James sees are his dad’s records. He finds the classified section and clicks on it, only to get the warning Cable got. Moving on, he goes to reformat the drive, which would erase all the data and goes through with it. On MediaNet, they talk about how RoboCop has gone rogue, showing video footage of RoboCable shooting the Old Woman’s car. Apparently, OCP has no explanation for this transformation, but they are moving quickly to put a stop to it. The Old Woman comments about how the safety of Delta City is there priority and they won’t let them down. Officially, they are recalling RoboCop. Just then, a promo is shown for TV special When RoboCop Attacks. With the citizens questioning how OCP plans on going about things, they have Sara comment.
She says the Zero Fatality Act has been suspended until further notice, and all Delta City troops have been equipped to do deal with the crisis. How far is OCP willing to go? Sara comments, “Just watch us”.
At the Delta City Shopping Plaza, RoboCop walks through and everyone runs in the opposite direction. He catches the end of MediaNet as its displayed on a big screen on the wall. After they are done bashing him, they say OCP has announced the release of an upgraded law enforcement droid to replace RoboCop. The unit’s first assignment will be the apprehension and/or destruction of RoboCop. Sandra, Buck, and all the other guards show up to detain RoboCop, telling him he’s under arrest. RoboCop says they’re making a mistake. Buck leaves, despite protests from Sandra. Sandra tells the others to prepare to fire, but one guy reminds her that he’s a cop. Sandra insists on her orders, reminds them how they all work for OCP, and they are to follow these orders. Anyone who doesn’t follow the orders will be fired, and they will lose their pension and benefits. They all shoot RoboCop, and he stands there and takes it. Pointing out how he’s made from titanium, he quips that he doesn’t think they are. He pulls out his gun and challenges them to make a move, prompting all the guards to run in the opposite direction. Sandra gets close and tries to get tough with RoboCop, but she changes her tune when he grabs her by the shirt and pulls her close. She pleads with him that she’s just following orders, so he asks who’s orders they are. Sandra says it’s Security Concepts and Sara Cable. RoboCable shows up, so RoboCop lets Sandra go. Once she runs away, RoboCop demands RoboCable identify himself. He doesn’t and just gets closer, saying how he has to bring RoboCop in. When he gets close enough, RoboCop can see through his voice analyzer that the remnants of John Cable are technically alive. Still, they get into a shootout. However, RoboCable’s dual pistols outdo RoboCop’s one, and it leads to RoboCop jumping through the window, landing on the ground, and escaping in his car. Archie Nemesis defends RoboCop flipping out on his show, noting how RoboCop has had no break, no pension, and has had the same schedule for a decade. While driving, RoboCop calculates an escape route. In arrest mode, RoboCable is in hot pursuit.
They drive through a construction site. Eventually, RoboCop tries to avoid some regular citizens in the way. He swerves and accidentally drives off into a body of water. Back at OCP, James uses his password of “Ellen” to authenticate his account, as he is a Gold Level member. He enters the Detroit Police Department database and looks at his father’s file again to see what’s classified. He opens it, but he gets an error message that says the document is restricted to project staff. It asks for his project password. He uses “Ellen” again, but it’s invalid and the session is terminated. Following this, a commercial is shown for a cartoon about RoboCable called Cyborg Police Officer. Next, a segment from X-ploitationNet is shown where host Vaughn Krass goes deep into Precinct 1 looking for RoboCop. He takes the cameraman to the room where he goes to recharge, the Robo Chamber. The door is unlocked and Krass points out where RoboCop stores his data, his chair, and the media center while he rambles about possibilities because he’s notably unprepared for the experience. Eventually, he’s spotted and runs. The camera feed is cut. Right after, a promo is shown for Escape from RoboCop’s Lair!. At night, RoboCop climbs out of the water and begins his trek. His GPS is offline. At OCP, RoboCable is in his special chair. Sara comments how she likes Cable better this way, adding that she should have had Hill use more of his brain stem when putting him back together. Lowe stands at the doorway and overhears this. He starts trash talking her, but Sara just tells him that he’s not authorized to be there. Changing the subject, Lowe brings up how she’s put down SAINT but has never taken the time to look at it. It’s already assumed provisional control over environmental systems, aspects of building maintenance, security, and surveillance. However, he’s not here to bust Sara because he’s tired of RoboCop too. Emotional manipulations aside, he does say that the Old Woman is a lot tougher than she looks. On top of that, once SAINT is fully online, she will have push-button control over the entire city and all of Sara’s “brilliant schemes will have amounted to squat”. Finally, she asks what he wants.
Lowe has been running the numbers on SAINT. Since Sara has used his resources to fund her RoboCable project, he sees them as partners. She laughs this off. Lowe points out how RoboCable failed to get RoboCop, so now RoboCop knows they are after him, which doesn’t bode well for anyone involved. RoboCable wakes up during this part but doesn’t say anything. Sara thinks RoboCop is dead, but Lowe assures her of RoboCop’s touted resilience over the years and knows they can’t assume anything until they get real evidence. With this, he tells Sara that he’s bringing in Systems Support, which apparently was a Dick Jones creation. Sara doesn’t think it’s a good idea, but she goes along with it. However, she says RoboCable goes with them or there’s no deal. At an underground market in Old Detroit, a diguised RoboCop goes to a man to see if he has a “cherhon multiprocessor in the 200-megahertz range”. The man notes how old it is, but he does have one for him. They are interrupted by a thief running through the market with electronic teddy bear toy “Otomo” he stole from a little girl named Jordan (Rebeka Coles-Budrys). Because of his directives, RoboCop has to act. He turns and clotheslines the guy in front of everyone. They all see he’s RoboCop now, so the market guy shouts that he’s a cop, and they all disperse. Anne is there and sees RoboCop. After the crowd dies down, RoboCop checks on Jordan and tells her to go home where it’s safer. When she doesn’t, he invites Jordan to come along with him to find her mother. At dusk, RoboCable is driving alongside Systems Support into Old Detroit. In some abandoned building, Jordan is still with RoboCop. He is fixing his communications system, so he can find RoboCable. Just then, he hears noise, so he tells Jordan to stay there. He looks around to investigate, and Anne appears and shocks him. RoboCop tries to say she’s under arrest, but she explains this is Old Detroit, not Delta City. It’s a whole other world out here. Jordan comes into the room and stops her. Evidently, Anne is her mother.
Carver (Eugene Clark) of Systems Support collects his group. Before he can get into his speech, Lowe immediately interrupts with a call to ask for his status. He tells Lowe they are about to deploy. He’s cool with it but tells Carver to keep him posted. Afterwards, Carver begins his speech and comments that RoboCop’s GPS tracking system is offline, so they will do this the hard way. He lets them know that RoboCop’s replacement in RoboCable is at their disposal and not vice versa. On top of that, they have the latest in anti-cyborg hardware like the “Guzi 9000 post rifle, 60 kilowatts of raw, robo-stopping power! It is non-lethal to humans, we think, so don’t screw around!”. Lowe interrupts with another call for a status update, so Carver tells him they’re moving into the city. Again, Lowe is cool with and tells Carver to keep him posted. With this, Carver directs his team to tear the city apart piece by piece. In the abandoned building, Anne gives RoboCop credit for finding a good hiding place, but he tells her that he’s not staying because someone wants him dead. She notes how bad of an idea this is because Delta City wants to kill him, but RoboCop insists he serves Delta City and protects its citizens. She argues he was carrying out a policy and he was a mere tool. She says the past doesn’t matter, but RoboCop states plainly, “The past is all I have”. She implies she has a place for them, but RoboCop tells her to go because he has work to do. With this, she grabs Jordan to leave. Before she exits, RoboCop asks Anne for her name. Once she says it, she asks for his, but he doesn’t say. Anne and Jordan leave. RoboCop looks over and notices Jordan’s Otomo teddy bear on the ground after they go. Following this, a commercial is shown for Otomo where the kid is obsessed with the toy and its millions of apparent functions. Soon after, RoboCop’s communications are working properly and he calls out to Cable, saying he knows who he is and what they have done to him. He invites RoboCable to come find him by following his trace. He even says, “Let’s finish this”.
At OCP, James uses Sara’s name to access his father’s file and uses the password “The Trust”. He opens it and sees an email from Hill to Bob Morton from the original movie with the message, “Our wait is over” regarding a donor. In Old Detroit, RoboCop approaches RoboCable and tells him that he’s been recalled and asks for RoboCable to remember. He retorts that he remembers nothing and shoots RoboCop. They get into a huge fight. Elsewhere, Anne walks with Jordan, and Jordan is bothered by RoboCop not coming with them. She was about to refer to him as a big teddy bear, but it only clicks in her head that she forgot Otomo back at the abandoned building. She then uses her apparent superspeed and runs back to get it, prompting to Anne to chase after her. RoboCop and RoboCable are still in the midst of a massive battle. At one point, RoboCop throws him down the stairs, and RoboCable tackles him through a wall. Eventually, RoboCop tries to get him to come back to his senses by pointing how they are cops and he is Alex Murphy. RoboCable just tosses him through a door. He goes after RoboCop, but RoboCop pleads with him to remember and transmits playback of the old Cable talking to him. It does confuse RoboCable, and he goes through a lot of pain seeing his own death on video. Just then, Jordan runs back and brings up wanting Otomo, but RoboCop tells her to go because of how unsafe it is there. Carver shows up with the troops, so RoboCop tells Jordan to hide. RoboCop gets into a shootout with Carver’s guys while RoboCable stands and contemplates the video footage. In the middle of it all, Lowe asks Carver what his status is. Carver says it’s a bad time, but Lowe ignores him. He tells Carver to not damage the new unit in any way because it hasn’t been paid for yet. Eventually, the Systems Support team use these electric firing weapons and shock RoboCop to the ground. Jordan checks on him, but he tells her to leave because he can’t protect her. Jordan yells at the Systems Support team to leave RoboCop alone while Carver laughs. Anne shows up to the scene with her super speed powers too.
A Systems Support guy fires and electrocutes Jordan, so RoboCop musters up enough strength to shoot the guy. Anne sees this and steps in, kicking Carver down. Then, she uses her staff to take out more guys while pleading with RoboCop to help Jordan. RoboCop crawls to Jordan but is getting continuously shocked with that weapon, and Anne is taken down as well. Anne asks RoboCable why he’s not helping them. RoboCable remembers the words of his former self about how he took an oath to uphold the law and how he’s a man, not a machine. More importantly, he’s a cop. RoboCop pleads with RoboCable too before he’s surrounded. Carver is about to shoot Anne until RoboCable finally intervenes. He starts mowing everyone down, freeing up RoboCop. RoboCop sends Jordan to check on Anne. After Anne and Jordan runs away, RoboCable refers to himself as Cable and helps RoboCop up, giving him a gun. He now remembers who he is and who they are together. Carver and his men retreat. On MediaNet, OCP claims RoboCop and RoboCable were destroyed, but it hasn’t been confirmed. With this, they ask for citizens’ thoughts on the manner. One woman calls him a bad role model for the kids because of all the shooting and killing, and another said he was dangerous and had to be put down. Sara comments that the RoboCop program is a thing of the past. OCP mourns his loss, but they are more concerned about the future. That night at OCP, the Old Woman talks with Lowe in private about how they like to think of themselves as a family business and how workers who work hard are rewarded and given bigger responsibilities. However, when one abuses their authority, the company suffers. The family suffers. Bringing up his deployment of the Systems Support Division, she says it was unauthorized, unjustified, illegal, and a direct violation of her orders. His petty personal corruption and lack of judgment cost OCP greatly and the only option left is to disavowal. OCP will absolve itself of all responsibility of what happened, any legal or civil ramifications from the events will be directed at Lowe, he is fired from his job as an executive, his shares have been revoked, and all his pensions and benefits are suspended.
He is to have his office cleared out immediately, and he is to leave his identification and OCP credit card with security on his way out. Lowe asks about SAINT since he created it, but the Old Woman explains that it’s property of OCP and it will continue to serve their needs. Lowe storms out and goes straight to Hobley to ask how the building integration is going. Hobley says it’s fantastic. All he needs is one more day. Lowe tells Hobley to go home to get some sleep. He insists he can’t because he has two more tests, but Lowe insists. Hobley concedes and leaves. With this, Lowe asks SAINT to access the environmental controls for the executive level and the boardroom specifically. In this moment of time, the Old Woman is heading up a meeting with all the other executives. There, the Old Woman asks for nominations to replace Lowe. One guy jokes they should pick the next most obnoxious person they have, and everyone laughs. Incensed, Lowe has SAINT increase barometric pressure and temperature in the room before having it lock the doors. While watching it all on security camera footage, Lowe has SAINT increase it to “30 atmospheres” until everyone in the room dies. Then, Lowe has SAINT delete the files of the event and shuts it down for the night. James is still in the building looking at the classified files and finds the helmet design of RoboCop with and without the helmet. Finally, he realizes his dad is RoboCop. In Old Detroit, RoboCop and RoboCable walk side by side down the street. To end things, there is a quote from Henry David Thoreau:
“The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots”.
RoboCop reminds RoboCable how they’ll be coming for the both of them, but he is well aware.
In “Resurrection“, Carver leads his Systems Support team through Old Detroit on the hunt for RoboCop and RoboCable. The two are walking together, but RoboCop is badly damaged and isn’t sure how long he can keep going. RoboCable sees Carver’s team in the distance, so he tries to encourage RoboCop to keep moving. With RoboCop sitting at 17.9% for his systems efficiency, RoboCable has RoboCop hide under a bridge and goes out alone to face them. RoboCop’s efficiency hits as low as 16% once he leaves. RoboCable starts taking out Systems Support guys all over the place. In the middle of it, Anne comes back with Abby and Lexx and they find RoboCop. Knowing how he can help them and he’s obviously in need of assistance, they attempt to help him escape, though he has a system shutdown at the same time. RoboCable looks around to get RoboCop out of there, but he’s beaten down with sledgehammers until Carver shows up. They’re about to take out RoboCable for good, but David Kaydick (Davies) appears and is incensed with Carver’s team coming to Old Detroit without his permission. He attacks them with his electric weapon until they run away. He then introduces himself to RoboCable as a friend, though ulterior motives are obvious. After a commercial for SAINT is shown asking why anyone should do something if SAINT can do it for them, we are shown a revamped MediaNet, which is now MN version 2.0. Two new co-anchors also lead it with Bunny Bustamente (Juliette Powell) and Rikki Oh (Marie Ward). They detail how Delta City is in mourning after it was revealed the entire OCP Board of Executives “died of simultaneous heart attacks late last night”. Rikki transitions this to saying OCP is now accepting applications for junior executive positions. They must have a strong work ethic, an MBA or higher, and sound physical health. Lester Worth says tragedies like this are common in the corporate world. Bunny quotes Lowe saying that it’s still business as usual for OCP moving forward, as Lowe is now the OCP President. There’s a quick cutaway of Lowe saying the previous board would have wanted the company to continue onward. Rikki says the board’s first action was the permanent repeal of the Zero Fatality Act.
There’s another cutaway of Lowe adding that in light of the departmental losses brought on by the mismanagement of OCP by the previous regime, he says it’s clear that the most effective form of crime management in Delta City is “bigger guns, better guns, more guns. On the street, where they belong”. After an ad for Plowshares into Swords, we cut to a church where RoboCable is on a table. David shows up and tells Cable that he will repair him. This includes his body and his mind. Following this, RoboCable has a system shutdown. At the same time, RoboCop is in Anne’s hideout. She lets him know they will fix him right up, and he goes through his system shutdown too. At OCP, Lowe heads up a meeting with all the new executives, along with Sara and James. He talks about moving forward and trusting each other, though he’s distracted at the other end of the table, which used to be reserved for the junior executives like himself, James, and Sara. He makes a call to get rid of it and to give a 27% raise to all new executive board members’ salaries. Once he hangs up, Sara questions where the money will come from, so Lowe brings up how he has initiated the integration of SAINT with the building systems. Once it begins running things, they can begin trimming overhead. Moving on, Lowe speaks about OCP going into a new era and gives Sara the new executive vice president role. Afterwards, Sara is with James in the hallway and asks how his RoboCop search is going, implying she knows about his search history. So, James admits he’s received some covert messages, but he’s not sure who has sent them. Sara says it was her and takes credit for putting James in the best foster care facilities growing up, getting James his first job there, and fast-tracking him into the executive training program. She made James who he is today. When he asked why him, she responds, “Business is war. War involves the allocation of resources, and the cultivation of loyalties”. She needed to know who’s side he was on. Sara likes how James doesn’t draw attention to himself, and since they both know what happened to the board, she wants to know who she can trust.
The two discuss what he’s prepared to do, how he doesn’t consider RoboCop his father, how Sara has officially shut down the RoboCop program, and she wants James to be the one to take care of it and tie up any loose ends. In addition, she gives James her full authority, which extends to however far he’s willing to go. Lowe watched and heard the entire conversation through SAINT’s security camera and knows Sara is plotting against him. Hobley questions why Lowe doesn’t just fire her, but he brings up the promotion he just gave her. Hobley chalks it up to the “Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer” quote, and Lowe loves it because he’s apparently never heard of this line. Hobley changes the subject to ask about the board members, but he tells Hobley to not ask questions he doesn’t want answers to, along with not discounting the possibility of divine intervention. Lowe asks if SAINT is 100% yet, so an anxious Hobley says the environmental controls need tweaking but it’s fully operational otherwise. Lowe is happy with this and talks about moving everything upstairs because he has investors and foreign buyers coming through to look at the system. At the church David is hiding at, he finishes working on RoboCable. He rerouted his power supply, and he incorporated some additional features in his defense capabilities. RoboCable asks how he knew how to do that, and David downplays having being privy to early prototypes of his system. With this, David finally introduces himself. Through his programming, Cable is aware of who David is. He’s a neurocybernetics specialist wanted by OCP for unauthorized research practices but is presumed dead. Even so, David goes on about how OCP used RoboCable like he was used by them. They killed Cable and resurrected him as a tool, as an enforcer of their tyranny. He thinks Cable should want to make them regret that. He parlays this into introducing the Svengali Chip, a chip he has inserted into RoboCable. If David uses this special device to activate it, he can send shockwaves to every circuit in RoboCable’s body in the case he disobeys him. David then adds that they were put together for a reason. They have a common enemy and friend.
RoboCop wakes up and sees that his operating system cannot be found, so he chooses to reboot even though it may cause system damage. Once he comes back online, Anne greets him and says they patched what they could, though she notes it’s a miracle with how long he’s lasted because most of his parts are outdated way past their operational lifetime. When he asks why she’s helping him, she admits she and Jordan owed him. Pointing out her scar, RoboCop asks who gave it to her. Anne asks him if he knows what it’s like to be a slave and to have no will of your own. He confirms he does. Anne vaguely responds that she used to but is past all that. Either way, she insists their location is secure. RoboCop wants to leave to help Cable, but she tells him to stay put and that Cable is on his own if he’s still out there. Once she leaves with Jordan, RoboCop sees that he’s still only at 23% system efficiency, so he can’t help Cable anytime soon regardless.
Unbeknownst to RoboCop, David now has RoboCable under his control, and David plants to inject his programming virus “Legion” into all the computers and all the people of Delta City and the world. Anne, Lexx, and Abby are the one group standing in his way, but they need RoboCop’s help to have a shred of shot in defeating him. At the same time, Sara sending James out to shut down RoboCop for good, and James still dealing with mixed feelings regarding his father being RoboCop and wanting to move up the ladder, will complicate matters in the midst of this apocalyptic plot. The intersection of all these moving parts will prove to be potentially cataclysmic.
My Thoughts:
For a television miniseries with a hard-to-ignore low budget, RoboCop: Prime Directives is low-key fantastic. If you can get past certain hangups regarding the production in its entirety, the Prime Directives are a must-watch for RoboCop fans. Clearly wanting to make up for the childish 1994 television show, the Canadian Fireworks Entertainment company conceived the miniseries to do something with the RoboCop IP before their hold on it expired. Moving back to the dark, violent, and highly satirical focus of the first two films in the franchise, RoboCop: Prime Directives serves as a finale for the old incarnation of the character and succeeds mightily. The story told through its four, feature-length episodes is exactly what a RoboCop 4 could have been. To be fair, it is marred by some terrible acting and low production quality, but the storytelling involved, the new crop of characters introduced, its compelling, interweaving plotlines involving all of them, and a return to form for the beloved franchise star makes this forgotten entry in the franchise something special, a nostalgic last ride for the legendary cyborg that serves as its own take on the series, as well as being an ode to what came before it.
RoboCop: Prime Directives does contain the satire of the first two movies, so it does more than just focus on the action. However, what it succeeds at the most is that it finds the best of both worlds. It retains the heart of the franchise with its humorous segments poking fun at sensationalism in the media, the irony of Delta City touting its safety concerns by bringing more guns into the equation, and the commercialism of everything like Bone Machine being mentioned as this murderous terrorist but MediaNet promoting his action figure on the same program. Yet, it maintains the fact that the most fun involving RoboCop is where he’s kicking ass. The Prime Directives are made with serious love for the franchise and its titular star, and it’s felt with its nerdy, action-packed, detailed, science fiction, lore-heavy screenplay we always wanted the franchise to be but weren’t allowed to admit because it would sound less intelligent. With the Prime Directives, they treat RoboCop as the legend he is, the mythical hero that has protected Delta City and Detroit for as long as we can remember. In the miniseries, RoboCop has been in operation for only a decade, with Alex Murphy’s death as a regular human being listed in 1990, a possible nod to some fans claiming the death of the franchise being RoboCop 2. Regardless, fans of the character know in their heart that Detroit’s symbol of hope has been with us longer than that. Even so, the love is not lost. It just serves the story being told here, and the way they treat RoboCop in the grand scheme of things is a respectful nod to the cinematic hero. Admittedly, not all of it works. For example, there’s one sequence where he tries to disguise himself in Old Detroit with a hooded cloak on. Though it does give off the aura of a jedi knight lurking in the shadows about to strike, it logistically doesn’t make sense because every time the character moves an inch, audible machine noises are made. Plus, you can’t hide how obvious he stands out in a crowd. They did the same thing with Dennis Rodman in Simon Sez, and it’s comical because there’s no shot in hell either of these guys can look inconspicuous.
On the other hand, the idea of acknowledging the age of the character was cool, as a big part of his character arc in the Prime Directives is detailing the wear and tear of his body parts, with many characters throughout noting how some of his parts aren’t even made anymore. When they stress this, it actually makes the Alex Murphy character that much cooler because despite the noted risks, he can’t stop himself from enforcing the law and stopping bad people. In addition, the miniseries does a wonderful job with its adherence to the nostalgia we have for the character. In “Meltdown“, RoboCop tells Anne how his plan is to head back to Delta City because he lives to protect its citizens. Anne points out how he was just carrying out a policy and was a mere tool for OCP, adding that the past doesn’t matter. RoboCop responds with the surprisingly deep, “The past is all I have”. It’s such an eloquent line that not only serves to define the miniseries’ goals in a way but also cut deep into the heart of the viewer and fans of the franchise. For regular viewers, we can all relate. As we get older, no matter how good or bad our lives get, we tend to look back at what has happened over time, what has led to this life we live. Such as the case with RoboCop himself, some people become so fixated on the past that it stops them from moving forward. With everyday people, this isn’t in reference to just “happy” nostalgia either. It can be about the negativity surrounding the past as well. This is why a line like this is so perfect, as everyone can relate to it in a different way. For the fans, it’s almost an acknowledgement of the franchise’s previous failures and how years of fandom of wanting something better or something close to the original movie’s direction has been met with responses of causals telling them to “grow up”, move on, or get over it. We have been clinging on to this idealistic view of what we have wanted for the RoboCop franchise after the first couple of movies and because of this, it has led to many fans not being able to accept anything less than their highest or even most unachievable of expectations. For further examples of this, take a look at the fan response to the Star Wars sequel trilogy, or the Marvel Cinematic Universe following Avengers: Endgame. The past is all we have. We as fans cling to it, these times we considered our favorite IP being done “right”. It’s why our fandom still exists so strongly.
Again, the past is all we have, and the nostalgia surrounding these beloved franchises is what makes us come back in waves any time the product is revived. It’s what has helped us gravitate towards the series in the first place, and why we keep revisiting it any time something is added to it. It’s the gift and the curse of what the past gives us.
Now, all these years later, it’s hard for the fan to move on because we have invested so much over the years and just want it to be done right. We want closure. In the Prime Directives, Alex Murphy is written with this in mind, as he is the representative of the fans’ vision of the character. This Murphy is for the fans that stayed loyal and wanted something bigger for their favorite hero, with the protagonist being this aged version of RoboCop still fighting and doing what we know and love while being a step slower and closer to defeat almost every day. Finally, they get to see the action hero RoboCop again but in his later years, which only makes him more compelling as a result. It’s essentially an “Old Man Logan” arc, and it’s a phenomenal starting point for the character and in making the Prime Directives the bookend that the franchise deserves. Alex Murphy’s heart is there, but his body doesn’t move the same. As we have come to learn over the years, Father Time comes knocking for everyone, even cyborgs. For the first time in a while, we see RoboCop at his most vulnerable. Granted, he was broken into several pieces in RoboCop 2 and has had more system failures than we can count, but we still have never seen RoboCop take enough damage like the moment in which he is forced to tell Jordan to leave because he’s unable to protect her. In a way, he still satisfies his directive because he is protecting the innocent by telling her to leave, but his inability to fight to protect her and this being his last-ditch effort to do so shows you how RoboCop is on his last legs. It’s done again later when he yells at James to run when he’s getting his ass kicked by RoboCable. Both are great story-telling details in showing where the character is at in the timeline. How they build RoboCop’s character arc through these four feature-length episodes is arguably just as good, if not better than any of the previous iterations of the character. For fans, we never thought his police work before that fateful first day at Metro West would be all that interesting, but the way they write this whole backstory with the Motor City Mangler and Murphy’s old partner John Cable was magnificently done from a screenwriting standpoint.
They tie it all together seamlessly and by “Resurrection“, you are salivating at the mouth in wanting to see the story through. That’s how good it ends up getting. Had the acting matched up to the quality of the storytelling, they would have really had something here. However, this paltry cast cannot be bypassed in this review. They’re not going for the grossly over-the-top style the 1994 live-action series lived in. The Prime Directives takes a serious approach for the most part, which is why the performances are notably hammy, resulting in it taking A LOT of time for the viewer to digest the lack of subtlety in the performance of the cast as a whole in “Dark Justice“. The exception is Kevin Jubinville as Damian Lowe, as though his overacting in being one of the most smug sons of bitches on the planet is incredibly obnoxious, it is intentionally done and makes sense for the character written. Plus, he does end up being kind of funny because of how ridiculous he gets. However, Maurice Dean Wint tries outrageously hard at being a cool cop cliché to where it seems like he’s joking, Maria Del Mar has this slight smirk on her face the entire time to where you’re not sure if she is looking to double cross everyone she talks to or is thinking about having sex with them, and Anthony Lemke struggles early due to his obvious mirroring of Jubinville’s performance in the first half of the miniseries in an effort to figure out his own personality, which doesn’t come out until “Crash and Burn“. Up until that point, you want to slap him too because everyone in OCP has the same smirk on their face and they all just give each other two-faced responses in every dialogue exchange. Even for a child actor, Rebeka Coles-Budrys is god-awful. The Jordan character is actually quite important in “Resurrection” and “Crash and Burn“, but she’s so horrendous at delivering any line with emotion that the viewer may think she’s a robot too. It’s the only explanation as to why her performance is so putrid. I’m not sure if this was what David was trying to say when he said he used Jordan as an incubator for Legion by hiding the virus in her bio-circuits, but this is more or less a calculated story element inserted in an attempt to explain bad acting.
Seriously, when Anne is nearly killed by Carver’s Systems Support team, her wailing of “Mooooom!” is so terrible, you wonder how it made the final cut. Were there enough takes here, or was that really the best one they had? These suspenseful moments are crucial to the emotional depth of the miniseries, but the actress is so abominable that it completely takes the viewer out of it because they have to note how dreadful the acting is.
Bone Machine was a great character and an awesome spearhead for the background storyline of “Dark Justice“, but Richard Fitzpatrick couldn’t help but ruin the potential of this cool villain by chewing the scenery like it was a fucking Tootsie Roll. Geraint Wyn Davies is given the role of your typical “genius, psychopathic madman who wants to destroy the world” character and though he does what is asked of him, it seems like he was asked to look and act like Malcolm McDowell in Star Trek Generations. The only one who had a good handle on things was Leslie Hope as Ann R. Key, an on-the-nose character name if there ever was one. However, in the miniseries’ defense, the acting quality is typical of TV movies of this era. If you take a look at most productions similar to the Prime Directives, especially during the early 2000s, it is almost a prerequisite for whatever reason. For media people well-versed in the era and understand what they were working with at the time, they will be able to look past this after settling into “Dark Justice“. It’s the reason why the acting isn’t make-or-break for the miniseries as a whole. For those that don’t remember this time period in television entertainment, it may take a little longer, as there are YouTube videos and short films today that have better quality and acting in comparison. Regardless of this, the biggest drop off in acting that cannot be ignored is Page Fletcher, who takes the cake as the worst actor to ever portray Alex Murphy/RoboCop, with films, shows, and cartoons included in this argument. It has been said that Fletcher had not watched any of the previous RoboCop films and went out of his way to NOT mimic Peter Weller’s movements as the character, creating his own style that he felt was appropriate with how it was written. To say this is a slap in the face to the foundation Weller laid is an understatement. First of all, how could Fletcher not even watch the first movie? No one is asking him to be a die-hard fan, but not doing any semblance of research for the part beforehand is incredibly ignorant. To be that full of yourself and come up with your take that has nothing to do with how the character was beforehand, despite three movies and three television programs to base it on is flat-out disrespectful.
It makes you question who was on the shortlist for the role because there’s no way Page Fletcher was the best option they had to play the main character.
Speaking of which, Fletcher is so short from a physical standpoint that he makes RoboCop himself look like a joke in comparison to the people he comes across. Cable, James, and Lowe outsize him by almost a foot. Hell, Sara might be taller than him too. The actor portraying the cyborg doesn’t have to be a giant, but Fletcher is comically short for what should be a character with a hulking presence. By the way, no one is demanding an outright copy of Weller’s performance because they wrote the character to be older. Some adjustments had to be made with this in mind. It couldn’t be a replica, and that’s fine. Nevertheless, Fletcher overexaggerating the robotic movements of the character and flailing around like a cartoon every time a bullet hits him has nothing to do with the age of the character. This is simply the exact opposite of how RoboCop acts, which is indicative of the actor hired not doing any research because he was too full of himself to do so. Fletcher walks through scenes swinging his arms up and down like the “robot” dance move and steps with unnecessary emphasis because he thinks a robot would act this way. He’s trying to be rather than simply “being” like Peter Weller was as the titular character. It only further proves that Page Fletcher has in fact never watched the RoboCop films or the live-action television show because literally none of the previous actors do it in such an excessive, over-the-top manner. Because of the main actor’s failure, it completely detracts from the darker tone of the miniseries because of how outrageous it is in practice. Richard Eden of the live-action 1994 program would have been a better choice to return to the character by leaps and bounds instead of casting Fletcher, but negotiations apparently broke down at some point during pre-production. It’s a shame because as bad as the show was, Eden was a decent RoboCop. In comparison to Fletcher though, Eden was Marlon Brando. It’s not that Fletcher is a bad actor in other stuff, but he put together a terrible RoboCop. Along with this, his concerted effort in NOT doing any research on the legacy of the character makes him the worst by default because he’s that far of a detraction from who he should be at this period in the character’s life.
The only positive of Fletcher’s casting that does makes sense is that the character has aged, so Fletcher fits the older look of a hardened veteran of the force.
However, this STILL doesn’t work because a good portion of the miniseries has them flashing back to ten years prior when Murphy was still human, before he transferred to Metro West in the opening of 1987’s RoboCop. In these flashbacks, Murphy should look younger, but Fletcher doesn’t look a day under 55, not a young cop on the force the character should be, considering the timeline. It doesn’t work no matter what way you slice it. If they wanted to make the timeline work within the trilogy of movies, they could have picked younger actors to play the young duo of Alex Murphy and John Cable in all the flashback scenes. Then, they could use the older stars for the rest of it, tying it all together. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work with how it stands. We can say this miniseries exists in an alternate timeline again, but at some point, you have to call out the bullshit. Outside of the main trilogy, the writers behind every production in the RoboCop franchise keep using this as an excuse for dumb decisions, and it only becomes painfully obvious with each subsequent project. You can’t tie it back to the first movie for 90% of it and then when other details come into question, they just use this excuse as a cop out! No, it either is or it isn’t. Fletcher’s casting does not work at all with anything that has happened previously in the series. On top of that, his acting choices in bringing out RoboCop’s emotions are laughable. His line deliveries are done well (“I’m sorry”; “Your move gentlemen”), but his only notable facial expression when his helmet is off consists of his eyes bulging out of his head to where it looks like he is going to explode. In what should have been the biggest moment in the history of the franchise in “Resurrection“, James is about to kill his own father with an EMP, so RoboCop uses the opportunity to reveal the horrors of the reality he has faced over the last ten years by showing his now adult son what he looks like. Richard Eden’s creepy but subdued silence would have worked wonders here in saying a thousand words without having to actually say it, but Fletcher trying to be serious in stating “If this is what you want, I want you to look into your father’s eyes before you do it” while unintentionally doing a Rodney Dangerfield impression was hilarious.
Just like that, one of the biggest moments of the entire franchise was botched, which only furthers the importance of casting for a role like this. Again, you’d think casting a cyborg would be relatively easy, but Page Fletcher proves this is not the case. His unpreparedness in the guise of “doing his own thing” was too jarring to let go.
It also didn’t help that it looked like the budget for the costume went to RoboCable instead of RoboCop. Even if RoboCable is supposed to be the new and improved version of RoboCop, there’s no reason for the star’s costume to look that cheap. He shouldn’t take precedence over the protagonist as much as he does, and that’s arguably the problem with the climax of the miniseries. Cable’s final monologue beginning with the question, “You really think I was gonna let you hog all the glory?” is the Prime Directives in a nutshell. At the same time however, the story is told well enough regarding Cable that I’m on the fence about this, especially after a rewatch. In the Prime Directives, this new character of John Cable gets off to a rocky start, but they do a great job in building the character. Actually, it might be the best written co-star of the RoboCop universe outside of the star himself. For the first time in the series, you find yourself seeing someone else’s point like when RoboCop pleads with RoboCable how the other people don’t deserve to die and he quickly responds, “Neither did I”. Making him such a big part of Alex Murphy’s backstory was an excellent decision (“Can we trust him?” – “He’s my friend”), and the horrors of an ex-wife like Sara playing a part in his demise and resurrection is a harrowing development that is just as devastating as Murphy’s, albeit in a much different way. Cable dealing with Sara having a miscarriage, the dissolution of their marriage, Cable cold killing the Motor City Mangler because he knows he would’ve gotten away in court to Murphy’s disgust, how Cable technically works with Sara because Delta Security works with OCP to protect Delta City, and him being so serious about his job that it costs him his personal life TWICE was an excellent plotline to follow that added more depth to the miniseries than Alex Murphy’s story could have done at this point. Sara just referring to Cable as “excess tissue” was appalling enough to make you want to see RoboCable get some revenge because the man earned it. The payoff may have given Cable a little too much at RoboCop’s expense, but I can see both sides of it without being too annoyed. Either way, all the fight scenes between the two cyborgs and the shootouts involving them are awesome to watch unfold, so at least we got that.
Though it was cool to see RoboCop and RoboCable fire bullets that block the other’s to the point where RoboCable can’t help but compliment him, the overuse of Mexican standoffs between the two reach a breaking point. With that being said, it aligns a lot with the “Old West” motifs used in the miniseries like the western music during shootouts, RoboCop’s entrance into a scene, and how they present him like an aged gunfighter, with Delta City taking the place of the “Wild West”. In a sense, RoboCop: Prime Directives is almost like a low-quality, cyberpunk Unforgiven if you could believe it. For the record, this “Old West” style of the series is cool, but there was one missed opportunity. At one point all hope is seemingly lost with Hobley and James being caught by RoboCable and David telling him to kill them all, with RoboCable refusing. James, Hobley, Jordan, and Anne run to the door before it closes for good, but RoboCop reappears and stops it from shutting in an awesome hero moment. This right here would have been the PERFECT moment for the theme song to hit with a closeup on RoboCop’s hand stopping the door, but the blame goes to MGM for being a bitch about the copyright.
The Prime Directives do a lot right, but there are still narrative questions that make the viewer do a double take here and there. After Lowe kills off the entire board at the end of “Meltdown“, why does he push through with SAINT if he knows it’s not ready? His incentive to push it was to move up the corporate ladder in the eyes of the Old Woman, but his incentive to do so is gone after he kills her and everyone who opposed him. His obsession was being the leader, and he’s the president at this point. Lowe wanting to make OCP money and getting it out of debt is part of it, but it’s not like he has this passion for OCP itself and feels an obligation to take the company over to save it. This is never expressed until he starts making sales in the third act of “Crash and Burn“. If anything, James had more of an obligation to do that, as he details to Sara about how the company practically raised him. With Lowe, it just seems like he’s more obsessed with control and has an ego problem, which is why he takes it so personally after being belittled. Once he secures control of the company however, it doesn’t make sense to go through with a risk like SAINT, at least in terms of releasing it to buyers before it’s ready. There’s no hurry even if the company is losing money. If Hobley thinks he can smooth out the bugs in a 6-month period and perfect SAINT, why not do that instead? Lowe has no obstacles moving forward with everyone dead. Sara has ulterior motives and he knows it, but he doesn’t need to prove anything to her once he becomes president. Also, he never gives a good enough reason to promote her to VP. Lowe never hearing the “Keep your friends close but your enemies closer” line was a funny choice, but that being his only reasoning for keeping Sara isn’t good enough. Hobley’s right. Why didn’t he just fire her if he doesn’t trust her and knows she’s plotting against him? It’s not worth the headache. Furthermore, he had no problem with killing the entire board of executives prior to him taking over, so what’s one more death?
The writing just has him vaguely walking around reasoning with biting lines, but anyone who’s paying attention can look past this and still wonder what his motivations are moving forward when he could have avoided so much. This is only furthered in “Crash and Burn” when Lowe tells Sara that Security Concepts’ portfolio is weak and he wants to streamline it by shifting defense contracts into New Technologies since the success of SAINT will have military clients wanting to make sure their material is coming from a prestige division. When Sara argues that without the contracts, Security Concepts will collapse, Lowe points out how RoboCop is gone, SAINT is online, and everyone in the company is expendable. However, the question is just raised again as to why he would put himself through the stress of these arguments with Sara instead of just firing her when he has every right to?
Anne wanting Abby to stay with Jordan was also a time-wasting, asinine exchange. Anne argues that the chances of the mission succeeding aren’t great and someone has to look after her daughter, so Abby has to remind Anne that Anne should be the one to stay then because SHE’S HER MOM! She’s right! No matter what Anne says, no mother is arguing Abby’s point. Plus, it’s not Abby’s responsibility. She doesn’t have a child, so why should she be the one to step up and take care of a kid that isn’t hers on wishes from the kid’s own mother? Anne argues that no one knows the OCP building like she does and “nobody else can interface with David’s machinery”, but neither point is convincing enough as this obvious, black and white answer she makes it out to be. There’s nothing that happens before or after that convinces the viewer that any of the three women couldn’t have had similar success to what Anne ended up doing. On top that, the two speak about vague details to apparently solidify Anne’s pleas, with Abby stressing how Anne can’t go back to David because of the “hold” he has on her, and Anne responding with how this hold died “when you burned those chips out of our skulls”, referring to the Svengali Chip that David planted in Cable. Though this explains why Anne isn’t at risk for falling for David’s bullshit, it still doesn’t convince the viewer that she’s correct in leaving her daughter to save the world instead of letting the woman with nothing to lose do it instead. Plus, they have the technology where if there were any questions regarding the building in the hypothetical that Abby or Lexx goes instead, Anne could have just directed them through an earpiece or something. They are genius tech thieves after all, so I’m sure they had something laying around that could aid them in this scenario. What’s more frustrating about all of this is that it’s all for naught. Seconds after they decide Anne is right and should go on without Jordan, they find out Jordan is gone. So, Anne goes out to look for her and tells Abby and Lexx to go on the mission without her because she has to find her. So, what the fuck was the point of that entire conversation?
At some point, you have to wonder if this was even necessary to telling the story or they were really trying to fill out the length of each episode. Otherwise, I have no explanation for RoboCop staring in awe of Anne doing tai-chi by herself for what felt like an eternity. What the fuck did that accomplish? Abby jokes that RoboCop is smitten with Anne, but there’s no follow-up to it to explain the scene’s existence or even allude to this further.
Besides this, there’s the scene in which Anne’s group works on RoboCop and finds that within his cortex interface, there is an interface point that is completely inert, as if it’s “never even been activated”. Since its deep and hooked into the frontal lobe, it may contain some long-term memory. Despite arguments of there potentially being a reason it hasn’t been switched on, Murphy demands they do it because it’s his decision. This is a rather big deal, and the viewer thinks it’s going to lead to something truly revelatory regarding the protagonist. In a frustrating unveiling, it just shows Alex Murphy’s death from the first RoboCop movie over again, and he starts screaming and passes out. How is this considered to be an informational overload? How would he not already know this? This is a fundamental aspect of the character and is the reason why RoboCop is who he is! It’s the entire basis of every previous RoboCop production, as his death haunts him every day. Now, in a miniseries that is supposed to take place ten years after the event, so canonically he should be more at ease with his past than ever before, we’re supposed to believe that he is just now learning about it? It’s well-known that this is what led to him being RoboCop! Anyone who tunes into the miniseries or is even a casual fan at best is aware of this backstory. It doesn’t make sense for it to be this “big” moment for Murphy to find out after all these years. It’s completely avoidable too. Up until that point, we are under the assumption that Murphy knows his own backstory since this is the most human RoboCop has ever acted in live-action form. Considering the age of the character, it’s just assumed at this point that he is well past his death, despite it haunting his personal life. Now, the “huge” emotional moment is that he’s reminded of his death? What? He HAS to know this already! Of all the continuity errors, this is the most egregious by far.
Besides Det. Madigan, the other major highlight of the 1994 live-action series was how the Media Break interludes and satirical commercials were arguably at its peak. Coinciding with the digital age, RoboCop: Prime Directives gives it a run for its money as the best. With it emulating the fast-paced internet style of the 2000s with MediaNet and the loud, exploitative style of trash TV in the middle of it, every segment involving these transitional sequences are amusing, like OCP’s biotech promoting cloning of three beautiful blonde women and the final caption being “Now available in ethnic”. The only one that wasn’t all that funny was Archie Nemesis, but Lowe calling the network and telling them to force Nemesis to put out a puff piece of SAINT instead of a critical one was an amusing, ahead-of-its-time moment. The miniseries has a lot of replay value too, and part of it is because more and more details will be noticeable in these MediaNet sequences with subsequent re-watches. The “Otomo” commercial may have been my favorite, as the kid spokesperson talking about how awesome the toy is, sliding in lines like “Otomo is my God” and then ending the commercial with “I AM OTOMO” was legitimately hilarious. On a lesser note, my own theory is that the all-seeing Otomo is a parody of those creepy Furby toys because the miniseries came out when those toys were hot. Though I can’t prove it, the parallels are damning. Other positives stem from the production reveling in its Detroit heart with a muscle car for RoboCop to drive after Lexx is killed, Cable blowing off Carver’s hand and then beating him to death with a sledgehammer (“Now, I’ve got your fat black ass!”), the existence of Jerry Springer Civic Square, the constant threat of lasers, the gag of the janitor being mad about having to fix the window in the OCP lobby every time RoboCop drives through it with his car, RoboCop plainly stating “No” when James asks if they could have infiltrated the building quieter, and RoboCop stopping David’s first attempt at having Legion override SAINT by saying “Forgive me” before driving through the window of a church were all gloriously entertaining. Plus, Cable had some great lines like rushing a pregnant Sara to the hospital in a flashback and yelling at people to get out of the way because they are obstructing justice, or him commenting to the now evil Sara, “Nice office. Probably use a woman’s touch though”.
On the other hand, I could have done without the dial-up noises when the two cyborgs get each others signals. That brough back some terrible memories.
The idea behind Jimmy Murphy growing up to be an executive for OCP is a great twist to complicate the narrative. It’s not too hard to buy into either. In the 1994 series, Jimmy has plenty of episodes where he teeters the line of falling in with the wrong crowd. Though he’s still a good kid at heart, he becomes swayed in different directions because he’s young, impressionable, and his father isn’t in his life to teach him. Watching the entirety of the franchise together and connecting certain dots, it’s kind of like this miniseries continues with this take of Jimmy, showing how he still is Murphy’s son at heart but glory within OCP influences his decisions. Of course, Alex Murphy’s hand is forced, and he has to reveal himself as alive to stop his son from fully falling to the dark side. Making Jimmy, or “James” as he likes to be called, this corruptible adult is yet another applaudable narrative decision that strengthens the Prime Directives, and his inevitable redemption is fun to watch too. The in-fighting between him, Sara, and Lowe reaching a breaking point in the third act of “Crash and Burn” was also gold. James wanting to do the right thing and the other two not making any sense and just wanting to avoid the problem while they are at each other’s throats was highly entertaining. Seriously, what the hell was Sara talking about? She pleads with James, “Don’t you get it? Dead or alive, we’re the key!”. What? Though the Dr. Frankenstein-like David Haydick is about as “TV movie villain” as they come, his introduction in “Resurrection” ups the stakes immensely and makes Anne infinitely more compelling than she had any right to be. The details regarding Legion being powerful enough to infect computers and human beings isn’t explained as thoroughly as we would like, but his plan being referred to as “evolution by apocalypse” is good that it’s whatever. Either way, him being a child prodigy and former head of OCP’s research and development who developed new weapons and biotechnology, with his research being probably what led to the tech that created RoboCop was a cool enough backstory to buy into.
With this being said, David being fired for “unauthorized research” on human test subjects doesn’t seem like a fire-able offense in the world of OCP since Alex Murphy was a human test subject. Regardless, despite the terrible fight choreography between David and Anne that consisted of a lot of low-frame rate moves to make it look like they weren’t using stunt doubles, David being more of a direct adversary for everyone compared to the suits was another great insertion into the narrative that livened the “B story” immaculately. It gave the climax a “Big fight feel” that is usually only reserved for major Hollywood productions. Plus, their final battle between them in the sealed off room was actually a great, albeit bittersweet moment.
Very rarely would this be worth talking about, but the title graphics were very cheap looking too. Any editor worth a shit could have come up with something better on Premiere Pro, so it’s crazy to think that the producers saw this as professional enough to be put on television. In addition, the anarchist group “DaBombs” was not only an idiotic choice for a name, but all of the dialogue given to the group in “Dark Justice” had the Prime Directives stumble out of the gate because of how moronic they sounded. Combined with Fletcher, the aforementioned Richard Fitzpatrick’s excessiveness as comic book villain Bone Machine, and the leader of the terrorist group speaking about “The awesome power of DaBombs” was a terribly corny way to begin the miniseries, and it makes you question what you have gotten yourself into. If a non-RoboCop fan just decided to tune in, the first act of “Dark Justice” would be hard to get through. As previously mentioned, if a viewer were to get through these parts and gave it a chance however, they would be pleasantly surprised with how invested they become with the miniseries. Even so, the production is so low-quality that it no doubt will test non-fans or casual fans’ patience with it.
Still, we do get that moment where the one cop and RoboCop give each other the nod, prompting the cop to drop back and act like he lost pursuit. That was iconic.
Though RoboCop: Prime Directives is essentially what would happen if the SyFy Network got a hold of the RoboCop intellectual property, the team behind the production did an excellent job with what they had. Had they removed the dogshit actors, and this miniseries was turned into a big-budget film instead, no one would have any qualms about it being the final RoboCop movie in the franchise. Still, as it stands, RoboCop: Prime Directives is a gift to television movie entertainment, being a definitive bookend to the long-running franchise. With a return to the darker and action-driven content, a narrative with the best written supporting characters of any RoboCop production, and another haunting reminder of the dangers of artificial intelligence mixed in with a world-ending plot only our favorite hero can stop, RoboCop: Prime Directives is the finale fans have craved. By the end, Alex Murphy’s prime directives aren’t programming orders he has to follow. It becomes a hero accepting his higher calling by choice. You can’t ask for a more fitting swan song than that.
Despite this, make sure you stay through the credits. The epilogue is everything that has been building up since 1987.
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