‘Bad language makes for bad feelings...’
Robocop is such an unimpeachable masterpiece that any attempt at a sequel or reboot was always doomed to fail. Robocop 2 keeps much of the cast together, but losing director Paul Verhoeven and the writing team of Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner was always going to lead to diminishing returns, and predictably, that’s what we have here…
There isn’t much of a plot. Robocop (Peter Weller) is back, but he’s malfunctioning. Nancy Allen also returns, but is given absolutely nothing to do. Tom Noonan makes for a compelling villain (he wears a ridiculous earring throughout). Effects legend Phil Tippett also returns and most of the good things going on in this unnecessary sequel are down to him.
This is a weird film in many ways. Losing Verhoeven is a terminal blow that Robocop 2 never really recovers from. Despite the aforementioned, the film also features Irvin Kirshner (the director of The Empire Strikes Back) behind the camera and celebrated graphic novelist Frank Miller on writing duties, and yet it’s mostly just a bland retread of the original. The effects are genuinely great (and, in truth, make the film worth watching), but this second outing for Detroit’s most famous robotic son lacks the biting satire of the first film and never really reckons with the duality of a man being stripped of his humanity. It’s also tonally uneven and lacks a coherent third act. I don’t really want slapstick in my Robocop movies, thank you very much, and I certainly don’t want a foul-mouthed villainous child stinking the place up.
Robocop 2 is a fun hang for most of its run time, and apparently, it’s far superior to Robocop 3 (a film that depressingly is lurking on the horizon for me to watch some time unnervingly soon), but it also suffers in comparison with its predecessor, and it’s not a film that I can envision ever watching again.
