Robocop: "Hey, you're taking this kinda personal..."

"Good business is where you find it." I'm sure the business justification shared by the ne'er-do-wells of Old Detroit was used to a similar purpose when someone got the bright idea to remake Robocop - and if ever there was a film that didn't need remaking, Paul Verhoeven's 1987 classic is it. At the time of its initial release, Robocop was revolutionary. This kind of science fiction, social satire and extreme violence was a real head-snapper back in the day. Now they've gone and "reimagined" it. "They'll fix you. They fix everything." I have nothing against the folks involved in this new incarnation - I've really enjoyed Joel Kinnaman's work on The Killing - he's a terrific actor, and I'm sure everyone involved wanted to be part of something that worked. Still, I just can't get behind this one. Robocop is a personal favorite, and if you haven't seen it in a while (or God forbid, ever), it truly merits revisiting. This is smart and skewering sci-fi that has a ton to say about the peril our souls face when we become part of the machine. Verhoeven served up a ruthless preview of a corporation-run America where crime was an epidemic - and whoever had the most effective tools to stop the bleeding would be king. The synchronicity between boardroom and gun thug was palpable and hilariously disturbing. Peppered with faux commercials for things like "The Jarvik Artificial Heart" and a family board game called "Nuke 'em," Robocop saw the reality-television distractions lurking just around the corner and knew that consumers would happily "buy that for a dollar." Peter Weller's Alex Murphy was just an average family man, trying to do the right thing who gets left for dead only to be cannibalized by the mother of all corporations into their newest prototype "product," haunted by the last vestiges of memories of a family - of a self - that's just not ready to roll over and play dead.

In the center of the chaos, grinning sociopath Clarence Boddicker (Kurtwood Smith) wreaks havoc on all fronts as one of the most absolutely terrifying and unforgettable villains in screen history. His laconic delivery and relaxed satisfaction of a job well done are unforgettable. It's the performance of a lifetime, and contains so much quotable dialogue, it'd be a sin to miss it. Then just when you think things can't be any worse, we get Dick Jones. We get ED-209. We get a rogues gallery of some of the most maniacally delirious gang members ever seen. Verhoeven cut Robocop like some kind of deranged pulp manga, with horrific fates around every corner. The shiny utopia envisioned by the executives at Omni Consumer Products would have plenty of blood and gristle in the cement of its sidewalks. Can the impossibly damaged memory of one man find enough of his own self to look in the mirror again - and punish the guilty? Believe it.

While I may see it someday, I'm trying to check my morbid curiosity and skip the new Robocop, despite the plethora of "not as bad as I thought" average reviews. Whatever the new incarnation is, it ain't my Robocop. If Clarence isn't coming to the party, you can count me out. But on the lemons out of lemonade side of things, we have a fantastic new remastered 4K blu-ray of the original film for the sinfully low price of $7.99, and toy maniacs had their dream come true with a ginormous ED-209 from NECA - a tremendous treat! So some good came out of this recycling.

But for me, we just never should have gone there - the original was magic - it still is magic, and it always will be - ridiculously entertaining on every level. This new Robocop you can keep. Or as Dick Jones might have said, "You've insulted me. And you've insulted this company with that bastard creation of yours." And you can buy that for a dollar.