RoboCop Trilogy: The First Experience

 Perhaps it's time to throw in some personal stuff into the blog, and I thought, why not just describe watching the three films for the first time back in the days, something I did with other movie classics on different blogs I write for. 

Not to sound like an old guy, but viewing movies back in the 80's and 90's was completely different because there was a mystique about them. You didn't have Making Of clips, you didn't know everything about the actors or the director, or the design of the film. You opened that clamshell VHS box, and there was a journey awaiting you. You didn't know how effects were done most of the time, and you had no spoilers other than publicity pics in magazines and basic plot details (Unless you read novelizations), and whatever was on the back cover of that VHS tape.

RoboCop (1987)

I must have seen RoboCop, the first movie, either in early 1990 or shortly prior, as a very young kid. My unsuspecting father rented it for me thinking it's going to be some kind of silly superhero movie, and that the character was something like the Robot from Duck Tales. And looking at the cover, I also thought it's going to be a guy dressed in robotic suit to fight crime. Of course, you can only imagine the surprise. To be honest I remember the day of the first viewing and watching the very beginning, but not much else, so I can't describe my reaction, other than feeling as if I witnessed a real murder. 

But the very next day I told everyone I knew in school and in the neighborhood about the film. Some asked their parents to rent it and unfortunately for them, they watched it with them so my friends only got to see a couple of first minutes until their parents shut it off. But I did get to see the full movie, at least sort of, because my eyes were covered by my parents throughout most of it.

About 2 years later I stayed almost entire night to tape the first movie off a late showing on TV. Naturally,  after I got it on tape, I came to know the movie by memory, and watched it whenever I had the chance. I remember being really taken by the seriousness of the film, despite the satiric angle. The violence and people in it were so real. I wished for the second film but it never aired. Of course as a youngster, you really wanted to have the one with the cool Monster Robot and bigger budget, especially after I already knew the original backwards and forwards after viewing it so many times on my VCR. Paul Verhoeven's name was deeply engraved in my mind, and he proved to be an amazing director soon after with Total Recall, another adult scifi which was just plain badass for the younger viewers.

Nowadays, as I view it from a perspective of a decades older guy who has wife and kids, my perspective on the first film is of course somewhat different. It's just as "cool" as it ever was, but as a kid I always thought of it as an appetizer for the second film (after I saw the second naturally), because it was more real, less scifi. Nowadays, I view those characteristics as positives. The movie is not only real with violence, but real with the portrayal of people. Look, the main villain isn't some supervillain with cool design, it's a balding short guy in glasses. And that makes him so real. He is one of the most terrifying villains in cinema, because he feels and looks like a real life crook, drug lord and a murderer. Clarence Boddicker channels lack of empathy and cruelty with an unnerving realism. The movie is so real and grounded that if you would take out the element of a robot/cyborg, and replaced it with someone who, let's say, barely survived and got back to form to avenge his would be killers, it would be the same movie nearly. The element of scifi is minimalistic. There is no future tech at all (other than the video home tour guide), no super computers, no futuristic cars. And what drives the movie is a person with no memory of who he was, going on a journey to discover his past and tracking down those who killed him. And Robocop was not just a robot/cyborg - he had all the emotional elements of a man - he was angry, he screamed in pain, he gritted his teeth during nightmares, he screamed in agony when hurt. That's what made him different. It was Murphy, just with new armor, and no memories of his past. Not a robot.

And I couldn't really think of the movie as low budget, because it felt like it showed and achieved what it meant to achieve. Other than the OCP tower, no environment was designed. They use real gritty places. Abandoned factories, warehouses, downtown urban decay. Even Robocop's lab was just a small area inside a battered old building with chipping paint, surrounded by chainlink fence. The look of the film is a concrete grey, and every day scene is shot in a groggy, murky day. It's hard to call this film a sci fi film because the scifi element is so minimalistic and everything else, from story to characters to environment is more real than what most non-scifi movies show.

RoboCop 2 (1990)

Going back to the early 90's, months after seeing the first movie for the first time, RoboCop 2 was hitting theaters. From my perspective, it had a pretty decent marketing and hype and everyone was talking about it, but my friends and I weren't even counting on seeing it. We knew there was no way. There was no way our parents would rent a new release for us that's a heavy R. By that point everyone knew what RoboCop was. But I did get to see a part of it before my peers did. I went over for a day to my cousin, who had a much older brother in his late teens - all pierced up, wearing mohawk, he came with his bad boy friends with a new NES RoboCop 2 game. We all sat around and watched them play it, listening how they couldn't wait to see the new movie, supposedly even bloodier than the first one. Stuff like that just makes you want to see the movie even more. Older kids drooling about it, the fact it's a forbidden film for youngsters. And then a week later I did stop by one late evening and lo and behold, my cousins were in the middle of watching RoboCop 2. And what a moment to start watching the movie - I joined in moment before the monstrous RoboCain massacred everyone in the warehouse. Right after Robocop arrived at the scene, I had to go home. But two days later my much older sisters rented it for themselves and yet again I was able to see it (although again mostly through covered eyes). All I remember from that viewing was that I thought the Robocop 2 monster was one of the coolest looking things ever. Hey, that is a normal takeaway from that movie for a kid. And the second movie became like a holy grail for me after some time, because for some reason it became unavailable in all the rental places, with the first and, in time, third, widely available everywhere. I tried to track the movie everywhere later on with no luck. All I could get my hands on was the novelization, which I passionately read.

In my late teens, when movies were available for purchase, R2 was still elusive but through some friends I managed to place a special order and finally get it. I was so eager to see because by that point I haven't seen it since being a kid. I loved it, I loved it as much as I did when I first saw it, but was surprised about how different it was from what I imagined (I remember next to nothing from my first viewing). I was also surprised about some new elements, like a new music composer, and how blue and shiny Robo is in this one, as if he's covered in epoxy. The other thing that surprised me was that the director was Irvin Kershner, known the most of course for The Empire Strikes Back. I loved that element of variety in the series, and at the time I thought R2 was so much like the first one. 

Nowadays, I don't think that at all. First of all, as I already mentioned, the first movie is incredibly grounded. It feels very real, and the characters don't feel like movie characters. At all. In R2, it's the opposite. While I still very much love the movie for different reasons, it does feel like a big(gger) Hollywood action scifi, rather than a gritty, realistic human revenge story. Stylistically, the movie differs a lot as well. The original is very grey and has washed up colors throughout. Again, note that every scene in the original is either in the dark or on a groggy day. There is never a clear sky, never a sun. The second picture has very strong colors, and interestingly heavily highlights two colors, Robo's steel blue and crimson red colors. It looks great, and I love it, but it's very different look from the original. It's a graphic novel look. And the music sets it aside as well. However, the tone, the ultra violence, the lack of empathy and the humor are absolutely consistent with the original. The movie's flawed but still very interesting, and in some ways very weird. It's like a colorful but cruel and gory graphic novel, scored with a very classical music sounding score that would fit movies in the 50's. It's all very surreal. It's that weirdness, quirkiness of the film, the whole odd comic book look and feel with a classic soundtrack that makes this film one of a kind and just plain deliciously weird and very unique. 

RoboCop 3 (1993)

in late '93 or early '94, among my peers Robocop was pretty much forgotten. One day the cousin that was my age stopped by on his way from a video rental place for quick hello, and showed me three new releases that his family was going to watch over the weekend. And to my shock, one of them was RoboCop 3! I was shocked because I assumed the fact that a third Robocop movie being made alone would have been a hot topic on everyone's tongues, nevermind it suddenly being out on VHS! Yet nobody ever mentioned it and nobody knew it existed. I rented it as soon as it was available, but this time it felt weird that there was no buzz about it, nobody cared about it, and it was out on VHS suddenly just like that. For the first time I watched a Robocop movie (for the first time) alone in my room, with no one else caring. The movie felt off, and at the time I didn't know it was the PG13 rating was one of the reasons it felt this way. It just felt off, and not at all like a sequel to the first two films. And something was very off with Robocop, but I couldn't tell what it is. Then when the credits began to roll, I realized what it was, but at the same time I was shocked Peter Weller isn't in it. Shocked. But I also didn't know it wasn't just the casting change. The movie felt like a low key VHS film, not unlike anything else that was out there, and such a step down from, what it felt like a big budget extravaganza and blockbuster that was the second film. 

Today, if I look at this movie as a part of the trilogy, I sort of like it because it gives the trilogy a variety which I like very much. But at the same time, if it makes sense, the movie itself can be easily seen as a terrible sequel to the first two films. But while it's easy to point at the PG13 rating as the culprit, I don't think it's that at all. Sure, the first two RoboCop movies are known for their nasty R rated violence, but the amount of red liquid doesn't really determine a good story or a good sequel. And all things considered, R3 does continue the grim tone and violence of the series, just without the graphic details. Hey, Lewis dies, and so do many of the other main characters. Even Niko's parents are murdered! The movie IS bleak, and continues that somber tone. And the lack of empathy is also present heavily here, with McDagget being a worthy villain, even if a bit of a non-event after the first two films and their characters. So what is it? The little girl Niko? Well, I think there are two reasons why the movie does not work as a Robocop movie or a sequel, and they're both related to the title character. Number one: Robo is just a robot. The humanity in him, any characteristics, any character, is completely gone. He is monotone, stiff, and does not channel any humanity at all. He doesn't react to pain, talks like a robot, doesn't even get basic human behaviors, such as jokes. For some reason, which I believe to be just mishandling of the character, Robo is just a plain stiff police robot in R3. 

Reason Two: for the first time, Robo is not the main character of the film. He is a sidekick, he is a gadget, a big toy that the good hearted resistance fighters and computer genius girl Niko try to fix to have help in fight for their cause. Robo is a device, and the main characters are Marie and Niko, while the supporting characters are the Resistance bunch. Robo isn't even the supporting character here. And true, the story, while feeling bleak and hopeless in many places, does feel like a VHS film geared towards a pre-teen to early teen audience first and foremost. Plus, the grounded realism of the original is completely shattered here, with Robo having gun arms and flying in the sky saving the day. And yes, if you have a good hearted kid, who is also an ethnic minority, and a computer genius, as a main character, you are gearing towards the younger audience.

R3 still feels the same way as it did back in the days - it feels like a much cheaper, straight to video sequel by a relative unknown, with no thrills. Even writing this, the ninja androids were so exciting that I almost forgot to mention them here. They were a non event, albeit I must admit, it is something of a fresh idea after Robo battled larger robots in the first two. The story is fine I think, and the movie does have some heart and a great score by the returning Basil Poledouris, and the cinematography is nice. The movie doesn't try to hide the fact it's trying to go back to roots in a way, and is trying to be a sequel to the original, but despite the similar color palette, music and certain other elements, it doesn't gel with the other movies at all. 

RoboCop's Lips

Its interesting that none of the successive actors after Weller even closely resembled Weller, not even with mouth which is an area that the actor works with with the character. Peter Weller was chosen for a lot of reasons, but one of them was also because, according to Paul Verhoeven, he had an interesting face, he was very Mannequin-like which fit the character. Weller had an almost feminine, short but thick lips and an elongated face, which placed his lips higher up.
Every actor after Weller had completely different, wide and thin lips forming a bitter arch shape, and were closer to the chin as oppose to Weller's which were closer to the helmet line. That's one of the reasons why other actors just never looked right in the gear, they looked alike among themselves, but completely different from Peter. Therefore, they looked like someone dressed as Robocop rather than the Robocop.

RoboCop Against Drugs?

There have been some (rare) claims that the Robocop movies carry an antidrug message to some extent, however that seems to be far from the actual truth. Even putting aside the fact that, after decades and countless interviews none of the filmmakers ever mentioned or hinted an antidrug messages, there is nothing in the movie that would support that claim.

The first two RoboCop movies are a hard R material, presenting a dark and dystopian world, filled with corruption, greed, murder, prostitution and - heavy drug use - it's a part of the crime scene and dark environment. In the first movie most of the characters use coke, and they use it heavily. From corporate guys like Bob Morton to gang/drug dealers such as Clarence's gang, coke is an ever present drug in the film. As a matter of fact, the movie's major shootout scene takes place in a coke factory.

The scene was never meant to be an antidrug imagery, and in fact was an homage to western movies, showing a "new sheriff cleaning up the town". There is a shot of Robocop stepping over and crushing the vials of cocaine, but the meaning of that image is that of a triumph of law and justice, justice trumping over crime

The drugs, or in the case of the first movie, cocaine, is ever present throughout the movie with the villainous characters sniffing coke of small vials throughout the film

In the second film, as in the first, drugs are omnipresent, although this time the main drug is a fictional designer drug called Nuke. It is puzzling that, simply because the movie centers around drug lords and heavy drug use and Robocop is fighting them, that there is a claim of some sort of antidrug message in the film, whichm, as far as drug use in the story, is no different that what cocaine was in the first. A shot of Robocop yet again crushing a drug is shown.

There is nothing that would indicate that drugs are bad in the movie other than Duffy and Angie's "hunger pains", and there are no consequences of drug use shown. Just the opposite, everyones actually shown as feeling really good and enjoying those, even the RoboCop II monster gets a high and all the hydraulics raise him by the end when he is enjoying the ecstasy and comfort of his drug.

RoboCop 3 is completely drug free

Perhaps what could give some the idea of the movies or at least one of the movie's being an antidrug message is the PSA from Peter Weller that he did in 1990 in conjunction with promoting the movie

The Delta City problem

ROBOCOP

In the beginning of RoboCop, the Old Man says that Delta City will begin construction in 6 months.
Much later in the movie, when Robocop is on his way to Jones' office, he enters Delta City under construction  - it's even confirmed to be Delta City in the special features from the 20th Anniversary edition by a matte painter who did the shot, Rocco Gioffre, confirming it's Delta City. It can be found on the Special Effects section of the DVD: "There's a wide shot of Delta City when Robocop's car is driving away from camera" and the above mentioned shot is shown. 

Take a closer look, there's a construction going on on the left and that at least 3 skyscrapers are still under construction. Gioffre isn't the only source confirming that this is indeed Delta City. 1987's Cinefantastique magazine confirms it as well

Now the problems begin - the next day Jones tells Clarence that Delta City begins construction in 2 months...oversight?

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ROBOCOP 2

Now lets move on to RoboCop 2. Even if we ignore that we've already seen Delta City being raised and if we only take the 2 months comment, then it seems like the construction was postponed for some reason. The movie takes place about a year after the original, and Delta City is still just a blueprint. RoboCop II is built to clean up the city from crime for the construction, and OCP still needed to foreclose and take the city private in order to greenlight the project 

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ROBOCOP 3

Now RoboCop 3. Its hard to tell how much time have passed, but we have different hairdo on Lewis again and Reed and Johnson visibly aged. That, and now we see OCP in serious trouble and on its last knees, and partially owned by Kanemitsu, and with new CEO and with Johnson as Vice President. All that must've taken a lot of time. And yet, Delta City is still not ready and rehabs are forcing people out of their homes in order for demolition to begin, and here's when things get even more confusing - so the whole point of rehabs is to make Cadillac Heights clear for demolition...well, didn't they start the demolition already within the first few minutes of the movie? 

RoboCop Character (In)Consistency

Paul Verhoeven: This guy is completely robotic and starts to realize that there was something else. (...) In the second act, Robo starts to remember. That was for me the emotional level and the reason I wanted to do the picture (Cinefantastique Dec. 1987)

Peter Weller: The heart of all this is a morality tale. It’s like Beauty and the Beast, or the Tin Man of The Wizard of Oz. It’s a great little jewel of a human story

RoboCop always had Alex Murphy's signature characteristics and personality, just didn't have his memories. Murphy's personality started to come through in a rapid pace, resurfacing as soon as on the first day of his duty. The first sign appeared even before he went on his first patrol when he was in the shooting gallery. The gun spinning trick

Very soon after there was another one - his inability to properly enter the exit way from the Police parking

Robocop's way of talking is very official at first ("Thank you for your cooperation. Goodnight", "Madam, you have suffered an emotional shock. I will notify a rape crisis center") but that didn't last long. Murphy's witty personality and one liners started to re-emerge the very same night starting with "Your move creep" after shooting a guy between the legs and that night was the last time we've heard him talking in a very official manner.
The turning point was his "dream", in which he got a first snippet of his memory back and when he started investigating his identity and origins, that's when Murphy's personality and signature characteristics fully emerged. He wasn't using official by-the-books speech anymore, he was using his one liners. "Dead or Alive, you're coming with me". By that point we've already seen RoboCop scared and in pain while experiencing his nightmare.

He was a MAN, only with significant memory loss and enclosed in a metallic body. He had Murphy's personality and acted like human all the time, getting angry, shocked, confused, sad and experiencing pain. He even sleeps like a man, with head down and his mouth open.

It's even more evident when he's visiting his home, regaining small pieces of his memory. Even with the helmet on, we see plenty of emotions in him

Peter Weller: Lost guy trying to find who he was. (...) I simply approached it as a man who had had amnesia (AMC Special)

Nancy Allen: [Peter Weller] brought a soul and a heartbeat to that character. You don't even see his eyes, when you're even looking at him it's just this little visor. You can feel the character through all of that. (AMC Special)

Soon after we see even more of his character, when he grabs a guy in a very painful way - this time, by the hair. "Let's talk"

He also doesn't take crap from anyone and throws the suspect against obstacles, leaving his face badly damaged and cut.

Another cool characteristic of Robocop are his fancy moves during the shootout which make the action that much more engaging and interesting

He is also visibly mad when he responds to Jones' talk with "I will!". We see Robocop in pain many times, gritting his teeth and twisting when he's fighting the painful program in Jones' office,

or when he's impaled by Clarence,

or when he's shot by ED 209. We also see him scared, surprised and angry, like when Lewis tells him who he is, or when he sees Lewis after getting chased by the SWAT team,

or when he sees his own photo with the "Deceased" written across it and there's many more examples. We see him sad and depressed. We also see him visibly making a physical effort to lift heavy things, like when he's taking the debris off of himself after killing Clarence,

 

and he can even be seen making some effort while squeezing Boddicker's throat

We also see him visibly exhausted and hurting

Again, he's a man, just in a cyborg body. When he's pissed, he's pissed and when he's sad, he's sad. When Lewis got shot in RoboCop, he shouted "Lewis!!"on the top of his lungs, with both fear and concern in his voice.

Nancy Allen: That character was not a cartoon, it was a real life human being and [Peter Weller] really made sure that that was not lost (AMC Special)

What changed at the end of the movie is that he got small snippets of his memory back and realized what he is and who he was. There really wasn't any drastic shift in his personality, he was just grieving because of what he had found out. Once the final showdown starts, he's the tough character again with his witty personality. Even though he could just shoot them, he wanted to screw around with Clarence's gang first. First he tosses a piece of debris to startle them, then he says "Looking for me?!" and starts taking them down, starting with Joe

"Murphy had a wife and son what happened to them"
"I can feel them but I cant remember them"
Murphy never fully comes back. He only has flashes of his memory, but he does feel connection to his family and misses them. He does however, have Murphy's signature characteristics and personality.

Murphy really dies, totally flatlines. While it may be true that some of Murphy's memories and personality may resurface through the cyborg's computer programming, Robocop does not restore Murphy's life, nor does it provide him with enough of a semblence of human for him to have any hope of rejoining his wife and son - Cinefantastique ,1987

He also made sure that his most wanted enemy knew that he was going to get shot to death: "I'm not arresting you anymore" he says, after which he slowly starts to aim the gun at his future kill

After making sure that Lewis was safe he threw a joke "They'll fix you. They fix everything". That's all Murphy, since we also get to know that outside of  his witty tough character and one liners, he was also a jokster "Why won't you drive"?

THE SUIT

Bottin, a comic book fan, decided to give Robocop the kind of heroic physique seen in Marvel comics superheroes. "It's meant to look very speedy and aerodynamic. All the lines are measured to go on a slant - forward, forward, forward! All the lines were geometric, and compliment every shape on the body from all angles. When Verhoeven came on the project he requested numerous design changes, additions to the suit which looked more like machine than man-like. I've never done so many conceptional drawings for a director in my entire life - changing it, and changing it, and changing it!" Bottin sculpted numerous variations to determine the practicality of Verhoeven's suggestions only to end up with the design close to his original heroic concept. "Robocop looks the way he does because that's the way a man's body works! Although we went through fifty different variations, developing his character, everything came back to man-like. It's definitely a guy in the suit, which doesn't belittle it any" - Cinefantastique 1987

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Irvin Kershner: I wanted the characters to go further than they went the first time. I was working towards an emotional base that would be true to Robo one year later. His synapses are beginning to join up, memory has returned, and he has to deal with the fact that he's a man in an iron suit. He's a man in a no-exit situation (Cinefantastique, 1990)

In the sequel, we get to see Robocop who accepted his fate and carried on after a significant time has passed (the strike we see in the movie is not the continuation of the same one from the first movie. It is said that the police has returned to the picket line, and the Old Man says "about a year ago we gave this city Robocop"). We also get to see the conclusion of his internal struggle when he cuts the ties with his family for their own good, realizing that by not letting go he's only hurting them.

Peter Weller: It's a continuation of a dillema of a guy who's doomed to science. He's reaching out for ways to return to who he was. Except now he's reaching out - he's not just finding out, he's trying to find a way back
[I decided to do the sequel because] I just didn't feel complete about the character.I thought there was something else to say with it (Cinefantastique, 1990)

Murphy-Robocop returns, and so do his signature characteristics like the gun spinning

grabbing people in a painful way (this time it's by the nose)

and throwing his suspect against obstacles, leaving his face broken and bleeding after he's done with him

And of course, the witty one liners return ("You are a rotten cop!", "As good as money can buy" , "Think it over creep" or "Have a seat" before smashing the guy against the arcade game)

We also get to see his sadness. We see him twice on a verge of crying, with a shaky voice, when he's responding to Holzgang's mental bashing with teary eyes and when he's comforting Hob,

And we also get to see his anger ("I ..will ...kill... you!") and ruthless stubbornness against criminals

And just like before, he makes a visible effort to move something heavy, like when pulling RoboCain off the rooftop and he's reacting to pain like a human being, gritting teeth and screaming, for example when he's tortured in the factory.

Fancy moves during the shootout make their return as well

Just as before, Murphy makes sure that his most wanted enemy knows that he's going to get shot to death: "You Want Me?- Dead or Alive. -Then one of us must die. -Dead then", after which he slowly aims at his future kill

And lastly, we get to see the last of Murphy's personality traits, which is his humor: "Patience Lewis, we're only human"

Peter Weller made sure that the character is consistent: There are a lot of guidelines to the character. Sometimes Frank [Miller] would have to alter his stuff because he wasn't used to writing the character.(...) So a lot of those things, when I would read them, I'd say 'Frank, this is out of the character'. Instinctively, I knew what was right (Cinefantastique, 1990)

Irvin Kershner, 1990: I wanted to extend the character, I wanted him to make choices, I wanted him to get back free will (Making Of).

Once free [of his programming] he doesn't walk away from the evil around him, but stays to risk his life to destroy Robo 2. By doing his duty he is giving purpose to his existence (LA Times).

Peter Weller: He's reprogrammed and he becomes almost comical. He becomes kind of sadly impotent. And then he gets his life back and he becomes pretty brutal (Starlog, 1990) 

Jon Davison (producer, RoboCop, RoboCop 2): One theme of the first picture that's also in the second is Robo's obsession with his human identity (Starlog, 1990)

Peter Weller: You know, Frank Miller, a great writer, and Irv Kirshner, but, I read the second one and I knew it didn't have a third act. It has a great plot, but it never had a third act, whereas the first one is a great classic because the third act is the thing that makes all great third acts of all great movies, and maybe that's what makes this movie alive to this day (DIFF 2012)

THE SUIT

Jon Davison: The new suit looks a lot better. It's got a different paint scheme and it looks like a brand new car (Starlog, 1990)

Dennis Pawlik (Rob Bottin team): Jon Davison and Rob talked about a lot of stuff. They made a list of things they would like to try out, and they came up with the changes through trial and error. It looks better now. The basic design is the same. We had the basic inner suit from the abdomen up. It was all a rubber inner suit before. Now, he has the beauty suit, which is a hard suit with movable pieces on the abdomen. We're able to polish it and do a nice shine. (Starlog, 1990)

 
 

Rob Bottin: I wanted him to look like a damned show car. In the first one we couldn't, because we didn't have time to sand him and get all that right. (Fangoria, 1990)
 

Under street lights the costume is a vivid, unusual blue. When Weller stepped into the more balanced glow of the film lights, the suit miraculously turned a steely blue-gray - Starlog, 1990
   

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Fred Dekker: "I loved the first picture, and I thought this was a character who was ripe for exploration. I wanted to pay homage to Verhoeven and get back to the roots of what the character was all about, RoboCop is the ultimate example of the endless conflict of man versus machine, with the added twist that they are both in the same guy." (1993)

The above quote is extremely confusing since Dekker did the exact opposite. RoboCop 3 introduces major changes. In this movie, all humanity is taken out of the character - throughout the entire movie, there's not one trace of emotions or humanity on his part. His voice is so deep that he sounds angry all the time, but he's not, it's just the way he talks and how his robotic low and loud voice sounds like. He's just raising his voice sometimes and that is all personality we get, but he never even changes tone and sounds like the text-to-speech reader. He doesn't react at all when getting hurt. He feels no pain. When he gets his fingers and then armed chopped off, he just looks at it , and has the same expression on his face that doesn't change once in the entire movie - a blank expression

Same goes when he gets hit in the grenade, which seems to damage him more than anything else before - zero emotions or expressions. Just a stoic "cover me"

He acts like he's constantly on Valium. Again, remember in RoboCop when he kills Clarence and screams after the hurt Lewis? "Lewis!!" and in RoboCop 3 he never does anything, he just looks at her and then he still shows no emotions at all.

Even when she's shaking and sobbing and saying that she's scared, he still stand there expressionless like a statue

And not to mention his Robot talk - "a vehicle is approaching", "tracking", "Scanning". And he actually responds to a little 9 year old girl's question "How are you feeling" with "My efficiency rate is 93%". It seems like he is unable to have any humane conversations. He's not even looking at her and stares blankly into space like a robot

There is NO gun spinning

There is NO grabbing and hurting the suspects, or throwing them against something

There is NO witty humor or one liners, replaced with lines like "Maybe you have a hearing problem"

There is NO humor on his part - he actually doesn't even recognize jokes, and responds to them literally; Marie (joking): "It looks like you've become friends with a Mac Truck", Robocop: "I don't have many...friends"

There is NO humanity, NO Murphy, NO pain and NO personality on his part. When he gets his arm cut off, he even says "Detroit Police, identify yourself (...) You under arrest for destroying Police property". Robocop is back with his official robotic talk. There's plenty more like "Good evening Sgt. Reed. Please direct me to the Rehab staging area. Thank you."

There is NO fancy choreography either. When he enters the Rehab station he only...burns the walls while only walking in a straight line. He never even hurts his suspect but uses force of the explosion to put him down and grabs him by his clothes.

Even when he pushes heavy things, like when folding the elevator door, he shows no physical effort and - as usual - no expression on his face

He also is unresponsive plenty of times. He doesn't respond to  Lewis and Nikko when they're talking to him. He also seems disconnected from the world sometimes. When Marie and Fleck are talking about wiping out his humanity, he just stares blankly into space and seems sleepy. Also his responses sound like the reprogrammed Robocop from the previous movie: "I'm fine Anne, thank you for asking"
Even without the helmet he displays no visible emotions when remembering his death or that Nikko's parents have been killed

This is how we see Robocop and all of his emotions throughout the entire movie:

Ed Neumeier (co-writer Robocop): I think the more weaponry you gave Robocop the worse it got, and the less interesting he was. I think. If you look at the Leone westerns later on it's all about the decision of a gun, and I think that there's something to be said about with Robocop. I think that he kind of is this notion of, when he shows up, and the gun comes out, it's the same sequence, he's a gun slinger, and he's here to clean up the town
Robocop is a gun fighter, so Robocop should not have a machinegun arm, and Robocop should not be in a jetpack, I mean, this is boy stuff, sorry. But I thought about this things probably too much for my own good as a middle age man, but no, the jet pack ruins him (via RobocopArchive 2013)

Nancy Allen: It was kind of half baked in my opinion, but I tried to do the best that I could (...) They tried to make this mainstream, you know, PG-13, and that was not the sensibility, you know, I mean Robocop was a really gritty, political, reverend stark piece, and the minute you start turning it into a kind of a fairy tale it just doesn't work (via robocoparchive 2013)

Jon Davison (RoboCop & RoboCop 2 producer): I didn't want to do the picture without Weller, which was something suggested by the studio - "the hell with it, it's like the Mummy, just put anybody under the bandages.". I thought that was probably not a good idea (...) I think some of Weller's best performing is done under that rubber suit. He really has it down. (...) You can tell when Boris Karloff was playing the Mummy and when Tom Tyler was doing it. (Cinefantastique, 1990)

THE SUIT

Rob Bottin: We had pretty much kept everything intact in terms of materials and the suits. We were told at the end of the second picture that there would probably be a third; so this was sort of a known subject matter, And I had no reticence about working on yet another sequel-we created this character, so it would be kind of silly to say no, I'm proud of the character: and I'm proud of the fact that my company built it.(1993)

The loss of Weller presented the budget-conscious filmmakers with the problem of finding a new actor who could step into Weller's shoes- both figuratively and literally. "They wanted to be able to save money by using the old suits from the second picture," Bottin recalled, "So they were on the hunt for an actor who would fit into the suit we had -it was the 'Cinderella Syndrome.' They didn't have the money to create a whole new body cast and a whole new sculpture just to basically get what they had before, Also, they didn't want to have to change the look of the character at all, So they went searching for Cinderella. We gave them Peter Weller's measurements -ridiculously precise measurements, like from wrist to elbow, elbow to shoulder joint, center of rib cage to the outside of rib cage, et cetera, They found two actors they liked, and the one that fit into the suit the best was Robert Burke. But it wasn't as if he was cast merely because he fit the suit; Robert had had mime training, so he was able to do really good robotic moves," Even with the close size match, the suit still had to be tailored to Burke's physique, "The upper chest didn't fit him exactly, Also, Robert's neck was much longer than Weller's, and his head was a different shape, So we did have to cast some new parts, cut them, make them wider or longer, shorten them or refit them by remolding. But, all in all, Robert fit into the suit very well".

In addition to modifying the suit to better fit the new actor, Bottin was required to refurbish the existing suits which had been heavily damaged by the rigors of shooting the previous film. "We would have preferred to make all new suits, just to make it more comfortable for the actor. Anytime you have to patch up holes or fix things up, it adds to the weight of the thing. A hand-sized bit of bondo here and there, a little wire and a little metal reinforcement -it all adds up, By the time you distribute all the little fix-ups over the suit, it can add ten to fifteen pounds to the weight -and that's a problem when people are already complaining that the suit is too heavy. But much to Robert's credit, he pretty much made it to the end of the film before he started complaining about how heavy the suit was" (1993 via RobocopArchive)