Upon first glance, the 1987 Paul Verhoeven film RoboCop may seem like just an ordinary action film. The basic plot of the film, it may seem, has been done many times before. A policeman who has been wronged seeks his revenge on the person or people who have done said wrong to him, and the policeman ultimately succeeds. There is a twist this time, in that said policeman is dead and seeks his revenge as a cyborg, but the basic idea, it seems, remains the same. Upon closer inspection, however, RoboCop is not an ordinary action film. It is, in actuality, a parody of the generic action film, and also presents a parody of the mythic hero in the person of RoboCop. It is, in its own dark way, very amusing and very effective as a satire. To understand how RoboCop is such an effective film, one must first examine its story and plot.

According to Giannetti, the story of a movie "can be defined as the general subject matter, the raw materials of a dramatic action in chronological sequence. The plot, on the other hand, involves the storyteller’s method of superimposing a structural pattern over the story" (328). The story of RoboCop can be explained relatively simply. In a futuristic Detroit, crime is running rampant. The police force has recently been taken over by a company known as Omni Consumer Products (OCP), and they plan to create a new, robotic "supercop" to aid in the war against crime. Once crime is eliminated, OCP can proceed in their plans to build a new, idyllic version of Detroit, that they call Delta City. Since the plans for the first robot (the ED-209) fell through, a new creation, called a RoboCop, is developed. There is only one catch, though. OCP needs a human subject to volunteer his or her life in order to make RoboCop complete and fully functional.

This potential problem is soon solved when a policeman, Alex Murphy (Peter Weller), is violently killed by a gang which is headed by the leader of crime in Detroit. Since he is legally dead, OCP takes Murphy’s body and converts it into RoboCop. Though Murphy’s memory was supposed to have been eliminated, it wasn’t completely, and soon RoboCop begins experiencing some of Murphy’s memories. This leads him to track down the gang that killed Murphy. Soon he discovers that the gang is working for Dick Jones (Ronny Cox), the senior president of OCP, who is no doubt bitter that his creation, the ED-209, has been ignored in favor of RoboCop. RoboCop, who by this time has realized he is indeed Murphy, kills the gang in a fight at an abandoned steel mill, and then kills Jones, thereby completing his revenge.

Although the basic story of RoboCop can be explained in a couple of paragraphs, the actual plot of RoboCop is much more involved. The plot of the movie fits Syd Field’s three-act plot diagram almost perfectly. It even features the major turn of events in the second act, which is what Field teaches most second acts contain. Field’s plot diagram also contains ten to twenty instances which he calls "plot points," and which serve as important moments in the plot of the film. These plot points are spread out over the three acts of the movie movie. Again, RoboCop fits this mold perfectly.

RoboCop opens with a newscast that shows how much violence is prevalent in Detroit. It is notable that the news anchors seem desensitized to the violence that they are reporting. The newscast also includes an interview with Dick Jones, a senior president at OCP, who had recently bought the Detroit police force. This rather brief opening sequence is actually the first plot point of the movie. It establishes the fact that Detroit in the future is indeed a very violent place. More importantly, though, it also establishes that OCP runs the police force. The fact that a corporation could own such an important facet of life as a police force is rather startling, and this revelation is foreshadowing of the major role OCP will play throughout the movie.

The next scene in the movie shows Murphy entering the police station, telling the lieutenant that he has been transferred from the south side. The scene showcases the police station, and the fact that it is run-down and inherently gloomy. Shortly after Murphy goes into the locker room, the lieutenant comes and removes from a locker the name of an officer who had been killed on duty. This police scene is also very important in the movie, and serves as a plot point, for not only does it introduce Murphy, it also shows angry police officers talking about going on strike. The impending police strike is one of the underlying factors of the movie, as that is basically the reason ED-209, and later RoboCop, is created. After the police sequence is a scene of an OCP board meeting, where Dick Jones talks about the plan he has for ED-209, and even shows the board a prototype of the machine. However, ED-209 backfires and violently kills a board member. The head of OCP (Dan O’Herlihy) gets very upset at this and dresses down Jones. A young executive, Bob Morton (Miguel Ferrer) takes advantage of the opportunity to tell the head, whose only given name in the movie is "The Old Man," about plans he has been developing for a machine known as RoboCop. The Old Man likes the idea and tells Morton to talk about it with him in his office later, and this very much annoys Jones. This is a very important scene in the movie, and is definitely a major plot point. It introduces the audience to The Old Man and Morton, and gives us a lot more insight into the Jones character than what was seen in the brief news clip at the beginning of the movie. Through a brief shot of Morton while Jones is speaking, the scene also shows the audience the disdain Morton has for Jones, and later on in the scene, it appears that the feeling is mutual. This contempt that the two parties have for each other will come into play later on in the movie, as it is Jones who is ultimately responsible for killing Morton. Also notable about the scene is that it is the first scene, aside from the opening newscast, that showcases some humor. After the board member gets violently blown away by ED-209, all The Old Man says is, "Dick, I am very disappointed." The line is typical of the grisly humor that will surface throughout RoboCop. The most important thing about this scene in the OCP boardroom is that it contains the first mention of a RoboCop, and it also features ED-209, which, of course, will be RoboCop’s robotic nemesis later in the film.

The next major sequence in the movie is when Murphy teams up with his new partner, Anne Lewis (Nancy Allen), and they embark on their first assignment. Their assignment is to track down a gang that had recently robbed a bank. They catch up to the gang on the highway, and a violent chase ensues. This sequence is noteworthy and serves as a plot point not only because it showcases several visual motifs that will be discussed later in the paper, but also because it brings Murphy and Lewis together for the first time. Hardly a minor character, Lewis will be the one who is ultimately responsible for RoboCop discovering he is indeed Murphy. Most importantly, the sequence introduces Clarence Boddicker (Kurtwood Smith), the head of the gang and the man who ultimately kills Murphy. The sequence shows just how evil Boddicker is, as he throws a member of his own gang out of the van they are travelling in and onto the hood of Murphy and Lewis’ squad car.

The chase leads Murphy and Lewis into an abandoned steel mill where Boddicker and his gang are hiding out. Murphy finds two members of Boddicker’s gang watching television, and he tells them to freeze. After killing one of the men, Murphy prepares to arrest gang member Emil (Paul McCrane) when Boddicker comes walking up. Thus begins the most crucial plot point in the movie as of yet. After dropping him to the floor, Boddicker shoots off Murphy’s hand. As Murphy walks away in extreme, bloody pain, Boddicker tells him to turn around. He does, and the gang fires several shots into Murphy’s body, and blow away his right arm. However, he is still alive. Boddicker takes care of that, though, with a shot to the head. This is the most crucial scene of the first act of RoboCop, for not only does it kill the human Murphy, it also establishes a motive for Murphy, as RoboCop, wanting to track down Boddicker and his gang. Indeed, it is shortly after this scene that the first act of RoboCop concludes. For directly after this scene, there is a sequence with Murphy in the hospital, which ends with him being declared dead. Bob Morton then gets access to Murphy’s body, and he and other OCP lab technicians convert Murphy into RoboCop. The basic premise is established, and with this Act I concludes.

There were a number of plot points in the first act of this movie, but there had to be for the premise to be properly established. The second and third acts contain relatively fewer plot points, but they are nonetheless important. It is, after all, the second act of the movie that takes up the bulk of screen time, and it is the second act that shows the audience just how evil Dick Jones is, and also features RoboCop discovering that he is really Alex Murphy.

The second act begins with Murphy, now transformed into RoboCop, entering the police station. The other officers are amazed by the sight of him, and even more amazed when they see him on the firing range. This sequence can be considered a plot point not only because of a visual motif that will be discussed later, but also because it shows the audience just how much of an outsider, and a potential distraction, RoboCop is on the police force. Following this are a few scenes that show RoboCop in action and showcase how effective he really is. Next comes another clip from a newscast, and this one features Bob Morton, who has recently been appointed a Vice President at OCP. Shortly after the newscast, Morton goes into the bathroom, where he and Dick Jones have a confrontation that turns out to be a crucial plot point in the movie. Jones tells Morton that he insulted all of OCP with RoboCop, and he also reminds Morton that he is the number two man at OCP, and that The Old Man isn’t going to live forever. In a rather tense moment, Jones runs his fingers through Morton’s hair, and then grabs a handful of it, telling Morton that he "just fucked with the wrong guy." He concludes the confrontation by telling Morton that he should just pray that RoboCop doesn’t screw up. This confrontation is definitely one of the most important scenes in the movie, as it shows us just how evil Dick Jones really is.

After this confrontation, another noteworthy sequence occurs. RoboCop is shown sleeping, and his brain waves are being monitored via a machine. Suddenly, the brain waves begin to fluctuate, as he remembers his wife and child. Then the brain wave readings get wild and practically off-the-chart, as RoboCop remembers Boddicker and his gang killing Murphy. The flashbacks are especially violent and troublesome to RoboCop, and he soon gets up from his chair and begins to leave the police station. He is stopped momentarily by Anne Lewis, who tells him that he is indeed Murphy. Momentarily taken aback by this, RoboCop nonetheless troops on, telling Lewis that, somewhere, a crime is being committed. This sequence is indeed a crucial plot point, as it shows the audience just how much of Murphy’s memory RoboCop had actually retained.

Following this sequence, RoboCop soon spots a robbery in progress at a local gas station. It is Emil, one of Boddicker’s gang, who is holding up the station. While RoboCop does not recognize Emil, Emil, thanks to an aural motif discussed later in the paper, recognizes that the cyborg attempting to arrest him is indeed Murphy, the man he helped kill. Following Emil’s exclamations of "We killed you! We Killed You!," RoboCop, after failing to learn Emil’s identity directly from Emil, goes back to the police station, where an incident very crucial to the plot occurs. By searching the police database, RoboCop not only learns of Emil’s identity, he also learns who his accomplices are, and, most importantly, he discovers that Boddicker has killed a policeman, and that policeman’s name is Murphy. Lewis’ previous line in which she tells RoboCop he is Murphy replays over and over inside his mind, and soon RoboCop comes to a realization. He is not just RoboCop; he is Alex Murphy. This prompts a visit to Murphy’s old house, where he experiences several memories of his wife and son, and these memories upset him greatly. This whole sequence is quite imperative to the plot. RoboCop finds that he is really Murphy, a human being, and he displays real human emotions.

The next scene in RoboCop contains that major twist of events that Syd Field mentioned before. While Bob Morton is at his house, enjoying his female company, Boddicker invites himself in. He proceeds to shoot Morton in the leg three times, and then he plays a videodisc that features Dick Jones. It is revealed that Boddicker and his gang work for Jones, who, in his own words, is "cashing [Morton] out." Boddicker places an automatic grenade on Morton’s coffee table, and then leaves the house, just before it blows up, taking Morton’s life in the process. This was completely unexpected. The audience knew that Jones was evil (thanks in large part to that bathroom scene), but it had no idea that he was in fact the head of Boddicker and his gang. This is, indeed, a crucial turning point in RoboCop. Whereas it was previously believed that all RoboCop would have to fight was Boddicker’s gang (a formidable task in itself), it now becomes clear that he has to fight a corrupt member of OCP, the very company that made him.

Following this sequence is what would occur to be just a random drug-bust scene, but it is not. Boddicker and his gang are in the cocaine-manufacturing warehouse that RoboCop is investigating, and, after RoboCop roughs him up, Boddicker reveals that he works for Dick Jones. Upon hearing this, RoboCop goes to OCP to arrest Jones. However, it is here where "Directive 4" comes into play. Earlier in the film, RoboCop reveals his three prime directives to Bob Morton. As he says them, the directives also appear visually in the screen RoboCop has in the visor on his head. The label for a fourth directive pops up momentarily, but that directive is classified. When RoboCop tries to arrest Jones, he finds out just what "Directive 4" is. Inserted by Jones himself, the fourth directive makes RoboCop shut down whenever he attempts to arrest a member of OCP. Consequently, RoboCop becomes very weak in this scene, and reacts in much the same manner Superman would react to Kryptonite. Taking advantage of the situation, Jones unleashes ED-209 on RoboCop, but before he does, he makes a fatal mistake. He tells RoboCop that he "killed Bob Morton because he made a mistake. Now it’s time to erase that mistake." The very thing that he chews Boddicker out in the third act over, Jones does himself. He incriminates himself in front of RoboCop, forgetting that RoboCop is a cyborg and can record every word Jones speaks. It is this statement that will ultimately bring Jones down at the end of the movie. It is indeed a crucial plot point. This is also the last major plot point of Act II, as RoboCop eventually escapes ED-209 and then gunfire from people on his own force. Lewis then drives a battered and bruised RoboCop off to an abandoned steel mill.

Act III is much shorter than Act II, and it is even a bit shorter than Act I. This is due mainly to the fact that director Verhoeven apparently does not like to waste time with gratuitous padding at the end of his movie. As soon as Murphy saves the day, that is the end, the credits roll. This is not to say that Act III does not have its own share of plot points. Indeed, it does. The first such plot point occurs early in the act, when Boddicker has a meeting with Jones. After Jones yells at Boddicker for getting him involved, he then tells Boddicker that he’ll have to destroy RoboCop, and he gives him access to some Cobra assault cannons to do the job with, as well as a device that lets him know where RoboCop is at any given time. By accepting the job, Boddicker unwittingly seals his own fate, as he will not escape his encounter with RoboCop alive.

Meanwhile, while Boddicker shows his new weapons to his gang, RoboCop and Lewis rest in the abandoned steel mill. It is here that RoboCop fully completes his conversion to Alex Murphy. He removes the helmet from the top of his head, and the Murphy face appears, for the first time since the opening act of the movie. It is interesting to note how he uses the drill. He brings the drill up to his head in a manner similar to the way people bring guns up to their heads. This hints at the fact that Murphy is killing RoboCop. The fact that Murphy does not reapply his helmet for the rest of the film only increases the likelihood that Murphy is killing his mechanical alter ego.

Boddicker and his gang eventually arrive at the abandoned steel mill, and one by one the members of Boddicker’s gang get killed, until, fittingly, there is a final showdown between Murphy and Boddicker. Murphy prevails, and kills Boddicker. However, this is not the last plot point of the film. Murphy drives to OCP headquarters, where a board meeting is being held. Murphy busts in to the meeting and accuses Dick Jones of murder. The Old Man asks Murphy if he has any evidence. It is at this point that Murphy plays back, on a monitor screen, the recording of Jones admitting he killed Bob Morton. Murphy also explains that "Directive 4" prevents him from acting on Jones, as he is a member of OCP. The Old Man then fires Jones, and Murphy freely fires several bullets into Jones, sending him flying out of a window and to his death. The Old Man then asks Murphy what his name is. Instead of saying, "RoboCop," he instead says, "Murphy." Also, for the first time since the opening act of the film, he actually smiles. He is RoboCop no more; he is Alex Murphy again. This scene marks the end of the final act of the movie.

RoboCop is not simply a study of plot, however. There is much more to the movie. Part of the appeal of the movie is the fact that director Paul Verhoeven gives the audience credit for being intelligent. He includes various visual and aural motifs for the audience to pick up on. Some of these motifs contribute to the overall plot, while others have a foreshadowing effect, and can tip an educated audience off to events that will soon occur in the movie.

A visual motif of RoboCop that contributes to the plot has its origins in the first act of the film. When Murphy and Lewis initially team up, Lewis watches as Murphy twirls his gun before putting it into his holster. When Lewis asks Murphy why he does that, Murphy explains that his son’s favorite TV action hero, T.J. Laser, twirls his gun in a similar fashion. Shortly after this exchange, when Murphy and Lewis get in their squad car, Murphy drives out of the police garage in such a manner that he bottoms out with the squad car. Both of these events come into play in the second act, as RoboCop does the same things. Shortly after RoboCop joins the police force, there is a scene of him at the firing range, taking firing practice alongside other police officers. After he is done shooting, he takes the gun and twirls it around, just like Murphy did in the first act, before putting it into his holster. Lewis sees this, and she gets her first clue that this, indeed, may be her old partner, Murphy. This leads her to go up to Murphy as he is leaving the police station after his flashbacks from the second act and say to him, "Murphy, it’s you." Also, while Lewis does not see RoboCop bottom out in the squad car, the audience does, and it helps to reinforce the notion that RoboCop is more like Murphy than OCP would perhaps care to admit.

An aural motif that works along those same lines is the line "Dead or alive, you’re coming with me." Murphy says this line to Emil in the first act, when he is preparing to arrest him, right before he gets surrounded by the rest of Boddicker’s gang and is then killed. Then, in the second act, when RoboCop spots Emil holding up the gas station and is about to arrest him, he says the very same line. Emil recognizes the line instantly, and gets shocked, and says "I know you," before shouting "We killed you! We killed you!" over and over. This seems to stun RoboCop, as he stops moving and just replays the image over and over in his mind. Actually, this aural motif is more important than the aforementioned visual motif regarding the twirling of the gun and the pounding of the pavement. For it is Emil’s exclamations that prompt RoboCop to go to the computers and find out that Boddicker and his gang were behind Murphy’s killing. It is this, more so than Lewis’ "Murphy, it’s you" statement, that first really clues RoboCop into realizing he is Murphy.

There is a rather subtle audio-visual motif that is very prevalent in RoboCop, but that may take more than one viewing of the movie to completely understand. It is a clip from a bawdy comedy show that features a man, surrounded by two women, saying "I’ll buy that for a dollar!" The first time this clip comes into play is in the first act, in the sequence set in the abandoned steel mill. Emil and another member of Boddicker’s gang sit down, and Emil turns on a television, and that clip is shown. This is right before Murphy enters and shoots the other member and then attempts to arrest Emil, which, of course, is just before the gang and Boddicker surround Murphy and kill him.

At first, it seems that the television clip was just a coincidence, and may not necessarily mean anything. Emil was watching television, and that show just happened to be what was on. However, the scene occurs later on in the movie, towards the beginning of the second act. An owner of a convenience store is watching the clip on television when a man comes in and tries to rob the place. RoboCop then enters the convenience store and prevents the robbery. This is the first time the audience actually sees RoboCop in action, and to see how truly powerful he is. At the same time, though, it is rather jarring to see how wooden RoboCop is.

The third instance of the "I’ll buy that for a dollar!" is not actually a clip from the television show, but, rather, spoken dialogue in the film. Bob Morton is discussing with a colleague of his some rather promiscuous plans he has for the upcoming Tuesday night, prompting the colleague to say, "I’ll buy that for a dollar." Morton agrees with the colleague and then enters the bathroom, where he has that fateful encounter with Dick Jones. The fourth and final occurrence of "I’ll buy that for a dollar!" is, again, a television clip, and it occurs near the beginning of the third act. Emil is watching a clip of it on a TV in a store display window. It is the night the police force goes on strike, but, more importantly, Emil is watching the clip as Boddicker drives up with the Cobra assault cannons Jones gives him to kill RoboCop with. In fact, it is this scene that closes the second act of the film.

All four instances of the "I’ll buy that for a dollar!" line coincide with major points in the movie. The first one is right before Murphy gets killed. The second one is right before RoboCop is first seen in action. The third one is right before Jones’ confrontation with Morton, which winds up with Morton getting killed. Finally, the fourth occurrence of the line is right before Boddicker shows off the weaponry with which he intends to kill RoboCop. It is also notable that the line makes everyone who sees it explode in laughter, yet it is particularly unfunny. This fits in with the whole rather disparaging view of Americans director Verhoeven displays throughout RoboCop. First, he paints an overly glum picture of the future. Then, he shows Americans as being fairly passive about violence and death (note the way the news anchor almost glosses over the fact two former Presidents were killed in California fires). Now, it seems, Verhoeven is saying that Americans laugh at dumb jokes.

There are other visual motifs used in RoboCop. One of these motifs helps to distinguish between street criminals and corporate criminals. Street criminals are seen, well, on street level, whereas corporate criminals are seen from higher above. This is most clear with Dick Jones, as his office is on the eightieth floor, and he’s about as corporate as criminals come. Also, the criminals do not have to be directly in a corporation in order to achieve the effect of being higher up. For instance, Clarence Boddicker is not directly in a corporation, but he does have corporate connections via Jones. Consequently, in the scene in the cocaine factory, Boddicker is seen walking on a catwalk above the ground floor. This leads into another visual motif, although it is a rather small one, and that would be the presence of cocaine in the movie. Bob Morton is heavily using cocaine shortly before he is killed, and the shoot-out in the cocaine factory results in many people being killed. A rather subtle anti-cocaine message is in these visuals.

Point of view (POV) shots are very prevalent throughout RoboCop. Murphy’s flashback scenes, which are uses of formal technique themselves, are told entirely from his POV. This is why when, as RoboCop, he jerks so violently while dreaming in Act II. He feels that the gunshots are coming straight toward him. Also, and perhaps more importantly, there are several POV shots when the doctors are operating on Murphy after he was shot by Boddicker and his gang. The POV shots show the audience that Murphy is still alive. The audience sees, from Murphy’s POV, nearly every attempt performed on him to help save his life. The audience even sees the fade to black as the doctors give up on him, and it hears as the doctors declare the time of death. The very next shot the audience sees is a POV shot of static, as OCP begins to convert Murphy’s body into RoboCop. In fact, the next few minutes of the movie are all POV shots, as Bob Morton and others at OCP assemble RoboCop. Also, after Murphy becomes RoboCop, there are a number of shots throughout the movie that are POV shots of what RoboCop sees. It is through these POV shots that the four prime directives are established and seen (although the fourth appears merely as "classified), that the audience sees the video that RoboCop records and then plays back in his mind, that the audience sees how RoboCop makes an arrest, and various items of that nature. In fact, POV shots remain in RoboCop up until the killing of Jones at the end of the film.

Of course, this does not mean there are not any other kinds of shots in RoboCop besides POV shots. There is a wide range of shots. For example, when Murphy is being wheeled into the hospital after Boddicker shoots him, there are both high angle shots and low angle shots in this sequence. The low angle shot is of the stretcher being wheeled down the hospital aisle, whereas the high angle shot does a quick overview of Murphy’s body on the stretcher. Verhoeven also makes ample use of close-ups in the film. Whenever RoboCop learns something about his past life as Murphy, there is a close-up of his face, even though one can usually only see his mouth, due to the helmet that is in the way.

Clarence Boddicker also gets special treatment in the shots of the film. It is interesting to note that many shots of him in the film begin with a wide-angle lens, and then show him gradually walking into the frame. This, no doubt, is to show the power Boddicker possesses, but it also shows us that he can generate fear in the hearts of men. A shining example of this is in the first act of the movie, when three members of Boddicker’s gang have Murphy surrounded. A voice off screen is heard, and it soon becomes clear who the source of this nonsynchronous sound is. Slowly, from off in the distance, Boddicker comes into view. This same scene also features one of the relatively few zoom shots in RoboCop. It is when Murphy first catches a glimpse of Boddicker. An uneasy look appears in Murphy’s face, as if he knew that Boddicker is indeed a force to be reckoned with.

The lighting in this movie should also be noted. Because of Verhoeven’s dark view of the future, most of Detroit is in low-key lighting. Even the fake newscasts have a dark quality to them. The police force is, predictably, usually shown in high-key lighting. Boddicker and his gang are usually in low-key lighting. What is interesting is that all the members of OCP, even Dick Jones, are depicted in high-key lighting. This is interesting because the members of OCP that the audience gets to know, Jones and Bob Morton, are hardly saints. The Old Man at OCP does appear to be nice, and he could have been shown in high-key lighting, and yet all of OCP is depicted in this manner. It is rather strange.

In addition to all the techniques used in the film, RoboCop also presents a number of thematic oppositions. Obviously, the most basic one is man versus machine. If more RoboCops are developed, normal human police officers, it appears, would be out of a job. Yet, these RoboCops could also make the police officer’s job easier. It is a dilemma, and an opposition. A very similar thematic opposition in this movie is past versus future. Again, nobody wants for the RoboCops to make human cops obsolete, but people also see the benefits of having some RoboCops around. They see, too, that RoboCops are probably the coming thing, and one cannot stop the future. One can only mold it to help himself or herself.

Another thematic opposition in RoboCop is RoboCop versus the ED-209. ED-209 is a destructive robot designed ostensibly for law enforcement, but it was more likely designed to line Dick Jones’ own pockets. RoboCop, meanwhile, is a safe cyborg that can effectively uphold the law. RoboCop wants to prevent machines like ED-209 from running rampant throughout Detroit (as per Jones’ plan), whereas ED-209 just wants to destroy RoboCop, and, in fact, anything in its path. It is indeed a thematic opposition.

Another thematic opposition evident in the film is the battle between Murphy and himself. Murphy no doubt is lucky to be alive, but does he really want to be alive? He is a cyborg, and he can never be held or hugged. His own child would probably not recognize him. Yes, he is still alive, but he will never truly be a human being again, no matter how much he feels like the old Alex Murphy. Although he reaches some sort of resolution by the end of the movie, one gets the feeling that the Murphy versus himself conflict is one that will haunt him again.

Of course, RoboCop is not made up entirely of thematic oppositions. There are themes to the movie as well. Perhaps the clearest one is corporate corruption, as that is basically what Dick Jones is doing over at OCP. Greed is an underlying theme as well. The Detroit police force goes on strike in the movie, in order to make more money. Also, Dick Jones designs ED-209 solely for the purpose of making money for OCP. In fact, even The Old Man, sweet as he appears to be, gets most upset at the shooting spree ED-209 goes on at the beginning of Act I not because it kills a man, but because it will cost OCP fifty million dollars.

Overall, Paul Verhoeven’s version of the future in RoboCop is pretty dark. Corruption and greed are the laws of the land. Crime runs rampant. Americans have become so desensitized to violence that the death of, not one, but two presidents warrants little more than a footnote in a nightly news telecast. Verhoeven’s RoboCop was a good movie, but it was also a very grim movie, and I would not like to see it become reality anytime soon.