Blank Check with Griffin & David - RoboCop

Episode Date: January 14, 2018

Griffin and David discuss dystopian action satire, 1987’s RoboCop. But is old Detroit a cancer and the cancer is crime? Was this film a deconstruction of the American hero mythology? Is it true that Verhoeven initially read half a page of the script and threw in the trash only to have his wife retrieve it and encourage him to give it a second chance? Together they examine the construction and evolution of the RoboCop costume, breaking squib records, 1987’s Academy award winners and many other tangents. This episode is sponsored by ZipRecruiter and Sci-Fi.com’s Cerberus Rex.

Lewis Lewis I'm a mess. They'll podcast you. They podcast everything. Jesus. I'd podcast that for a dollar. That's a good one. That's a good one. Better alive, you're podcasting with me. Calm quietly or there will be podcast.

Ooh, podcast, podcast podcast podcast what is that come on the tigers are podcasting tonight do you podcast bobby you know this movie I might know every line

hello I'm David Sims You know this movie better than me, clearly. I might know every line. Hello, I'm David Sims. My name is Griffin Newman. All right. You are clearly suffering post-traumatic stress. I will notify a crisis center. Well, I was going to say the podcast center. Oh, yeah.

Podcast crisis center. The nearest podcast crisis center. That might be indelicate. This is an indelicate movie this is the best movie ever made hi everybody my name is griffin newman i know i already said it but i need to get it out again because god i'm twice as excited for this episode as any episode we've ever recorded it's disgusting he's been sweating with glee for an hour that's not sweat come on it's blood alright okay been bleeding

my face has been bleeding with excitement sure his face is blood red we're hashtag the two friends competitive advantage

concert of contacts okay and this is a podcast about filmographies Ben's laughing David's already pissed off and I'm having such a fun time. It's a narrative.

I'm having fun, too. It's a podcast about filmographies. Directors who have massive success early on in their career and are issued a series of blank checks. And sometimes those checks clear. Cha-ching. Sometimes they bounce, baby. Boing.

But this time... I don't know. I'm trying stuff out. You better check yourself before you wreck yourself, because this one's clearing. You better blank check yourself. Hey. This is a main series on the films of Paul Verhoeven. Yep.

It's called Pod Ship Casters. Well said. And today we are covering his seventh movie overall. Is that correct? I'd tell you, but the Wi-Fi's down. His second English language film, because we're only covering the English language film. Paul Verhoeven, The Hollywood Years. Yep.

And more importantly, we are covering The Great American Film. The? This is The Great American Film. Capital T, capital G. I would say so. I think a lot about Idly, and I'm sure you do as well, what you would do were you invited to

submit your your sight and sound top 10 you know the very vaunted uh highly esteemed decades right every decade they have a combination of a survey no there's two lists journalists and filmmakers and then the composite list of the two together I said well no but there's the journalist list and the critic list I think of those as I mean journalists and the composite list of the two together. I said, well, no, but there's the journalist list and the critic list. I think of those as, I mean, journalist list and the filmmaker list.

Yeah. There is a combined list. Fuck the combined list. There's three lists in total. Fuck the combined list. Two lists. Two lists. Two good lists.

There's three lists in total. It's like the mystery of Eleanor Rigby. What's that movie called? The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby. Whatever. I don't know. Fuck me.

That movie was a stinker. I can't believe I whiffed a reference to a movie for people now. That was a movie where I saw the, you know, them, the combined version. That was the joke I was making. I know, and I was like,

ugh, what a slog. And people were like, well, you know, both the two separate versions, him and her, you know, which were each like, you know,

an hour and 45 minutes long. You know, those are good. And I was like, I'm not, after watching that, I'm not, after watching that, I'm not going to go see the longer versions. Yes, yes. That's how I feel when people tell me to watch

Batman v Superman, Dawn of Justice, The Extended Cut. I actually kind of want to watch that. Someday I will. But today this is the Great American Movie. And what I was trying to say was, I think about that

if I were handed a sight and sound list, right? Yeah. And I know what my top ten favorite movies are pretty well. There's some rotation with the moods. I don't think I do. I'd say I have a 15 that are always in my ten. Wow. You know, and sometimes the lower rankings, I go through periods, you know.

There are very few movies that are in my personal top 10 that I think would also make my like sight and sound here's my objective analysis of what I think are the 10 best films ever made I get it a lot of the cases of the movies that are on my favorite movie list it's a very roundabout way to say

Robocop is on your favorite movie list and your best movie list yes yes I get it I get what you're saying no but what I want to say was like a lot of my

the movies I think are the best films of all time. There's another film that director made that personally I feel more attached to. Okay. If that makes sense. Sure. Like, it's the same directors overlapping on the two lists a lot. Right. But this movie, I just think, is like the film for me that.

It's the film for me. It's the film for me. I think it's the Great American movie. Yeah. Made by a sex- dutchman sure yes one of his least sex obsessed films yes yeah which i love about it and i want to talk about a lot but you're great i i'm gonna talk about every single fucking element of this movie no guest on this one no because we already don't have space for me to share all of my thoughts yeah i chased the guests away from this one i no because we already don't have space for me to share all of my thoughts yeah i chased the guests away from this one i was like no you don't want to come here

get far away yeah exactly um i i just i look at this movie and i'm like no objectively i think this is as good as any english language film ever made sure uh well i think it's definitely the second best thing paul m McCrane was ever involved with. Yours number one? Yeah. Okay, go fuck yourself. I love this movie. I adore this movie.

The film we're talking about today is called Robert Cop. Yep. Please don't do that. Robert Cop? Yes. Yes. Please don't do that. It's Bob Cop.

Half man, half machine, 100% Robert. No, it's bob cop half man half machine 100 robert no it's half half robert half cop bobo cop cops and robersons that's what we're discussing today that's right chevy's back yeah i would be down for that i know you would yeah robo cops and robersons yeah RoboCops and Roberson's RoboCop and a half sure RoboCop land oh oh it's a serious turn that sounds like the the Jurassic World type reboot where it's like we gotta make it bigger you know it's a whole land of Robert Cops Copland is one of those movies that when it came out everyone was like wow what a like sort of dramatic turn for Sly Stallone this sort of like you know weighty drama yeah and now you watch you're like this is a fun movie like I wish Hollywood would make more movies

like this. It's about breaking balls basically. That's like when I always think about this but when Paper Moon came out it was dismissed as like fucking popcorn fluff. Yeah like puffery Right like puffery. Now it's like art cinema of the highest order. There's another one oh oh like The Untouchables

is fascinating to watch in that sense. Because when it came out, everyone was like, this is just like a dumb blockbuster. And you watch it now and you're like, it's written by David Mamet. It's true.

It's got, like, a fucking Morricone score. It's big set pieces and homage to Battleship Potemkin. All true. And everyone's like, this is some movie for fucking teenagers at a mall.

Just spilled water everywhere. But that's what I love about Roboc And everyone's like, this is some movie for fucking teenagers at a mall. Just spilled water everywhere. But that's what I love about Robocop is I think this is a movie and I've said this before and I'll say it a thousand times and it's why I think this movie is like

the Sputanka deal of what I think film can do as a populist medium is that this is a movie that works for the smartest person in the room and the dumbest person

in the room. Sure. Sure. I mean, that's Paul Verhoeven's double whammy there, right? And this is the one that synthesizes it best. And I think the

thing that this movie does that puts it above the other Verhoeven films, which I love, I love all the films to some degree or another that we're talking about in this main series. Even Hollow Man? I haven't seen Hollow Man. That's the one I haven't seen. But you love Showgirls. I do. Love Starship Troops. Yeah. Basic Instinct? I haven't seen Hollow Man. That's the one I haven't seen. But you love showgirls. I do.

Love Starship Troops. Yeah. Basic Instinct. I thought you hadn't seen that one. You're right. I forgot that. So you're not a huge, yeah, you're not a completist over here.

I'm not. I'm not. Hey, I'm completing over here. Sorry. I think this movie is the most genuine affection Paul Verhoeven has had for his characters in one of his American films. I think often he uses his protagonists as sort of delivery devices

to get to the larger points he wants to make. Or they're sort of built around movie star personas. And I think this movie has a real humanism to it. Yes. That seems incompatible with everything else this film is doing. I think this film is this insane balancing act that he's able to have his cake and eat it too and make this movie that's like balls-to-the-wall satire, an action film, this sort of deconstruction of the American hero mythology mythology our obsession with violence yes

you know the culture at the time our relationship technology and also just like a movie about like a fucking good guy trying to

remember who he is sure you know what is the worst of all those things what it's not like an amazing action movie

it's like a fine action movie I think it's a really solid action movie but you also have to compare it to the action movies at the time which are very different than the action movies where they are but even i would say even then you know i think the action in the movie is totally fine but i don't think he's that interested because you know the character is sort of a lumbering giant well okay lumbers around okay so so let's lumber yes but that's that's a huge part of this film everything's gonna be a huge part of this film yeah because this is the biggest movie ever made it's the hugest it was it was pretty cheap though this movie 10 mil 10 i thought it was a little

higher like i thought it was like 15 okay so i'm gonna tell you something crazy oh my god what last night i watched this movie with great pleasure. How many times have you seen this movie? I couldn't count. Honestly, I've probably seen it somewhere between 15 and 20 times. Okay, okay. That's my guess. All right. But I watch it a lot. I would have guessed more, honestly.

I mean, all right, Wikipedia says $13 million for the budget. Okay, so what I was going to tell you was I watched it last night with great pleasure. And I was like, oh, fuck. God, I love this movie. How much fun this is. Can't we go back to the Star Wars was where we just talk about one movie every week can i just watch robocop every week that's so crazy i've been listening back to our star wars episodes uh-huh um because the reddit listens back to them yeah and uh thank god we don't do

that anymore we really struggle in some of those episodes, we got sweaty on a lot of those. All right. All right. But you watch with pleasure. I watch with pleasure. I go to sleep. I have wonderful dreams. I have the best night's sleep I've had in years.

Sick weird person. Thinking of my friend Robert, okay? And then I wake up in the morning, and the disc is still in my player, right? Sure. And I turn on my PlayStation 4 to play Lego City Undercover. And I'm like, huh. You've never listened to the commentary. Oh, okay. And I watched RoboCop again today.

I watched it twice in the last 24 hours. It's amazing. I mean, good for you. Good for you. I've never listened to the commentary either. I have it now because I own the Blu-ray. Yes. And I'd like to because I believe it's cited.

I've seen it cited. I believe it's ported over from the Criterion. Yes, it is from the Criterion. Yes, because the commentary was recorded in 2000. They talk about George W. Bush just having been elected. Wow. What a great time. Yes.

I'm nostalgic for the era of the Robocop commentary. Yes. But they said on it that the budget was $10 million, and they went a little bit over. You want to hear one of the best examples of smart producing I've ever heard? Because the commentary is him, Ed Neumeier, the screenwriter, co-screenwriter,

and John Davidson, who was the producer on the film. Okay. And they were running out of money, coming up against the end of their schedule. And Verhoeven had all these big ideas, adding in the commercials, all these things they wanted to shoot that they didn't have time to fit in. And so what they did was they pushed the scene of Murphy's killing off of the schedule. the scene of Murphy's killing off of the schedule. Okay. They used the couple of days

they were going to need for that entire set piece to fill in all the other stuff they wanted to do. Right. So then they went back to the studio and they were like,

shit, we didn't, this is a crucial scene. You gotta give us more money to make this. You gotta give us money for that. Interesting.

Because they were like, if we shot that, they would never give us more money to do the other stuff. Yeah, no, I get it.

I get it. I get it. That's very, that's very cute of them. It's really smart. Yeah smart yeah sure uh so yeah they didn't say the exact amount but it was a budget of 10 went over sure 13 is the amount i'm seeing perfectly small amount honestly yes uh 1987 87 yes yeah so orion uh you know is is a pretty substantial studio At this time But doesn't make Huge budget films No

They make a lot of trash They also did some High class kind of stuff Silence of the Lambs notably Dances with Wolves Yes But that was when They were starting to tiptoe

Into bigger and bigger budgets But they started out As kind of like A Lionsgate-y kind of Like mini-major sort of But you know How many best picture winners Did Orion produce?

Three? Four How many best picture winners And Orion produce? Three? Four. How many Best Picture winners, and I found this out today, has the Walt Disney Company produced? Zero. Zero.

That's nuts. Do you know how many nominations Disney has? Four or five. I think Mary Poppins and like Beauty and the Beast and like three Pixar movies. Yeah, it was,

yes, it was two until they added, they expanded the field. Pixar movies, yeah. No, but Orion had Amadeus, Platoon, Dances with Wolves, and Silence of the Lambs. That's crazy.

That's quite a pretty good run for a studio that goes bankrupt like a year after the Silence of the Lambs or whatever. Yes. So at this point, they had won two of those? Yeah. Yeah. But they do a lot of genre stuff. Yes. Well, that's the thing.

Much like Lionsgate, mix of schlock and slightly of genre stuff. Yes, well, that's the thing. Much like Lionsgate, mix of schlock and slightly more arty. Yes. So he had done Flesh and Blood with them. He's now fully wanting to convert into the studio system. And as I said in our Flesh and Blood episode, disappointed in himself at the failure of Flesh and Blood, said, I need to move to Hollywood

and ingrain myself in American culture with my wife he has been chased out of the Netherlands they said you are too cuckoo for these Cocoa Puffs you're not getting any government funding for your silly movies so he goes to Hollywood and says

I need to King Louie style figure out how to walk like them, talk like them who are you? oh that King Louie not the King of the French to King Louis style figure out how to walk like them, talk like them. Oh, that King Louis. Not the King of the French. Right. But so he starts observing American culture from this almost like anthropological level.

And American films. And really studying the rhythms to try to figure out what connects with the American populace. He's just going to talk for the whole episode guys. Go on. This is my dissertation. This episode's my dissertation. Sure. They're sending him a lot of scripts.

Yes. He reads a script. He throws it in the trash. It's called Robocop, the future of law enforcement. He says he reads half a page.

Is it the Neumeier-Miner combined script or is it like some earlier version of this script? No, it's the combined script. Because I believe the genesis was that

one of them had written a script about like robo-drones in the future and one of them had written a script about like a cop who gets a machine in his body and they were like... It was pretty much what they shot. With some on-the-fly changes.

They had already decided to combine their ideas. This was the movie existing in pretty much the form we know today. Yeah. You read like half a page of probably just like the table setting. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we're like, this is garbage. Give me a cigar and a crap. Blinching a bong.

Oh, God. He took a little skin flake out of a box and put it on his tongue. I love gold. Unfortunate smelting accident. He's got a gold member. Yeah, exactly. We get it, right? I was about to say smelting accident too,

which is funny that both of us thought of that considering that's not a notable quote from that movie. Oh, really? Smelting is a term always jumped out to me. Right, right. But me and my cousin used to just say that to each other all the time for some reason. See, I used to say that too. This is why we're friends. Unfortunate smelting. Unfortunate, right. But me and my cousin used to just say that to each other all the time for some reason. See, I used to say that too.

This is why we're friends. Unfortunate schmelting. Unfortunate. Yes. He throws it onto the floor, into the rubbish, right? Yeah, the gold member. Right. Clunk.

Right. But he was just getting all these scripts. And his wife, his wife of 50 years, she, you know, is just cleaning up. She fishes it out. Yes. And she reads it and she goes paul you fucking idiot she she swipes the coffee grounds off of it you know right then paul slips on the banana peel ah smelting i don't know she reads the script and says are you are you a fucking idiot do you think she says literally are you a fucking idiot? You think she says literally, are you a fucking idiot?

On the commentary, he makes it sound like she was that dismissive and angry of him. Sure. Said like, Paul, you idiot. Did you read this thing?

And he was like, no, it's called RoboCop. He's dumb. I hate RoboCop. Right. And she was like, there's a lot going on in this country.

This country is sick. This is a smart screenplay written by canny people. There are layers to this, but also, this screenplay concerns all of your main thematic interests. This is very much a Jesus story. And this is very much a Frankenstein's

monster tale. It's a real Frankenstein movie. That's what I really think of it as. But the Jesus stuff was already in there. I get you. And Verhoeven reads it and he goes this isn't just a Jesus story. In his own words Verhoeven says this is the American Jesus. This is the American equivalent of Jesus.

Right, right. The figure we've needed within the American mythology who died for our sins. Great. And at the end rises and walks on water. Sure. Good call. A very, very deliberate choice. Okay.

So he goes, they give him the $10 million budget. He starts obsessively watching American action films. And by his own admission, he was terrified going into this movie because he felt he did not understand American culture.

There's an anecdote he tells that's hilarious where when he was like doing meetings with the executives and going over script things, he said, you know,

page 36, there's this moment where a character says are you okay brother where in the script is it previously established that they are siblings uh-huh you didn't get the slang you didn't get any right yeah but i think that's a key to this movie is that like when we were talking our detroit episode right about like i know that was different because it was within a political sphere but what's your point what's your point who is the right to tell what stories right and gerard was saying like i don't think you need to have lived through something to make that movie

but you have to know what you don't know in a sense yeah you know like someone like sean baker doesn't know the people he's making the films about but he learns he meets them he listens to them this is quite a tangent about Robocop. Verhoeven was doing that with America. Yeah, okay. Which means he didn't take anything for granted going into this movie. And every element in it is so deliberate and sort of field tested through his sense of trying to understand what this culture is. Okay.

They hire Peter Weller. Who do they want first? Arnold Schwarzenegger. And then? That's who the studio wants. Studio wants Arnold Schwarzenegger. Who does Paul want's who the studio wants. Studio wants Arnold Schwarzenegger. Who does Paul want? Rucker Hauer.

Rucker Hauer. Yeah. But you know what the problem with them is? Not getting along these days. No, I mean, that's actually not what I read, but maybe. But it's just, they were too big. Well, I know that with Arnold. Rucker Hauer's huge.

Really? Yeah, like, I think it was just like, they're too large. Like, they're too bulky. You got Amanda Dung? Maybe. Does Arnie? arnie no no no no actually pointedly no like he says have you ever seen those dude modeling pictures from like the pumping iron it doesn't i mean possibly it doesn't stick in the memory he's got like a dish long but like nothing to write home about um but they were just like they could like very much not the the Schwarzenegger of penises if that makes sense. Sure.

Sure. Yes it does. His penis is shorter than his name. You could write his name on a grain of rice I mean yeah with the proper

Okay but comparatively Alright. The grain of rice he draws penis on would be smaller. Great. How are we doing Ben? Deleting the episode yet?

No no it's great. How are we doing producer Ben? Yeah no good. How are we doing Ben? I'm going episode yet? No, no, it's great. How we doing, producer Ben? Yeah, no, good. How we doing, Ben Dueser? I'm going to restart my computer. It's going to make the noise. How we doing, Poet Laureate? Okay, wait. So I have to get it done. Fuck. Oh, I thought. You didn't have any.

Just keep going, keep going, keep going. How you doing, Fuckmaster? How you doing, Tiebreaker? How you doing, Birthday Benny? Oh, man. Sucking with Benny? Well, I'm dry, but. Peeper?

Yes. I'm looking at you guys. I'm dry. Peeper? Yes. I'm looking at you guys. Meat lover? Fart detective? Yes. Voice of reason was recently recommended. I like that. Yeah.

The voice of reason? I guess so. Sonia said that in her locker when she was disappointed at Ben. She said Ben you're supposed to have my side here. You're the voice of reason. It's true. I think it's a little bit my job. Okay.

Get over yourself got him um got him you of course graduate to certain tells over the course of different miniseries kylo ben producer ben kenobi ben i chomelon ben say it say benny thing war has illy ben's with a dollar sign yeah it's getting harder it's getting harder pre-urbain and whatever the fuck pod 19k ben 19 oh oh ben 19 the fennel maker yeah yeah yeah i feel good about that one there's been some controversy yeah all right people were upset that they didn't even have used a vote shixing of using osama ben hasley whatever i just i don't think but that was the funny thing. That thread, it was like, you cowards, Osama Ben Hosley.

You idiots. It should be Osama Ben Laden. They couldn't decide on what it was. Way to prove our point. Also, I feel like they're treating us like we're the DNC. And Osama Ben Hosley was like Bernie Sanders and we suppressed the people's choice.

And they're right. And they're right. And they're right, but for a reason. For a reason. Exactly. Ben didn't want to. I don't want to be synonymous with this horrible terrorist figure. I mean, it's just not a funny joke. But did you hear about how he liked-

Bernie? Bernie? Or Bin Laden? Which one are you talking about? Oh, come on. Did you hear about how he liked Final Fantasy 7 or whatever? I can't remember. I saw you liked

all these weird like 16 bit like sexy roms that's weird right did you see that no he liked like like ASCII porn

no but like 16 bit like pixelated like leisure suit Larry's style like when people made like sexy poker for like the Commodore or whatever

seriously that's what it was alright you should look up the artwork sounds pretty good like the Commodore or whatever. Seriously. The Anacoleico. That's what it was. All right. You should look up the artwork. Some of it's pretty good. This is, my friends used to make fun of me because

we were, when I was in high school, someone mentioned, they were reading some history book and they were like, oh, apparently Hitler was a major lover of cinnamon. He used to have like a huge library and he would watch one movie a day like at the absolute minimum and i

was like huh and they were like what because i sort of gave him like a contented like oh wow that's really uh that's cool apparently hitler was very active on letterbox all right jesus we are off the rails. This is a later episode recording for us. This is a real After Dark episode. The sun has set. This is a blank check after dark. Oh, God.

A BCAD, if you will. Yeah, BACAD. Schwarzenegger. Yeah, Schwarzenegger. Was who the studio wanted. Yeah, and Rucky. Right. They're too big.

They designed this suit that they couldn't move around in. But they didn't even have the suit that established at this point. But what they knew was the suit was going to add bulk to whoever it was. Sure. So they said, if we put a big guy in the suit, he's going to look like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. If we find a really live guy, a guy who looks as far away from an action hero as we can, we can make his proportions just right to build the mass on top of him. So they said the two things they were looking for were a real solid actor.

They said they were really worried because they thought no one would want to take the job. It's a tough job. Most of your face is covered. It's kind of thankless. It's difficult. For a lot of the film, you're suppressing emotions. But Peter Weller read the script and got it. He saw what the arc was.

He saw what he could do with it. And the other thing was, dude has a great fucking mouth. Incredible jaw. Right. Just an insanely good jaw. And they knew that. They said,

we need someone who has that right sliver underneath their nose between their chin. Did they make him read for the part? I hope so. Just with like this part of his face covered? I fucking hope so. That would be so funny. He hadn't been in

that many movies had Bucker Bonsai already happened yeah that's 84 and that was Orion as well which he's astonishingly good in and I love that movie

but he's a very cerebral kind of leading man in it is not the kind of guy you would place into this sort of film apart from that I don't know much about his earlier

like movies Firstborn A Killing Affair these are not movies i'm like that familiar i'm gonna fuck this up as well origin but also in the um in the commentary i think ed newmeyer refers to his absurd pathos sure there's something about him that looks very sad and he's got this sort of like his voice is a little like well his voice is really special right but there is an innate sort of he's got a

bit of like an American Liam Neeson thing where there's just a sense of longing to him which Buckaroo Banzai really runs with that works really well for this movie you know apart from Naked Lunch I feel like he is underserved and Buckaroo Banzai by cinema like it's not like he is underserved. And Buckaroo Bonsai by Cinema.

It's not like he's had enough great roles. He has. He was a villain on 24, which he was good on. He was always good. He was the villain in Star Trek Into Darkness, which he's totally wasted in. He's fine in it. It is bizarre, though. For a guy who gave three great leading performances in three very revered movies of three different kinds, that it never really happened again.

Yeah. That he never went into a kind of cool older character actor phase. Yeah, not really. Maybe he's... He's mostly like an Italian architecture art history professor now. Seriously. I know, I know.

He also directs TV. He directs a lot of TV. And, you know, yeah, you're right. He has a PhD in Italian Renaissance art history. Thank you. I wasn't denying it. I was just laughing at the...

He's apparently a great teacher. Yeah, cool. Go to RateMyTeacher.com. Look up Robert Kopp. Anyway, they cast Peter Weller. And Peter Weller takes to it. And he goes, I want to fucking make this work. I have, like, a real serious have a real serious background as an actor.

I come out of theater. I did extensive training. I understand what the limitations of this role are, and I want to make it sing. So he buys himself all sorts of rugby equipment, padding, heavy outfits, goes to the park every day and practices walking around in physically encumbered ways, right? They hire a company to design the suit. They aren't happy with the suit. So they throw a...

Suit comes late. Right. They throw a flyer out to Rob Bottin, who comes up with this fucking incredible suit under short notice. It is incredible. And the design of the helmet especially is amazing. Perfect, perfect, perfect.

It's like the exact perfect level of design. Yeah. It's just detailed enough it's got just enough going on while still being very clean very iconic very elemental right i really agree so they bring this suit and they filmed a couple weeks i think two weeks without weller in the suit either stuff with other characters or some of the murphy stuff right right although there isn't much of it uh at beginning of the film, which is one of the things I like about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So it's two weeks in when they actually put him on the suit in the first day. And they have him come in at like four o'clock in the morning in order to start getting into the suit, which I think they said was going to take 11 hours. Wait, it takes him 11 hours every day? The first day. Okay, all right. The first day, 11 hours hours they put him in the thing and he can't move he cannot move yeah no this i know that he it was all like again what

did wasn't his expectation at all and he was freaking the fuck out and he said i can't do this i can't do this i can't do this for months what the fuck is gonna happen right right right and they flipped out he wanted to. They wanted to shut down the movie. And he reaches out to his college... His movement teacher. His mime coach. Yes. Whose name is Nomi something, I think? I can probably find her.

I think it's a man, but I might be wrong about that. Moni Yakeem, the head of the movement department at Juilliard. Thank you. He was a Juilliard dude. Right. They had envisioned Robocop moving like a snake. Very smooth. But instead, they slowed it down into this sort of clunky, Frankenstein-y kind of way.

Because what Moni said is, look, you're not going to have that agility. You're not going to have that fluidity that you planned. What you need to do is make the most of what you have. And the thing you can do that's really powerful is to make every fluidity that you planned. What you need to do is make the most of what you have and the thing you can do that's really powerful is to make every move as deliberate as possible. Every single movement

has to happen one piece at a time. So because of that they established the whole Robocop look which is not planned which is an accident which is the key

to this fucking movie and ties into what you're saying about it not being as much of an action movie as the other things. Because you have an action movie starring a guy with the same level of agility as as present-day Liam Neeson

sure who's big and lumbering and rickety sure and doesn't move around space as well so it becomes kind of like he's an action hero in this sort of western way where it's about him standing one spot where he aims his gun it's about the intimidation more than anything intimidation but obviously also this is not a movie where action uh is like a direct line to a good consequence you know robocop he'd rather not act he'd rather just hand out parking tickets well okay no i more means like they deploy robocop and he you know leaves chaos basically wherever he is deployed he smashes things up and things blow up. Right, he's almost unstoppable.

Causes extensive property damage. Right, the action sequences don't have that much tension. There is no stakes except when the cops are all fighting him. Because, yeah, he just sort of stands there. He's sort of Superman-esque. Yes. But, you know, slow. Until we find his kryptonite, which is D4, baby.

Uh-huh. Also, or just shooting like a hundred guns at him also known as d4 okay so corporate america's gun directive four yeah so they make so they make this movie yes uh filmed from august to october 1986 in d Dallas, Texas. I was a young boy. I was an infant. I was not born yet. Yes. I was waiting. I did not want to live in a pre-Robocop world. So I said, keep me in the oven for a couple more years.

Then I'll come out. Yeah, you had an unusual three-year gestation. My mom was pregnant for three years. And for that, I am sorry. Truly sorry. They filmed it in Dallas. Mostly in Dallas. It was boiling hot.

Yes. They also filmed the mill stuff is in Pennsylvania. Yes, Pittsburgh. Yeah, I think so. And they said they're a little, little, tiny bit in Long Beach. But it was mostly shot in location. They didn't have the money for sets. The precinct, I think, is mostly a high school.

Interesting. Which I imagine going to that fucking high school. Be the coolest. The steel mill is Pittsburgh, though. All of that stuff. Yeah, and then the couple of soundstage stuff. But, you know, Ed Neumeier said, like, the pressure was always,

do we have the courage to stick with RoboCop as a title? Because when you say it, people think it sounds dumb. Really? And people write off the movie as, oh, it's some genre, canon, exploitation junk, right? But we knew what we were making. And we said, if we can make it through with the film still called RoboCop

and stick to our guns, once people have seen it, they'll love it. It is a real B-movie title. Right. And the movie comes out and is a surprise hit. We'll get to that surprisingly well received has only grown in critical circles since then nominated for several academy awards

which was very unexpected yeah although not for best makeup which drives me fucking nuts yeah that's insane he was nominated for three Oscars but not for visual effects or makeup. And visual effects, you know, whatever. I'm not sure.

The stop motion stuff in this movie is great. It's very cool. But that's back, there were only two nominees. You know, that's back when I think it was like a juried award. What the fuck was nominated for makeup this year? There were two nominees. Okay. The winner was Harry and the Hendersons.

Oh, go fuck yourself. It's Rick Baker. I know, but go fuck yourself. Harry and the Hendersonserson's okay and what's the other nominee because according to science bigfoot doesn't exist yeah i know but when you believe your eyes uh trust your heart i don't know i was trying to read and what lost that year i like only two nominees means that there's literally just a winner and the loser happy new year what the fuck the john g avildsen movie where like uh it has like

a lot of old age makeup and shit like it's got like charles durning and like crazy like waxy old age well i like charlie so but isn't that weird because like what like joanna was marveling like you know the scenes where he's his head is off his mask is off i think that's the most emotionally charged moment of the entire film because of how good and striking that image is. How did they pull that off?

I will tell you when we get to it. Fucking hell, what do I even ask? Okay, so how does this movie start? The way all good movies start, with giant letters

that say Robocop. That's how Citizen Kane starts, right? Robocop. The best way to start a movie. And then you pan over Xanadu helicopter shot of Detroit skyline and then

now I'm going to guess you like the music in this movie my boy say his name Basil Polidorus hot off his flesh and blood and Verhoeven said he worked really fucking hard on the score they were working on the score.

They were working on the score before they started filming because he knew he needed a real fucking rousing theme. And he didn't want to sound... He was the Conan guy. Yes. He did the Conan music. But he didn't want

an action movie score. The thing he kept on saying in Basil Polidorus is make it sound like Lawrence of Arabia. Sure, right, right. I want a sweeping emotional epic. I want a sweeping emotional epic.

I want a good propulsive heroic theme that I can repurpose for more emotional scenes, for tenser scenes, but I want a classical sounding score. This episode's going to be four hours long. Which this movie has. We're literally just on the opening title. Fuck's sake. He's running wild. Dun, dun, dun.

And now Griffin will perform the opening theme. RoboCop. RoboCop. Here we are. His name is RoboCop. No, he's not inviting whatever this is. RoboCop. That was his name.

Changed it to RoboCop. Oh, God. RoboCop. RoboCop. Neumeier said, the trend with these movies at the time was you always started with a big action set piece. You wanted the immediate stakes of the first attack,

here's the hero's entrance, whatever it is, right? You always start with a first mission. This movie goes from awesome musical stink, fucking big silver letters Robocop, to a news broadcast. Which already... Which I love news broadcast. Mm-hmm. Which already Which I love this shit. Love this shit.

But this shows you this movie is just like not fucking around. Like it's it has no interest despite how much Verhoeven was studying American action films in playing by the exact rules

of what everyone else is doing. Right. It states its intention right up front. And it's also this brilliant way to fucking A. Get exposition out in a world

building way to establish the rules without having to do inner titles of like, the year is 2049. Blade Runner. Doesn't do that shit. But also there is an element of show don't tell in that the news broadcasts are so stylized.

The way they talk about what they're talking about tells you so much about the state of the world. I love it. The shit they're saying. I always forget that it's really Lisa Gibbons. Mm-hmm. Which is amazing

because if it wasn't her, it would have been someone doing an impression of her. Right. But you just get a couple news stories. You get a state

of how dire things are. This weird disconnect with how performative the media is, you know, even more so than today. Them all laughing and smiling and sort of like 15 are dead yep yep and yep right and then they immediately cut to an ad every time something crazy they say something crazy the yamaha sports heart which is amazing the robo heart and then we get so now like you're watching the movie you're

a 12 year old boy you one ticket for robocop please i watching the movie. You're a 12-year-old boy. One ticket for RoboCop, please. I want the movie about the RoboCop, right? And then you sit down, and the movie starts giving you a news broadcast, and then it goes, we'll be right back after these commercials. And then you're watching a commercial. Like, it's committing so hard to this fake broadcast thing. And then you come back, and they give you the basic deal.

Looming threats of a police strike. Yes. Cops are dying on the force every day they're becoming disenfranchised crime is on the rampant rise old detroit has a cancer the cancer is crime yep and omni consumer products ocp is uh you know very involved with detroit has been contracted and uh they bought they bought the police essentially right to run the police right right it's it's capitalism run wild sure and their big plan is to essentially just kind of get rid of detroit build this new delta city they want to build delta city over detroit they want detroit to be a write-off right uh they want to hyper gentrify yes ben and wouldn't you say that

during the filming of this this era of America, this is the crack epidemic. This is really weird. Like the middle of the Reagan era. Like crime is really rampant. The presentation, all smiles were on drugs. Yes. Yep.

Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. And also, you know, uh, what's the Reagan line?

Fuck, you know, um, worst thing about government. What the hell? Uh, I'll look it up. I find that interesting.

I think this film is in a really interesting dialogue with the time it was made in. But I also think there are so many different points baked into the cake of this film. And the points it gets out about the American psyche are so timeless. They're not connected to any one administration because they're tied to, like, the mortal sins of our being. That this film always finds some purchase. The mortal sins of our being. I'm fucking going there, baby.

Oh, come on. Robocop's the American Jesus. He died for our sins. He's walking on water. This is very tied to the 80s. Dead or alive, you're coming with me. In this present crisis, government is not the solution

to our problem. Government is the problem. That's the famous Reagan inauguration right all detroit is a cancer cancer's crime so um yeah a lot of the early stuff is uh at ocp yeah you know me uh but he's out of control it's great yes thank you i'm gonna be here all day Ben loves it day? you mean night start at day

end at night start at night end at real late night I don't know that's after dark baby we're starting at like you know

fucking Leno and we're gonna end it daily I got it last call yeah alright go on it's like we're

we're starting at mad hour we're ending at uh the liar brian williams the 11th hour can we just all agree on one thing yeah sure alter troye's a cancer the cancer is so we're intercutting between the cops i guess and ocp right in these early scenes so we have the old man the head of the board that's his only name that's his only name he's in and he's in at least robocop 2 right so do you know this you gotta say more i've never seen robocop 2 or 3 uh okay

sure never now i'm a completist with shit as you know i know of you complaining about how robocop 2 like resets robocop i have tried RoboCop 2 a number of times. I never make it past the 15 minutes because the reset bums me out so much. I've never seen 3. 3 doesn't even have Weller in it. I know. 3, which Sam Decker, I believe his name is. Fred Decker.

Who's the Monster Squad guy. And 2 is Irvin Kershner. I know. It's his last movie I believe I think that's right and two I think is basically just Robocop again you know

it's like very similar whereas three is like rated PG-13 and I think is and obviously Weller's not in it it's a lot cartoonier

it's more aimed at kids and it's interesting I read an interview with Decker when I was poking around about for this podcast where he was like you know people say we didn't have the budget or the studio was controlling me and it's interesting I read an interview with Decker when I was poking around about for this podcast where he was like you know people say we didn't have the budget

or the studio was controlling me and that's why it's bad no it's my fault he's pretty on board I made the movie I wanted to make and it was bad and that killed his career but what was the thing I was going to say oh Frank Miller who was a big fan of the original RoboCop

so he wrote a script for RoboCop 2 and they pulled it apart and used about half of his script and then for robocop 3 they repurposed the other half they got two scripts out of him and he was always angry which is what a surprise frank miller angry at the world yeah well the other thing though is like he used to have the it was like the legendary robocop sequel script that frank miller wrote that was so good and then he published it as a comic book and it was fucking terrible. And it was like, fuck you, Frank Miller. Oh yeah, you always sucked. You didn't always suck, but you sucked for a long time. But I read that published book.

It is bad. Very bad. It's like, what if Robocop was What's good? Robocop. The movie Robert Cop. The old man, Dan O'Hurley, who's the sort of kind grandfatherly figure at the head of the table

yeah but even he's pretty fucked up well that's what I like about him yeah exactly okay but they treat him like he's this nice hey the old man he's a

right no but he's a he's a he's a monster right but the real dickhead is Dick Jones played by Ronnie Cox

in a career changing performance because this sets him on the villain path he was a sweet man he was a sweet kind of grandfatherly man. I think of Bound for Glory. Yeah, he's great in that.

He's in Beverly Hills Cop, obviously. What else is he in? He's in Deliverance, obviously. He's the sort of nerdy one with glasses who gets, he eats it on the falls. He's the first to go. He's the first to go. He doesn't even get to see the rape, or does he? No, he was lucky.

Yeah, exactly. But then he does Total Recall after after this and he becomes a villain guy yeah he becomes a classic 80s villain i think yeah and uh he's jellicoe in star trek the next generation which is a great character who's also villainous ish they're trying to figure out how to deal with this cop problem and justify the means kind of guy yes Yes. Dick Jones has a big initiative. But this is all being given to us in like one minute. Because there's the elevator ride. Yes.

Where they're like, yeah, he's got the plan and we had the backup plan. You know, where they just sort of like make that really clear really fast. Right. Because we also have Morton. Miguel Ferrer. Yes. Who's kind of nipping at Dick Jones' heels. A little bit.

Right. This is bit. Right. This is the rat race. You know, they're all trying to get up atop, be sitting on the old man's lap, right? Right. And Dick Jones has this big move, ED-209. It's a weird chicken robot. Yes, it's a little chicken walker. With little gun T-Rex arms.

It looks fucking rad. Beautiful stop motion from Phil Tippett. I would say it's very cool stop motion, yes. Yeah, and then once it stops moving, it's a real fucking full-size build thing, which you can tell. It has viscerality even when it's not moving. Oh, for sure. When it's moving around, it looks really cute by our today's standards,

but I do like it, yes. But I also like they animate it in a cute way. They make him like a baby who doesn't know what he's doing. Yeah, well, it's... I love this movie. The greatest movie ever made? Yeah, it is weird that it's like that's their first idea and RoboCop is their second idea

because the chicken robot can't even climb the stairs. You know, it's like... Dick Jones is an asshole. I know. He doesn't know what he's fucking doing. No, I mean, his plan, as he basically says... Corporate negligence run amok....is like, who cares if it doesn't know what he's fucking doing. No, I mean, his plan, as he basically says. Corporate negligence run amok. Is like, who cares if it doesn't work or kills people?

Right. We already sold the contract. Who fucking cares? Thank you. But in this public demonstration. Yes. And this is when, so when did you, we were talking off mic, you know, when did you first see this movie? I watched this movie when I was very young.

I used to watch the Robocop cartoon show. Yes, I watched that too. There was an Alvin and the Chipmunks Robocop parody that I loved. Do you remember? No, I don't remember that. The eighth and final season of the Alvin and the Chipmunks cartoon show in the 80s was rebranded as Chipmunks Go to the Movies, and every episode was a full-length parody of a popular movie from the time.

So they did, like, Batmonk, Honey, I Monked the Kids. I swear to God, these are what they're fucking called yeah i know i believe you and there was a robo monk one that was a pretty straight retelling of robocop but without the violence right instead of guns they use bubble gum and it was him in one of the chipettes and he becomes robo monk right uh and i loved that so i had this like appreciation of RoboCop from afar. And I remember sneaking it, watching it on my little rabbit ear TV, Sunday morning, WB11, a heavily edited version when I was probably 10 years old.

And then when I was in high school, I saw it on like cable in full. I had these distant memories of it. My friend Colin was like obsessed with RoboCop, was talking about it all the time. And I was like, I got to fucking rewatch that. Watched it and obsessed with RoboCop, was talking about it all the time. I was like, I gotta fucking re-watch that. Watched it and was like, oh, this is the best movie ever made. And that launched my RoboCop obsession that's been going on for almost 15 years now.

But it's just with this movie, to be clear. You never watched the sequels. I watched the cartoon show when it was on. I never watched the live-action show. I didn't watch the sequels. Did you watch the remake? I did. What did you think of the remake?

I hate it. Okay, I've never seen it. That's the one... I'm usually pretty like, look, the remake I hate it okay I've never seen it it's that's the one I'm usually pretty like look you remake stuff it doesn't ruin the original that's the one where I get really fucking angry about it

it doesn't ruin anything but I get like physically enraged there are a couple good things in it how do you feel about like if you got like your criterions all set up and then there's a steelbook

do not alright so but this can I tell you something I don't know this is i need to i don't know if you can tell me something at this point i need to admit this because this has been weighing really heavily on me okay i went on my infamous anti-steelbook tirade yeah you i broke the internet right you know you broke yeah that's when you broke the internet international headlines what's a steelbook who fucking cares

a steelbook is a limited i'll show you it's like a collectible form of dvd or blu-ray packaging that's like literally a steel book that the disc is inside you know it's got this kind of hey look there's your favorite movie in steelbook form nice wreck it ralph love wreck it ralph ben just saw wreck it ralph it Ralph he fucking loved it big I cried a lot I cried too at Wreck-It Ralph it's a wonderful movie what Ben texted the other night

about King Candy and he texted us at about 3am we're in like our fifth tangent he's sad and he sucks

letter N he sucks but don't let him trick you he'd call you a glitch in a heartbeat i woke up at whatever time i wake up 7 30 in the morning basically humblebrag and uh my phone had like 18 text notifications and it was you guys talking about wrecking ralph at four in the fucking morning i knew that griff was gonna be up and i needed to tell somebody about my experience. It's all good.

I was just sad I missed it. He knew I was awake and he knew there was a 25% chance I was watching. All right. Okay. But I was just going to say, or are you still on some tangent that you have to wrap up? Oh, yes. Steelbook. Steelbook.

Jesus Christ. Since that episode where I went on my steelbook tirade, I bought like seven steelbooks. Seven? I've been buying a lot of Steelbooks lately. What Steelbooks? I got Fate of the Furious and a nice new Steelbook. Jesus. I will never own that movie.

Well, I have them all. Uh-huh. And I need them all lined up on my shelf with similar spines because I had the rest of the Fast and Furious franchise and Steelbook except for five because the five one was hard to find. Or the seven. Seven was limited. Finally found the seven. I got Nice space friends volume two on steelbook i got starship troopers on steelbook interesting i bought i bought that on uh 4k ultra or whatever my friend i bought it on

4k steelbook well you always gotta have bigger balls than me don't you it's a steelbook with Nazi style propaganda art Jesus it's great nice space friends part two I bought Wonder Woman on steelbook

well I think I got one more than I'm forgetting now find a lot of steelbooks great there's my point my friend alright well my point way back

ten minutes ago was when I'm first watching this movie when I'm probably I would guess I can't remember exactly but we are 14-15 years old and I'm sure I'm first watching this movie, when I'm probably, I would guess, I can't remember exactly, but we are 14, 15 years old. And I'm sure I'm watching it on your premium. Or no, actually it was probably in Britain,

so it was just a channel, but there's no editing for violence in Britain. It was cut down, certainly in the States, for violence. It was rated X, originally cut down. And since then, the original cut's kind of been phased out with the director's cut, which is the X rated cut. It's only a difference about a minute or two.

It's just the extremity of the violence. To be clear, the X rated cut was never released. That was just the original rating. And then there were 11 appeals before it got an R. Because this movie is crazy violent. And when the ED-209 lights up the poor guy.

Paul Ahmed. Yep. And like four billion squibs explode and he spurts blood everywhere. This guy was on, I was there too recently and he holds the record for the most squibbed actor.

It's insane how bloody his death is. What's the number? He couldn't remember. He said it took two days to film his shooting. Oh my God. Not two days to film the boardroom. Yeah, right, right, right.

Two days to film just the amount of angles, the mass squibs, and the amount of time it would take to reset. Right, of course. That's the real problem. You have to clean

so much shit up and he has to change. But this is like a psycho shower scene number of cuts within this, like, they cut so many times for the squibs.

That's the thing. That moment is when the movie is first like, this is how viscerally violent this movie is going to be. Like, in a shocking way. And this is where Hovind's whole thing is. Like, the violence is cartoon like, this is how viscerally violent this movie is going to be. Like in a shocking way. And this is Verhoeven's whole thing is like, the violence is cartoonish,

but I'm going to push it so far that it affects you on a visceral level and upsets you and you can't just write it off as like, oh, it's a comic book. Which is something he does again in Starship Troopers, especially. And which I love. Love it. But when I'm 15, I think I'm like pretty freaked out. Yeah.

You're like, what the fuck is going on here? Or when I'm watching this with Joanna the other night, she's like, whoa. Like, you know, it always sort of takes you aback the first time. Right. And when you're young and you're watching it, you're like, this movie is so corny and over the top because the responses afterwards are so bizarre. Yeah. If you have a critical mind.

Right. You understand immediately what he's angling at. Someone call a goddamn paramedic is a hilarious line. Amazing. And then- Dick, I'm very disappointed. I love that line. So that is the ED to it.

I'm fucking up. So Miguel Ferrer, who is Oscar worthy in this movie. So fucking good. Absolutely the perfect 80s boardroom guy. You one bad motherfucker i i love miguel ferrer all the time i do too who doesn't love miguel ferrer r.i.p truly tragic loss yeah but uh in this movie he's just incredible he's spot on it's one of those things where you almost think he's in the entire movie like every time i always forget he kind of dies like halfway through the

movie and here's this other interesting thing There's this whole chunk of the movie where RoboCop stops being a protagonist. Yeah, he's not really in the movie. And it sort of becomes Bob Morton's movie for like 25 minutes. And then it shifts back to RoboCop. Which I think is a really ballsy move this movie makes, which is like it de-centers you in terms of what narrative you're following. When also, not just that, but you're rooting for him. Yes. Because you don't like Ronnie Cox.

He sucks. You do kind of like Miguel Ferrer. And he brought us Robocop. He's our friend. He brought a good guy. And yet, of course. If Ronnie Cox succeeded, we'd be watching an Ed 209 movie. We, through the dialogue, kind of figure out that not only

do they have this crazy Frankenstein plot, but that they transfer Peter Weller you know what's his name Murphy to this new precinct because they like he's a prime candidate for Robocop they want him to die he's such a good decent guy

yeah exactly he has like the right mental and physical it's such a hero cop that they know he will sacrifice himself for the name of justice. They're putting him in the line of fire. Okay, so now we come to our friends, Clarence, Boddicker, and the gang.

I guess we should mention, Murphy shows up, transferred in. Robert DeKee, a fucking phenomenal character actor, died a couple years ago. He's the sergeant. Also in Nashville. Rules in Nashville. Rules in this yes Sergeant Reed who I fucking love

because this is a character that like could just be the gruff yeah sure badge on my table but they give him a little more I also love that scene

where they're clearing out that guy's locker and you know they sort of sadly slide his name off of it and he's like I don't want anyone talking about Strike

because he walks in I could analyze every single millisecond of this movie but first of all we're in a gender neutral locker room

this is this weird kind of like passively which he'll do again in Starship Troopers which he said he felt like it didn't register in Starship Troopers

in Robocop it registers in Starship Troopers but that's what's amazing is he was like I had this whole idea that it's post-sexual and there's no discrepancy between the genders

and they can be in the room together naked. But I felt like audiences didn't get it, so I did it again in Starship Troopers. And I made sure they got it. I really made sure they got it.

Love Starship Troopers. Spelting. In Starship Troopers, it's so overcooked. In this, it's beautiful just how offhanded it is. Yeah, and yeah. I mean,

the Nancy Allen character in general, you know, we first see her beating up a perp Yes. pretty brutally and, you know,

it's pretty casual about how, yeah, everyone's together. She holds her own and it's a thing I love about this movie. This is one of the only

Wait, do you like this movie? Robocop? Yeah, Robert Cop. Robert Cop, yes, I do. Okay, okay. A thing I love about this movie, do you like this movie? Robocop? Yeah, Robert Cop. Robert Cop, yes, I do. A thing I love about this movie, this is like one of the only films, certainly genre films, like this

I've ever seen where it never becomes romantic between the lead male and the lead female. Sure, yeah. I'm not really looking for romance there, that's for sure. No, but so often, then in the last act it happens and you're like... Well, especially in your 80s. That's for sure. No, but so often, then in the last act, it happens and you're like, Well, especially in like your 80s genre movies, for sure.

Yes. Right. Yes, yes, yes. And then something like Beverly Hills Cop where that, they don't end up together and you're like, oh, that's kind of cool.

It only happened because the studio was racist. Truly. Yeah, no, I know. They cast a white actress because they thought it was going to be Stallone. I know, I know, I know. But this movie, they like, by design,

they said, A, RoboCop, it's Paradise Lost. Once he becomes RoboCop, he's... He doesn't really have much of a body. And he's not going to move on.

You know? And you don't want to see him become sexual. And so it becomes a film about mutual respect between these two good cops. Sure. Which I love.

All right. Good movie. So we've been introduced to Murphy transferring into this hell precinct. Right, and he's got just a real cool, calm demeanor. No confidence. No confidence. No arrogance.

No arrogance. Just a quiet confidence. Very calm. He does like to drive. Yes. That's his one kind of Sweeney and Dick move. And his other Sweeney and Dick move is the TJ laser. I was about to get to that

but then she she sort of big foots him on that the second time around which I like. But yes, then he's doing this thing where he's twirling the gun like a western guy.

My kid watches the show. He watches TJ laser. TJ laser. Lewis is chewing gum which I think is where Robo Monk got the inspiration. Sure.

Blowing some bubbles. Great. And they go to investigate this Boddicker. Yeah. High-speed pursuit. Not even investigate. It's just there's a high-speed pursuit, and they're put on it. Right.

Yeah. And Boddicker is played by the great Kurtwood Smith. Yeah. In both cases, he's casting these villains who are totally against type. Yes. I love that Boddicker looks like a weird little treasury agent. Like, he looks like a nerd. Yes. I love that Boddicker looks like a weird little treasury agent. Like he looks like a nerd. Yes.

So what is Kurtwood Smith's life before this? At this time. Yeah. Because obviously we all think of him as red.

Right. That's the big thing. Which Talk about Eric's dad? Yes. But the fact that he became Eric's dad only helps this movie.

Like it helps his performance that you're like why is Eric's dad this evil? He's barely been in anything. This is his first big role. They say on the commentary that he improvised a large percentage

of his dialogue. He was a stage actor. All the iconic lines are him. They said they would just let him go. And like, the tiger's playing tonight,

guns, guns, guns. Can you fly, Bobby? All that shit's improvised. Right, right, right. Neumeier said he wrote a lot of kind of like stock, overwritten, bad guy intimidation. Yeah, right,ation right he knew he wanted boddicker to be against type right he liked the idea of him being a sort of pencil pusher white collar looking dude who had this

menace in him which i think is this really interesting take on this sort of banality of evil you know not just oh it's all these boardroom guys are the real villains banality of evil is strong but yes sure the universality, I guess, or whatever. It could be anyone. Then he just looks like some fucking dude. Banality of evil to me, which is like Hannah Arendt's term, that means more like your Eichmann types who don't think of themselves as evil, but do evil things.

Okay. It's like the pencil pusher behind. I would say the aesthetic banality. Okay, fine. Sure. Yeah, because he is, to be clear, a total crazy person. And he loves being bad. Yes.

And he's bad to the bone. He's real crazy. And Verhoeven said he picked those glasses because he wanted him to look like Himmler. Yeah, yes, yes. And Neumeier on this commentary track record 15 years later is like, wait, really? I just thought you thought they looked nerdy. And he was like, no, I wanted to look like a Nazi. Oh, God.

So I guess he is going for the banality. Right. Thank you. Don't shriek. Right. No, I mean, yeah. I think the quote-unquote design of Betteker is perfect. Well, and that smith doesn't feel

any need to play against his appearance what's scary about him is that you're like why is this guy so fucking confident uh yeah yeah definitely right teacher and i mean the whole gang yeah is is pretty crazy paul mccrane ray wise pa Paul McCrane, who is not another bald man. They've got two baldies. He's at a terrible state of balding in this film. Crazy state of balding. And then they give him this weird gelled part. But there's this sort of furry area.

It's not even hair, but it's sort of a design. He's got a tough, but they're doing a lot with the tough. And then his weird Matrix beard. Yeah, he's short. he's a ginger yeah he's just got but i love paul mcgrane to be clear i do too love him a meal uh so you got him and what is he like five six and you know 120 like he just yeah why would he be intimidating then you got size he's griff size you got ray wise who's awesome rules love him he's great yeah but even he kind of looks like a club promoter like he doesn't really look like a a violent gangster well it's even like you like think about him

in like twin peaks and it's like okay he's like kind of unnerving in twin peaks but it's also just like because he's like the dad like he's the kind of like intense you know what i'm saying yeah he's so special ray wise in general i mean he is the devil i think that's the clearest way to put it right he just kind of looks like the devil and then of course they made him the devil way or whatever he was in fucking reaper but but he's the devil in the body of your girlfriend's father right like that's what's scary about him is you're just this guy's judging me so much i just i love your daughter i have the best intentions and then you've got hinged uh his his work on tim and eric is some of the best yeah very good best cameo appearances on that show

so good I once went as a plus one to the Saturn Awards you know like the genre award show which happens in like a hotel ballroom which I want to throw this down right now I believe in letting the work speak for itself I'm going to campaign so fucking hard

for a Saturn Award this year I think that's potentially attainable letting the work speak for itself. I'm going to campaign so fucking hard for a Saturn award this year. Yeah, get a Saturn. I think that's potentially attainable. I don't know, man. Peak TV makes it tough. I'm with you. I want you to get a Saturn award. I'm saying best supporting actress last year at the Saturns was someone on The Flash.

The Flash is good. So is The Tick. I think I can get a fucking Saturn nomination. I'm going to work really hard on it. I think you can too. Blowing out the mics. What's the award? Is it rings?

God. It's a trophy? Is it rings? God. It's a trophy. It looks exciting. I want to look up last year's supporting actor, though. I think it was Well, they got nominees.

Ed Harris on Westworld, I think. Well, you know. Yeah, sure. I mean, Ed Harris. I looked up last year's nominees. I don't need to win.

I just want to be nominated. But the problem you've got, which I think, well, I guess it's their genre. Yeah. So they I don't need to win. I just want to be nominated. Well, the problem you've got, which I think, well, I guess it's their genre. Yeah. So they don't do drama and comedy. They just do best supporting actor on television.

Yeah. But no, you can break in here. I think I can. We've got Ed Harris in Westworld, Jeffrey Wright in Westworld. They're both gone. Yes. Because that show's not coming back for another half a year or whatever.

So two open slots already. Two open slots. Okay. Lyndon Ashby and Teen Wolf, get out of town. I've never heard of them. That shows also end it. Get the fuck out of town. Out of here. Three open slots. We got Mack Hodbrooks as James Olsen Jimmy Olsen in Supergirl. Fine. He'll probably

stick around. He's only getting more to do. He's the guardian now on Supergirl. Okay. Cool. He's around. Kit Harington in Game of Thrones I mean yeah sure. But you figure if not him someone else from Game of Thrones will get it. There will be a Game of Thrones dummy Lee Majors on Ash vs. Evil Dead had no idea he was on it

he plays Ash's dad proud of him me too glad he's doing well Norman Reedus on The Walking Dead I mean I think there could be

some Walking Dead fatigue I'll say this too he's I mean he's a favorite you know of the fans Ash vs. Evil Dead season 3 got pushed back to 2018

so it won't qualify. Maybe he's not in there either. They have a year without a season. Do they? Interesting. But I would say, safe to say, one Game of Thrones person will make it, one Walking Dead person will make it. But here's who you gotta fend off. Who? There's like eight Stranger Things boys. You gotta keep them out. You know, cause they're nipping at your

heels. Yeah, fuck. Those Stranger Things. No, but they have, last year they put all the Stranger Things kids in the young actor category. Interesting. Alright. I think they might be squared away. I think Mahershala Ali gets in no question. He'll get an easy nom for Luke Cage. They do have a younger

actor. Thank you. Millie Bobby Brown. Right. So I'm not going to have to do hit out with Finn Wolfhard. He'll be in his own category. Mahershala I think will get in for Luke Cage. Maybe. I don't know. That one kind of vanished from right right so I'm not going to have to do hit out with Finn Wolfhard he'll be in his own category sure sure sure Mahershala I think will get in for Luke Cage I think you'll have one

maybe I don't know that one kind of vanished from memory that performance no Luke Cage was this year oh really Mahershala wasn't nominated

that's crazy they nominated Lyndon Ashby of Teen Wolf I think I can fucking get in I think you can get in too I'm not being arrogant

but I think I'm going to launch a full Melissa Leo campaign here's my problem I'm going to make people consider. Here's my problem. What's your problem? You're elite on the tick.

This is category fraud. You're pulling a fucking Rooney Marr and Carroll right now. It's not category fraud. I'm second bill. Yeah. This is what I would call a classic Rooney Marr and Carroll situation. I'm number two on the call sheet. It's not category fraud.

Because let me just point my eyes at the lead. That's me looking up to lead. Lincoln walking dead who won last year. Okay. Uh, Bruce Campbell, Ash versus evil dead. Fine. Mike Colton,

Luke Cage, he's gone. Charlie Cox and daredevil. Uh, he's gone. Yeah. Grant Gustin in the flash, Sam Huynh in outlander.

Okay. Very hot. Very cute. Yeah. And Freddie Highmore in Bates motel. And has that ended now with it? It did end. Sam Huynh in Outlander. Okay. Very hot. Very cute. Yeah. And Freddie Highmore in Bates Motel. And has that ended now? It did end.

Maybe it's eligible. I can't, you know. Well, I won't have to compete with those people because I'm submitting myself for supporting actor. It's not category fraud. Category fraud. The show's called The Tick. This is the only time I'm going to claim that I'm not the lead. All right.

Back to RoboCop. Back to RoboCop. Yeah, I'm so glad we went on that tangent because we need to pad this episode out a little bit. I went to the Saturn Awards with my friend as a plus one and I sat next to Ray Wise at a table. Okay. And he was so terrifying and I wanted to win him over so much.

I was like 19. I just kept on making jokes to Ray Wise because I want him to like me. Did he tell you to try silence? No, what did he do? What did he do? We were like getting along pretty well. And then I kept on ordering wine because I was 19 and they weren't carting me.

And I at one point poured an entire glass of red wine on my body. Poured is the wrong word. Spilled. Yeah, right. That's the word you were looking for. I could not regain his respect after that for the rest of the night. He was like, well, happens to the best of us. But was kind of like eye rolling.

And then, and this was Reaper era wise. So he's hella scary if you catch my drift. This is a drunk kid. Happens to the best of us, but was kind of like eye-rolling. Oh, no. And this was Reaper era-wise, so he's hella scary, if you catch my drift. I do. Hella scary. The fourth member of the gang is Joe Cox. Oh, yeah. Played by Jesse Goins. I don't know how you say his name.

He's the laughing guy? Yeah, the weirdest performance in Robocop. Most certainly. He definitely has a take on this character uh but uh he really he came in and i think he was like paul i've got this character figured out he laughs at everything yeah and paul was like oh okay sure you're kind of the least rounded out you know you and ray wise don't have a lot to do anyway so i want a car very badly yeah right yeah right I really want that Ford SUX yeah the SUX

and yeah he just laughs a lot yeah it's a weird performance so we're still on minute 8 of Robocop well they're chasing

we should note this is a short movie it is this is a mic drop of a movie oh yeah yeah really

they're chasing Bada Gur in the gang shoot out from the back of a truck sure can you fly, Bobby? Sure. Throws Bobby at the windshield.

This is already, you're like, okay, this is the game that fucking Boddicker's playing. He'll throw one of his men. He'll use them. Yeah, he's demented. John McClane out of bullets. He'll throw a guy as a projectile, right? And, you know, they go to an old steel mill. They get there.

Abandoned mill. Very cool location, in my opinion. And they're both trying to sneak up. Sure. And it is, in fact, Joe Cox who takes out Nancy Allen. Yes, because Lewis is kind of creeping up on him. She catches him. He's taking a piss.

He goes, mind if I zip this up? She goes, okay. No, no, she doesn't even go, okay. She just looks down for a second, and that's enough. And he was banking on that. Yeah. That she wanted to take a peek at the peen. Oh, boy.

Who wouldn't? I'm just letting that lie. Take a peek at the peen. I'm going to take a peek. I'll put it out there. I'm going to take a peek. Oh, you're not progressive enough to take a peek at the peen? Sure, I'll take a peek.

It's 2018, David. Take a peek at the peen. Wow. It's 2018. It's 2018. You're the peen. Okay. david take a peek at the pain wow it's 2018 it's 2018 you're the pain okay he knocks her out on two like knocks her out doesn't a series of pillows what's important bags of rice she lands in a very soft space it doesn't matter what she's out yeah i know what's important is what happens to poor murphy What happens to him? He gets shot with 800 shotgun shells.

Where do they shoot him? Well, the crucial thing we see is they shoot his hands off and one of his arms. The crucial scene, more like the crucial fictional scene. Yes, it's real stigmata. Robocop is American, Jesus. I mean, the shot, which I believe may have been edited in the R-rated cut, but the shot that I watched is nuts. You're like, what?

That's the moment where they— That was the big thing that the X was over. I mean, there's that, and there's the ED-209, a couple of little things, but that was the big one that they were flipping out over. It's so drawn out, and it's also not just the level of gore, but how sadistic it is. They keep on laughing at him, taunting him. It's really like morally

kind of off-putting. I don't want to bring up Flesh and Blood but it's like that intense scene. But it's used to a much greater purpose, a much greater end here. But it is similar. It's very similar. But in this case, it is not our hero of the film who is doing that.

Sure. But they just love fucking killing this cop. Right? Sure. It's also that he needs to be really blown up to be RoboCop. Right. Shoot him in the back of the head, brains fly out, and then

black. And Lewis is watching it happen, but can't get to him, right? So she's seeing this. She knows firsthand what's going on here. Cut to black. On the commentary, Verhoeven said he wanted 40 seconds of black and silence. Wow. That would have been awesome.

He wanted audiences to go like, is the movie over? Is the hero just dead? And he says, even now, we got it down to like five i wish i had pushed for like 10 he's like my one regret watching the film today yeah no i mean 40 seconds is a crazy amount of time that's like the the fucking um uh the zodiac director's cut where the only difference is there's that one sequence that's two minutes that's all black where you just hear songs right to note the passage of time. Yeah.

He wanted that, no audio. He wanted audiences to question it. It ends up being like five seconds in the film. He says, if I go back, I'd make it 10.

Okay. You said that twice now. Then we come back, POV, Robocop's screen. Grid. A masterful, masterful sequence.

A great gooey, as they say. We're understanding Robocop's display. We're placed directly in his head. And you get, I like it's kind of like your whole hot take on Empire Strikes Back, the whole kind of like

side business comedy with Admiral Piet and everything. I like the little trappings of like narrative we get with the scientists. Just little bits. Little bits. Most of that was improvised. They let them kind of work on stuff. Right, right, right.

They had party supplies, so they were like, let's make it New Year's. Right, but it's also just insane that very early thing where they're like, we saved his arm. And Ferrer is so mad at them. Yeah. Where he's like, what? Get rid of the arm. Total body preceses. Exactly.

Because it's so much about creating a product. Yeah, but they don't get that. Initially, they're like, oh, aren't we trying to like save this person's life turning him into a robot which do you know what the fucking remake does what the remake's like all we were able to save was his hand so he's got one human hand they do the opposite of this just to like fucking flip him off right so for the whole movie he's got one visible human hand which looks dumb well the suit in the remake looks dumb. You know they also show the design for the suit, and it's this,

and they go like, that looks like something out of a dumb 80s action movie. Boo. Then we can go fuck itself. I'm going to watch it. Keaton's good in that, though. And my boy Jackie. My boy Jackie Earl. Very good in that.

How about Oldman? It's a weird casting. He plays like the kindly scientist. He plays like the Dr. Erskine role. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What about Sam Jackson? Sam Jackson is the way they do the news broadcast. Yeah, he's like the one who's...

But he's Bill O'Reilly. So he's like not news. It's like commentary. It's like, it's dumb. It's funnier that the news broadcasts are the news broadcasts. Exactly. And they hire two real anchors. I know, it's amazing. And they write it like news copying. Yeah, except they're just saying the most insane

things in the world. Yeah. It's bad sci-fi. The Robocop remake is bad sci-fi. Yeah, you're right. Now you want some good sci-fi. Okay. You don't always have to go to the multiplex. I want like an original sci-fi adventure. Yeah, and I'm saying, you're thinking, oh, movies, TV, those are the only arenas in which I can get my original sci-fi.

Okay. You're here to correct me. Not so fast. No, no, no, no, no. Okay. What if I was to tell you that there was an original science fiction adventure built from the ground up to be an audio experience

featuring a large cast of professional voice theater and screen actors. Okay. A full dedicated score that draws inspiration from classic action adventure movies.

Very important to good sci-fi. A full slate of sound effects and most importantly, professional mixing. Oh, yeah. So it sounds like a real drama. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Maybe you've heard of it. Are you talking about the hour and a half long sci-fi audio adventure Cerberus Rex? Why, yes, I am. My friend? Yeah. I am. Well, we've talked about this show.

This show's cool. Look, a large number of audio drama shows say they're the cinematic experience in audio form, but come on. We're amongst friends here. Let's be honest. They're really not. But, like, essentially, this is the good version. This is large production.

It's large-scale adventure experience. It actually captures that effect. And if you want to listen to it in a higher quality, you can actually pay $1.99. But you can also listen to it for free, right? Uh-huh. On sci-fi.com. Sci-fi.com sci-fi.com you gotta and remember the dash because you gotta dash over to this website sci-fi.com sci-fi.com sci-fi.com with that dash you gotta dash

um yeah no this is this is a cool show we talked about it on a previous episode but it's a more exciting sponsor for us because it's actually something original. This isn't a company. This isn't a product. This is art, my friend. Right. It's, as you said,

large-scale audio adventure about this scientist who is recruited to investigate this mystery of physics. You get to experience the day-to-day of these people in this station trying to solve a mystery. But the patina, day-to-day is a larger

term. The hour-to-hour, do you know what I'm saying? Patina? Rosetta Stone? All of it. You want to hit them all? Yes. All your faves? Morass. Oh, you like that one? Urtext. No, it's a cool show and it's special.

I'm glad they're advertising on Blank Check. Yeah. The Creator 2 is incorporating a lot of sort of touchstones of different directors that we've discussed that even fall into the wheelhouse of science fiction. James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, maybe you've heard of them. John Carpenter, who I'd love to do. John McTiernan, who we've long talked about wanting to do. John McTiernan is someone we should do. Yeah, when we do our Year of the Felon.

Good point. Yeah. But still, he's cool. Cool guy. Cool guy, good friend, good director. And writers that, you know, we've probably talked about, like William Goldman, right? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I was just saying, give her a listen, okay? Okay. Yeah. Well, you've got to go to sci-fi.com. That's S-C-I. right like yeah yeah i mean i was just saying give it give her a listen okay okay yeah well uh you have got to go to side-fi.com that's sci-fi.com to listen to serverless rex and you can listen for free but if you want a higher quality version you can pay two bucks for it $1.99 so you're saying if you want a higher quality version you can buy that for $2 that's perfect okay Robocop they make him

so you're watching them make him slowly over this period of time Morton's getting excited this woman who looks like Parker Posey kinda has a crush on him every time I watch it I'm like did Parker Posey go back in time and then we see that like he set up, celebration.

They take the plastic wrap off of him. I love that perspective shot where it's like the plastic wrap and you see the table being lifted up and you're watching an audience applaud him. And he's not responding at all. So you just know you're like, is this guy fucking catatonic now? And then we go to the precinct. I'm a repeat offender. I repeat I will offend again.

Great joke, 10 comedy points. He's just going to do the whole movie, folks. Clunk, clunk, clunk, clunk. What's that? Through the glass, foggy, distorted, we see the silhouette of RoboCop. Yeah. Otin went to Verhoeven and said,

please tease out the look, because I think if you just cut and show the suit, it's going to look goofy. People are going to be jarred by it. You need to tease it out. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's good advice. You get that. He comes through the door.

You see all the reactions. You see little bits and pieces as everyone's following him down the hallway trying to figure out what the fuck is going on. And then the first time you really see him. Oh, you see, in the sequence from his POV, you see him distorted on the screen a little bit. Okay. Which is a nice touch. Sure.

But then, the time you fully see him, after all this build-up, is this very banal shot where they lock the cage. They lock the gates. They marron him. It's good that you have total visual memory of this movie. Yes. And now he's sitting in his little baby high chair.

Yeah. They do lock the gates. He's in his baby high chair. Miguel Ferrer is there. They ask him who his guys are. And then they calibrate. They do the thing with the pen. We set up the visual device of him being able to record memories,

picture and picture. All this is important later. And I just think it's all very artfully set up. Right. I think it's good. It's good. Yeah. Right. They, they introduce all the information. He's got his? I think it's good. It's good. Yeah, right. They introduce all the information.

He's got his baby food. He's got his little high chair. Everyone's looking at him. No, no, but what's the word for it? It's a paste. I forget. A rudimentary paste. It's such a classic 80s sci-fi word.

Right, and then he takes the finger doll up. He's like baby food. It's that guy who's the thumbs up guy at the end of the movie. That guy rocks. Felton Perry. That guy rocks. He's so good. He's awesome.

He's really funny. I like like Robocop comes in is intimidating and immediately is like infantilized where it's like is this even like does it have a consciousness yeah no it's true I like that too it's not like the movie begins with like there's a criminal wilding out I mean the introduction and then Robocop like smashes and he's like dead or alive you are coming with me you know and you're, oh my god! Instead it's like this weird science experiment. But then we cut to the firing range. And now he's looking cool. He's got this badass gun. He's got this insane gun.

I hate guns so much. So fucking much. How did you feel about the gun scene in Ragnarok? Didn't like it. Carry on. Didn't like it. I don't like guns. And I don't get gun fetishization that much. Sure.

That had been said while re-watching this movie for the second time in 24 hours. I was like, how much does it cost to get a replica of Robocop? I don't buy a fucking replica of a gun. Jesus. I was like thinking about it. It's this crazy, like it's a Beretta and they like extended it to make it fit his hand. They had to modify it. It's a gigantic gun.

They were first, they were going to give him a Desert Eagle, which is the biggest pistol that there is. But they were like, that's too small. They needed this sort of obscene gun. Yes. And he's just there totally still nailing it, nailing it, nailing it. And all the cops love this guy. They're all rushing to see him.

And this is a sequence with no music, just the sounds of the shots. Everyone else is taking deliberate shots. And he's got this da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da, kind of rattling. They all start looking over, crowding around him. Lewis is kind of the last to get smart to it because she's not, you know, easily impressed. She's not impressed by the flash, but she's starting to wonder what's going on here. And when he finishes, what does he do? TJ Laser.

And then she notices that. Wait, but David, where does he put his gun? It's in his leg. Oh, shit. Motherfucker puts his gun in his leg. Robocop just changed the game. You're weird. Oh, here I am.

I'm a cop. Here's my leg. Let me put a holster on top of it. Mm-mm-mm-mm-mm-mm. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Here's my leg. Let me put a holster on top of it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Ben's wagging his finger. We're both wagging our fingers. Robocop puts it

in the leg. He's got a leg holster. He puts it in the leg. No, no, no. You're being a little stinker, David. You guys have lost your mind. The gun is in the leg.

And Lewis is like, Murphy used to do that. That's a weird reading of her internal monologue. Murphy. Guys, we have a good time making this show. Yeah, we have a great time. It's a good time making this show yeah we have a great time I can't believe people listen this is garbage

I love doing it yeah I love doing it too it's my happiest thing I just don't understand how people keep we just keep growing I know people are like I just discovered the show really like it and I'm like really this thing we were looking at numbers right before this and it was like at an exponential rate.

Like, I thought at some point we'd hit a ceiling where it's like, this is the full amount of people alive in the world who would ever want to listen to this nonsense. But it keeps on expanding. The blank check read it just hit 701 queer means. Hey. Anyway. Yeah, Murphy's in there. And we're also introduced to two is three directives which are

directive one directive two serve the public trust obey the law protect the innocent uphold the law directive four classified you don't know what directive four is

I'm kind of embarrassed I didn't remember that I know I was a little shocked but I also thought you might not because they're so bland and generic, and they also never come up. Right, I knew what the sentiments were. Yes, so, and then he starts to rampage, right? Well, no, but Lewis stops him in the hallway. Does that happen later? That's not initially, because he has a couple of scenes of just being Robocop.

Like, there's the scene in the convenience store. Well, first we have the moment where he walks past the sergeant's desk. Yeah. And goes, I'll take this. And takes the car keys. Right. Yeah. And walks out.

That one shot with one line was the first thing they shot with him in the suit. And they said it took eight hours. Jesus Christ. Because the suit was such a nightmare. And then once they finally got him to figure out how to walk, they realized the hand couldn't grip the glove. So they were like, that was the day where we thought the movie was never going to get finished. But then you get this awesome series of like, here's just one night on the town being RoboCop. Yeah, but I think it's, why I think it's good is that it's just immediately clear, like, this is madness.

Yes. I mean, like, that's why I love RoboCop. Yeah. He's, he's, he's not good. He's bad. We's why I love RoboCop. Yeah. He's not good. He's bad. We should not have a RoboCop. And the city is also fucked. I mean, it's like one fucked element meeting another fucked element.

Sure. Like, we go to the convenience store. The guy comes in. He's itchy. He's over the safe. He knocks over the beer can. He takes out this really overzealous gun. Yeah, huge gun.

Like, you don't need this gun to rob a convenience store, right? But a pointed joke, I think, the movie's making. Yeah, huge gun. Like, you don't need this gun to rob a convenience store, right? But a pointed joke, I think the movie's making. Yeah, sure, sure, sure. He loves I Buy That for a Dollar. Everyone loves I Buy That for a Dollar, which is the most popular TV show. J.W. Bixby, I think,

is the character's name? Yeah, who? Bixby Snyder. Bixby Snyder, sorry. Yeah, who is that guy? He looks crazy. I don't know, but I'd buy him for a dollar.

Uh-huh. It is 4 a.m. where we are currently. Yeah, the auto lights in the office just went off. It's also pitch black outside.

It is. Yeah, it's a grim day today. It's like pouring. Yeah, it's been cold. It's been bad. So,

I feel a little like old Detroit outside. I'm going to catch my drift. He goes in and RoboCop starts walking in what the fuck are you? right?

and then clearly Robocop is not stopping he's an immovable force right? and he's got his gun and the guy just starts going oh fuck

oh fuck it's pretty good in the script it was written as one oh fuck and Verhoeven was like just keep shaying it just smelt it away keep smelting it.

Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. I also always love that the safe is hidden underneath the pyramid of beer cans. Me too. I think that's a good move by them. I always think that's a really cool detail.

But he just eviscerates the guy. Yeah. Graphically, in a way that is unnecessary. It's great, though. He could have just shot him one time. He's got perfect aim right instead he like makes him into swiss cheese and then says like have a pleasant evening yes and uh has traumatized these people he has he has he could have stopped the crime very calmly but

robocop is is cranked up to 11 right what's his next stop his His next stop is... The streets. Two bad guys. No good, very bad, don't do it. They are harassing a woman. Yes, chasing after her with a knife, commenting on her blonde hair, questioning whether she's got more hair down there. It's a rough scene. Two points for the rhyme. I'm going to say no points.

A blanket no points for these guys. I'm deducting them points for other behaviors. I'm giving them say no points. A blanket no points for these guys. I'm deducting them points for other behaviors. I'm giving them two rhyme points. Originally, it was not supposed to go that far. Oh, okay. The scene. Paul Verhoeven, who likes sexual assault in movies, had the idea of the scene going on that far,

but also then it creates the cool setup of, okay, now he's holding the woman in front of him with the knife to her throat how is Robocop gonna shoot? Wow it just went dark like radio silence. David? He shoots through her skirt.

You gotta pick at that pecker. Ben's pointing at his crotch. You gotta pick at that pecker. Jesus Christ. It's a dress I believe actually she's wearing a dress. Yeah but he's not shooting the dress he's shooting the pecker. You got to pick up that pecker. Jesus Christ. It's a dress, I believe, actually. She's wearing a dress. Yeah, but he's not shooting the dress. He's shooting the pecker.

Yes, he shoots the guy in the Johnson. He aims right between her legs. Hits that pecker. Useless garbage. Fatal Farm, who are really good filmmakers who do a lot of stuff with Tim and Eric for ad companies. When you see things that aren't made by Tim and Eric

that are Tim and Eric-y yeah yeah yeah they do a lot of that stuff they did do you know about this our Robocop remake thing? no they did this with Footloose as well

maybe one other recent 80s remake because I want people to watch this it's really good okay okay fair enough it was around that time when they were remaking

starting to remake all these classic 80s movies a lot of like UCB comedy people in LA and filmmakers, sketch teams, what have you, did this project where they would each take one scene from the original film

and remake just that scene on its own. And piece together their own scene for scene remake. And the Fatal Farm version of that scene, that's the scene they did and they're really high production value. The thing that's great about them is they make everything look real is they shoot the guy

in the pecker and it flies out of his pants like the disembodied dick and then another guy comes up with a knife and they shoot him and his dick flies off and it becomes like

80 different men running in and just a bunch of disembodied dicks lying on the ground. It's great. You should watch it. It's really funny.

You've seen it, right? it. It's really funny. You've seen it, right? It's really good. Roe Cups kicking butt taking names. Picking peens. But then, as you mentioned, he runs into what's his name? Emil. At a gas station. He's fucking with a kid who's supposed to be

young Verhoeven. Oh, interesting. Who's reading his book. And he's like a creepy Nazi fucking with a kid who's supposed to be young Verhoeven oh interesting who's reading his book who's reading his math book and he's like right he's like a creepy Nazi fucking with him or whatever the Nazis were gone

by the time but he's fucking with the kid reading his basic planes book yeah and Emil's just doing it for sport good Paul McCrane shit here by the way

love Paul McCrane and he's going nuts and it's great and Robocop Robocop. Robocop shows up. Yes. And, you know.

What the fuck are you? I'm supposed to be scared of you. Starts fucking with Emil. And he says, dead or alive, you are coming with me. And Emil knows. He clocks that line. And this is the first time we're getting a sense of. We saw the physical, the TJ laser.

But there's some part of him, even though they wiped the memory, there's something there that's muscle memory almost. And he goes, what? We killed you! Yeah, he starts yelling it over and over again. And you see Robocop replaying the video in his brain. So Emil gets away because

Robocop is sort of stopped in his tracks by this. Also, he flicks a sig, sets everything on fire. We get an awesome shot of Robocop walking out of the in his tracks by this. Also, he flicks a sig, sets everything on fire. Yeah, sure. We get an awesome shot of Robocop walking out of the flames. Yeah. There's a shot I love where it's the one where he's fully engulfed in the fire. And so they had to put the stuntman in like full shit. Yeah.

So he's wearing a plastic lower face. Okay. There's one scene where Robocop's head looks insane. Okay. Because it's not just like. You've seen this movie too many times. Yes, I have. So. Oh, boy. But he's wearing like a sculpted lower face mask cool uh and he comes out of the fire chase after doesn't get a meal or he does

he does at this point no he doesn't no emile gets away yes correct yeah right and then he uh goes into the precinct has a dream oh yeah well first he does that that's right his fucking information spike yeah he's got is that what it's called? Yeah. That's pretty cool. I love it. It is pretty cool. He doesn't have like a USB dongle. He has an information spike. Data alive, you are coming with me, Data. He's got a data dick.

And it's his middle finger. So anytime he wants to access it, he has to flip people off. Cause Robocop ain't got time for your bullshit. Your move. Creep. Data. Podcast.

Who are your guys? I remember one time Damon Wayne said, I'm just going to do a jazz set. But that's what he's asking the database. Yes. Who are your guys? Yes. He says, who are your guys? And he finds the guy. Right. Who are your guys? Yes. He says, who are your guys? And he finds the guy, right?

Emil and his known associates. Emil, Boddicker, Carlin. What the fuckstables? Why does anyone listen? By the way, this is two Verhoeven movies in a row where he locks gates.

I want it to be a thematic. I guess so. We'll watch for more gate locking. Yes. But so he's watching the guys. And this is like a big information dump scene, but it's really artfully done. Every scene in this movie, he gives enough juice. Good 80s tech, right?

So good. Great 80s tech. Interfaces, David, man. I mean, right? Good interfaces, David. Man, I mean... Hot interfaces. Everything looks like an NBA jam screen. Yeah, I'm obsessed with this kind of design. He's on fire! Yeah, like I want to get AirDog involved.

Yes. Do you remember the code? Yes, yeah, and then you could be Clinton too. That's true. The Lewis scene has already happened. yes do you remember the code uh yes yeah and then you could be you could be clinton too it's true yeah the lewis scene has already happened monster jim by the bucket it happened earlier when i said it did because he at this point has already happens after he has the dream because maybe it happens right before he comes into the office yes that's right that's right he goes home he it is. I was right. He goes home. He has the dream. He goes home.

He goes to his cage. He has the dream. This is his high chair. He plugs in. And like the guy. I have the nightmare. Yeah, the guy tasked with watching this is turned around and looking at his, come on, man.

At least face the screen. And he does some great convulsing and some amazing grimacing. Good convulsing. He has this dream of his murder. Yeah. And then he sort of walks and she confronts him with like you're Murphy you're Murphy

what's your name and he's like I'm sorry ma'am dead or alive I'm gonna drive you crazy right now okay can I do a merchandise spotlight oh sure

okay go ahead of what of what we all know got a collection of toys I'm a toy boy you have a collection of toys

that's what I said no no yeah you dropped the eye or whatever I swallowed it Got a collection of toys. I'm a toy boy. You have a collection of toys. That's what I said. No, no. Yeah. You dropped the eye or whatever. I swallowed it. I said it. You swallowed it.

I'm a mumbler, baby. It's a jazz set. Just let me speak, okay? I tend to stay away from the high-end stuff. The really fancy $200 toy. That's the heroine of the trade, right? I like fucking the white collar, blue collar,

salt to the earth toys. Once you start buying those $200 toys, it's like, yeah, you're going to need them all the time. Especially if now suddenly you have

disposable income after nine years of mostly subsiding off a dollar pizza. Yeah. Dangerous if you are a working actor on a TV show and they're giving you money

and stuff like that exists out there. Sure, sure, sure. There was one high-end toy I own and it is that crazy company, Hot Toys, which is the Japanese company that makes like, anytime you've seen something

where you're like, that's fucking insane and then you look at the price and you're like, that's fucking insane. They're that company. I got a RoboCop that cost me $250.

It was 50% off. It was a $500 product. I know. I knew that would get that response out of you. Oh boy. $500. What is it? How could I find it?

What do I Google? They recently, the same company released a Hulkbuster from Avengers Age of Ultron. That's fine. What do I Google? That costs $900.

Okay. Why would you ever want that? What do I Google? That's my point. Just to give you a sense of pay scale. Hot Toys RoboCop chair. Because what I got was the deluxe version that comes with this little high chair, with all the monitors.

It's made out of real metal. How big is it? 12 inches. So it's not that big. It's a good 12 inches. Bigger than an action figure, but not like, you know. It's G.I. Joe size. Like large, old school, as opposed to real American hero.

I mean, it looks like RoboCop. It looks exactly like RoboCop. It's very shiny. It's made out of real metal, as I said. You can open up his leg and put the gun inside. Yeah, you heard that right, David. Inside the leg. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Uh-huh. It's a disgusting noise of yours. Yes? He's got three different lower faces so you can change the expressions great including the grimace face from when he's in the chair he has four faces oh you're right yeah one's three extra faces yes he's got like a busted torso and helmet so you can like make him a little scarred you can move each individual finger as well but i just have him in the pose representing this scene where he's like pushing himself up on

the chair having the nightmare. That's funny that you do that. That's what I think is funny. I have him with the grimace face like twisted having a nightmare. This is with sound effect? Yes I said he talks. It comes with a little remote that looks like the RoboCop logo and if you touch the O it says dead or alive you're coming with me.

It says other stuff as well. Dead or alive you're coming with me. But I got RoboCop in his little chair. Your move, creep. Thank you very much. That was my merchandise spotlight. Oh, also, the NES game was great. I had it growing up. I loved it. It was really fun. I had at least one RoboCop game. It was hard, though. Yeah, well, that's back when games were just punishing.

But do you know what's an even better game? Because I got a Sega emulator recently, Genesis. Proud of you. Thank you. My managers bought it for me so I could play the Tick video game. It was a nice thing to do. I remember that game. I played the Tick video game in my dressing room the limited time they weren't working me to the bone. And I've been buying some other Genesis games.

Robocop versus the Terminator for Sega Genesis is a fucking phenomenal game. I never played it. There is a Dark Horse limited comic book series that was then adapted into the video game medium, and it rules. You play as Robocop. He is the good guy, Robert Copp. And you got to stop them, Terminators. So he has his dream, and he uses his information spike and it's perfectly represented on my

mantle he's destroying my brain I'm hungry too well yeah it's breakfast now so Louis comes up to him in the hallway after he's we can't control him it's you Murphy it's you we haven't said that

she says the name Murphy to him for the first time Murphy what the fuck does that mean excuse me but also she says

what's your name and he won't answer right and then Miguel Ferrer's like you want me to start off the program is he a dream

fuck you yeah fuck you what are you talking about snort some coke off some boobs keep babysitting him come on and so

then we have these sort of two vague-ish plot lines. One is RoboCop sort of hunting down these men that he gets from the spike. He gets the death spike. He sees Boddicker. The face kind of strings a chord with him. And then he sees murder.

Click, click. Cop killer. Click, click. Alex Murphy deceased. Flashing. Murphy, it's you. murphy it's you murphy it's you he's remembering you're gonna do every minute i've got a water bottle i'm gonna throw at you at a certain point and you see you've got him hunting down everyone yeah you know the the lesser when does the mayor scene happen is that in the first night on the town the mayor scene when the mayor is holding the office hostage because he wants a recount oh

i love that no he's not the mayor he's just a councilman but yes i love that scene that's yes that's early that might be in his initial run along with the rapists and the i think a meal is a separate run yeah sure because i think the mayor ends that first run council yes councilman sorry that's a great scene though because that right that's where he uses his like thermal scanning something with really shitty gas mileage. That's a really funny line. Do you know how they did the thermal scanning scene? How?

This is a funny anecdote. Okay. They made body suits that look like thermal scans, and they wear them, and then they just use that as a plate, so if you watch the shot, you can see the zipper in the back. Wow. It wasn't done as an effect, but like body coloring. They just shot that on a green screen and then did the background later it's practical it's fucking cool uh and robocop punches through the wall strangles him throws the

guy out of the car and when he hits it cuts to the news broadcast and it goes robocop who is he what is he immediately we're like contextualizing him you see him on the playground with the kids newmeyer said that was the best day of filming because he's like, you make these movies and it's a bunch of angry, tired people and everyone's pissed off. Once we got to a playground with kids talking to a robot cop, we were like, that's pretty cool.

Bob Morton's doing the victory lap. Everyone's loving Bob. We've got a couple scenes. This is why I went back to this because I think it's important to reestablish. Bob Morton now, he's in the executive washroom oh there is the executive washroom he thinks he's fucking hot shit and he's talking about

Dick Jones he's a dinosaur he's old we're new yeah yeah the guy next to him taking a leak he knows

that Dick Jones everyone scurries out of there he lets himself pee on his on his fucking crotch yeah I know he zips up so quickly there's pee pee

I swear to god yes I know I know yes which Neumeier said he wrote because it was his greatest fear in life crotch. Yeah, I know. He zips up so quickly there's pee pee. I swear to God, yes, I know. I know. Yes. Which Neumeier said he wrote because it was his greatest fear in life. That he'd pee on himself when zipping up? That if he was wearing a lightly colored suit. Sure.

He worked in an office where he had a crush on the receptionist and her desk was right by the bathroom and if he accidentally peed on himself, then she would be the one who would see it. Because he wore gray suits. So he wrote it in. Right what you know. Uh-huh. Dick Jones is there.

Suddenly it's just him. Verhoeven and Neumeier said this scene is meant to be an homage to Papa Ferrer's scene in Lawrence of Arabia. Okay. In the sense of it being an interrogation that's maybe also erotically charged. Okay.

Because Dick Jones keeps on stroking his face. It is. Yeah. Yeah. Deliberate? Sure. Because, you know, we used to make fun of the old man. Sometimes we even called him an asshole.

But we always had respect. And Morton shrugs it off. He's like, you ain't got no bite no more, baby. Yeah, he doesn't buy it. Ed 209 sucks. Go fuck yourself. he doesn't buy it. Ed 209 sucks. Go fuck yourself. He doesn't buy it. Dick Jones.

But don't fuck with Dick Jones. He ain't that old yet. Let me check quickly. What's that he's got in the pocket? Clarence Boddicker. He's got Boddicker in the pocket. I'm going to give you that. Yeah, sure.

Yeah, no. David's giving me the wrap it up sign. No, I'm not going to give you the wrap it up sign. We're not close to wrapping up. Although I guess it is kind of close to the end already you know it's it's a it's a fast maybe i knew exactly what i was doing no but no no no no no no no no maybe i've been playing this episode like a fiddle i'm in complete control the entire time oh boy no you are very much uh the uh dick jones of this podcast that's not true i'm bob morton uh okay well that means you're about to die because because as

robocop has taken out the the lesser bettakers um boddicker yeah occurs boddicker comes to the disco he takes down ray wise ray wise tries to kick him in the Robodeck. But what happens instead? Gong. Boing. One of the most overt jokes in the film. It's a good joke. And then do you know what happens right after that?

I don't. Tell me. They cut to a close-up of Paul Verhoeven dancing straight into the camera. Oh, really? It flashes for two seconds. I'll never find that. It's just Verhoeven going like this, and the story is that he was trying to direct the extras

to dance the way he wanted, and the camera guys told him without his permission. The editor found that footage and was like, I'm going to fucking put this in, and they kept it in. So they kick him, gong, and it's Paul Verhoeven staring straight into the lens going like this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, very good. Taking him down, taking him down, taking him down. Boddicker, at the same time kills Bob Morton by blowing his whole house up with a grenade bitch in his sleeve

yeah yeah good line sure sure I mean bad sentiment yeah good piece of writing

I guess so he tongues a grenade mhm he leaves it there on the table Morton Morton just cares about the coke he plays

the Dick Jones video wait what he plays a video from Dick Jones for Bob Morton announcing that he's about to die yeah but Morton's like

you know Miguel Freire he's like crawling to get the grenade you know he's been shot or whatever yeah and then

he is dead. So now we know that Boddicker and Dick Jones, they're kind of working together, which makes not a ton of sense, but whatever. Was not in the script. That was a studio note of like,

oh, the two films should be working together. They were originally completely unrelated. Yeah, they should be unrelated. They don't really make much sense. I disagree. I like the fact that the entire company, the whole world is fucked around them. I like that everyone's in cahoots. I just think it makes Boddicker more powerful than he really needs to be.

Because initially, he's just some asshole. But I love that he's some asshole who's also disproportionately powerful. I like that it's a corrupt corporation that's working with the criminals. They own the cops and they got the criminals. I get it. It means it's Robocop versus the entire world versus the system. David's just throwing a water bottle at my head.

I want to. But Boddicker... Oh, Jesus. I'm getting so... There's the cocaine factory scene. So that's the next major thing. Right. Yes.

Uh, he goes, there's the awesome shot of the door kind of like bending like the cartoon door of him like breaking it in. Yes. This is a great shady. The cocaine factory is awesome. This is like probably one of the best shady factories of the 80s. It's a good shady factory. It's like a really good conveyor belt, like factory line. It's like the Isle of the 80s. Yeah, it's a good shady factory. It's like a really good conveyor belt factory line.

It's like the Isle of Lucy chocolate factory. And Bodker's doing full the game tonight. Yeah, he's great. Every scene he's in is wonderful. Neumeier said that's the scene that was really poorly written

where they just let him do whatever the fuck he wanted. Sure, right, right, right. Right, so he says all this weird, he does the shit where he puts his fingers in the red wine, which is such a power move, and then just sniffs it.

Yeah, that's right. And they will point the guns at each other. Right. Guns, guns, guns. Yeah. I love it all. I love Kerwood. All great.

He's amazing in it. And then Robocop comes in and he's kind of like excited. Like here's this fucking Robocop dick that everyone's talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Robocop just starts busting ass. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

Cool trick shots. I swear to God. All right, now we have now officially exceeded the running time of this movie. Great. That's what I was watching for. Okay. Carry on. Cool trick shots. We have now officially exceeded the running time of this movie. Great. That's what I was watching for. Carry on. Cool trick shots. He's taking them all down. He finally gets to Boddicker. Boddicker's like, you don't know what you're messing with. You can't fuck with me.

I'm with Dick Jones. Robocop takes him in. What's the charge? He's a cop killer. He's a cop killer. Who are your guys? Boddicker's in. What's the charge he's a cop killer he's a cop killer who are your guys so boddicker's what's wrong with me pow uh he um but of course dick jones brings him right away right because like you say they are give me my phone call he spits the blood on the table it was originally it's gonna be like

boddicker was the initial villain right and this is the end of the line once this is resolved yeah end of the line creep but yes it is revealed that Dick Jones kind of wants Boddicker to make crime because that just sort of accelerates the Delta City thing it's the opposite of the Dent Act

please make more crime yes but he goes into Dick Jones' office. He's all busted up, but he's still got that same disproportionate confidence. This guy's so confident. He hits on the receptionist, who is Kerwood Smith's wife.

I think that's really sweet. Were they already married? They got married a year after they were already together. But they've been married since 1988. Sweet. Yeah, and Jones is like, okay, I'll get you out, but you're really

fucking shit up for me. He is mad at him. Yes. Here's a tracking device. Fine. Go kill Robocop. I'll give you these gigantic, absurd

military weaponry that will destroy him. Right. Then Robocop comes to the office because he's got the evidence on file recorded. I work for Dick Jones. He goes in.

I'm going to arrest Dick Jones. You were under arrest. Directive four. He's going to give him the D, the D4. It says he cannot harm an employee of Omniconsumer products. Which is great. Yeah, you know me. And it's the classic, like, it's a, you know, scenario it's the classic like it's a you know

scenario that's playing out over and over and again now right we're like don't put your info your data your life in the hands of private companies don't read the fine print yes but even then there could be a directive for yeah i like the body acting uh of like him trying to yeah classic good like the glitchy kind of movement he's so good oh oh oh we did miss I'm sorry we did miss the emotional linchpin of this movie going back to his home yeah I don't like

that I love that scene that's the one scene I'm just like I already am connected to him and him as a person I find that scene really operatic and emotional. It's the Paradise Lost. Because it's the scene where he realizes he can't go back home again.

Literally. It's also Vaporwave. It's also Vaporwave. Because I don't know or care about his wife or his kid and don't need to, I just don't care. I like that that's the full extent we get of them. I like that they don't come back. I hear that in Robocop 2 he meets his wife again which is why I don't want to watch it

but the thing where she's like I have something to tell you and then later you see the full thing where I love you yeah I love it I also think that's the single best piece of robot acting Weller does is at the end when he's like short circuiting losing his mind from the emotional overload and then he punches the screen.

I like that it's also set up as the fucking... I like that. It's on the market. I like that. That's great. No problem with that. I think the whole scene's really well done. And the score is beautiful in that scene.

You're insane. I'm insane? I love you, but you're the best. You're a cop killer. Just like this movie's an hour, 40 minutes long. Lose that scene. It's even leaner and meaner. Disagree.

Lean and mean. Disagree. Lean and mean. This movie is the exact right length. I mean, I would basically agree because it's a great lean, you know, straight train of a movie. Great. Yes. You have the scene with Lewis and the sergeant, which is a nice kind of downbeat moment before chaos um where they're sort of just

resigned to it the dick jones like don't fucking mess with my people i own this the boddicker thing right when you and they have that kind of look to each other where it's like reed really he's trying his best in tough circumstances he's trying his best and and re circumstances, he's trying his best. And Reed and Lewis get each other. But now RoboCop is gone. Directive 4, they chase him out. Yeah, he's in trouble. They do that great escape where he keeps on rolling off the different levels. Well, first they shoot him a million times.

A thousand times. Yeah, and so he's all dinged up. But then, yes, I love the rolling. That's great. And then Lewis picks him up. Right. So you got that he also escapes

ED-209 before that oh fuck right they send ED-209 the stairwell in the script they just wrote ED-209 falls down

the stairs and Phil Tippett handed them that thing with him like testing tipping his foot over yeah which is great oh he's like a little puppy

such a good performance like bit of character animation yeah and then just like collapses down the great. Oh, he's like a little puppy. Such a good performance. Like a bit of character animation. Yeah. And then just like collapses down the stairs and is on his back like a little baby turtle. But now he's chased. He rolls off the different levels. He runs away.

He goes back to the mill. Right. Much like Jesus, they turned on him. And he takes off his helmet. They turned on him. Yeah, we get the Jesus thing. They get there. Lewis gives him all the tools he needs.

You might want to look away. Yeah. I love this scene. And in this scene, from this scene. And I also love that he never puts the helmet back on. Also from this scene on, his voice isn't modulated. Yes. Because when he says that line of like, you might want to look away, his inflections are different.

His voice is processed differently. He sounds like a person now. Yeah. He takes it off. He gets this amazing fucking effect of it looking like they stretched his flesh. Yeah.

So what they did was they made his head bigger. Uh-huh. Right. They built his face out bigger in size so that they could put the back head piece

of the metal skull which is the size of his actual head but then it overlaps in the front. It's a very impressive effect. It's really well done. I love the bullet wound right at the top.

Me too. It's really, really upsetting. It is. It's freaky, but in a cool way. They send the concert. They auditioned a lot of people for this who would want to overplay that scene and make it like the grand soliloquy of like, what did they do to me? Murphy had a wife, a son.

Right, right, right. Armando Asante is someone they cite by name who auditioned sure i could see him going big and did that he likes to go big this scene is so muted it's just like fuck this is my reality and he talks about murphy in the third person which i love he's starting to feel some connection to murphy but he doesn't think it's him really he feels like that's not him murphy had a wife a son he's getting so excited guys because this is when this movie really starts kicking into like that's not him. Murphy had a wife, a son. He's getting so excited, guys. Because this is when this movie really starts kicking into transcendent levels for me, as he starts reckoning with his identity.

You're so crazy. This is the great American movie. And there's the scenes with the anti-tank rifles where we're cutting to the boys playing around, blowing up the shit. Boddicker's out. He's got the SU-X. These guns are just hysterical. It's so funny. They're like eight feet long. And the world is out. He's got the SUX. These guns are just hysterical. It's so funny.

They're like eight feet long. And the world is chaos. The world is chaos. The police are now on strike. At this point we've cut between Bodecker and his boys having fun and Lewis saving Murphy. This very selfless act of kindness

with just rampant chaos and nihilism and hedonism, right? Right. Now, I, in high school, loved this movie, as I said. Sure. And one night at family dinner, I made a RoboCop comment. And my mom said, Arnold Schwarzenegger did that? Okay. And I said, Mom, that is not RoboCop.

That is the Terminator. Okay. And she said, same difference. Wow. And I went off. Wow. You sound like a fun guy to be around in this moment. God.

Everyone should hang out with 50-year-old Griffin because that guy was a little shit. Uh-huh. With no off switch. So you're like, Mom, Robocop is a cyborg. Terminator is a robot with human disguise. But he is not relying on his organic components.

I believe the argument I also used against my French mother was if I said Truffaut and Godard were the same thing, you would fucking disown me. Jesus God. Why didn't she kick you out on your ass at this very moment? She got really defensive. She was like okay calm down. Made me irate.

I probably stormed off to my room. Right? Yeah seems like a good reaction from her. Bad reaction from you. Good reaction from her. So like a week later I'm at home. Okay. And my mom knocks on the door and she says hey are you done with your homework? I was like yeah. She was like do you have any

plans tonight? Are you going out or anything? I was like no. Why? I was like yeah she was like do you have any plans tonight are you going out or anything and I was like no why and she was like well I was thinking maybe we could watch Robocop together

well things we do for our children really and she was like yeah you know I mean I saw how upset

you got about that thing last week and I feel like if it means that much to you I should watch it uh huh I was like I'm not sure if you're gonna like it

and she's like I probably won't but I just I feel like I should know about it to you, I should watch it. Uh-huh. I was like, I'm not sure if you're going to like it. And she's like, I probably won't, but I just, I feel like I should know about it. Okay. I sit there and watch it with her. And when like the early strikes, you know, all the violence, the sort of excessive, you know, sort of maximalism of the movie, she's like, at a certain point I turned around, I'm like, what do you think? She's like, you know, it's really, it's well done.

Sure. Like I get it. She gets it. I get it. Right, I turned around, I'm like, what do you think? She's like, you know, it's really, it's well done. Sure. Like, I get it. She gets it. I get it. Right, right, right, right. And then about, like, halfway through, she's like, this is pretty good, actually. I mean, I don't like these kinds of movies, but this is, like, pretty solid. Then at this point, when they cut between the Lewis Murphy save and the guys firing the guns.

You better play some music under this. When, you know, like, play some weird, like, mommy music under this when you know like play some weird like mommy music under this okay yeah she turns to me she goes it's like their friendship is the only pure thing left in this world which i always think about when i get to this scene i i understand the these connections to movies it's like their friendship is the only pure thing left in this world the rest is cast you just see people looting in the street. It's true. It's terrible. The rest of the world is bad. And to end this story, the next day my mom called me from work and said,

Griff, I can't stop thinking about RoboCop. That movie is great. It is great. As much as I'm trolling you, it is great. And as much as you sound like a horrendous child. Yeah, but that's a sweet story. Very good story.

My mom's the hero of that story, not me. Ten story points. My mom is the hero of that story. me story my mom is the hero of that story yes 10 hero points for your mother 10 little shit points for 15 year old griffin my mom's the your band-aid fell off and is like on your shoulder now that's my neck band-aid what did you do to yourself this fucking skin condition i don't know it's's a problem. I think I'm dying. Yeah, skin's falling off. Robert Kopp. Now, Lewis Murphy there.

He's taking the helmet off. She's helping him train. Get his shooting back. He sort of realigns his aim. Right, but he's becoming more and more human now. And now, Boddicker, who has the tracking device given to him by Dick Jones, comes with his remaining living boys

for this final set piece of the film. Very good set piece. To just fucking kill Robocop. Right. Kill him. Sure. Blow him up

with the anti-tank gun. But here's the thing. What's the thing? He's a Robocop. Even without the helmet. It's the thing? He's a robo cop. Even without the helmet. It's tough to kill him. And now also he's got some emotional charge.

This isn't just a job anymore. So how does he kill everyone? We'll get to Emil. Because obviously his death's the best. But isn't that the first one? I guess it

I'm trying to remember if Joe He shoots the toxic waste. Well, no. He drives into the toxic waste. Right. Doesn't he? Yeah.

Emil drives into the toxic waste in the car chase. Sorry. Yeah. It all lands on him. He comes out of the car. He's a melting goop man. Yeah. He looks like the toxic Avenger.

It's great. It's great. I mean... His skin is like just dripping off of his body it's an incredible fucking design for something that's in the movie for like five seconds i know and it's especially when these things had to be practically made that i love i like his flipper arms i also just love that it's like it's so weird even for this movie toxic waste like turns him into a mutant like that like and his ear is like

all the way down on his neck now like my bandaid for my skin condition doesn't like the henchman one of his henchmen like react to how he looks he's like

yeah and pushes him away yeah and Neumeier on the commentary track goes this is my metaphor for how relationships work

in show business this is how people treat you if you're film bombs. Which is 10 comedy points. Good job, Ed. I also just like that when he finally gets hit by the car. One of the other boys who just is like, oh, gross. He just like, he's just water. Yeah.

Just melts. Yes. Like there's just not a lot holding that dude together. He just turns into Gak. Ed Neumeier has written two movies, basically. He's one of those guys who's done a lot of other... But it's essentially Starship Troopers

and that stars two amazing films. He wrote the Great American Movies, so it's better than the rest of us. I actually know... I have a family connection to Michael Miner. Like a vague one. I've never met him. Can we reach out to him?

Yeah, I think he exploded from cocaine after this movie, if that makes sense. I mean, he's still alive, I think, but I think this movie, he's rich forever because of it. And like, yeah, I'm not sure though. I don't mean to, I actually don't mean to, what's the word, denigrate this person who I barely know. I mean to, what's the word, denigrate this person who I barely know. Neumeier says on the commentary, he's like, I had a very hard time dealing with the success of this movie. Like I spent years struggling and I've had ups and downs in show business and the lean years have their own problems.

But this movie was so weirdly big and there was so much pressure on us because we had done something so different that I actually didn't know how to handle it and I kind of collapsed for a couple of years, which I think is why he doesn't really make another big movie. Maybe it's Ed Neumeier who exploded from cocaine. One of them exploded from cocaine. That seemed to be the implication from how Neumeier was talking. I mean, look, maybe they both did.

It was the 80s. Yes. So Robocop, he fights them. Yeah. What does he do to Joe Cox, though? I can't remember. Because he blows up, you know, what's her name? You know, Lewis blows up Ray Wise by shooting him up in uh you know uh lewis blows up ray wise right

uh by shooting him up in the tower there right i think he just shoots him he just shoots him i guess yeah he's i think he well i can't remember if he's the first who's laughing now uh exactly and then you know finally he stabs butiker with his because ray wise has the big crane and he drops the debris on him right which like crushes a shot I love where Robocop just like fucking collapses. I know, it's cool. It's intense. And then Lewis gets back, blows him up,

and now Boddicker's there and Robocop rises and say it with me now. I'm not going to say it with you. He walks on water. Clarence Boddicker, you are under arrest. He's there.

They said, how do we fucking get Robocop to kill Boddicker? We don't know what it is. It wasn't in the screenplay. And they were like, oh, fuck. We never use the information spec again. I'm like, Chekhov's gun. It was hanging up there the whole time.

What a satisfying payoff. Fucking just lances him. Another very gruesome shot. Underneath the jaw. Boom. Dead. Murphy, Underneath the jaw. Boom. Dead. Murphy, I'm a mess. And she just collapses into the water.

And he says, They'll fix you. Whatever. They fix everything. They fix everything. Which was a Peter Weller improv. Oh, really? Not in the script. A gorgeous line.

It's a great line. I just love it because it's so like haunted. Right. And at this point, he has full awareness of what was done to him he doesn't feel like robocop he feels like a fixed frankenman yeah he is a frankenstein um so now final scene boom boardroom there was originally further material written after this point okay it wasn't gonna end this concisely which it ends concise masterstroke of the movie i i truly believe and i know i'm saying a lot of hyperbolic things in

this episode the ending's amazing this is the best final line in the history of cinema you whack a dude it's a good final line though joanna just turned to me when she was like that's it they just end it and like you couldn't do it today which was her argument you couldn't no studio would allow this as an ending i will ask you this sincerely yeah and and you can answer this and i can't think of final lines right i'll try and think of some good final think of another movie where there is a one word summation of the entire thematic concern of the film resolved in one word. One word is a challenge. I have no idea. I'll think about it. No, it doesn't have to be one word, but I'm just saying. Well, nobody's

perfect. Everyone always thinks of that. Okay, that's a joke. Three comedy points. Three? Come on. Give it more than three. I got issues with Joey Brown. What did he ever do to you? to you oh boy he fucked with the wrong griffin uh all right yeah it's a great final line but before then just he walks into the office i

think thank you is just so good right does this fucking information spike into the screen plays. Yeah, plays the evidence. Right. I had to kill Bob Morton. Oh shit. Now. Takes the old man. Holding him hostage. Gun to the head. Oh, is this going to become a whole new action scene? Directive 4 flashing. How do we get out of this? Old man goes, Dick!

You're fired. Good shit. Directive 4 shut down. Thank you. ronnie cox flies out the window crazy shot gorgeous like fucking this like the since the rest of the stop motion is like a fucking t-rex in a car commercial yeah yeah and uh you know ed 209 once they get to a human stop motion puppet it it suddenly feels like we're in Pee Wee's plans. It's weird. I forgot to mention that they said that when they screened the film for the LA Times,

when it cut straight from Lewis saving Murphy from the police firing squad, Lewis saving Murphy from the police firing squad hard cut to the T-Rex in the SUX commercial the head critic from the LA Times

got up from her seat went to the projectionist booth and said you've messed up you played a reel from a different movie. Wow.

Because she didn't know why a dinosaur was in the movie. The reason they put that in is because Verhoeven and John Davidson wanted to make a dinosaur movie. They pitched a dinosaur was in the movie. The reason they put that in is because Verhoeven and John Davidson wanted to make a dinosaur movie. They pitched a dinosaur, an animated stop-motion dinosaur movie to Disney

that was going to be classical music over a story of survival with non-talking dinosaurs, and that film was eventually turned into Dinosaur, the CGI animated film. Weird movie, to be clear. But that started out as a Verhoeven pitch. Had no idea. To be clear. But that started out as a Verhoeven pitch. Had no idea. That's crazy. Yeah.

So, shoots him, falls out the window. Nice shooting, son. Straight into the tie. What's your name? And he says... He gives a sly little smile. I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Nobody's perfect.

Let's just wait a while, see what happens. Try to think of good last lines we need to fuck that's a great last line I just rewatched that movie yeah that is

an incredible last line that's in my top 10 last lines ever it's in my top 10 movies ever I'm finished yeah that's pretty good

yeah that's a good one that's pretty good but he says Murphy yeah Murphy and it's the most concise

beautiful elegant ending ever because suddenly he knows who he is where we're going we don't need roads good one that's pretty good but he says murphy yeah murphy and it's the most concise beautiful elegant ending ever because suddenly he knows who we're going we don't need roads he starts out as alex murphy yes he becomes robocop a man without an identity then he starts to understand that he once was murphy but refers to him the third person thinks of it as a different guy, and now finally stripped down, armor crunched, mask removed, face visible, voice no longer distorted. He knows who he is.

He's fucking Alex Murphy. He can't go home again. The wife and son are gone. He's not man. He's not machine. He's 100% cop, but he still knows what his fucking identity is. At the end of the day,

he's Alex goddamn Murphy, and he's the American Jesus. Would have done it in July. What if he'd said that birds dead or alive you're coming with birds we have lost our minds

forced water landing great movie RoboCop is a great movie that is a hilarious satire of American police militarization gone wild. And the psyche of our nation. And according to you, Jesus. What's your question?

Ben just dislocated his fucking elbow. We're physically falling apart now. How did you do that? I don't know. I got a question though. What's your question? What was the box office like that week? Oh, what a great question. Can I just say this thing? Yeah.

Originally they had further shit, further dialogue, and when they got to it, they just went, oh, the last line of the movie is Murphy. Yeah. They cut it off there. Just title card. And Verhoeven tells a story about going to see the film after it did surprisingly well, seeing it at a theater in Harlem where the audience was really fucking into it. And when it got to the end of the movie and the old man goes,

nice shooting, son, what's your name? Before he even said it. They went Murphy. They all yelled out Murphy. And Verhoeven said he got chills and it was the greatest moment

of his career as a director. It was a satisfying thing. That's pretty cool. That's great. And Neumeier tells a similar story about seeing it opening night and when it went from

Murphy to, that's the other thing, he says Murphy and then it's just the word Robocop. It's the two identities now. It's great. And Neumeier tells a similar story about seeing it opening night and when it went from Murphy to... That's the other thing. He says Murphy and then it's just the word Robocop. It's the two identities now. Yeah, no, it's great. Back to back, the audience exploded. They went ballistic. It is too bad that the sequels are bad

because there's plenty of opportunity to make great sequels to this movie. But the character needs to evolve. Of course. It needs to be the Robocop he ends up being at the end rather than just resetting to now he's got the helmet on and he's a Robocop. You can put the helmet back on if you want. He just has to be Murphy.

I think you need to redesign the suit a little bit. I think he needs to have an evolution. No, I think it's fine with him. I think he can't have the same helmet on. I think you need to see his eyes. No, no. Then you can't make a sequel. You have to have that. You don't need a sequel. You gotta introduce time travel.

I'd be fine with that. No, I think the helmet's fine. You just say he can pop it up and down like it doesn't you don't need a sequel. You got to introduce time travel. I'd be fine with that. No, I think the helmet's fine. You just say he can pop it up and down. Like it doesn't, you don't, whatever it is. He needs the helmet because the helmet is why the movie works. It's just how Jaws, like the score is 50% of why the helmet is 50% of why that movie works. It's like in the fucking remake, it's a visor and it puts up his whole face is underneath there and it looks normal. Well, because they want you to show you Joel Kinnaman or whatever. Right.

They spend so much money on Joel Kinnaman that they have to make. Roll lies. But I think it's just, the world is so fun and Omni Consumer Products is so fun. There's just so many fun things you could do. That's why I've seen some of the live action show, the cartoon show. I think that's the way to do it. Just make spin-off shows where the stories are just fun adventures. But the movies, A, I think it was impossible to replicate all the elements.

Why did I get us started on this? Yes. You know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think you don't want to see canonical, weighted stories with him not being full awesome Robocop, but also it's sad to see him not be the happier, more reconciled Murphy. So just do the TV show.

Box office. Opened at number one? Surprise hit? Yes. July 17th, 1987. Dead of summer. It opened to... It's almost 30 years ago. A little over. Shut up. Almost 31 now by the time this episode

comes out. Exactly. it opened to 8 million dollars which was adjusted for inflation would be about 18 million now so you know big opening weekend but obviously it's not on the kind of screens no 1500 screens number one

I'd buy that for a dollar you get it David? I would buy that for a dollar. Yeah. You get it, David? Uh-huh. I would buy that for a dollar. Quiet. 53 million domestic total, which is adjusted about- 115? 122. Hey, not bad. Number two- I'd buy that for $122.

Shut up. Number two at the box office is a reissue of a classic animated film. A Disney picture. Yes. Open to $7.5 million. Real counter-programming to robocop can you give me the decade 30s is it snow white yes i believe that's the only 30s disney movie i believe you are correct i think pinocchio is 1940 i mean bambi is 40 yeah i think snow white's

39 right i thought it was 30 bambi's 42 i thought it was 30. Oh, no. Bambi's 42. I thought it was 37. Pinocchio's the second one. Yeah, right. Oh, I was right. I shouldn't have overthunk it. Yeah, yes, I'm right. Snow White is 37. Pinocchio is 40.

Okay. Because, you know, it took a while. Yeah. Number three is the fourth, and I believe last, in a series that is a great movie and then three terrible sequels. It's also opening. No, it's the fourth. I'm saying this is the third terrible sequel in a row. Correct.

Yes, it's number four. And this is the end of the franchise? I'm sure it is. They didn't make another one. I believe the lead actor in this movie has very clearly stated that he made this movie to buy a nice summer home. Oh, this is Jaws for the Revenge. Correct. Starring? Michael Caine.

Who did not accept his own Academy Award because he was filming this movie. Correct. And always regretted it. Because he won for Hannah and Her Sisters. Yes. And they said, you know, do you have any regrets? Right. And he said, I have not seen the picture

but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house it bought and by all accounts it's wonderful. Or should I say I have not seen the picture

No, no, don't, don't. But by all accounts it is terrible. So that opening these are all new openings. But I have seen the house it bought and by all accounts

Shut up. It was wonderful. Shut House I bought. By all accounts. Shut up. It was wonderful. Shut the fuck up. I'm so hungry. That was an opening. That was... All three of those were new to the theater this week.

They all made about the same amount of money in their opening weekends. Jaws 4. The Revenge. The Revenge. Does not make much money. 20 million total.

No. Number four was number one the week before. It's a sequel as well. People complain about the sequels. They were rampant back then. Is it a deuce? It's a deuce. It's a comedy.

Cashed up with another genre? No. It's just a comedy I hate these movies yeah it's really oh police academy 2 no but you're near yeah problematic is a good word

same same I mean not near maybe not quite as like blatantly bad as the police academy how many were there in total oh good question so a lot

I don't know I don't think about these movies at all it doesn't even say here we can have Bernie's don't think about these movies at all. It doesn't even say here. We can have Bernie's too? No. I hate these movies. Mannequin 2 on the move?

No. I think you hate these movies. Yeah, but I mean like it's even weird that I hate them. Just like there's four total. There's four total. But two of them are TV movies. Oh, oh, Run to the Nerds. Number two. Subtitle. but two of them are TV movies oh oh number two called subtitle

cause four three is nerds in love four is nerds in paradise no this is nerds in paradise oh really okay bad franchise yeah bad movies so there it is

fine number five isoger's cool is the penultimate movie by a director we just referenced without saying his name booger david is now he is conclusively yeah i've got another bottle threw a water bottle at me. I missed. Okay. No, we've mentioned him. Today. Yeah, but we just mentioned one of his movies in our final lines rampage.

So that was his last movie. This is his penultimate movie. What? Wait. We referenced his last movie. This was the film before his last film. Yep. So it's not something like that.

Oh, oh, oh, it's Full Metal Jacket. Correct. Right. Full Metal Jacket, which made a pretty healthy $46 million. Yeah. Way over its budget. One of his bigger hits. Yeah, but he made a lot of hits.

I feel like people sort of forget this. It's like The Shining was a nice sized hit. I think Unadjusted, that's number two though, behind 2001? Unadjusted, it is number three. Oh, behind Shining as well? No, Eyes Wide Shut.

Made $55 million. It's so weird that Eyes Wide Shut opened to number one in July people were really hyped up for that movie and then they saw it and it freaked them out weird like his only real

bomb is I guess like Paths of Glory Eyes Wide Shut definitely didn't make money considering how much it cost who cares

who gives a shit I don't know what do you think of Full Metal Jacket you know what I've actually never seen the whole thing how much it costs. Who cares? Who gives a shit? I don't know. What do you think of Full Metal Jacket? You know what? I've actually never seen the whole thing. Yeah, okay.

I watched it on TV when I was in high school and for whatever reason I never finished it. So I've only seen the first half. Well, that's the, you know,

supposedly the good half. I like the second half. That's the thing. The second half's just weird. I think it's very good but I've also haven't seen the half that turned some people off. Yeah, but I mean it's not bad. It's just that the first half is so's the thing. Second half's just weird. I think it's very good but I've also haven't seen the half that turned some people off.

Yeah but I mean it's not bad. It's just that the first half is so spellbinding. Adventures in Babysitting which someone recently told me to watch

on the blanky slack Reddit whatever the fuck it is. So D'Onofrio's killing it right now. I guess so. Good for him.

He's Thor in that movie. He's the original Thor. Yeah. Remember that? No. Interspace with my boy Dennis Quaid. Joe Dante.

A movie I hope we get to cover someday. Sure. Beverly Hills Cop 2. The Deuce. The Witches of Eastwick. A lot of good movies. The Untouchables

which we mentioned. Spaceballs. This is an amazing weekend. A lot of movies to see. If you're interested in going to the theater in July 1987. Well, I was, when this movie came out, I was one year old.

About 15 months. We don't have time for personal stories. Let's wrap it up, please. It's a tight episode. This film was nominated for two Oscars. Editing and sound. Editing and sound. It was given a special Oscar for sound editing,

which was not yet like a full category okay so that was a special achievement award but editing was definitely an unusual unexpected nomination for this movie

sure yeah because the other I mean you know editing nominees are often just the best picture nominees and indeed

the other four are best picture nominees can you name them 1987 Full Metal Jacket no no it wasn't nominated for best picture really no Best Picture nominees and indeed the other four are Best Picture nominees. Can you name them? 1987 Full Metal Jacket? No. No one's nominated for Best Picture.

Really? No. Just Best Screenplay. Okay. The winner of 1987's Oscar. A good movie. A good movie.

Very stately. A goofy movie? No. It's not on my desk? No. That's 84. Stately. Long.

Very long epic period drama. Out of Africa? Nope. That's 85 or 86. Long epic Asian. Oh, Last Emperor. Yeah, which wins. Then you got a comedy that we might be talking about one day.

87. Great year for movies. That might be broadcast news. Yes. Then you got a Spielberg movie. Not nominated for Best Picture. So I was wrong, actually. 87 Spielberg.

It's not a Jones. No. It's one of his prestige pictures. Is it... Why am I forgetting the tell now? The Empire of the Sun. Yes. And then you got Robocop.

I'm sorry. You mean Robert Cop. And then you've got a sex thriller. That was the biggest hit of the year, pretty much. You said it's not a goofy movie? No, it's not a goofy movie or an extremely goofy movie. Fatal Attraction? Yes.

All the other nominees, best fiction nominees, were Hope and Glory and Moonstruck. I love Moonstruck. I've never seen Hope and Glory. I've never gotten into Moonstruck. I try to give it a shot every couple years and I still,

I don't dislike it, but it never clicks. The moon doesn't hit my eye like a big pizza pie. Oh, it won't click you. Ben, how you doing? It's late. We kept you late.

Let's wrap it up. Oh boy, oh boy oh boy so this is your number one Verhoeven with a bullet yeah yeah spoilers

yeah so Griffin just described the whole plot of Robocop to you so I hope you guys enjoyed that you're welcome he took longer

than the movie does I suppose I talked a little bit this movie won one two three four five Saturn's Awards so try and top that he Weller should have been honored for best acting he was nominated This movie won one, two, three, four, five Saturns awards. So try and top that.

Weller should have been honored for best acting. He was nominated. Oh, by the Saturns. By the Oscars. Oh, yeah, I agree. But he's amazing in this movie. Did he win the Saturn that year? Nope.

Who won? You're going to make me look it up, aren't you? He went home with the ring. But you know what? Let me say this. You fucker. If Weller was nominated... I stopped recording i hit all right now we're good he literally stopped fell down ben laughed dropped the headphones off his head hit the keyboard best actor went to jack nicholson for the witches of eastwick well i look forward to being nominated but not

winning and being able to say i'm in the rarefied company of Peter Weller. It's too bad. Everyone else nominated for the Best Actor Saturn this year is so good. Michael Nuri in The Hidden. A fucking great movie. Terry O'Quinn in The Stepfather. Fantastic!

This is the Saturns honoring the genre movies. Peter Weller, Schwarzenegger and predator, Lance Hendrickson and pumpkin head five great nominees. But then they're like, they can't help themselves. Nicholson probably didn't even show up to the ceremony. A hundred percent did not show up.

And yet they're like, Oh, Jack Nicholson for the witches of Eastwick. What if he just was there in the front row wearing a toxic sunglasses? That would be great. They give it to him at like the Lakers game. He's like, Oh, thank you. They gave him the ring. I mean, Nich. If they give it to him at like the Lakers game, he's like, oh, thank you. They gave him the ring.

I mean, Nicholson's a creep, right? Jessica Tandy won for... I mean, there's... I mean, probably. It's gonna... Yeah, you want to do Benny on the record? I mean, yeah, that's Joe, totally. Yeah, that's true, right? We're like... Jessica Tandy won best actress for Batteries not included at that Oscar. It's just the weirdest Saturn. That's cool.

Saturn's a rule. I used to spend so much time looking up Saturn winners because they nominated and would give awards, the kind of performances that I love that never get recognized. Anyway. And I hope to join that company someday. Starting my campaign now. Consider me in a fur coat. He's on the record. Melissa Leo style.

Telling you. Consider. It's 2017. I'm predicting that Nicholson will be revealed to be the creep that he is. You know, he's certainly Laura Flynn Boyle. That's all I really know of Jack Nicholson's life. Yep.

So, that was our episode on Robert Kopp. Yep. Great movie. American film. Great movie. Subpar to bad episode. We did a great job. Now, are you happy? That's weird because, oh my God, I just was handed a Saturn award for this episode.

Why are you so happy? You were going to tell me why you were so happy. Because I watched Robocop twice in 24 hours. Oh, that's the reason. You're so weird. The best mood stabilizer. He was like, I have news that I will share with you once we start recording. I said, I'm in a really good mood.

I'll tell you why when we start recording because I want your reaction in real time. And now it's captured forever in history. That's the magic of podcasting. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you for listening. Thanks for listening. Next week we have a Total Recall with the We Hate Movies boys. That's going to be exciting.

We got some of the We Hate Movies boys. We're hopefully going to get the other ones on for another episode. We didn't want to overload you with too many boys in one room on the mic. Yep. But yeah, tune in for that. Total Recall with the We Hit Movies

boys. Listening to Jetsons, meeting the Flintstones. My favorite reference. Please remember to rate, review,

subscribe. Go to blankies.red.com for some real nerdy shit. Thanks to Ang for Gudo for our social media,

Liam Montgomery for our theme song, Joe Bowen and Pat Reynolds for our artwork, and as always, I am a supporting actor in the tech category. Rooney, Marr, and Carroll.

Supporting actor. What's up? Ethan Hawke and Training Day. That's what you're pulling right now. Less competition. Number two on the call sheet.