TV has delivered some hidden gems in major SF franchises, like “Total Recall 2070” (1999) and “Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles” (2008-09). In brief flashes, “RoboCop: Prime Directives” (2001, Space, Sci Fi Channel) – a four-part miniseries of 95-minute episodes – looks like it could achieve that status, especially since it scraps the kiddie appeal of “RoboCop 3” (1993) and the 1994 TV series. But it ends up running out of money and ideas – and in retrospect, it never had much of either.
Brad Abraham and Joseph O’Brien wrote this as a pre-planned miniseries, but the fourth installment, aptly titled “Crash & Burn,” plays like one of those finales of a canceled series. The network has decided to cut its losses, so it provides enough funding to reach “the end,” but not a penny more.
So director Julian Grant, despite achieving cyberpunk noir moments such as steamy alleys in the first three episodes (“Dark Justice,” “Meltdown,” “Resurrection”) now has to resort to cheap syndication tricks like playing amateur fight choreography in slow motion so it looks boringly bad instead of laughably atrocious.
“RoboCop: Prime Directives” (2001)
Space (Canada), Sci Fi Channel (USA); four-part miniseries
Episodes: “Dark Justice,” “Meltdown,” “Resurrection,” “Crash & Burn”
Director: Julian Grant
Writers: Brad Abraham, Joseph O’Brien
Stars: Page Fletcher, Maurice Dean Wint, Leslie Hope
This week, RFMC looks at the films and TV shows of the “RoboCop” saga.
Abrahams and O’Brien do their best work on the intentional laughs. Rather than aiming for Neumeier-esque cleverness, the news-break cutaways land on-the-nose jabs at trends in TV news presentation: shorter segments (down to 1 minute), increasingly hot female newscasters (including supermodel triplets), and information scrolls running across the top and bottom. The gag commercials are often sharp, like an advertisement for a kids’ plush toy/game/backpack that serves as OCP’s ideal, innocuous spy device – like what smartphones have become.
NeuroBrain by another name
But the writing of “Prime Directives’ ” main narrative – at its core, the standard “RoboCop” plot about OCP’s gradual takeover of people’s lives – is fleshed out with nods to other SF sagas. While the idea of spending 6 hours in the world of “RoboCop” is appealing when one thinks of “RoboCop” at its best, it’s far too long when the quality is at the other extreme.
Borrowing the Neumeier-Miner concept of NeuroBrain (from their “RoboCop 2” draft that was repurposed for the pilot episode of the ’94 TV series), Abraham and O’Brien fake us out like they’re going to dig deeper into the HAL-9000 concept and ask “How much automation in your life is too much?” But they end up merely riffing on “2001,” including having S.A.I.N.T. (OCP’s Smart Building that’s going to make all of Delta City into a Smart City) say “I’m sorry, I can’t do that.”
It sounds like I must be making this up, but Old Detroit-based heroine Ann (“24’s” Leslie Hope, the most recognizable actor) honest-to-god has Predator-style stealth capability and wields a lightsaber. “Prime Directives” fails to build up the “RoboCop” world and instead uses its robust running time to remind us of other franchises.
For a while, it almost achieves slow-burn noir intrigue as it gives us flashbacks to Alex Murphy/RoboCop (Page Fletcher, plus a loudspeaker-toned voice) and John Cable/RoboCable (Maurice Dean Wint) when they were entirely human beat cops. When the character traits are built up via two cops working a case, it’s clear that acting is not the show’s problem.
Longer doesn’t mean better
But all of the episodes are twice as long as they should be, with lots of OCP boardroom intrigue that has its moments (one corporate-climber’s method of offing the entire board is Palpatine-esque and rather delicious) but ultimately doesn’t mean much. Top-billed actress Maria del Mar is the biggest victim, as her character climbs the ladder via plot conveniences, not clever schemes.
“Crash & Burn” is the worst offender. Imagine if “Terminator 2’s” raid on Cyberdyne had no sense of brisk pacing and was unable to craft convincing action.
And also if it had a less clear and more stupid goal. Villain Kaydick (Geraint Wyn Davies) aims to release an organic/computer virus via S.A.I.N.T. We learn toward the end that some characters (not only the two RoboCops) are organic/computer hybrids. This could’ve been interesting, except that – like the stealth shields and lightsabers – this mind-blowingly advanced tech’s development is never explained.
If you embark on a viewing of “Prime Directives,” you might for a while feel like I did: “This only rates a 4.6 on IMDb? It’s no masterpiece, but it’s better than that.” The acting isn’t bad, the tragedy of RoboCop’s existence is strikingly emphasized as he sits alone in a dark room when re-powering, some style is achieved despite a low budget, and Norman Orenstein often delivers wall-of-sound action music (you just have to brush off his tangents into Western music).
And there’s a sense of build-up: It seems “Prime Directives” will have something fresh to say about the classic sci-fi theme of an AI computer being handed total control. But if you’re a completist and get to the end of these four inexplicably movie-length episodes, you’ll see everything fall to pieces. The good stuff was either a fake-out or an accident, and while the promise of being for adults instead of kids is honest, it’s not enough. “RoboCop: Prime Directives” is a virus that tricks you into clicking on it.