As I’m sure those of you follow me on the twitters and the like to see what kinds of things I like to think about when I’m not drawing pictures of fuzzy-chested action heroes have figured out by now that Robocop is quite possibly my absolute most favourite thing in the history of everything forever and probably responsible for making me the person I am today.
With that in mind, I felt it would be downright irresponsible of me to not point you towards movement to build Detroit a Robocop monument.
“But Coela! I don’t live in Detroit! Why do I care if they have a Robocop?” you may be saying to yourself (or rather, projecting at me) right now. Don’t you want to know that somewhere out there exists a large scale permanent solid metal monument to the best cyborg cop tale that ever has (Or I suspect will be) told? Don’t you want to know that you helped make it happen? Well, even if you don’t, it’d still be mighty rad of you to pass the info along through all them newfangled Phaesbooks and Tweeters and other social Network things you kids like so much.
Remember guys, Serve the Public Trust, Protect the Innocent, Uphold the Law.
Discussion (32) ¬
That is pretty epic. I hope it gets done :D
AHEM
I’ll just plug my own Twitter here as well.
OMG I DIDN’T EVEN NOTICE THAT WORD WHEN I FIRST COMMENTED HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAa….
You made burst in intense laughter and now my cheeks hurt :(
What do you do, close your mouth and puff your cheeks when you laugh?
They could be a natural frowner like I am, because I know that if I smile for just a little bit too long my mouth hurts too much for me to smile for a few hours.
You know, I have not even seen Robocop. And yet I will vote. I cannot deny his awesomeness.
I’d rather see a semi-mobile statue of the ED-209.
It would turn to point at anyone who stands in front of it for over a minute, accusing them of loitering. Maybe rubber bullets and zero accountability…. Would match the dystopian feel of the movies’ societal framework that would allow such a thing to be built in the first place.
@won: yes.
I have no idea why the city of Detroit doesn’t want to erect a proud monument to a movie in which it was depicted as the 5th circle of hell.
One of the comments on the kickstarter page adresses this in response to someone else saying they felt offended by the idea of a Robocop statue in their city;
“I’m going to break it down a little here since apparently for all the living you do in Detroit you don’t know much about what Detroit was even like in the 1980s. It was an absolute nightmare. It had the highest infant mortality rate in the country, crime was absolutely rampant, sections of the city were set to be closed down, and there were places where civil services feared to tread. Detroit was a nightmare city.
Robocop was born of that climate. It WAS gritty, and violent, and desperate. For all that has changed over the last 30 years, it still somewhat is. Robocop was representative of a positive, almost Christ-like change in the city. You seem to hate the movie for reasons you won’t even explain, calling it “shitty-ass” when you either haven’t seen it, don’t know what the climate of Detroit was like when it was made, OR it reminds you of all that and it hits a bit too close to home.
Even ignoring the Detroit aspect of the movie, thematically, Robocop is fairly brilliant. Sorry you’re so mad about a movie you don’t understand, and a city you’ve forgotten the history of.”
That’s a fair point to make, although Robocop as representative of the change which the city underwent is undeniably applied after the fact. It works, though.
This is awesome. Great shout-out, count on at least a little bit of my support! :D
Best case scenario: I’ll go outside on the streets and preach the Robocop goodness.
I might not like the movies, but come on every city needs a few statues of cyborgs about it just incase they are attacked by the third world. Put the statues around factories as well so it freaks them out that they cyborgs are coming ;p
I dunno, Ghost in the Shell is a better cyborg cop movie in my opinion. Not to say Robocop isn’t good and I don’t support this idea, just saying, we need a Kusanagi statue in Tokyo now
You want maybe I will punch you?
I’ll concede that I haven’t seen ghost in the shell, but without writing another whole essay, Robocop has a lot of significance beyond being a “cool robot movie” and I am not kidding when I say it played a huge part in the way I look at characterization and storytelling. In General, Verhoeven is one of my heroes.
Have you read Judge Dredd? He’s a bit of an influence on Robocop, and also pretty cool.
I do think GitS hits the “what it means to be human” aspect of cyberization better and raises far more questions on how humans would live in a cybernetic future. Yet Robocop IS Detroit’s cyberized human. Cyberized human’s like Mokoto are a dime a dozen in Niihama. (Tokyo was annihilated in World War III)
Also, Mokoto does have the better rack….which distracts you long enough for her foot to meet your face.
ANYWAY. This does sound awesome. Robocop either needs to be shaking the had of a statue of mayor Daley, (either one,) or able to shoot pigeons with a body count kept at the base.
Eh, I just have a problem in general with setting up monuments to obviously fictional characters and hailing them as the hero of the city when there are legitimate non-fictional people from history that could fill that role just as easily.
Philly, I’m looking at you. Directly.
The blunt truth of it is, Robocop as a cultural icon has more personal significance to me than Detroit as a city. If I was donating to a fund for a statue historical figure, I’d put it towards another Louis Riel monument in Manitoba or a Pierre Trudeau in Ottawa or a David Suzuki out in BC before I put it towards a person who has very little relevance in my life in a city I have never visited in a State I have only seen in passing on my way from Ontario to Illinois.
I just want a Robocop monument, I don’t care where they put it. Some people have their Star Wars obsessions, some people were permanently altered by Lord of the Rings, I have Robocop.
i only just realised… COELA IS CANADIAN oOo (derp as if the rest of you hadnt figured T__T) but i LOVE CANADA OoO
and uhh… return of the epic jar? AWESOME.xD
I believe every city should have a robo-cop statue. It would make people notice the statues in town more often if one of them were amazing.
If Riverside Iowa has a monument to the future birthplace of James T. Kirk (original timeline obviously) then Detroit should have a Robocop monument.
There’s one for Rocky in Philly as well, and honestly, the movie isn’t that great when you look at it objectively. It was pretty much the Avatar of its day.
Rocky is a simple but well executed archetypical movie. It succeeded very well for what it was, almost like a template for that style of story. Being simple does not inherently make something bad, especially when you look at what the director’s objective was. The same goes for Avatar. Veeery tried and true progression of events and characters played as straight archetypes, but they use an easily digestable story that appeals to the lowest common denominator as a venue for exploring a very richly constructed world. Trying to match a groundbreaking story with a groundbreaking world in a constrained timeframe runs the risk of overloading the audience, alienating viewers, and distracting from one of the two objectives you’re trying to communicate.
I agree but, from what I’m seeing, Robocop did a pretty good job, no? I appreciate Rocky and Avatar, don’t get me wrong. I saw Avatar twice, once in IMAX 3D, spending a net total of $24 on a movie I didn’t even get to keep. They don’t let you keep the glasses either. I just don’t think either are statue-worthy, and if/since they are, certainly Robocop deserves one in Detroit. Honestly, if any movie deserves a statue, it’s the Rocky Horror Picture Show, which pretty much defines the term “cult classic.”
I live near the city of Detroit and am trying to get people involved in this. I think it would be great as a symbol, as a touristy kind of thing…and just to represent that Detroit can can see itself in a fun light, and also realize that it’s got a lot of work to do.
This is actually quite amazing, I wish we had something akin to this over in the UK, I have no idea who we would have though, we don’t seem to have many archetypes of that calibre. :(
I guess I’m watching Robocop tonight…
Looks like the statue is gonna get made…