Here’s another throwback from my undergrad days. I thought “The Kid Goes Wild” by Babylon A. D. wasn’t enough, so I made this MVE (Music Video Essay) focusing on RoboCop 2 and the song “Electric Blue” by Ice House.
The film and the song are three years apart, but I think they fit together. Please forgive the video quality. >!A rolling stone is worth two in the bush!!<
I've always wondered what RoboCop would be like as a Netflix original series. I'd like to imagine that the first film would be expanded upon and broken down (striped) into 8 to 10 episodes.
The first season of the show would cover Officer Alex Murphy and his work at Metro South with his partner John Cable before he gets transferred to Metro West.
The penultimate episode will end with him meeting Boddicker and company. Then, the season finale will end with Murphy becoming the Crime Prevention Unit built by OCP.
In the video below, this is how I think the season finale episode would end: with RoboCop on duty for the first time.
This is what happens when you ask AI to make a comic/cartoon version of the Boddicker Gang having fun in the Steel Mill.
"All right, look out!"
"Turn around, man!"
"Hey, pretty boy! Over here!"
I like to play around with footage and music, so I put this short montage together a few years back using Final Cut Pro and Premiere Pro. It's a slice of 80's nostalgia for those who love it.
A few years back, when I was in undergrad, I put together a music video essay based on the 1980 Astroboy series. It is a tribute to Astro and Atlas to the song "Jah World" by Wu Tang Clan. It's a bit dated, and I'd like to redo the video with updated footage (4K Ultra). For now, take a look at this piece of nostalgia.
As a child, I first saw Astroboy in the summer of 1986 on WTGI Channel 61 out of Wilmington, Delaware. A few years back, during my undergrad years, I ordered an Astroboy Region 4 DVD box set (from Australia) which had the original first two episodes uncut. After searching online, I finally learned the reason for the heavily edited pilot from an Astroboy website dedicated to Osamu Tezuka.
Apparently, the Japanese version of Astroboy (Tetsuwan Atomu) was a bit too dark for American children. There are religious references, alcohol use, and of course, violence and death. The English dubs are toned down, but the intended darker tone is still there in episodes like Blackie Young (robots being dismembered) and The Anti-Proton Gun (Walpurgis is vaporized in gruesome fashion).
The biggest factor here is the omission of Atlas’ backstory, which is sad and cruel. I like to believe that Atlas is the poster boy for child abuse and neglect. In the episode Atlas Lives Again, we see flashbacks of Astro fighting Atlas, but I never knew how Atlas became an adult, because it was cut from the English version.
So when I watched the episode Crystal of the Desert, I was confused because I was only treated to a brief flashback of damaged boy Atlas repairing himself and Livian after Walpurgis tried to destroy him. The image of damaged boy Atlas on the work table with Livian’s wreckage is a haunting image and it stays with me until today.
When I finally watched the Japanese edit of Episode 2 Astro vs Atlas, it all came full circle. I finally got to see how Atlas was damaged and why he had to rebuild himself. Atlas is a mistreated foster child looking for a forever home, but all he got was mistreatment and abuse.
In the end, the humans who were supposed to look after Atlas used him and abandoned him. Walpurgis dismantled Livian (basically tortured her for breaking a gargoyle statue) and he tried to blow up Atlas using heat seeking missiles.
It's really sad to see poor Atlas drag his broken body all the back to the castle. It’s heartbreaking to see Atlas trying to find comfort among the mangled remains of Livian, the only one who ever showed him any kind of compassion.
No wonder Atlas became such a tyrant. Atlas was an adult with a wounded child on the inside, like many of us who carry childhood trauma and pain with us. Atlas was forced to grow up. His adult appearance is proof of that. Astro was there to remind Atlas that innocence is to be valued.
I land my plane.