RoboCop is a 1994 cyberpunk television series based on the RoboCop franchise. It stars Richard Eden as the title character. Made to appeal primarily to children and young teenagers, it lacks the graphic violence of the original film RoboCop and its sequel RoboCop 2 and is more in line with the tone of RoboCop 3.
The television series ignores the events of the sequels and many character names are changed from the movie series. The RoboCop character has several non-lethal alternatives to killing criminals, which ensures that certain villains can be recurring. The OCP Chairman and his corporation are treated as simply naïve and ignorant, in contrast to their malicious and immoral behavior from the second film onward.
Background
While RoboCop was initially an American property, Orion Pictures received a $500,000 cash infusion for TV licensing rights by Canada's Skyvision Entertainment in May 1993. Orion Pictures had originally planned to make a fourth RoboCop film, but decided to license a television series instead due to the bankruptcy of the studio and the negative reception to RoboCop 3 (1993). This allowed access to co-production agreements and possible partnerships with other countries. The series was filmed in Toronto and Mississauga, Ontario and originally planned for a January 1994 debut, several months after the unsuccessful release of RoboCop 3. Skyvision was also in negotiation with Peter Weller, the original RoboCop, but this did not come to fruition. 22 episodes were made, but the series was not renewed for a second season. Expense played a significant part in this; according to Skyvision VP Kevin Gillis, episodes would be produced at $1.2 million to $1.5 million each.
The pilot episode runs two hours and was adapted from a discarded RoboCop 2 script, Corporate Wars, by the writers of the original RoboCop, Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner.
Villains on the series include Dr. Cray Z. Mallardo, OCP executive Chip Chayken, William Ray Morgan aka Pudface, Vlad Molotov.
The series gave writers more of an opportunity to develop the central characters and to extend the human interest aspect through the introduction of Gadget, the station mascot and the adopted, insightful daughter of station Sergeant Parks. Gadget, along with the presence of Jimmy Murphy did much to shift the focus from the adult to the youth target audience. The writers also introduced an element of virtual camaraderie in the character Diana, formerly a secretary to crooked Vice-president Chip Chayken, who is unwillingly turned into the 'mind' of Metronet and OCP's city-running super-computer, NeuroBrain and RoboCop's biggest 'behind-the-scenes' ally in his fight-against-crime.
Many of the characters' names were also altered from their movie counterparts due to rights issues.