“Dead or alive, you’re coming with me,” may be the only familiar line in the new “RoboCop” left over from the 1987 original, to which it bears very minute similarities in content and quality.

The original story centers on a cop named Alex Murphy, who was transferred into the depths of crime in a dystopian view of a corrupt Detroit.

On his first day, Murphy is shot multiple times near death. Without the consent of Murphy’s family or the police department, Omni Consumer Products (OCP), a military development company, uses Murphy’s body to make a machine that has no morality, soul or feelings to be sent out onto the streets to end crime for good. With his family gone, Murphy begins to actually have some feelings and regain his emotions.

In the remake, Murphy (Joel Kinnaman) likewise suffers a near-fatal injury and is turned into a machine that OCP can sell to the public as a giant publicity stunt for its CEO (Michael Keaton) to dominate the consumer industry. From that moment on, the film becomes a giant twisted mess of ideas that are more well-developed in the original. Besides the name “RoboCop” and the movie’s central theme of a protagonist getting a second chance, the two movies are not even comparable.

“RoboCop” has great visual effects compared to the original, but then again so does every movie made since 1987. If not just for Samuel L. Jackson’s terrible hair, I would recommend waiting until it’s available for home viewing or online streaming.

★★☆☆☆

braber@mavs.coloradomesa.edu