New RoboCop TV series has James Wan as executive producer

James Wan is on board to executive produce a new TV series inspired by the classic 1987 film RoboCop for Amazon MGM

Back in 2022, Amazon closed an $8.5 billion acquisition of the film studio MGM, giving them ownership of the studio’s thousands of films and TV shows. Last year, we heard that the six MGM properties Amazon was most interested in doing something with were Poltergeist, *Stargate, The Thomas Crown Affair, Legally Blonde, Rocky, *and RoboCop… and we’ve recently heard updates on some of those projects, with a Poltergeist TV series finding its showrunners and Michael B. Jordan signing on to both direct and star in a new version of The Thomas Crown Affair. Now Deadline has broken the news that a new RoboCop TV series is moving forward and has James Wan, the director of such films as Saw, The Conjuring, and Aquaman, on board as executive producer.

Peter Ocko (Lodge 49) has been hired to write, executive produce, and serve as showrunner on the potential series. Wan, Michael Clear, and Rob Hackett are executive producing through their company Atomic Monster, while Danielle Bozzone is overseeing the project for Atomic Monster. The series is being produced by Amazon MGM Studios.

Directed by Paul Verhoeven from a screenplay by Edward Neumeier and Michael Miner, the 1987 film RoboCop has the following synopsis: In a violent, near-apocalyptic Detroit, evil corporation Omni Consumer Products wins a contract from the city government to privatize the police force. To test their crime-eradicating cyborgs, the company leads street cop Alex Murphy (Peter Weller) into an armed confrontation with crime lord Boddicker (Kurtwood Smith) so they can use his body to support their untested RoboCop prototype. But when RoboCop learns of the company’s nefarious plans, he turns on his masters. The movie was followed by sequels RoboCop 2 (1990) and RoboCop 3 (1993), an animated series that ran for one season in 1988, a live-action TV series that ran for one season in 1994, a 2001 mini-series called RoboCop: Prime Directives, and a 2014 remake, as well as video games, comic books, toys, clothing, and other merchandise.

The new TV series has the following official logline: A giant tech conglomerate collaborates with the local police department to introduce a technologically advanced enforcer to combat rising crime — a police officer who’s part man, part machine.

Now the last time they did this, it was back in 2000 with a series called RoboCop: Prime Directives. It comprised of four 90 minute films. I followed the official website for all the news, it sounded great. It was going to ignore the sequels and follow on from the original. I was quite excited as RoboCop is a scifi classic.

When I finally managed to see it here in the UK, I was so disappointed I didn’t even finish the first episode. So I’m not holding out any hope here. I didn’t think much of the 2014 remake either.