Paul Verhoeven is not a fan of the RoboCop and Total Recall remakes

https://www.joblo.com/paul-verhoeven-is-not-a-fan-of-the-robocop-and-total-recall-remakes/

Regarding Robocop, Verhoeven took issue with the 2014 movie, which starred Joel Kinnaman – who himself knew his version was far removed from the 1987 original – over its lack of subtleties and nuances, in addition to how the filmmakers tried to develop the central character. “The problem there, I felt, was that he was really aware that he lost all his legs and arms. He knows it from the very beginning. The beautiful thing about the original RoboCop, what makes it not just pure tragedy or whatever, is that he really does not know anymore. He gets a couple of vague flashes of memory when he goes to his old house, but RoboCop is not a tragic figure. Yes, he’s killed in the most horrible way in the beginning. But when we see him again as a robot, he doesn’t feel that. In the new one, because he remembers everything, he’s much more tragic. We wanted you to accept him at the beginning as a robotic cop. That’s what they did to him. In my opinion, I thought it was a problem to make him more tragic.”