Liam Kenney - Core Post #3

 In Susan Jefford's Hard Bodies, I loved her notion that "sequentiality," was "Hollywood('s) response" in displaying “crises” of masculinity. Although Robocop II comes up in passing, it had me considering the way the original Robocop really toyed with the idea of the male body, especially in the way that amnesia and the family play a role in the original film. I was surprised that she didn’t talk about the original Robocop more, as the film has elements of each piece of her analysis of the shift that she talks about when discussing Terminator 2, with the "hard body” becoming the “family man.” Robocop is essentially a film about that exact struggle, presenting tug-of-war between the two versions of masculinity in a far more literal sense, albeit through the form of satire. Robocop's main struggle lies in his amnesia and hard metallic body, as they are what prevents him from ever returning to his family. Jefford’s writing about amnesia, especially in reference to Rambo, presents an interesting side to the same coin in thinking about social trust of institutions. Both First Blood and Robocop are films that feature a hard bodied protagonist struggling to maintain sanity when faced with police, but Robocop critiques the institution from the inside, while First Blood presents the police as the antagonists full stop. I think Robocop offers a useful look at the masculinity of the 80s, especially in the fact that it was made by a filmmaker famous for satirizing social issues in a way that isn’t immediately identifiable for those not examining his films in a thoughtful way.