James Wan Boards Amazon’s ‘Robocop’ TV Series

Robocop fans got some good news last year when Amazon put into motion a Prime Video series based on the film franchise that began with Paul Verhoeven’s 1987 classic. It’s been a long, tough road for Robocop, especially after the failed 2014 reboot and Neill Blomkamp’s shelved project, but there’s new hope on the horizon as the show starts taking shape.

Variety reports that Amazon MGM’s Robocop series has added James Wan as a producer through his Atomic Monster label. Not only that, but Peter Ocko has joined as writer, exec-producer, and showrunner. Ocko has been in the business a long time, having worked on such shows as Weird Science, Parker Lewis Can’t Lose, Dead Like Me, and most recently as showrunner on Lodge 49.

Here’s the series synopsis: “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.”

Robocop die-hards know the character has a long history of TV projects, including a Saturday morning cartoon in the ’80s, and two more animated shows in the ’90s and early 2000s. A live-action show ran for one season in 1994. All of these were primarily aimed at kids which is wild when you think how violent the original movie was.

Travis Hopson has been reviewing movies before he even knew there was such a thing. Having grown up on a combination of bad '80s movies, pro wrestling, comic books, and hip-hop, Travis is uniquely positioned to geek out on just about everything under the sun. A vampire who walks during the day and refuses to sleep, Travis is the co-creator and lead writer for Punch Drunk Critics. He is also a contributor to Good Morning Washington, WBAL Morning News, and WETA Around Town. In the five minutes a day he's not working, Travis is also a voice actor, podcaster, and Twitch gamer. Travis is a voting member of the Critics Choice Association (CCA), Washington DC Area Film Critics Association (WAFCA), and Late Night programmer for the Lakefront Film Festival.