It was while passing by the set of Blade Runner that writer Edward Neumeier came up with the idea for a futuristic law enforcement officer who was part man, part machine. Combining that experience with inspiration from the Marvel Comic Book character Iron Man, the eventuality became 1987’s Robocop. Neumeier based the story on the classic 1965 anime series 8th Man with the main character design coming from the first of Toei’s “Metal Hero” series, 1982’s Uchû keiji Gyaban. While Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michael Ironside were both considered for the titular role, producers realized that a much smaller actor was needed to accommodate the suit. The actor chosen to play the part of the cop who becomes the cybernetic police officer was Peter Weller, whose initial fitting into the overdue suit took so long (eleven hours) that production was halted so that he could get accustomed to moving in it. At one point, Weller was losing three pounds of water weight a day in the stifling costume, leading to the installation of an air conditioner.

With crime rampant and worsening in Detroit’s near future, the responsibility for the city’s law enforcement is turned over to a powerful corporation called OCP. Tensions between OCP and the current police force worsen with the brutal murders of several officers by known crime boss Clarence Boddiker (Kurtwood Smith) and the catastrophic failure of OCP’s new crime-fighting robot, the ED-209. A young executive (Miguel Ferrer) steps into the void and introduces his own program: Robocop. When officer Alex Murphy is gunned down by Boddiker’s gang, his corpse is used to create the very first Robocop prototype. Stocked with his four prime directives (the first of which, “Serve the public trust,” was inspired by a fortune cookie), Robocop delivers frank but effective justice in the streets which rockets the executive to the company’s vice presidency.

But when Robocop begins to learn the truth about his past self, his personal investigation begins to haunt him. And when Boddiker kills the new vice president to make room for the spurned creator of the ED-209 (Ronny Cox), Robocop goes after him with every intention of killing him. Unable to arrest OCP employees because of his secret fourth directive, Robocop is forced to flee with his old partner, who takes him to the site of his murder. Boddiker and his gang track him there and a battle ensues in which the villains are dispatched. With only the big fish left to fry, Robocop returns to OCP determined to secure his future by reclaiming his past.

While the box office numbers for Robocop were modest ($53 million), the signature character was somehow iconic enough to spawn a hailstorm of merchandising, parodies, and cultural artifacts. Two cinematic sequels, both written by famed graphic novelist Frank Miller, were made (Robocop 2 in 1990 and Robocop 3 in 1993. Miller also released a graphic novel based on his original rejected script for the second film. Robocop also appeared in a live-action television series in 1994 (Robocop: The Series), a four-part miniseries in 2000 (Robocop: Prime Directives), and two animated series (Robocop: The Animated Series in the 1980s and Robocop: Alpha Commando in the late 1990s). Several video games were made of the franchise character, including one that pitted him against James Cameron’s Terminator. Marvel, Dark Horse, and Avatar Press all released comic book series about the futuristic crime fighter.