ED-209
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The Enforcement Droid Series 209 (or ED-209) is a fictional law enforcement robot featured as one of the design and special effect highlights of the movie RoboCop (1987), and its two sequels. ED-209 serves as a heavily-armed obstacle and foil to RoboCop's title character and others throughout the series, as well as a source of comic relief due to its tendency to malfunction. It remains an often referenced and lampooned fixture of American popular culture.
The ED-209 was designed by Craig Davies, who also built the full size models, and animated by Phil Tippett, a veteran stop-motion animator. Davies and Tippett would go on to collaborate on many more projects. As one of the set pieces of the movie, the ED-209's look and animated sequences were under the close supervision of director Paul Verhoeven.
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[edit] Design
Director Paul Verhoeven made it clear very early on that ED-209 should not look "cute". He wanted the robot to look hard and mean. For this reason, various common robot features were left out. There are no eyes on the ED-209, for instance, since Craig Davies believed they conveyed too much emotion as well as being clichéd.[citation needed]
Craig Davies also incorporated his ideas about modern 1980s American design, especially car design, into the robot. He envisioned futuristic designers making the robot look good in order to make it marketable before they made it work well, "just like an American car". There is also commentary on ridiculous corporate design policies, with such features as an obviously over-designed hydraulic system, over-attention paid to cosmetics and the placement of obviously vulnerable features such as the radiator grill on the very front of the robot.[citation needed]
The audio for the ED-209 was composed by Stephen Flick and John Pospisil of audio effects company Screaming Lizard. The hydraulic heavy machinery feel of the robot was composed of various motor and piston noises. An intimidating growl produced by ED-209 in the first movie was created by playing a jaguar growl backwards. Its distorted human voice was recorded by the film's executive producer Jon Davison. It was never intended to be in RoboCop's theatrical release and was only recorded for an initial screening. However, it was kept as the voice of ED-209 all the way to the theaters.
[edit] Appearances
The ED-209 is featured in every RoboCop major motion picture, while it is missing from the series' direct-to-video releases and the television series.
[edit] RoboCop
ED-209 is primarily featured in the first film, where it appears three times. The 209 series was an attempt to create a series of law enforcement robots, the brain child of the movie's main villain, OCP Senior President Dick Jones. During its unveiling to the OCP board, it malfunctions, and kills a board member. In light of this disastrous malfunction, the RoboCop program is given the green light.
The ED-209 appears again when RoboCop confronts and attempts to arrest Dick Jones for murder. The robot manages to seriously damage RoboCop. ED-209's faulty nature is again highlighted when it trips and becomes disabled while attempting to traverse an ordinary flight of stairs.
The robot's final appearance is in OCP Plaza, assigned to protect the building during a police strike. When it attempts to interfere with RoboCop, he destroys the robot with a Cobra assault cannon taken from Dick Jones and Clarence Boddicker's minions.
It is unclear whether there is more than one operational ED-209 throughout the film. Either the film features different ED-209s, or there is only one prototype which is repaired between appearances.
[edit] RoboCop 2
RoboCop 2 features only quick cameos of the robot, where it is featured as a security bot for an OCP building on a television news report. The robot promptly trips on an open manhole and flails about uselessly while trying to disperse demonstrators.
A full-scale model (or out of commission) ED-209 also appears in the background as the executives are discussing their problems with the Robocop 2 program.
In the widescreen version of the film, just before the Mayor enters the OCP CEO's office, an ED-209 unit is spotted standing on the right side of the screen outside the building.
[edit] RoboCop 3
RoboCop 3 has one scene of ED-209 once again used as a security bot for an OCP building, this time an armory. Resistance fighters are able to easily hack the ED-209 via a dataport in its leg with a portable computer ("I am authorized to...be loyal as a puppy."). The ED-209 is promptly turned against its owners, and opens fire upon OCP security personnel.
[edit] Other appearances
The ED-209 is also used as a boss in the RoboCop video game, and the video game RoboCop vs. the Terminator. There were two ED-209s in the comic book version of RoboCop vs. The Terminator (though it is mentioned that there are 200 of them deployed), assisting RoboCop in shooting down Terminators bent on killing Flo. However, their limited intelligence remained a problem. In one instance, when ordered by RoboCop to "scan for cybernetic activity", the ED-209s immediately registered RoboCop as a target and opened fire, hitting each other by accident.
[edit] Armaments
The ED-209's primary weapon in all films are three 20mm machine guns, two on the left arm and one on the right arm. It also featured a three-round rocket launcher on its right arm and twin launchers for mortar rounds or gas grenades behind its head. The grenade launchers are never used on film, but are shown on models and schematics of the ED-209.
[edit] Other appearances
- In an episode of The Simpsons ("I, D'oh-Bot"), Homer fights an ED-209 look-a-like in a robot-fighting television show called Robot Rumble.
- In an episode of South Park ("Korn's Groovy Pirate Ghost Mystery"), Kenny wears a life-sized ED-209 Halloween costume. Coincidentally, in the RoboCop film, the ED-209 malfunctions and kills a man named "Kinney".
- In Aladdin and the King of Thieves, the Genie turns into a parody version of ED-209 armed with laser beams to secure the "Aladdin and Jasmin wedding perimeter".
- The ED-209 also makes a cameo appearance in the show Family Guy ("Running Mates") as the "XL-K" hall pass enforcement robot. The scene in which an OCP executive is killed after complying with orders is also parodied when a young girl is confronted by the XL-K and requested to present a hall pass. It attacks her even after she complied. Another similar situation occurred during the closing credits when Mr. Fargas (Peter Griffin's recently reinstated old teacher) is shown just before he was gunned down due to not having a hall pass.
- The Terran Goliath unit in StarCraft, if clicked on multiple times, mentions "MilSpec ED-209". The unit itself is very similar in appearance to the ED-209.
- In an episode of Mystery Science Theatre 3000, Joel (Hodgeson) and the Bots, Crow T. Robot and Tom Servo, during an opening sequence are reciting nighttime prayers "...God bless C-3PO, and God bless ED-209, although I don't know why anyone would make a robot that couldn't walk down stairs..."
- ED-209 (referred to simply as ED) is the name of Woody and Ted's cat in the online gaming webcomic GU Comics.
- In the comicbook, Sin City: Hell and Back, the character Wallace hallucinates that his buddy, The Captain, looks like ED-209. Sin City is written and drawn by Frank Miller, who wrote the original screenplays to RoboCop 2 and RoboCop 3.
[edit] Trivia
- According to RoboCop writer Ed Neumeier, the ED-209 robot was designed to resemble a bipedal Vietnam War-era Huey helicopter.
- The ED-209 "chicken leg" walking style resembles the AT-ST from Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, which animator Phil Tippett also worked on.
[edit] Reviews
ED-209 was listed as #5 in Wizard Magazine’s "10 Villains We'd Like to Forget." The text reads: "Cool looking? Sure. Functional? Hell no. Forget about the fact it killed an innocent man and blew off its own arm, the dumb thing couldn't even master stairs."
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
| RoboCop |
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TV: RoboCop: The Series | RoboCop: The Animated Series | RoboCop: Alpha Commando | |
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Video Games: RoboCop | RoboCop 2 | RoboCop 3 | RoboCop versus The Terminator | RoboCop |
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Comics: RoboCop versus The Terminator | Frank Miller's RoboCop |
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Organizations: Omni Consumer Products |
