The project hasn’t gathered any sort of noticeable forward momentum for the last eighteen months, but RoboCop Returns is apparently still out there somewhere in developmental purgatory, waiting on everything to come together behind the scenes.
District 9‘s Neill Blompkamp was initially spearheading the direct sequel to Paul Verhoeven’s classic original with designs on having Peter Weller reprise the title role once again, before he departed his second attempted reinvention of a beloved 1980s franchise after his planned follow-up to James Cameron’s Aliens also fell through a few years back.
Abe Forsythe was then hired to direct and rework the script from the ground up alongside longtime RoboCop veteran Ed Neumier, who thought of the idea for the story with Michael Miner, his co-writer on the first installment. It’s still early days, but a new rumor claims that the casting search is beginning to heat up, with Eiza Gonzalez being named as a potential candidate to play the female lead.
The actress is definitely on the ascendancy, having followed up her breakout role in From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series with supporting parts in Baby Driver and Bloodshot, along with big budget blockbusters Alita: Battle Angel, Hobbs & Shaw and Godzilla vs. Kong, while she also delivered an impressive dramatic performance in I Care a Lot and will be seen next year in Michael Bay’s Ambulance.
She’s definitely a rising star with a big future that’s no stranger to the world of either sci-fi or effects-heavy productions, but Neumier revealed last September that he’s still drafting the screenplay and RoboCop Returns has yet to be given an official green light by studio MGM, so we’re a long way away from anybody being officially confirmed for the cast.
