My Life In Fandom: Razorfist Reviews "Robot Jox" & What Creatives Can Take From It

It's been a while since Razorfist cut a Ragaholic Cinema video, so we were due and today we got it: Robot Jox

Razor's pointing out of the similarity between this film and BattleTech is apt, as a lot of us who were there also made that connection. It is no surprise that FASA responded in kind by making Solaris VII ('Mech Gladitorial combat) in its image.

As mecha media goes, this is the embarassing try-too-hard younger brother cobbling together from cardboard and broken LEGO a crude facimile of his cool older brother's toys and pretending to be just like him. The result is as you see here: a film that misses the mark across the board, but you can clearly see what it aimed at, which--put together with its time of release--tells you why they aimed at it.

This was because, despite all the allusions, you never saw the film get seriously mature in its language or depictions; it was firmly in the PG/PG-13 camp due to the target audience being boys 10-12 (i.e. that Transformers/GI Joe/Robotech cohort)- the same as Tron and Krull. Sure, it was a low-budget film with never-weres, also-rans, and veterans on their final years but they went for it and--while missing the mark--it became this cult classic because it was that earnest try-hard attitude that made it so bad that it's good.

That, folks, is the difference between this film and cynical nostalgia-bait-cum-propaganda that is the Mouse Wars trilogy and other Hellmouth releases in the last few years. You can, to an extent, overlook how bad a film can be because it was done in good faith and with earnest intent to make the best they could with what they had. You'll see this spirit in a lot of low-budget '80s films like MegaForce, Yor, and others akin to it.

And if you're wondering if there's a point here, you're not wrong.

As the folks at The Corridor Crew routinely point out, you can do a lot today that formerly took millions of dollars, massive human and technical infrastructure, and months of time to create. Couple what CG can do with careful application of what practical work you can afford to do, and you can create live-action works today that make the best of yesteryear look amateurish. Just look at the Star Wars and Star Trek fan film scene to see proof of that in action.

Come at what you do in good faith, be earnest about it, and that will do you credit even if you don't hit your mark. You'll get to try again sooner, with more people behind you, so long as you maintain that attitude. The worst that can happen is that you end up the subject of a review like Razorfist's review of Robot Jox, and that ain't so bad at all.