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YMMV / R.O.T.O.R.

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  • Anvilicious: The dialogue never lets the audience forget that R.O.T.O.R. is a film with deep moral themes.
    Roboticist: Well, who are we who create such a thing? Heroes and villains?
    Coldyron: Were we playing God, breathing life into our artificial Adam?
  • Big-Lipped Alligator Moment:
    • The bodybuilder redneck who takes off his shirt and suspenders to fight R.O.T.O.R., announcing he's a real man. What?
    • Dialogue version: the meeting held to provide a chance to exposit on what R.O.T.O.R. actually is. The scene itself: fine. Show, don't tell, but fine. But why, WHY the barrage of Beach Boys references?! Comes out of nowhere, nothing comes of it, and leaves behind naught but bafflement for the audience.
    • Coldyron thwarting a gas station robbery. It just comes out of nowhere and the dialogue is very odd and the scene itself isn't set up to help the audience realize he somehow recognized the signs of a hold up. And it doesn't factor into anything at all. The Kick Chick saves herself without his help and it's not like we didn't already know he was a cop as it was established early on, so at best, this scene was Padding and at worst was superfluous.
  • Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Fan Nickname: The crew at RedLetterMedia christen Coldyron "Back Problems" in reference to his irritability, clenched jaw, and wincing expression, Steele as "Skunk Lady" thanks to her streaked hair, and Willard as "Robot Cop" because it's a ... robot cop.
  • Fight Scene Failure: Just about every fight scene in the film is incredibly amateurish, but R.O.T.O.R.'s fight with Steele in the climax stands out as the worst, particularly in a shot where they fight in the background as Coldyron helps Sonya to his car, in which the two's punches and kicks very obviously miss each other more often than not.
  • Fridge Logic:
    • Why would everyone be attacking R.O.T.O.R.? From their perspective, they see a cop tracking down a perp, not a killer robot. Heck, the rednecks in the restaurant call R.O.T.O.R. a "faggot city cop" - do they have a grudge against law enforcement in Dallas?
    • Apparently, the fact that the lab already has a fully self-aware robot just hanging around the office doesn't warrant any kind of interest.
    • For a project that is (at the absolute most) going to take twenty more years to get all the bugs fixed, it sure is weird that it has everything in place for R.O.T.O.R. to just get dressed, get armed, get on his bike and roll out.
  • Narm: R.O.T.O.R. walks through a bunch of cheap metal fold-up chairs to show he's unstoppable, but not only is this not even a particularly impressive idea to begin with, the actor is clearly having difficulty doing it.
  • Narm Charm: Everything about Willard, who seems like he belongs in another movie.
  • Padding: And padding, and padding, and padding, and padding...
    Rich Evans: Establishing Shot: The Movie!
    • Coldyron's girlfriend has nothing to do with the plot and their romance takes up a good chunk of the runtime.
    • There's a lengthy sequence depicting Coldyron helping Steele check into her hotel room... just so that Steele can change her outfit and then immediately leave the hotel. Even counting the Fauxlosophic Narration that Coldyron delivers, they're in the room for about half the time it took them to check in, and they never return to it.
  • Retroactive Recognition: Bill Blair, who plays Statum. You may not recognize him, because he holds the Guinness World Record for the most Rubber-Forehead Aliens (202). His first science fiction makeup role was in Alien Nation and he never stopped. For starters, not only has he played in various Star Trek franchises as Cardassians, Jem'Hadar, Klingons, Borg and Vulcans (yes, all plural), but he has appeared in nearly every Babylon 5 episode as well as both movies. His credit on the show? "Alien Actor".
  • So Bad, It's Good: For all the ways the movie fails, it has the decency to fail spectacularly!
  • Special Effects Failure:
    • The "dancing" R.O.T.O.R. skeleton used in the demonstration is a poorly animated stop motion model. You can also clearly see the screws holding the thing together in one shot, exposing how small the prop really is. It's also unintentionally funny because as Coldyron is narrating that "it doesn't need motors, gears, or tubes," the friggin' camera pans down over the robot to show you its many tubes!
    • R.O.T.O.R tries to show how powerful and unstoppable he is by effortlessly shoving his way through a bunch of chairs. Unfortunately, this is harder than it looks on paper and he can be seen visibly struggling to push his way through.
    • R.O.T.O.R recoils at the loud horn of a truck before the sound effect of the horn starts playing.
    • When R.O.T.O.R. throws Steele into the lake during the climactic fight sequence, the water causes some of the hair dye used to create her white streak to wash out, mostly leaving the actress with her normal hair color. A few shots later, the Skunk Stripe is suddenly back to full strength.
  • Uncertain Audience: The movie really wants to have a Cyberpunk-like atmosphere, adding in constant monologues about human nature and the ups and downs of technology. However, there are so many goofy moments that the overall tone becomes muddled. If the Word of God is to be believed, Executive Meddling instructed they turn a parody into a serious film, hence tone issues.
  • Unintentional Period Piece: Huge car phones, mullets, and a hysterical pessimism about street crime? It must be The '80s.
  • The Woobie: Sonya is an innocent woman who's fiance is murdered right in front of her, and has to spend the rest of the movie driving for hours to escape R.O.T.O.R.
  • Woolseyism: The European Spanish dub changes the line "Justice delivered, C.O.D." to "Justice delivered immediately", which definitely removes the puzzlement of what the acronym is supposed to mean.

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