Whether it be utopia or dystopia (or both), sci-fi films almost always have something to say.
However, while our views on society might differ over the years, certain elements always remain.
Good or evil, a cyborg is a clean slate as much as any human character.
So what do they stand for?
Verhoevens vision of the future is a world where the Nukem!
Again, very few eyebrows were raised at that.
These moments present a social comment on the 1980s period which they were scripted in.
When asked his name soon after, RoboCop replies Murphy, his previous human surname.
RoboCop and Omni Consumer Products have both found a sliver of humanity out of all the violence.
While theTerminatorseries might be an allegory for dependence on technology, the character of Marcus delivers a broader message.
Again, Spooner is revealed as having cyborg-like bionic enhancements quite far into the movie.
Another instrumental movie in my understanding of cyborg cinema isStar Trek: First Contactfrom 1996.
The Borg travel the universe aiming to conquer it by assimilating people into their collective consciousness.
Like the inverse ofRoboCop, Data must be strong to not give in and let new-found emotions control him.
By grafting human skin onto him, the Borg Queen had hoped to encourage him to betray Picard.
This episode, like many, hinges around the removal of human creativity, imagination and emotion.
When a different batch of Cybermen appear inClosing Time, human emotion takes centre stage again.
These stories force the best out of the human characters that must resist evil and stop the assimilation threat.
