The name “Frank Miller” conjures specific stories in the mind of superhero fans. Daredevil: The Man Without Fear, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, and so many other iconic comic books sprang forth from the mind of the prolific creator. One of his credits that is not only real but feels like the answer to a trivia question is that Miller is one of the credited screenwriters on a surprising movie sequel, 1990’s RoboCop 2. Miller not only wrote the script but also appears in an uncredited cameo in the film, and even returned to write Robocop 3 down the line. They were his only film work for over a decade.
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Speaking with ComicBook about his new memoir, Push the Wall: My Life, Writing, Drawing, and the Art of Storytelling, we had the chance to speak with him about working on RoboCop 2 and how his work on the film influenced his comic work. Miller spends time in his book talking about how often he had to rewrite RoboCop 2 while working on the movie, noting that the process can either be your friend or a self-inflicted wound.
“It’s like I’ve been at sea after a while,” Miller said. “Paul Chadwick once wrote beautifully that a motion picture is a fragile creature and that many things can go astray or can get confused, and that it’s a tricky, tricky business. It’s got an astonishing number of moving parts, and it takes directors and producers and everybody else; they have to have iron discipline to hold the whole thing together and to make it really cohesive and coherent. So it’s definitely a wild journey to work on one.”
To that end, though, Miller confirmed that working on RoboCop 2 was actually an incredible influence on his comic book work. As diehard fans may know, Miller’s script for RoboCop 2was considered “unfilmable” by the studio, resulting in rewrites by another writer (and Miller himself turning his ideas into RoboCop comics a decade later). More importantly, though, his ideas being shot down for the sci-fi sequel gave him the boost he needed to work on something he owned himself.
“(RoboCop 2) made me more determined to pursue in my comics exactly what I most wanted to do. And it actually, it made me set out to do a comic book that I didn’t think could ever be translated to film….That’s where Sin City came from.”
Miller’s book, Push the Wall: My Life, Writing, Drawing, and the Art of Storytelling, is now available.
