The 10 Things We Learn About the Future in ‘Real Steel’

Get ready to have your sons/nephews/classmates/local neighborhood kids going gonzo for Real Steel, the latest lame cinematic statement from that motion picture antichrist, Shawn Levy. As the man responsible for the reprehensible Night at the Museum films, as well as the equally awful Pink Panther remake, his mangled Midas touch remains intact. Though horribly uneven and spotty in both an action and/or adventure sense, this otherwise cracked crowdpleaser will have those prone to snips and snails and puppy dog tails running to their local Wal-Mart to lap up the latest battling robot action figures. And when the video game comes out – especially for the motion control possibilities of the Wii and Kinect – a whole new generation of console coach potatoes will be born.

But perhaps the most appalling thing about this supposed slice of future shock is its lack of forward thinking. This is a world where several products that we know today – Dr. Pepper, ESPN, Nokia – still exist, where the advances we wanted for 2001 are still nowhere to be seen 26 years later (the movie is set in 2027, it seems). The planet is not more multicultural, white people appear to still be the majority, and robots have reached the point where they can mimic human fisticuffs – but yet they aren’t used as a labor or time saving force. Indeed, it’s as if the script, supposedly partially based on Richard Matheson’s short story, forgot that it was set sometime in the not too distant future and simply fudged a few tech geek tweaks.

So along with learning what it feels like to waste $10.50 at the local Cineplex, here are the top 10 things we learn about 2027 in Real Steel. Most of them are obvious. A few are fascinating. All become part of this movie’s lunatic lameness, beginning with the backdrop:

 
#10 – Apparently, this is a World Post-Contagion

Whenever our former pro pugilist, Charlie Kenton, goes cruising across America on his various get rich via robot boxing schemes, he has the roads all to himself. Long stretches of highway and byway pass without a single vehicle along the horizon. Even when he enters a big city like Atlanta, he has the streets to himself. About the only place we find people? The massive sports arenas where the bouts take place…or the abandoned zoo where such underground matches also occur.

 
#9 – Cellphones Look Even More Fragile…and Goofy

Whenever a character pulls out his or her trusty communication device to call up a roadmap, web search, and in dire situations, a phone call, their device looks like a sheet of glass with random metal pieces adorning its front. Imagine a tablet made out of doll house window and festooned with proto-Apple accessorizing, and you get the idea. Can’t imagine that they withstand the impact of a drop from several feet…or a stiff breeze.

 
#8 – Justin Bieber is Still a Cultural God

When Charlie finally allows his abandoned son to fight his scarp heap robot in a major contest, he makes it very clear that the boy needs to work on a outer ring routine to get paying customers jazzed up about his junk pile. Watching him shuffle around one day, he suggests a bit of dancing. So naturally, when the lad gets a chance to strut his pre-pubescent stuff, he looks like a double for a certain 2011 tween icon. It’s hard to say what’s more nauseating – the kid copping moves from the Biebe…or the robot mimicking every move precisely.

 
#7 – MMA is Dead!

For years now, Ultimate Fighting has argued that it is more popular than regular boxing…and it has a point. After all, no one knows who the latest heavyweight champion is, but everyone knows Kimbo Slice, right? Apparently, by turning the former king of sports into a vague video game using oversized controllers and 10 foot tall toys, the homoerotic element of mixed martial arts is nullified, resulting in a new fascination which has little to do with sweaty, muscled men rendering each other horizontal until one gives up in submission.

6 – 1

 
#6 – All Technological Sophistication Aside, Robot Boxing Makes No Sense

Like regular boxing, a robot can win on points, via a technical knock-out, or a true KO. The only way they appear capable of the latter is to cause their opponent to suffer a kind of major computer or power source malfunction. They can beat each other senseless, and yet survive, just to have their potential victory vanquished via a software bug or hard drive crash. And then there is the various baffling bells and whistles they can employ. In the end, cricket makes more sense.

 
#5 – You Can Buy and Sell Children Like Chattel

It’s good to know that, several decades from now, there will still be deadbeat dads. It’s also refreshing to see well to do adoptive parents bartering for a boy child like rug merchants in Marrakesh. Charlie needs money, and Max’s aunt apparently needs a kid to hug – that is, until he turns unctuous and rebellious. The price for the privilege? $100,000 – an in future money, that must be like 75 smackers. And no one seems phased by this concept. No one.

 
#4 – Hamburgers and Other Greasy Fast Foods Still Exist

Charlie’s son Max has a lot of flaws – he’s uber-precocious, doesn’t respond to half-assed parenting all that well, and when given the chance, will grab the microphone in the middle of a major robot boxing match and challenge the reigning champion and its rich Eurotrash owner with juvenile taunts. But his biggest personal defect? The boy DOES NOT LIKE CHEESEBURGERS! Again, a grade school aged male says, point blank, that he doesn’t like CHEESEBURGERS! Is there no god in the future as well???

 
#3 – The Combustion Engine is Alive and Well…

Again, Charlie travels a lot in this movie. Apparently, he can’t get fights near the gym where his harried gal pal lives, and doesn’t believe in short jaunts to neighboring areas. Instead, he must make his way across vast swaths of America in what appears to be a converted food truck…and there’s no question that gas and other petroleum byproducts are still important. While we do see a set of solar panels, we eventually learn they are used to keep Max’s robot Atom charged up and ready. Good news for all of you who enjoy global warming and turmoil in the Middle East.

 
#2 – As Are State Fairs and the Rodeo…

When we first meet our fallen idol, he’s not sitting in some gym bandaging his wounds or working on his comeback. No, he’s using his latest black market acquisition to entertain a local country expo – and this time, his ‘bot will be battling against a…bull? Yep, in keeping with the son of the soil simplicity of all things carnival, Charlie books his fighter against an actual animal – not a robotic steer or a hologram of same. An actual cow. Apparently, all those ASPCA commercials they show late at night on VH1 and Current have no affect on what happens in the future.

 
#1 – Nobody Has Heard of Rocky

This must make an aging Sylvester Stallone even more unhappy. All throughout the narrative, our hero Atom is primed to be the next metallic Italian Stallone. He’s given the same spunky underdog set-up and walks into the ring against a behemoth monster machine predicted to knock his block off within the first five seconds. Naturally, he goes the distance and ends up…well, that would be spoiling things, wouldn’t it. Anyway, with all the possible pop culture riffs that could be concocted out of the famous Oscar winner, not a one is offered. Instead, Atom becomes a boy’s best friend fashioned out of metal and wiring. It’s The Champ with diodes.

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