Would You Buy This For A Dollar? Samuel L. Jackson Is A TV Mogul In The New 'RoboCop'

The latest addition to the cast of Jose Padilha's remake of RoboCop is Samuel L. Jackson, who will play a character named Pat Novak. Details are thin right now, but the description we've got almost makes him sound like an updated version of Bixby Snyder, the Benny Hill-inspired "I'd buy that for a dollar!" TV personality from the original film.

THR describes Jackson's character as "a charismatic TV mogul and a powerful force in the Robocop world." That's not quite a direct analogue for the madly grinning personality in the original film, but it seems like Strike Entertainment and Padilha are making some sizable changes with this approach. We can't expect to see a replication of Bixby Snyder; that would just be silly. But an altered one? Maybe.

We know that Joel Kinnaman plays this film's version of Alex Murphy, a cop who is killed (or nearly killed) and becomes the biological basis for a cyborg law enforcer. Gary Oldman will play the man who creates RoboCop; his role is also one that is basically new to this remake.

RoboCop has a Toronto shoot planned, but we still don't have a start date or release date. (Edit: Oops, actually, there is an August 9, 2013 release date.) For that matter, we don't know anything about the film's villains, and given the so-memorable nature of the originals from the '87 film, there are some big shoes to fill.

Kinnaman has described this version as "a completely different take on this than [original Robocop director] Paul Verhoeven had," and "a new story within the old one." That 'new story' involves Alex Murphy and Oldman's character, as Kinnaman said, "[Oldman and I] have great scenes that have a lot of the substance that I was talking about," said Kinnaman. "It's very much a relationship between Gary Oldman's character and Alex Murphy."

But Kinnaman also admitted, "We're going to have a lot of throwbacks and there's going to be a lot of fun stuff for the fans of the first movie." That could be where Sam Jackson comes in.

Whether or not Jackson's character will really be a replacement for the guy, here's a great little two-minute video on the Bixby Snyder character that compiles some footage and quotes from Verhoeven.