Overview
Ro-Busters depicts a world where artificially intelligent robots are so ubiquitous they are treated with contempt by humans and there is a class hierarchy among the robots themselves. Ro-Busters is a commercial rescue organisation run by Howard Quartz, known as "Mr. 10 Per Cent" because 90% of him is robotic (a 'person' must have at least 10% organic matter to qualify as human). Quartz uses robots to carry out his perilous rescue missions because no-one cares if they live or die. Any insubordination in the ranks is dealt with by his enforcer, the psychotic and stupid "kill-dozer" Mek-Quake. Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein, the two main characters, are hugely courageous but after each successful mission they are usually greeted with indifference by the authorities.
When the owner of Ro-Busters decides to destroy the robots in an 'accident' as a tax evasion measure, Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein lead an escape plot. Once free they learn that a robot underground exists and that a safe haven for free robots has been established on the Saturn's moon Titan. The Ro-Busters by this stage are being pursued by a ruthless police unit charged with suppressing robot liberation. A transport is arranged to take the robots to Titan but at the last moment the police close in so Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein with a few volunteers lead a seeming suicide mission to fight off the authorities and buy time for their comrades to escape. The mission is a success and Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein are seen dancing into the sunset.
The series has a high degree of satiric comment on contemporary Britain as Pat Mills had shown on other series. The brutal police squad sent to capture the robots is a parody of the Special Patrol Group. Some claim the willful destruction of a productive and loyal workforce reflects the effects of Thatcherism - though the storyline was already well underway before the first Thatcher government had been elected. Ro-Jaws and Hammerstein's names are a word play on the musical writing pairing of Rodgers and Hammerstein and the story also features a number of song and dance routines.
Ro-Busters would turn up in Savage Book Five, set in an alternate 2009; a human Howard Quartz and his Ro-Busters company designed the first ABC Warriors to liberate Volgan-occupied Britain. Quartz was revealed to be the brother of the US Vice-President Dick Quartz and a leading arms manufacturer; when the US was neutral towards the Volgans, Quartz sold weapons to them via his British subsidiaries.
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