You can definitely say that Helldivers 2 has a good week. spanking GTA VSteam concurrent player recordsthe extraction shooter exceeds all expectations, including his own, and it seems that this success is spreading. Because if there is a source for it Hell diver owes it the most Starship Troopers, and it seems the 1997 film is having its own renaissance. That’s why you should check it out too.
As Johan Pilestedt, CEO of developer Arrowhead Studios, pointed out (Thanks IGN), Starship TroopersAccordingly, its popularity has risen to 45th place among the most popular online films the ranking of TV statistics. While the graphic on the site shows that number rising from number 109 on February 15 to the new number the next day, it’s incredibly unlikely that the 27-year-old film had even ranked this high before Helldivers 2‘s first release the week before.
Helldivers 2Like its original top-down predecessor, it begins on Super Earth, where democracy has been upgraded to a managed form, making elections more predictable. You see, people used to be able to just vote for whoever they wanted, but on super-Earth, democracy is rampant through bombs and war. You fight against Terminids, an alien race of insectoid creatures who are just plain evil and spreading their tyranny across the galaxy, and indeed against the evil socialist cyborgs and inscrutable Illuminati. The Helldivers are, as this catch-up video clearly states, “the galaxy’s last line of attack.”
What if you’ve seen it Starship Troopers, you will find something familiar. While there are no robots or cloaked Squ’ith, there were definitely bugs and a largely similar attitude towards spreading humanity’s unique approach to freedom across the galaxy. Of course that’s why Hell diver was heavily influenced by Paul Verhoeven’s science fiction epic. However, when it was released, not many others seemed to understand what it was about.
The book of the film
The confusion was at least justified. Starship Troopers is based (very loosely) on Robert A. Heinlein’s novel of the same name, and the politics of that book are…ambiguous. Heinlein himself transformed from liberal to libertarian over the course of his life; he was both a pioneer of racial equality and a big fan of Ayn Rand. The 1959 book seems to reflect some of him more conservative Biases that glorify the military and seem to confirm their conceit that the right to vote is only gained through military service. At the time of its release, many critics labeled it “fascist,” although it is fair to say that its precise political views were deliberately obscured.
Verhoeven certainly didn’t have time for that. Accordingly RichThe director was quoted as saying, “I stopped after two chapters because it was so boring.” He adds, “It’s a very right-wing book,” and asked the film’s author, Ed Neumeier (RoboCop) to summarize the story so he doesn’t have to read through it. But apparently this was enough to pique the director’s interest.
Neumeier had previously tried to have a script developed with the astonishing title: Insect hunting at outpost 7. RoboCop Producer Jon Davison noticed how similar his idea was to Heinlein’s book and eventually discovered that the film rights were available. The development took years, but the RoboCop The team of writer, producer and director finally reunited in 1996 with a plan to make a film that explored the inherent fascism in the source material.
An immodest suggestion
The result is extraordinary. Satire is almost always most successful when it is deeply subtle. People were angry about it A modest suggestion because the deadpan delivery meant they really believed Swift wanted the Irish to eat her babies. Starship Troopers did something completely different: it was brazenly loud, stupid, and bombastic in its satirical commentary on the military and the United States’ approach to spreading democracy.
It was a story about a monstrous future in which citizenship and voting rights could only be acquired through federal service, and in which humans carried out brutal attacks on the planets by insectoid creatures derisively called “bugs.” It was irony written with a sledgehammer swung at the screen again and again. And it was spectacular. Hilarious, snappy and wonderfully delicious, it had the eccentricity of RoboCop and turned it up to 11. And yet even then, no one got it.
The negative reaction from Heinlein fans was understandable. For those who enjoyed it as a fascist work, it was a film that directly contradicted that message. Boo-hoo. To those who refuted this interpretation, it was a film that deviated so much from its source material that it amounted to insult. But the broader critical response remains extremely confusing. No matter how obvious it was and how obvious every aspect of its mockery was exaggerated, reviewers still thought it was a pro-fascist parody. It’s deeply embarrassing.
Paul Verhoeven told AV Club in 2007 like The Washington Post wrote an editorial calling it “fascist, and the script and direction were neo-Nazi.” Same paper Stephen Hunter wrote that it was “Nazi through and through,” adding, “It’s spiritually Nazi, psychologically Nazi.” It comes straight from the Nazi imagination and takes place in the Nazi universe.” The cruel irony – indeed, the pathetic, monstrous one Stupidity – was that Verhoeven, born in 1938, grew up in Nazi-occupied Holland. He experienced the horrors of the Nazis firsthand and decided to go for it Starship Troopers partly because he wanted to criticize such fascist ideology based on personal experience.
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It’s a film that really holds up. Hell, it’s a film that has never lost its relevance since its release, and considering what 2024 looks like, it could soon become way too relevant. The depiction of both the military complex and the media response is perfect, and the incredible training camp scene will still shock anyone who sees it for the first time.
The special effects also remain fantastic. In addition to practical effects, the bugs are also complex CGI elements and don’t seem particularly outdated. Do you also remember Denise Richards? She’s great at it!
I highly recommend getting the film. It’s on Disney+which is quite something special and is also available on Prime etc. It’s an absolute classic – a powerful, over-the-top action film combined with anti-fascist satire, and you can call yourself smarter than one WaPo Journalist, if you don’t mind.
