I’ve wondered what the reception to Starship Troopers would have been if it was released 10 years later in 2007, as the US was bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Instead it was released during the era of dumb action movies and was treated as such.
There’s a book by John Steakley called Armor that reminds me a lot of Starship Troopers and really captures the feel of an embattled military operation.
I’m wondering if I read this. There are two points that I remember. First they were going through whatever device to another world and he gets a bad feeling and against protocol he readies his weapon before he goes through. And thus is one of the only survivors. The second part I remember is him or another person got snuck up on by one of the insects, and someone was bugging them imitating how a huge insect would sneak up on someone. Is that the book?
Yeah. Basically there’s this on going war, the Ant War, with any like alien creatures. There’s high casualty cost like in Starship Troopers and the main character is infantry. Most infantry only survive a couple drops but he’s done like 60 or something.
I’m not asking what the book is about. The question is more along the lines of: do you remember the points I outlined happening in Armor? Because I’m trying to remember if that’s the book.
To reach out to the modern people, I really think that we need to move away from books. Attention spans are getting a shorter, and who the fuck has the time to read a book? I think we need media to update themselves for the times if they want to message to reach the largest audience possible
I read lots of books and, honestly, I often find them more compelling than most visual media. When I read a book I see the world and the characters in my imagination. When I remember books I read I remember the visuals from my imagination, not the body of that text.
I do like being able to share the experience through movies and shows with other people though.
I suppose being one of those old millennials I’m not really representative of that younger changing culture anymore.
Paul Verhoeven is such a mixed bag. You get inspired trash like Robocop and Starship Troopers together with actual trash like Showgirls and Hollow Man.
But I don’t agree that the timing would have made much of a difference. If anybody took more notice of the movie, it’d be the chuds who mistake the lampooning of fascism as glorification. I’ve been quoted Rasczak’s class lecture about force and democracy unironically more than once.
A friend of mine screens tender matches by asking potential dates about Starship Troopers or Fight Club. It’s hilarious bc the chuds think she’s chill af right up till she unmatches.
He made a movie about fascism when no one was taking about fascism or eternal wars or anything like that. This was the blissful period between the end of the cold war and the start of the war on terrorism. It was the time of kick back, turn your brain off, and watch Arnold blow shit up. Watch aliens blow up the Whitehouse. Starship Troopers completely mismatched the time.
I was way too young and credulous to understand what starship troopers was doing. Other than feeling a little bad for the alien worm at the end i just watched it like an action movie.
Now that I’m a more experienced adult, it is overt in its commentary to the point it’s hard to believe i missed or the first time.
I use this lesson for myself when i find it hard to believe other people cannot see the propaganda that we are immersed in daily, or get a different message from a piece of media.
After all, I missed it too. I watched the same movie at two points in my life and saw two very different things. I think about that alot
I use this lesson for myself when i find it hard to believe other people cannot see the propaganda that we are immersed in daily, or get a different message from a piece of media.
This is a very good take away from that experience. One of the worst things to assume is that you are any different.
No Batman paved the way for superhero movies! No Avengers paved the way for superhero movies! No Christopher Reeve as Superman paved the way for superhero movies!
They’re both products of their times. The squid made sense in a time where comic books weren’t as grounded as they are today.
Also a squid makes more sense when you actually foreshadow a squid. The movie would have had to shoehorn that in through the plot and that would have been a mess.
It was cleaner. Different medium, different capabilities.
I don’t see how foreshadowing improves anything. Ozy explaining his bizarre and horrible plan and then revealing it’s already happened is a wonderful moment. Knowing it’s going to happen before it does would ruin it.
I’ve read it many times but I’m sure I missed 90% of the meaning. Just seemed like people want it to be telegraphed when I assumed the novel ending was intentionally shocking and weird.
The whole Dr Manhattan plan could’ve blown up at his face though if he took it personally and killed everyone.
I do kind of like the squid ending because it’s supposed to be something completely unexpected and unbelievable that governments would actually believe it’s an alien. They could’ve foreshadowed it a bit better but I like the weirdness of it.
I like the TV show fleshing out the squid thing more. I think the movie ending was fine for the time though.
I remember recommending the movie to people and being told “you should have warned me there was blue penis” by one person. And then he went on to say “blue penis” at random times when he saw me. I don’t know how he would have reacted if there was a giant alien psychic squid attack
I saw that movie and recommended it, with a caveat. I said, “It’s a great movie, but there’s a lot of big blue schlong. If that’s a problem for you, you won’t enjoy it. If it isn’t, it’s a great show.”
Yeah, while the movie had its flaws, notably pacing, my wife and sister lost it at “big blue penis,” and I was like, “what? THAT was what you focused on?”
I still felt the movie was pretty true to the message and had some memorable scenes and lines.
“None of you seem to understand. I’m not locked in here with you. You’re locked in here with me!”
The ending works a lot better, agreed. But most of the beginning and middle bits change the tone/framing/emphasis/etc to give the exact opposite meaning to what was originally intended. Biggest example I can think of is the opening battle between the Comedian and Ozymandias the mysterious assassin; in the graphic novel that fight is framed as a dying, bitter alcoholic well past his prime getting absolutely bodied in an unceremonious and fitting end to a despicable man. In the film, sure he loses in the end but it’s a much closer fight and he goes out in a blaze of glory, defiant to the end, quite literally a hero’s last stand. Snyder also does his best to make Rorschach look as cool as possible (while still being grungy and uncouth) instead of how he is in the graphic novel: psychotic, extremely antisocial, and borderline fascist. Again, the change to the ending was a good choice, but there were many other choices made that I personally completely disagree with
You can just tell in every movie the directors wanted to make something great but studios held them back at every turn. Want to do something daring? Nope, put them on a leash and make it boring
I keep telling people to watch the HBO show from 2019. It has some obvious flaws but Regina King is always fire and IMO episode 6 is still some of the best TV I’ve seen.
It also came out the year before the BLM protests of 2020 and damn was the subject matter relevant. Almost prescient.
It’s a good show but it feels like it has barely anything to do with Watchmen. The main villain was so weak compared to what the comic was going for, and the main character is a raging asshole while the show acts like we’re supposed to be sympathetic to her.
That’s what they were going for, but missed completely. In the series it feels like she gets rewarded for being that way, the ending especially sucked.
Watchman is a franchise with an intense blessing when so many seem cursed. The movie was made by someone who didn’t understand the comic at all and it turned out fantastically, despite that. Easily the best Snyder product, and I do generally like his goofy ass.
Then, over a decade later, it has a weird HBO TV show, made by the creator/writer of Lost, someone who did at least understand very well the comics. But someone with a controversial track record, and making a show entirely out of original material. And it SLAPS. I tend to market it as “what if lost was rated R, 1 season long, and perfect”. Still got my fingers crossed for another season, but it doesn’t need it at all.
The Leftovers was also great. Lost had an eh ending, but I wish I could watch Watchmen, The Leftovers, and Lost all over again for the first time. I’m definitely a Lindelof fan.
My wife and I had never heard of the Tulsa Race Massacre at the time. We were debating whether it was in poor taste to write such a disturbing/racist/violent event in fiction. Then we actually looked it up and realized how we had been failed by our grade school educations. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_race_massacre
Great show, but as a Tulsan the show was hard to watch because it’s a nice city now, but still with some racial tensions. The Tulsa Race Riots were depicted pretty fairly; it was an absolutely heinous event in American history that gets little attention even here.
It was honestly mind blowing to learn that most white Americans legit didn’t know what the US was like in the 1900s.
That realization played a large part in me investigating how white Americans basically lied themselves into believing the US gov/white Americans made amends for their crimes towards blacks during the period called Reconstruction - in reality, most gains black Americans made after the civil war (e.g. the surge in black politicians, the ability to get educated/start schools, etc.) were immediately taken away by means of terrorism, disenfranchisement, and bs legislation.
The movie/doc Exterminate All The Brutes does a great job detailing the stories Americans used to tell about themselves and how they had to deal with savage natives/tribes and whatnot. It’s hard to watch but it really shows how we’ve all been victims of very effective propaganda. I mean, we literally recite a pledge of allegiance as children. The bs goes deep.
the performances in that film are fantastic.. actors don't get enough credit for the work they do in silly films like this one, because Kinnear is great, Stiller is great, Geoffrey Rush is hilarious, Garofalo is awesome, Macy is obviously great, they're all awesome..
Fun trivia that Smash Mouth’s All Star was originally on the soundtrack for this movie and the music video features clips from Mystery Men, two years before Shrek.
There’s an incredible irony here too. Watchmen the comic was released after years of superhero comics had played out the tropes to exhaustion. Watchmen was a critique of that comics industry. So to say that it belongs in a post-Endgame world is to acknowledge that the movie adaptation is now working as pre-satire of what superhero movies would become.
But this is why things like The Boys and Invincible are doing so well right. They parody the super hero movie tropes, as well as modern day life and media. The Watchmen movie as it exists was just fine for what it was, but instead of dark parody, like its source material, it went full-on blockbuster superhero. If it was released today and done well, I think it would be a hit
The point you made about the boys and invincible is the point the article is making. If it had realesed around now itd be crazy successful as a tear down of the super hero capeshit, assuming they did it the same justice now as they did then.
But the watchmen movie didn't really act as a takedown. Aesthetically it is completely still convinced superheroes are cool, there isn't a whiff of subversion about the Zack Snyder version. Zack Snyder read Watchmen the same way he read Batman Returns. "Wow! Dark comic is cool! What is subtext???"
Id say the subtext is still there, but ill admit i wish it was there intentionally as a choice of the dircetor and not just seeping through the source material in a watered down way.
Everything I needed to know about Zach Snyder I learned from Sucker Punch. The lack of insight combined with the gall to behave like it was somehow progressive was amazing.
It just goes to show how far ahead of the cultural curve comic book authors/artists can be.
I’m waiting for Alan Moore’s Promethea to gain traction, but that’ll mean the majority of people are ready go to movies that speculate on how to go about becoming enlightened…so I’m not holding my breath.
I liked Promethea, astounding to encounter another fan in the wild! (I liked it enough to try to read Jerusalem, which convinced me that maybe I’m not generally an Alan Moore fan, haha.)
It could probably work well as a limited series, like on Netflix, but I think they’d water down the messaging too much to really do it justice. But it could also be an opportunity to correct flaws as well. I didn’t always love how the (almost?) all male creative team wrote women, as one prime example I remember.
Yes, Alan Moore isn’t the perfect writer his die hard fans make him out to be, but I’d argue he’s one of the more talented writers in the comics world.
I just feel like main stream media is always 10 to 20 years behind what is really pushing the envelope of the cultural zeitgeist… as much as it makes me cringe to put it that way, I’m tired and can’t express it more eloquently atm.
In short I don’t think it’s that these writers are ahead of their time, but rather main stream media can only ever be behind the times, especially since Hollywood can’t take risks on unproven IP by capitalistic design.
Anyways, nice to find another Promethea appreciator. ✌🏽
Another Promethea enjoyer checking in. I loved it. Never had time to read Jerusalem though. It’s sitting on the shelf next to The Art of Computer Programming. I guess I bought both out of respect for a legend more than to read.
It’s been fifteen years since I read Promethea. Probably should give it another look.
When I first read Promethea through for the first time and set it down, I felt like I had just read some sacred text and been visited by a Goddess. And I guess that’s the point of the comic, is that each person’s imagination is sacred.
Like you, it’s been a while since I’ve had time to give it another read, but I do recall it having a profound effect on me.
The only series of comics I can relate it as akin to is The Sandman series, and even then…Promethea is kind of better imho.
A lot of earlier geek fandom movies were released ahead of its time. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World came out in 2010 and didn’t find its audience, if it had released 5 years later it would’ve been a smash hit.
I’d put Spawn in this category as well. While not without its issues I think it captures the spirit of the comic fairly well and is still worth a watch even 20-some years later. I still have no idea how Michael Jai White didn’t become a bigger action star…
The Spawn movie was huge when it was fresh. The demand for McFarlane toys and the industry it spawned speaks for itself. I’d say that without it coming out at the time, comic book movies might not have been made in the 2000’s
I think it released at the perfect time as this was the era of 90s action heroes. The problem was they leaned so heavily on bad CGI that it aged super fast.
Dredd’s problem was it was marketed as “Dredd 3D” in 2012. Three years after Avatar when every movie had a 3d version and only trash movies like Piranha 3DD were still advertising it in their titles.
From a UK perspective, I think Dredd’s biggest problem was lack of marketing. The first trailer only came out a few weeks before the film’s release. Also, it was unfairly labelled as a rip-off of The Raid.
TBH I only knew it was on because I walked past a cinema with a poster up. I hadn’t heard anything or seen any ads, so went in completely blind on a whim … the marketing must have been non-existant
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