I really liked Starship Troopers as a kid. Pretty sure I said it was my favorite movie for a time. Last year or so, I had the chance to watch it again with some friends, and I was excited because now I could watch it with my Adult Knowledge that it's actually a satire of fascism. I was honestly bored out of my mind, and I wanted to turn it off halfway through.

Because it's not really a typical satire, right? It's an example of a movie that a fascist society would make. This kind of necessarily means that the movie needs to be trite and shallow. Neither the characters nor plot is compelling. Because of this, the action sequences fall flat to me, too.

I watched robocop the day before, and I actually liked it way more than when I was younger. I can also enjoy other satire of fascism like Warhammer 40k which I think is ridiculous enough to be fun.

I don't know, it sucks for the people who genuinely uphold it as a fascist piece of art because... Damn, it's really childish and boring when taken at face value.

Anyone with me on this? I honestly found it disappointing.

  • rootsbreadandmakka [he/him]
    ·
    10 months ago

    yeah I know I'm in the minority on this site for disliking Starship Troopers so I don't usually bring it up but I guess I'll vent about it here: If I hadn't had chapos going on and on constantly about Starship Troopers being a satire for fascism then the satire would have gone completely over my head. I would have just thought it was a dumb pro-imperialist action movie like so many before it and turned it off halfway through. And there really were a couple times I was watching it that I thought how the fuck is this satire, this is just the rhetoric I'm exposed to on a daily basis. To me that's bad satire. If someone who agrees with your satire doesn't understand your movie as satire, it seems like surely the satire has failed? Or maybe I'm just a dumbass idk.

    But also yeah, sorta boring movie otherwise. But I'm probably biased because I don't like those sorts of movies anyway. I only watched it because everyone kept saying it was some great satire of fascism so I watched it mostly for the politics, which was disappointing.

    • SerLava [he/him]
      ·
      10 months ago

      And there really were a couple times I was watching it that I thought how the fuck is this satire, this is just the rhetoric I'm exposed to on a daily basis. To me that's bad satire.

      This was untrue until about 4 years after the movie released