Starship Troopers general thread

[Aldarion]

Book is very good.
Movie ruined it,turning normal society into fascist parody.
Cartoons - dunno,i watched only few.

I'm not sure even movie comes off as a fascist parody. Considering the context, they are not that unreasonable.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

Something a lot of people don't realize is the bugs in the classroom scene are not Arachnids, they're just a bunch of giant cockroaches on some planet the humans are colonizing.

Additionally the teacher's face is horrifically burned by some sort of acid, the Arachnids aren't the first giant space-bugs the humans have fought.

 

[Captain X]

I guess I took that as suggesting that they'd found and been aware of them for a long time. I also wonder if the "Mormon extremists" mentioned at the start of the movie weren't intentionally sent there to die, as well as to provoke the war.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

I guess I took that as suggesting that they'd found and been aware of them for a long time. I also wonder if the "Mormon extremists" mentioned at the start of the movie weren't intentionally sent there to die, as well as to provoke the war.

Yeah I reckon the acid burns were from some sort of Arachnid caste.
They also mention the popular 'beach' planet to be consumed by bugs. Implying that planet was already bugged from the start, seeing as we never actually see them colonize planets so rapidly.

 

[Crom's Black Blade]

Something a lot of people don't realize is the bugs in the classroom scene are not Arachnids, they're just a bunch of giant cockroaches on some planet the humans are colonizing.

Additionally the teacher's face is horrifically burned by some sort of acid, the Arachnids aren't the first giant space-bugs the humans have fought.

I thought the bugs Rico and the others were dissecting for class were the same roaches which were used to help transport the brain bug around.

 

[Husky_Khan]

I thought the bugs Rico and the others were dissecting for class were the same roaches which were used to help transport the brain bug around.

They're similar but the teacher in Starship Troopers refers to the dissected bugs as the Arkellian Sand Beetle and then brings up the 'Arachnids' as a separate species as an example of Bug superiority. The bugs that drag around the Brain Bug are called 'Chariot Bugs' which in all honestly look remarkably similar to the aforementioned Arkellian Sand Beetles so it's actually possible they are closely related and it just wasn't known until the Klendathu Campaign or whatever.

 

[Crom's Black Blade]

They're similar but the teacher in Starship Troopers refers to the dissected bugs as the Arkellian Sand Beetle and then brings up the 'Arachnids' as a separate species as an example of Bug superiority. The bugs that drag around the Brain Bug are called 'Chariot Bugs' which in all honestly look remarkably similar to the aforementioned Arkellian Sand Beetles so it's actually possible they are closely related and it just wasn't known until the Klendathu Campaign or whatever.

Considering the divergent morphology of the various Arachnids, I do wonder if the race, willingly or otherwise, assimilates other insect life into its collective like a sort of Bug United Federation of Planets.

 

[Typhonis]

Well, they do have Tankers and Plasma bugs... Then again look at an ant colony with majors and supermajors in it.

 

[Aldarion]

Well, they do have Tankers and Plasma bugs... Then again look at an ant colony with majors and supermajors in it.

Personally, considering the anti-orbital bugs, I wondered if they hadn't been engineered as disposable bioweapons by somebody else. Alternatively, they are intelligent and doing designs themselves.

 

[Typhonis]

Personally, considering the anti-orbital bugs, I wondered if they hadn't been engineered as disposable bioweapons by somebody else. Alternatively, they are intelligent and doing designs themselves.

So....an early form of the Tyranid swarm?

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

I thought the bugs Rico and the others were dissecting for class were the same roaches which were used to help transport the brain bug around.

Nope! Common misconception.
The 'sand beetles' are just big stupid bugs the humans have trivially squashed.
The 'chariot bugs' are different, with a more red coloration and are actual arachnids.

 

[Crom's Black Blade]

Nope! Common misconception.
The 'sand beetles' are just big stupid bugs the humans have trivially squashed.
The 'chariot bugs' are different, with a more red coloration and are actual arachnids.

My mistake through the similarities do make me think the sand beetles either are an offshoot of the Arachnid race that got abandoned and diverged or, like the Tyranids, the Arachnids "absorbed" the beetles to serve a specific caste role in their hive society.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

My mistake through the similarities do make me think the sand beetles either are an offshoot of the Arachnid race that got abandoned and diverged or, like the Tyranids, the Arachnids "absorbed" the beetles to serve a specific caste role in their hive society.

The film never really demonstrates the ability of the bugs to adapt, although their forms are so diverse that they must be able to alter their own evolution to make new strains.
The sand beetles are never stated to be on a planet with arachnids, so it's likely just pure coincidence they look similar.
After all, 'big cockroach' is hardly a unique body-type.

 

[Crom's Black Blade]

The film never really demonstrates the ability of the bugs to adapt, although their forms are so diverse that they must be able to alter their own evolution to make new strains.
The sand beetles are never stated to be on a planet with arachnids, so it's likely just pure coincidence they look similar.
After all, 'big cockroach' is hardly a unique body-type.

As you say, the Bugs have to have some means of engineering new casts. Taking and adapting other strains they encounter seems as good a speculation as any. Further it isn't just that the beetles look similar but how dissimilar said chariot bugs look to most of the other Arachnid castes. Granted all the different castes look pretty divergent but to look so different while having so similar cousins in another species seems to scream a link to me.

Now granted it's completely possible the link is the other way around. Arachnids tried to colonize the Sand beetle's homeworld, most died out for some reason and the beetles alone survived and evolved into the current beetle the Federation discovered.

In any event the fact they were dissecting sand beetles, instead of any terrestrial life, would likely be because the Federation noticed the similarities between them and their arch-rival the Arachnids even they hadn't discovered the chariot bug caste yet due to being ignorant of the Brain Bug.

 

[Aldarion]

So....an early form of the Tyranid swarm?

Yes.

 

[Lord Sovereign]

The Bugs are hostile on a fundamental level. It is their nature to expand the colony and devour biomass to feed themselves.

As these beasties are interstellar, the oh so noble United Federation of Planets would be doing exactly the same as the Terran Federation if Klendathu was in the Alpha Quadrant, and they'd be right to do so.

The only good bug is a dead bug.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

As you say, the Bugs have to have some means of engineering new casts. Taking and adapting other strains they encounter seems as good a speculation as any. Further it isn't just that the beetles look similar but how dissimilar said chariot bugs look to most of the other Arachnid castes. Granted all the different castes look pretty divergent but to look so different while having so similar cousins in another species seems to scream a link to me.

Now granted it's completely possible the link is the other way around. Arachnids tried to colonize the Sand beetle's homeworld, most died out for some reason and the beetles alone survived and evolved into the current beetle the Federation discovered.

In any event the fact they were dissecting sand beetles, instead of any terrestrial life, would likely be because the Federation noticed the similarities between them and their arch-rival the Arachnids even they hadn't discovered the chariot bug caste yet due to being ignorant of the Brain Bug.

Looking at the CGI models of the chariot bugs and the sand beetle prop

They are quite distinct from one another, the differences are larger than I remembered.
Chariot bugs aren't too dissimilar to other arachnids, when you factor in tankers and brain bugs, it's only the warriors and hoppers which look similar.

The sand beetle planet also seems to not been invaded by bugs, as it's never mentioned to be attacked. I can only assume the "Arkellian Sand Beetle" comes from...Arkellia? A place we unfortunately never get to see.

The Bugs are hostile on a fundamental level. It is their nature to expand the colony and devour biomass to feed themselves.

As these beasties are interstellar, the oh so noble United Federation of Planets would be doing exactly the same as the Terran Federation, and they'd be right to do so.

The only good bug is a dead bug.

Memes aside we never actually get proof of the bugs invading a single planet, they seem more than content to just sit on their own planets and do...Bug stuff.
The spores they fire into space must take hundreds of years to reach other planets.

 

[Typhonis]

Here is a question. Where are the worker bugs? Someone had to dig out the tunnels and the warrior bugs don't have the mandibles to do that.

 

[ThatZenoGuy]

Here is a question. Where are the worker bugs? Someone had to dig out the tunnels and the warrior bugs don't have the mandibles to do that.

Tanker bugs allegedly dig tunnels.

 

[Crom's Black Blade]

Looking at the CGI models of the chariot bugs and the sand beetle prop

They are quite distinct from one another, the differences are larger than I remembered.
Chariot bugs aren't too dissimilar to other arachnids, when you factor in tankers and brain bugs, it's only the warriors and hoppers which look similar.

Uh, those don't look that dissimilar to each other. They appear far closer than the Chariot bugs look to any of the other Arachnid castes. The fact that few, if any, Arachnid casts actually look like they belong to the same species or even related species but instead seem to be random anthropoids slotted into a given role further lends credence to the idea rather than distracts from it. Why do they all look so different? Because they all were different species from different worlds until the Arachnids assimilated them.

And I will note you yourself commented on how it was a "common misconception" to assume both bugs were one and the same so the differences can't be that massive.

The sand beetle planet also seems to not been invaded by bugs, as it's never mentioned to be attacked. I can only assume the "Arkellian Sand Beetle" comes from...Arkellia? A place we unfortunately never get to see.

Which means we can't say for certain if it was conquered by the Arachnids, either in the present or distant past, or anything. For what little the movie says Arkellia could be the Bug's homeworld.

Memes aside we never actually get proof of the bugs invading a single planet, they seem more than content to just sit on their own planets and do...Bug stuff.

If we ignore Buenos Aires and the destruction of zegema beach in Starship troopers, Behemecoatyl desire to destroy humanity in Starship Trooper 3, Trig's destroyed home town in Starship Troopers invasion, the apparently common occurrence of Arachnid spores seeding Federation worlds in Starship Troopers Traitors of Mars. The Bugs have always been portrayed as hyperaggressive monsters obsessed with wiping out humanity.

In contrast we see the Federation actively tries to avoid war with the Arachnids establishing a quarantine zone for the Arachnid empire to inhabit and colonize and even the state approved media openly questioning on the eve of war if a "Live and let live" approach was better than invading Klendathu.

The spores they fire into space must take hundreds of years to reach other planets.

Eh chalk it up to scifi writers have no sense of scale or the Bugs are more capable than the Federation at the time suspected. Which makes sense since they didn't even seem to believe the Arachnids were intelligent before the Bug War.