50 Fun Facts About Starship Troopers

Which notorious 1995 flop did Paul Verhoeven direct just before Starship Troopers?

Showgirls: Verhoeven turned up in person to collect his Worst Director Razzie for it.

Which major science-fiction award did the novel Starship Troopers win in 1960?

Hugo Award: it took Best Novel in 1960, to its author's surprise, and marked the end of his long run of novels for young readers.

In Starship Troopers, how is Rico punished after a recruit dies in a live-fire exercise he was leading?

A public flogging: Rico takes ten lashes in front of the camp, and Sergeant Zim hands him a mouthpiece to bite on, saying that it helps.

In Starship Troopers, what must a person complete to earn the right to vote?

Federal service: only those who serve get the vote, yet Rico's wealthy father sneers that it is 'menial training for inferior people'.

In Starship Troopers, which city does an Arachnid asteroid destroy, prompting Rico to re-enlist?

Buenos Aires is Rico's home, so the strike kills his parents just after he has quit boot camp, and he asks to be taken back.

In Starship Troopers, what is the Arachnids' home planet called?

Klendathu: the first invasion of it ends in a rout, because military intelligence had underestimated how well the bugs could defend themselves.

What is Earth's government called in the film Starship Troopers?

The United Citizen Federation was founded by military veterans who took power after democracy collapsed, as a classroom lecture explains in the opening scenes.

In Starship Troopers, which branch does Rico join to stay close to his girlfriend?

The Mobile Infantry 'made me the man I am today', Rico is told by a recruiting sergeant, a badly maimed veteran who is hardly an advertisement for it.

Who plays the pilot Carmen Ibanez in Starship Troopers?

Denise Richards did not have to join the boot camp held for the actors playing troopers, but asked to go anyway and spent a blizzard huddled in a tent.

Who plays the psychic Carl Jenkins in Starship Troopers?

Neil Patrick Harris, until then television's child doctor Doogie Howser, ends the film as a grim colonel in a grey-and-black officer's uniform and jackboots.

Who plays Dizzy Flores, the trooper in love with Rico, in Starship Troopers?

Dina Meyer was steered by her agent towards the part of Carmen but asked to play Dizzy, a character who is a man in the novel.

Who plays Sergeant Zim, the drill instructor, in Starship Troopers?

Clancy Brown's Zim is told that the only way to a combat posting is to bust himself down to private, so he does, and ends the film as Private Zim.

In Starship Troopers, what was Lieutenant Rasczak's job before he led his elite unit?

Rico's high school teacher: the film created its Rasczak by merging two characters from the novel, a classroom lecturer and a heroic lieutenant.

In Starship Troopers, what is Lieutenant Rasczak's elite unit called?

The Roughnecks follow Rasczak until he is killed; Carl then hands command of the unit to Rico, promoting him to lieutenant on the spot.

In Starship Troopers, what kind of giant bug does Rico kill on Tango Urilla to earn promotion to corporal?

A Tanker Bug: Rico kills it from on top of its shell, and Rasczak tells him he is corporal until he is dead or someone better turns up.

In Starship Troopers, what is the intelligent Arachnid that directs the others called?

The Brain Bug is taken alive at the end, after it has sucked out the brain of Carmen's co-pilot Zander to absorb what he knows.

In Starship Troopers, how does the wounded Sugar Watkins buy time for his squadmates to escape?

He sets off a nuke: the rescuers had held the bugs at bay by threatening to detonate it, and the dying Watkins finally does so as the others get out.

Which animated series spoofed Starship Troopers in its 2000 episode "War Is the H-Word"?

Futurama: Fry and Bender join Earth's army only for the soldiers' discount on chewing gum, and are shipped off to war within seconds.

Starship Troopers reunited the producer, writer and effects artist of which earlier Verhoeven film?

RoboCop: its producer had spent years looking for a way to reunite the team, and found it in its writer's idea for a war film about giant insects.

What did Paul Verhoeven make of the novel Starship Troopers when he tried to read it?

Dull and too right-wing: he gave up after a few chapters, had his screenwriter summarise the rest, and then set out to satirise the book.

Whose propaganda films did Verhoeven cite as the look he wanted for his blond, blue-eyed cast?

Leni Riefenstahl: Verhoeven also copied her Triumph of the Will for the recruiting reel that opens the film, and said that at the time nobody noticed.

Which Wyoming landmark stood in for the bug planets in Starship Troopers?

Hell's Half Acre: the crew had to build roads into its remote ravines, which were rife with rattlesnakes, and lower some of the gear in by helicopter.

Which 2024 video game's satirical bug war sparked a revival of interest in Starship Troopers?

Helldivers 2: its troopers spread 'managed democracy' against giant insects, and its director called the renewed interest in the 1997 film 'incredible'.

Starship Troopers was half-funded by Touchstone Pictures, a label owned by which studio?

Disney: TriStar would not carry the $90 million budget alone after Waterworld's losses, so Disney's label paid half in return for the release outside North America.

Basil Poledouris, composer of the Starship Troopers score, also scored which sword-and-sorcery epic?

Conan the Barbarian: for Starship Troopers he spent six months on the music, and Verhoeven had him build the whole score on his theme for a troop ship.

For which Academy Award was Starship Troopers nominated?

Best Visual Effects was its only Oscar nomination, and on the night the bugs lost to the sinking ship of Titanic.

On the Starship Troopers set, what did Paul Verhoeven sometimes wave to show actors where the computer-generated bugs would be?

A broom: Verhoeven also played the bug himself, and one actor recalled him jumping up and down with a bullhorn, shouting that he was a big bug who would kill them.

What did an editorial in The Washington Post accuse Starship Troopers of being?

Pro-fascist, made by Nazis: Verhoeven, who says he meant the film as a satire of fascism, blamed the attack for helping to sink it with American audiences.

The FedNet propaganda clips in Starship Troopers end by asking viewers which question?

"Would you like to know more?": the clips were invented for the film, as its writer's guess at how television and computers would one day merge.

The Starship Troopers cast agreed to film a co-ed shower scene only after Verhoeven and his cinematographer did what?

Undressed as well: about fifteen actors then shot the scene on a set cleared of everyone but the two naked film-makers.

Which Golden Girls actress plays Rico's biology teacher in Starship Troopers?

Rue McClanahan, the show's Blanche, oversees a class dissecting giant alien beetles and tells the students the insect is superior to humans in many ways.

At the end of Starship Troopers, what does the psychic Carl announce the captured bug leader is feeling?

Fear: Carl lays a hand on the creature and declares 'It's afraid', and the assembled troopers erupt in cheers.

In Heinlein's novel, what ancestry does Johnny Rico have?

Filipino: the novel's Juan Rico lives in a future where his ancestry matters to nobody, while the film renamed him John and cast a blond American lead.

Which staple of military sci-fi did the novel Starship Troopers popularise, though the 1997 film left it out?

Powered armour: the film's producer said that making hundreds of suits for the cast and extras was financially impossible, so its troopers go without.

Under what title was the novel Starship Troopers first serialised in a magazine in 1959?

Starship Soldier ran in two parts in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, after the publisher of the author's earlier juvenile novels had turned the book down.

What did Robert Heinlein say prompted him to write Starship Troopers?

The US suspending nuclear tests: Heinlein had already taken out a newspaper advertisement against a test ban, and put aside another novel to write this one as his riposte.

In the novel Starship Troopers, which second alien race switches sides to join the humans?

The Skinnies start the war as allies of the bugs; Verhoeven dropped them from the film, thinking a second alien race would confuse audiences.

In the novel Starship Troopers, Rico's troop transport is named after which Medal of Honor recipient?

Rodger Young was a nearly deaf Ohio private who, already wounded, crawled on towards a Japanese machine-gun position in 1943 so that his platoon could pull back.

In the novel Starship Troopers, which school course of Rico's carries the book's ideas about citizenship?

History and Moral Philosophy is taught by Jean Dubois, a veteran whose letter reaches Rico at boot camp just as he is thinking of resigning, and changes his mind.

Which effects supervisor of the 1997 film directed its 2004 sequel, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation?

Phil Tippett, whose studio had animated the original's bugs, made his directing debut with it, on a low budget and straight to video after a $100 million original.

Which original cast member returned as Johnny Rico in Starship Troopers 3: Marauder in 2008?

Casper Van Dien sat out the second film, which followed new characters, then came back for the third with Rico promoted to colonel.

Which 1974 novel is often read as an anti-war answer to Starship Troopers?

The Forever War: Haldeman, a Vietnam veteran, says it grew out of his own war rather than as a reply, though he admits Heinlein's book influenced him.

Which future Breaking Bad star has a small role in Starship Troopers as a boot-camp commanding officer?

Dean Norris, later Hank Schrader, is the officer who takes Rico back after the attack on his home city, even though Rico has already signed his resignation.

Paul Verhoeven, the director of Starship Troopers, was born in which country?

The Netherlands: he spent his boyhood in The Hague under German occupation, living near a rocket base that Allied planes bombed again and again.

In Starship Troopers, what does the maimed Lieutenant Rasczak order Rico to do on Planet P?

Shoot him: Rasczak had done the same for one of his own men, snatched up by flying bugs, and told the unit he expected no less in return.

Which two future stars auditioned to play Johnny Rico in Starship Troopers?

Mark Wahlberg and Matt Damon both read for the part, but Verhoeven wanted a blond, arrogant-looking lead who could have stepped out of a 1930s propaganda film.

Starship Troopers' Michael Ironside had earlier played the henchman Richter in which sci-fi film?

Total Recall: Verhoeven was a fan of Ironside's, gave him the part there, and brought him back seven years later as the battle-scarred Lieutenant Rasczak.

Where was the 1994 'Bug Test' for Starship Troopers filmed, with Olympic gymnast Mitch Gaylord as the doomed soldier?

Vasquez Rocks: the short scene of two bugs killing a soldier won over TriStar executives, who did not realise the creatures were computer-generated.

Which national park helped portray the planet Tango Urilla in Starship Troopers?

Badlands: the park and a nearby ranch offered smooth, rolling ground with little vegetation, and were far easier to reach than the film's remote Wyoming canyon.

Starship Troopers opened at number one in the US in November 1997, beating which British comedy into second place?

Bean: the opening took $22.1 million, but the film lost half its audience the next weekend and ended its US run on about $55 million, roughly half its budget.