Paul Verhoeven’s iconic 1997 sci-fi film is loud, grotesque, violent, and completely committed to its own satirical bite. On the surface, it looks like a shiny, dumb military bug-war blockbuster. That surface is the joke. The movie’s whole power comes from how confidently it weaponizes propaganda aesthetics, patriotic bravado, and beautiful young soldiers marching toward disaster.
Few movies have aged as well through sheer refusal to soften as Starship Troopers. That’s why it still feels so sharp. The action is big and messy, the creature effects still land, and the film’s sense of irony has only become more obvious with time. It knows exactly how ridiculous its world is, and it leans into that without losing the thrill of the combat itself. That balance is hard to pull off, but Verhoeven makes it look easy.
Now that it’s streaming free on Pluto, there’s no better time for another round of rediscovery. The film’s cast includes Casper Van Dien (Sleepy Hollow, Alita: Battle Angel) as Johnny Rico, Dina Meyer (Saw II, Dragonheart) as Dizzy Flores, Denise Richards (Wild Things, Drop Dead Gorgeous) as Carmen Ibanez, Neil Patrick Harris (Gone Girl, How I Met Your Mother) as Carl Jenkins, Jake Busey (The Frighteners, Contact) as Ace Levy, Michael Ironside (Total Recall, Top Gun) as Jean Rasczak, and Clancy Brown (The Shawshank Redemption, Promising Young Woman) as Sergeant Zim.
Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Personality Quiz Which Sci-Fi Hero Are You Most Like? Paul Atreides · Captain Kirk · Princess Leia · Ellen Ripley · Max Rockatansky
Five iconic heroes. Five completely different ways of facing an impossible universe. One of them shares your instincts, your values, and your particular way of refusing to back down. Eight questions will tell you which one.
🏜️Paul Atreides
🖖Capt. Kirk
✊Princess Leia
🔦Ellen Ripley
🔥Max Rockatansky
01
How do you lead when the stakes couldn’t be higher? The way you lead under pressure is the most honest thing about you.
02
What is your greatest strength in a crisis? The quality that keeps you alive when everything else fails.
03
What is the thing you’d sacrifice everything else for? Your deepest motivation is your truest compass.
04
How do you relate to the people around you? Who you are to others under pressure is who you really are.
05
You’re facing a threat that no one else believes is real. What do you do? How you respond when you’re the only one who sees it defines everything.
06
What has your heroism cost you personally? Every hero pays. The question is what — and whether they’d pay it again.
07
How do you feel about the rules of the world you’re in? Every hero has a relationship with the system. What’s yours?
08
When everything is on the line, what keeps you going? The answer is the most honest thing about you.
Your Hero Has Been Identified Your Sci-Fi Hero Is…
Your answers point to the iconic sci-fi hero who shares your instincts, your values, and your particular way of facing the impossible.
Arrakis · Dune
Paul Atreides
You carry a weight most people would crumble under — the knowledge of what you’re capable of, and the burden of what you might have to become.
You see further ahead than others and you plan accordingly, even when the vision frightens you.
You are driven by loyalty to your people and a sense of destiny you didn’t ask for but can’t escape.
Paul Atreides is not simply a hero — he is someone who understands the cost of power and chooses to bear it anyway.
That gravity, that willingness to carry what others won’t, is exactly you.
USS Enterprise · Star Trek
Captain Kirk
You lead with instinct, warmth, and an absolute refusal to accept a no-win scenario — because you’ve always believed there’s a third option nobody else has thought of yet.
You take the mission seriously without ever taking yourself too seriously.
Your crew would follow you anywhere, not because you demand it, but because you’ve earned it.
Kirk’s genius isn’t tactical — it’s human. He reads people, bends rules with purpose, and wills outcomes into existence through sheer conviction.
That combination of warmth, audacity, and relentless optimism is unmistakably yours.
The Rebellion · Star Wars
Princess Leia
You are the kind of person who holds the line when everyone else is losing faith — not because you’re fearless, but because giving up simply isn’t something you’re capable of.
You lead through conviction. Your voice carries because your belief is unshakeable.
You gave up everything ordinary the moment you chose the cause, and you’ve never looked back.
Leia is not a supporting character in her own story — she is the moral centre of the entire rebellion.
That same fierce, principled, unbreakable core is what defines you.
The Nostromo · Alien
Ellen Ripley
You are not reckless, not grandiose, and not particularly interested in being anyone’s hero — you just refuse to stop when it matters.
You see threats clearly, you document the truth even when no one listens, and when the time comes you handle it yourself.
Ripley’s heroism is earned, not performed. She doesn’t have a speech — she has a flamethrower and a plan.
You share her composure under the worst possible pressure, and her refusal to pretend the monster isn’t there.
When it counts, you don’t flinch. That’s everything.
The Wasteland · Mad Max
Max Rockatansky
You have been through fire that would break most people — and what came out the other side is something the world underestimates at its peril.
You don’t ask for help, don’t need validation, and don’t wait for anyone to tell you the rules no longer apply.
Your loyalty, when it finally arrives, is absolute — but it’s earned in silence and tested in action, not in words.
Max is not a nihilist. He is someone who lost everything and found, against his will, that he still has something worth protecting.
That bruised, stubborn, ultimately human core is exactly yours.
Is ‘Starship Troopers’ Any Good?
While Starship Troopers was met with a lukewarm reception from critics upon its release, over time it quickly became appreciated by audiences because of the well-written characters and the hilariously subversive writing, deservedly earning it the status of a cult classic and one of the best films of the 1990s that hasn’t been seen by enough people. Many critics missed the point of the movie, and its satirical edge, dismissing it as a shallow action film, but there were plenty of 180s from critics when they re-evaluated the film in the years following its release.
The special effects were also extraordinary for their time, with industry legend Phil Tippettat the helm. The Arachnids were brought to life with a mix of practical and CGI effects that were jaw-dropping at the time and still hold up today. The visual effects were so good, in fact, that it earned Starship Troopers an Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects, though it ultimately lost to the plucky underdog Titanic.
