Animated Starship Troopers

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

OK, I don’t know if i’m reinventing the wheel, if so put me down fast, but I just bought today (cheap) a video of Roughnecks - The Starship Troopers Chronicles - The Pluto Campaign. The copyright date on it is 1999, produced by Paul Verhoeven(sp.?), director of the infamous movie. It is CGI animation and seem to be 5 episodes of a TV serie put together. The thing is, I never heard of such a serie. Does it ring a bell to anybody ?

Anyway, I just finished watching it and, for a (maybe) TV serie, its not bad. The action seems to occur after Rico’s first action in the movie and the operation where Dizzie dies, since she’s a character on the tape/movie/show/whatever. They use the same type of bugs as in the movie, but, and it is a big but, the MI is vertically inserted, not as in the book directly from orbit, but dropped from shuttles, a little bit closer to the book. They seem to have some kind of wimpy powered armor, another improvement over the movie (I’ll take wimpy powered armor over no powered armor anyday).

So, as anybody seen this animated version ? Is it playing on TV ? Any information would be appreciated, thank you very much.

2

Yeah, it was a TV show for a while. I liked it.

3

  1. First I’ve heard of it.

  2. If Verhoeven had anything to do with it, it can’t be any closer to the original. Except the wimpy MI. Woo hoo.

4

Yeah, it runs here on Foxtel, a cable thingy. Seems pretty neat. Better than the movie, anyway. I couldn’t even keep up with who was dead/alive etc etc. Confusing.

5

Interesting series, I was sad to see it disappear from the local network that was airing it here in L.A.

6

It still runs on Sky One here in the UK. I quite like it, really. IIRC, there are around four or five “campaigns”, including a final “grand battle” on Earth. Only one of the main characters ever dies on screen, although plenty of bit-part characters disappear or are implied to have died.

In terms of looks, it’s similar to the original (although with the human gore left out), but with a greater range of bug types and scenarios.

I believe the producers planned a final series (I think there are a good 30-40 episodes, maybe more) but didn’t get the interest from the networks.

7

There was a Japanamation/Anime version, but you can’t find it today.

Had a great reputation, though.