Review of Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation (2004) by Harry W — 18 Mar 2014

Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation was a film I didn't expect too much from because it is a direct to video sequel to its science fiction action masterpiece predecessor Starship Troopers and has received mainly negative reviews.

The low budget of the film is pretty obvious because most of the time the film avoids having to use things that will require money, such as visual effects to depict the aliens the troopers are battling, Most of the time is is fairly obvious that the actors are on a set in front of a green screen, because they don't interact with the aliens as naturally as they did in the first Starship Troopers. The action scenes, arguable the most important aspect of the first Starship Troopers are of both inferior quality and worse, significantly inferior quantity in Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation. The title is misleading because the characters aren't heroes, they're victims. And so if the title is satirical which I highly doubt, then it makes sense, slightly. But the film doesn't have satire or really any comedy in it. It is just a bad film, simple as that.

As was the case with Starship Troopers, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation bears some terribly cheap acting. It's no surprise, and considering the low budget and direct to video status of the film it doesn't shock me in the least that the characters are all paper thin and generic figures who are acted no better than they have been written to be. It wouldn't really bother me, but considering that to save money most of the film takes place on a set with the actors dealing out cheap dramatics to pass the time until the end of the film, it doesn't make the experience any more fulfilling and makes its negative B-Movie qualities more and more overshadowing to its positive ones or potentially positive ones. Really, most of Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation is a lot of waiting around for the titular troopers to do something which rarely happens, and its more dominated by pointless drama and horror themes that are bereft of thrills which makes it ignore the roots of its predecessor and make it seem like an episode of an empty science fiction television series that stretches on for far too long, even at 88 minutes.

It is a repetitive film from start to finish, and audiences should not expect any surprises in Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation. But still, it defied my expectations that it would have some good action because the quantity of action in Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation is minimal, barely extending beyond 10 minutes. And considering that the quantity of action in Starship Troopers was excellent and it was of incredible quality, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation is an even larger letdown than I had expected. The film got away with a small budget, but it didn't get away with being a good film in the process unfortunately.

Like I said, it simply defies the roots of everything that made the original Starship Troopers great and takes itself way too seriously. It doesn't have the satirical edge of the original one, nor the quality or the direction of Paul Verhoeven to give it guidance. Really, it could have succeeded as a semi-decent film if it had a different title, but boasting itself as the sequel to Starship Troopers, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation comes up too short.

It brings the film down from the scale of the war it is supposed to be covering to the experiences of a platoon stationed on the enemy planet as they fight off the intrusion of aliens taking over the bodies of their troopers. But it's all kept on a scale too small to bear the name Starship Troopers.

The nature of the scenes depicting the enemy aliens is very repetitive since it feels like the same basic shots are used again and again from different perspectives without audiences witnessing the aliens really do much but round around chomping and stomping until they are killed. Its enough that they barely have any time on screen, but when they do it is boring. So the actual essence of what was awesome in the first Starship Troopers is not around in its sequel.

As far as direct to video film sequels go, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation isn't too bad. It could stand on its own as an episode of a tv series or a film that doesn't bear the Starship Troopers title. But as it does, audiences are likely to be expecting cheap fun with a lot of shooting big aliens and gore exploding all over the screen at unexpected moments. Instead, the story is a generic and predictable theme for anybody that has seen a single episode of Stargate Atlantis. It is shot in the same was a TV show as well with rough cinematography, so its not flawless from a visual perspective either.

Admittedly, it has some decent scenes and its mostly convincing thanks to the strength of the production design and costumes. Honestly, the movie had a lot of potential if it wasn't a Starship Troopers movie. But it gets squandered on lacklustre direction from Phil Tippett who despite being an award winning visual effects supervisor is not really fit to be a film director as he proved with Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation. At least he essentially stopped directing films there.

Really, Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation has little to boast. It bears the name of the sequel to a film which it is generations away from ever living up to in quality, and it lacks the action and satirical edge that made Starship Troopers the awesome feature that it was. Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation is an unworthy sequel, but I guess it could have been a lot worse.