Review of Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the Federation (2004) by Kenneth H — 27 Sep 2008

Starship Troopers 2 is much maligned but I found it to be really not that bad. It's very different from the first and third Starship Troopers movies, to be sure, and uses more of a body horror/haunted house formula as opposed to fast-paced action. Also, it contains none of the satirical commentary or underlying themes from the first and third films. But I think it's a nice change of pace for the Starship Troopers series, and the idea of using these new kinds of parasitic, Alien-esque bugs to try to beat the humans from the inside out is a very interesting concept.

What ultimately wounds this movie is the low budget, which at certain points during the movie becomes painfully obvious. Some of the acting could've been better (though, on the other hand, a few performances were pretty good), and the whole movie felt very cheap and the quality seemed poor throughout. The bad cinematography (including bizarre and pointless zoom-ins and other strange shenanigans) made me feel at some points that this movie was some cheap homemade film class project. I think much of the movie's problems would be solved had it been made with a substantial budget and maybe a better director.