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Comment by MarkMarine | Hacker News Reader

Not my analysis but the amazing thing about that movie is Verhoeven was willing to make a BAD movie, with BAD acting, to make his point. He knew people might not get it and pan his movie and he did it anyway.

more than just displaying a fascist culture in the movie, this was a piece of art that a fascist culture would make. The acting is horrible, the casting of soap actors made sure of this, the glamorization of violence ignoring the horrible costs etc. It’s an incredible film. And courageous by Verhoeven.

I actually think that “meteor” that blew up Buenos Aires was a false flag, I didn’t see any bug meteor launching facilities, or even how they could target and launch something like that.

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I would love your false flag interpretation, except we did see the bugs shooting down the human spaceships, in a scene I don't think was intended to be a false narration or anything. They do appear to have some space capabilities and I think the lack of clarity is better chalked up to Hollywood science than directorial intent. Your mileage may vary, of course.

In support of the whole thing being a false flag, it would explain the sheer incompetence with which the war is prosecuted... a modern infantry unit would likely fate much better than Our Heroes did. Seeing it as a deliberately harrowing experience for social purposes where the technologically-superior humans are actually in full control the whole time would be an interesting twist. But, again, this would be a lot more solid if Hollywood didn't have a track record of unironic bad tactics across the board.

But the bugs were generating that plasma, and shooting up generally at things they may have been able to see. The meteor launch, they’d need advanced telescopes and orbital mechanics, plus a way to launch the meteor. I suppose there is an allusion to them being a multi planet species, so maybe these things exist.

Could it just be a naturally occurring meteor (on it's original path, not pushed) though? I think a false flag was unlikely (though just from watching, you can't tell for sure), but the bugs were far away so I'm not sure how they sneaked near to earth to push the "meteor". Probably in story telling logic the most likely is the bugs did it, then an accident or natural disaster.

It could totally be a natural disaster they just used to whip up the people. That’s more probable, I suppose. But I wouldn’t put it past that culture to blow up the city to gin up support for a war effort that does not look like it’s doing well. It’s so convenient.

Interesting reading of the meteor incident, had not considered in that light.

Do we know how Heinlein treats the episode, if at all?

I haven’t read the book actually. I grabbed this from the plot summary:

“ The "Bug War" has changed from minor incidents to a full-scale war during Rico's training. An Arachnid attack that annihilates the city of Buenos Aires alerts civilians to the situation; Rico's mother is killed in the attack.”

I’ll read it but right now I remain suspicious

Neither did Verhoeven, he apparently only read a couple chapters and had an assistant summarize the rest (https://www.looper.com/358395/the-real-reason-the-starship-t...). So I wouldn't assume that the movie strictly adheres to the events laid out in the book.

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