Quote:
Originally Posted by HamsterRage
Starship Troopers by Heinlein. The movie completely missed the point.
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I'm not sure the movie was aware the book
had a point. If it did, it certainly ignored it as completely as possible.
ST was a "coming of age" story, set against the background of an interstellar war. Johnny Rico, pampered son of a wealthy industrialist, joins up because his best friends do, and winds up in the Mobile Infantry because he lacks the qualifications for any of the choices he prefers. (A recruiting officer asks "Why didn't you study something
useful?")
In the process, he learns responsibility, first for himself as a Trained Private, then for others as a non-commissioned officer in charge of a squad, and finally for the human race as a whole as a commissioned officer who has chosen to make the military his career. The nominal reward for successful completion of a term of service is the vote: in the ST universe, getting the franchise requires completion of a term of government service. But serving members of the military
don't have the vote, and career personnel may not survive to attain it. Johnny chooses to place the welfare of those he protects over his own.
I believe ST was originally intended for the Scribners YA SF line Heinlein produced a number of other books for, and it would have fit in with his Scribners output.
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Dennis