10 Movie Deaths Only Explained Outside Of The Films
5. Captain Steven Hiller - Independence Day: Resurgence
Fox
Independence Day: Resurgence was a sequel no one really asked for, with the first film having developed a reputation as one of the nineties' most fondly remembered - and enjoyable - blockbuster movies.
The only appeal in a potential sequel was always going to revolve around the chance to see Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith link up again. When it became apparent that Smith wasn't interested in reprising the role of Steven Hiller however, filmmaker Roland Emmerich had to come up with a reason why his character wasn't active anymore.
The explanation was - much like the film - pretty anticlimactic. Hiller is said to have died testing the first line of Alien-inspired fighter-craft in 2007, but the details of that crash were only divulged in the film's tie-in novel, Independence Day: Crucible. Written by Greg Keyes, the novel details the build up to the events of Resurgence and follows a number of characters from the original film, including Smith's Hiller.
The book actually implies that Goldblum's David was partially responsible for Hiller's demise, with the engineer unable to make the vehicle safe due to being rushed along by the military.
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
