20 Movies Where The Hero Winning DIDN'T Matter
9. Starship Troopers
When Starship Troopers released in 1997, the sci-fi elements arguably fell second in line to its political and satirical nature. Yes, the Federation were fighting an army of alien "bugs", but the story and the themes went far deeper than just guns being fired in space.
Throughout its run time, the film was peppered with propaganda pieces, showing how the Federation was gearing up to win the war, and how civilians could join up and become citizens, allowing the right to vote and such. It was also one of these videos that ended the movie.
After some twists and turns, Johnny Rico (Casper Van Dien) found himself leading the Roughnecks into battle in order to find, capture, and bring home the intelligent and elusive "brain bug". This would allow the Federation to study it, understand their enemy, and in doing so ensure victory. When the beast was captured, there were huge celebrations, but to what end?
After the bug was brought back and experimented on, the Federation was still at war, having seemingly made no further strides in grasping how the enemy's minds worked. Instead, they were still churning out the same recruitment propaganda as they were throughout the film, strongly suggesting that the Roughnecks' victory on Planet P ultimately meant very little at all.