Starship Nerd On The Horizon

Are you ready? I am SO ready!

My geekdom, like my craftiness, is about to swing into full effect.

This weekend I will be hosting a science-fiction nerd-fest, full of gagh and blue milk and loads of food cubes, possibly even some fish fingers and custard. Extra points if you understood all four of those references without googling them! I’m also trying to think of a way to make the light fruit the faeries ate in True Blood; I’m envisioning glowsticks in the bottom of a bowl full of pears. I know, True Blood is more fantasy than sci-fi, but it’s close enough and unfortunately science fiction food tends towards the gross.

To further my geekdom, I’ll also be attending a one-day-only showing of Starship Troopers in theaters with effectively the same group of nerd-friends that will be joining me for gagh. (For the record, I will not actually be serving worms.)

The best part: we’ll be dressing up for it.

In.

Costume.

Yes, several weeks from now, my friends and I will be storming a theater dressed as members of the Mobile Infantry. We’re heading to Wall Mart tomorrow to pick up some costume supplies. Twill be epic. Anywho, rest assured, dear readers, there will be awesome nerdy sci-fi pictures on here soon!

But back to Starship Troopers.

Having seen the movie multiple times on cable (because let’s be real, when is it *not* on one of the crappy channels?) before Orion forced me to read the book—it’s his all time favorite—I have come to realize that the movie is essentially a joke. I do not know much about director who made it, or really anyone involved in the process, but having now read the book I would say that one of two things happened:

1) The movie director read the first five pages of the book and then stopped, or

2) The movie director absolutely hated the book and wanted to parody it.

Either way, let’s all agree now that the movie, while intensely entertaining, completely butchered the book. Yet there are some things in each that I prefer, such as the complex political subtext in the book, the badassery of the Mobile Infantry, and Carmen shaving her head. In the movie I like the gender equality of the MI unites (yay! Dizzy is a girl! In the book she is a he, and he dies in the first few pages…a detail the director chose to ignore, and I’m actually glad he did as it brought to mind Starbuck’s upgrade in the retelling of Battlestar Galactica). The movie glosses over the “skinnies,” and focuses on the battles with the bugs. Did I mention I really, really dislike the idea of giant bugs? Perhaps I have subjected myself to one too many B-grade sci fi movies full of giant, writhing insects. Or arachnids.

But whether in the world of the book or the realm of the movie, I would love to be a member of the Mobile Infantry. Just imagine! The training (in the book) was so intense, so inspiring, and at times reminded me of my college days—only briefly, however—and at other times caused me to think that perhaps I might not be able to make it through such an ordeal, and I very, very rarely think I may not be able to do something, so naturally that made me want to try even more. Perhaps Starship Troopers is one of the reasons I would jump in a heartbeat to go SF or Infantry if they open them up to my gender. Sure, Congress said, “You will let women in!” but nothing has changed, not yet. The Army gets to decide how—if ever—they will allow women to participate in combat. Right, because bullets and IEDs discriminate based on gender.

But that’s a whole ‘nother topic, one that is likely to set my raging feminist on a lengthy tangent, and right now I’d rather focus on my nerd-dom.

Mobile Infantry. Mobile Suits. I really, really want a Mobile Suit. The capabilities! The weaponry! In a way they brought me back to when I used to watch Gundam Wing on Toonami, lusting after their version of the Mobile Suits. Reading about them in Starship Troopers straight up made me drool, and the movie just skips them entirely. What a shame. But for the upcoming theater showing, we will be rocking the movie-version of the Mobile Infantry uniform. Without the suits, though, they’re really just your standard issue Infantry grunts. So we’ll be wearing black t-shirts, military-esque pants, vests, black-spray painted ray guns. We’re still trying to plan out how we’ll make/acquire the helmets, but it shouldn’t be too hard. We are clever little nerds, after all.

In conclusion: Nerdom in full effect. All systems go.