If Hollywood Made a Xenonauts Movie

I'm bored, let's do a Xenonauts what-if thread: If Xenonauts did well enough to get a film version made, who would you want to star in and/or direct it? Here are my picks:

Director: Peter Jackson

Scriptwirter: James Cameron

Producer: Stephen Spielberg

Special Effects: Industrial Light & Magic

Musical score: Howard Shore

Lead: Channing Tatum or Keanu Reeves, cause they have about as much personality as a typical video game character

Lead's Sidekick: Dane Cook, he would be the comic relief character who makes the occasional wisecrack in a stressful situation. Probably my favorite stand-up comic, who needed better films to establish an acting career on than he got imo.

The Rookie: I'll throw in Angelina Jolie to put an actress in there.

Main character's love interest: Natalie Portman or Anne Hathaway

Cameo role: Michael Cera or Christopher Mintz-Plasse cause they play awesome nerds. I think a funny scene would be them freaking out in the middle of a terror mission and getting saved just in time by the main characters.

Other character types:

The Grizzled Commander Guy/Woman: Edward James Olmos (for his role as Adama in the new BSG series) or Sigourney Weaver

The war weary veteran: Ron Perlman

The computer/tech guy: Justin Bartha, cause I think he's funny and needs to be in more stuff.

The bad guy: (maybe a corrupt xenonaut/politician, evil alien leader voice or in costume?) Johnny Depp, because you can pretty much put him in any role and he can play it.

I'd be interested in seeing Simon Pegg do it, just to see what he comes up with

Does there really have to be a love intrest in the film though? won't the Xenonauts squad have their hands full with saving the world or die trying? Concidering the mortality rate a film like this should need to have, a romance wouldn't make that much sense imo.

Johnny Depp as the villan would destroy the film, since you'd be rooting for him instead of the protagonist... (especially if it's Keanu Reeves. )

of course it has to have a love interest since its a Hollywood film

of course it has to have a love interest since its a Hollywood film

oh right ofc. my bad

Hum, i think you may have made a mistake for the musical score!

Hum, i think you may have made a mistake for the musical score!

+1

I could see how an orchestral score like the one from LotR films might be a bad fit, couldn't think of anyone else

I could see how an orchestral score like the one from LotR films might be a bad fit, couldn't think of anyone else

Ah man, he is right there.... that is just so cruel!

get the hint!!!

Was there a hint in there somewhere?

As with Gorlom, I'd rather not have a romantic tryst somehow shoehorned into the plot.

Either that, or GET HER TO DIE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Honestly, it's most likely going to just muck up the plot, as the audience will be distracted by whatever occurs between the two.

Oh...and the Comic sidekick HAS to die because movie tropes.

ah boy meets girl, girl falls for boy, boy wonders if there's a future for them after she has her head blown off. Your standard Hollywood tale of romance.

Would work just as nicely the other way round actually. But it's all to reinforce the overriding Xenonauts theme.

Everyone must look glum. at all times. Comic relief guy should be shamed into glumness early on. Then killed moments later. He could survive being shot by one of his own troops standing nearby, make a quip, only to have an Andron drop a wall on him, to add a bit of physical humour.

I want Thothkins to be scriptwriter now

In the end Disney would buy the rights to it killing the hopes and dreams of any serious fans.

Even with my screenplay involving some flamewerfering of mutant aliens with giant mouse heads? - my nod to Full Metal Jacket

My Xenonauts movie will be the best. just need time to make it hahaha. i cant use the game name since i dont wanna pay anyone but me hahahaha it will be inspire by both games thou.

As long as you're not going to profit from it, I don't think Chris or the other developers would care. Heck, they'd probably give you their blessing since it's free advertising.

I hope Hollywood leaves Xenonauts alone, one look at "Starship Troopers" should convince anyone of that...

I liked Starship Troopers!

- Good effects

- Decent action movie storyline

- Michael Ironside

- Cool Alien Critters

- Some tongue in cheek shots at the military machine.

- Michael Ironside

Yes, it wasn't anything like the book. But then, I wasn't going in expecting it to be and didn't particularly cherish the book in the way that others might have.

Oh god the acting in that movie...it was one of my favorites for a long time (still is), but oh god the hammy acting...

the way in which the events in the film should have hardened and aged them, and the way that they totally failed to pull that off

Michael Ironside AND Neil Patrick Harris in the same movie!!!

'Nuff said

It was awful. Heinlein was probably rolling over in his grave. They destroyed the whole concept and plot of the novel and turned it into a teen action/hooter flick. Seriously, futuristic soldiers with PERSONAL GUIDED MISSILES fighting at hand to hand range with machine guns against unarmed insects that happen to also have interstellar space travel ability??? Where were the weapons, the powered armor, I could go on and on about this... I was so disappointed when I went to the theater.

It wasn't intended to be anything like the book. As it has been explained to me, the book provided some handy names for a film satirising war whose working title had been "Bug Hunt".

I think we know if a film adaptation of Starship Troopers had been true to the novel, it would be too slow and boring for most audiences Liked the book and what it had to say, but I could imagine the glazed over looks of the audience expecting to see something explode or get shot at less than five minutes (or seconds?) into the film.

yup, I enjoy it for what it was and don;'t get too hung up on it compared to the movie. Another example of this allows me to enjoy all the movie adaptations of Alan Moore's work....oh no wait... bad example....