Invasion is nothing like the previous movies in the franchise, yet it maintains and shares a few similarities with them. It still shows graphic dismemberment of the bugs and Mobile Infantry as the two foes clash against each other throughout the movie.

There is a definite change in tone, illustrated clearly during the opening scene, in which Rico, now a general, is suiting up in power armor doing a voice over, with the dialogue quite similar to the one from the novel’s own opening.

“I always get the shakes before a drop. I had the injections. Hypnotic prep. The Federation shrink scanned my brainwaves. Everything checked out. Doc says it wasn’t fear. I could’ve told him that. A horse locked in the starting gates isn’t afraid. He’s just ready to run.”

This change in tone, brings new life into an otherwise dying franchise, that was doomed from the beginning due to the nature of the first movie as a satire of fascism and the military in general.

The over the top violence and the brain dead tactics used by the Mobile Infantry is simply laughable as shown in the first movie that viewers were left wondering why any advanced civilization would be dim-witted enough to deploy infantry with only air support available to fight their enemy, especially a hive minded one.

It removes all of this and leaves only the violence and the Mobile Infantry still using small arms to fight the bugs. Which are, arguably, the only good things from previous entries in the series and a refreshing change of pace after three movies of B-grade storytelling and over the top satire that effectively drowns everything else out, including the plot and the rest of the universe established by the movies, comics, and “Starship Troopers” FPS released in 2005.

Invasion brings the story into focus and the forefront of the movie, so it doesn’t leave it buried under the satire and parody. Which is a good thing because it means that the viewer isn’t distracted by them and they can stay focused on the plot and other details in the movie.

While this is a good development, it is here that Invasion runs into problems and this becomes self-evident as it goes on, much of this can be blamed on the focus on combat and character drama, which as is often the case in visual sci-fi, ends up making everyone appear incompetent. In this case, it is the UCF military whom are left holding the idiot ball.

As for the plot, it isn’t bad, as it revolve around a hijacked Federation starship and the Mobile Infantry. K-12 and A-10 teams, mission to retake control of the ship from the the Arachnid or more commonly known as “the bugs.”

Character wise, there isn’t much for viewers, there isn’t much to see in them, though the three main characters from the original movie, make a return as background characters. We have the usual array of action movie characters, who are given character establishment scenes and not much else, before we get to the combat where the majority of them are killed off. And this last point shouldn’t be a big surprise to anyone.

This only adds to the movie’s other problems, yet despite these short comings, the movie is still likeable and a breath of fresh air to the franchise. Thus pointing it towards a new direction that is completely different from the previous three movies, hopeful this new direction is maintained in future movies and especially since they have finally introduced power armor and added mechs to the Mobile Infantry.

For all these short comings, the movie is enjoyable, fun to watch, and while it doesn’t provide enough meat it delivers on the action, green blood, and guns.

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Update: this article headline has been updated to better reflect the article. 1:18 .p.m. 3/17/2014.