On this date in 1997, "Starship Troopers" was released in the United States.

Director Paul Verhoeven admits to have never finished the novel upon which the film is based, claiming he read through the first few chapters and became both bored and depressed, calling it "a very right-wing book" in Empire magazine. He then told screenwriter Edward Neumeier to tell him the rest. Verhoeven and Neumeier then decided that while both the novel and its author Robert A. Heinlein strongly supported a regime led by a military elite, they would turn the concept around and satirize it, making the film a hyperbole of contemporary American politics and culture. Diehard Heinlein fans declare that the filmmakers have completely misinterpreted Heinlein's nature and intentions. They say he was a libertarian who opposed conscription and militarism. He depicted the oligarchy-by-ex-military-citizenry government in the book because it was an example of something that has never been done in real life. He was not advocating it, but was merely speculating that such a system could exist without collapsing.

Involved with the project since 1990, stop-motion animator Phil Tippett witnessed the screenplay go through many changes. While the script was evolving, the world of visual effects evolved, too, as did the techniques planned to create the alien bugs. Tippett said, "The whole story was completely different in the early '90s... we started thinking about it back then, and mind you this was back in the pre-digital, pre-'Jurassic Park' (1993) days. We considered using traditional model photography, either stop motion or puppetry, and then of course everything changed in 1993 with 'Jurassic Park.'" It was directly after his involvement with "Jurassic Park" that Tippett Studio art director Craig Hayes, Paul Verhoeven, producers Alan Marshall and Jon Davidson, Neumeier, and Tippett got together and started thinking about what the bugs would look like. "After 'Jurrasic,' we generally decided that we could go digital with the bugs."

Verhoeven and stars Dina Meyer and Casper Van Dien confirmed that Verhoeven and cinematographer Jost Vacano shot the co-ed shower scene in the nude themselves, on a dare from Meyer. On the day of the shoot, Verhoeven had asked the cast to do a little "fashion show without fashion" so that they could get comfortable being naked. When the cast was reluctant to disrobe, Verhoeven asked them what the big deal was, to which Meyer responded, "Paul, if it's no big deal, why don't you do it?" Quite unexpectedly, Verhoeven got undressed, as well as Vacano (who had been raised in a nudity camp). After an initial shock (Van Dien reportedly yelled "Oh God! Dina! Why!?") and a good laugh from the cast, the scene was filmed without problems.

In a 2014 interview with Empire Magazine, Verhoeven said of the shower scene, "Americans get more upset about nudity than ultra-violence. I am constantly amazed about that. I mean, I haven't seen any sex scenes in American film that are anything other than completely boring. A bare breast is more difficult to get through the censors than a body riddled with bullets."

In a 2016 interview, Van Dien revealed a funny incident when he was picking up his two daughters from school, "I went by the line at school to pick up my kids. You know, you drive up to the school and when I get there and there are these six 10 and 8 year old boys hanging out with my daughters. I pull up in the line and the boys go, 'Johnny Rico! Why didn't you tell us your dad was Johnny Rico?' And I said, 'What are you boys doing watching 'Starship Troopers'?' And they said, 'Our dads made us watch it with them!' Then my daughters get in the car and my 10-year-old says, 'Dad, were you really naked in 'Starship Troopers'?' And I said, 'Yeah,' and she said, 'How could you do that to me?!' Then my 8-year-old says, 'Wait, like naked naked?' And I said "Yup," and she said, 'Oh my God, my life is ruined!' That was the longest three minute ride home I have had in my life." (IMDb)