• vsoponge@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    That’s the plot of the 80s movie The Last Starfighter

    The Last Starfighter is a 1984 American space opera film directed by Nick Castle. The film tells the story of Alex Rogan (Lance Guest), a teenager who, after winning the high score in an arcade game that’s secretly a simulation test, is recruited by an alien defense force to fight in an interstellar war.

    • Guy Dudeman@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Oh really? I’ve always heard about that movie but never seen it or looked up the plot.

      It is also similar to Ender’s Game, in a way.

    • disguy_ovahea@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      Greetings, Starfighter! You have been recruited by the Star League to defend the Frontier against Xur and the Ko-Dan Armada.

    • brsrklf@jlai.lu
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      3 days ago

      Also mostly the plot of Ernest Cline’s Armada, with a megaton of unsufferable 'tude and pointless 80’s references sprinkled on it. Those references include “the last Starfighter”, of course. It’s terrible.

      The podcast “372 pages we’ll never get back” with Mike and Connor from MST3K/rifftrax did its second season on it. Kind of a book club with books they assume they’re going to hate (mostly). First season was Ready Player One, from Cline too, so they chose this one next because they were astonished that Armada could be considered the bad one compared to RP1.

    • ouRKaoS@lemmy.today
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      3 days ago

      Loved that movie as a kid! I have an anniversary edition DVD of it somewhere, because my VHS copy broke in the mid 90’s from rewinding too much

    • Sundray@lemmy.sdf.orgOP
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      3 days ago

      Indeed! I fell in love with that move back in the day. Luckily, Alex at least got to directly pilot the Starfighter – but our alien freedom-fighters in the comic strip are sadly only looking for remote controlled drone pilots.

      • Drew
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        3 days ago

        This is what I first thought of lol

      • tetris11@lemmy.ml
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        3 days ago

        Yeah but the gov’t was in on it. Here, it’s literally just some alien dudes fishing for easy brainwashable recruits. Sort of like the Three Body Problem, but more realistic