I'm a huge fan of Paul Verhoeven's Starship Troopers, but ... not so much a supporter of Phil Tippett's direct-to-video sequel, although if you're looking for mindless mayhem, it's (just barely) watchable enough. But did you know that production is presently underway on Starship Troopers: Marauder? Yep, and not only that: Casper Van Dien is coming back to reprise his role as Johnny Rico! Imagine that! (Would you like to know more?)

This time around it's series screenwriter Ed Nuemeier who'll get the directorial reins. (Although he's making his directorial debut here, Ed Neumeier was a screenwriter on the original Robocop as well as ... Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid.) Also on board cast-wise are Marnette Patterson, Jon Falkow and Stephen Hogan, plus Dark Horizons just chimed in with a new addition: "FHM's Sexiest South African" Tanya van Graan will play one of Rico's bug-squashing allies. (The hot model also signed on for a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie, so she's definitely got a great agent.)

According to Dark Horizons, Starship Troopers 3 is presently shooting down under. Ms. van Graan will join the production a few weeks from now in Cape Town. No word on when Sony aims to release this late-coming sequel, but you can rest assured it'll be bypassing theatrical release and landing directly onto your Netflix queue.

Just because one of my old high school pals worked on both movies, that doesn't mean I really love both Starship Troopers movies. OK, I actually do love the first one, while the DTV sequel ... meh, a Saturday afternoon DVD, at best. And now it looks like the pair is about to become a trilogy, and get this: Johnny Rico is coming back!

Yep. According to reliable sources, veteran sci-fi screenwriter Ed Neumeier is poised to make his directorial debut on Starship Troopers 3, and I wasn't kidding about Johnny Rico: Original Trooper Casper Van Dien is planning to make his return to Bug Central! Having written both entries already (in addition to the original Robocop and, um, Anaconda 2), Neumeier is obviously pretty familiar with the genre material. (The first Starship flick was based on the classic novel by Robert Heinlein and resulted in a still buzzed-about Paul Verhoeven sci-fi action satire amalgam.)

Production is set to begin in South Africa next March, which means Starship Troopers 3 should be hitting your DVD stacks by this time next year.