Images via Hulu

I’m not going to lie, when I realized Independence Day was coming up I thought I’d try an experiment to see if I could try to get a slight surge in site traffic by taking advantage of the surge in Independence Day searches by doing a write-up on the 1996 hit movie ID4 or as it is better known to people, Independence Day. Unfortunately, I’m a little late with this post because I didn’t make this realization early enough and I also got side-tracked with a few things—but hopefully I’m not too late considering I’m still hearing people light off fireworks so there should be at least a few spikes in Independence Day-related searches.

Written and directed by disaster film artist, Roland Emmerich, Independence Day became the highest-grossing film of 1996 and at the time became the second-highest-grossing film ever behind Jurassic Park. On top of this, Independence Day created renewed interest for the Sci-Fi genre in the mid-late ’90s as well as become the leader in the forefront of large-scale disaster films and would also become Fox’s go-to movie to play on Independence Day nights for the next several years.

The story of Independence Day is this: On July 2nd, a large alien space craft is detected on approach to Earth. By SETI technician who in a good touch of foreshadowing is listening to “It’s the End of the World as We Know It “by R.E.M. After settling in Earth’s orbit this alien mothership would then dispatch several smaller city-sized space crafts to Earth.

These smaller ships would then proceed to destroy major cities and military installations in order to pave the way for a full-scale invasion of Earth.

On July 3rd, military forces from around the world launch counter-attacks against the alien ships. Unfortunately, all attempts at fighting back at the aliens are futile due to their advanced technology which includes protective energy shields around their crafts which human weapons are unable to overcome.

Using an alien craft that crashed in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947 and was being kept at Area 51, humanity finds a way to disable the aliens’ energy shields using a computer virus.

On July 4th, a mission is carried out to fly the recovered alien craft up to the alien mothership which is still in orbit and use it to distribute the shield disabling computer virus to all the alien ships as well as disable or destroy the mothership with a tactical nuke.

…while Earth’s remaining military forces launch full-scale attacks against the ships on Earth.

The cast of Independence Day consists of:

Will Smith as Captain Steven Hiller, a US Marine Corp pilot and leader of Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 314 AKA VMFA-314 AKA the Black Knights. In the film, after Hiller sees the rest of his squadron killed in a failed counteract against the alien craft which destroyed Los Angeles, manages to make his way to Area 51 where he volunteers to fly the captured alien craft up to the alien mothership to deliver the virus.

According to what I found online the writers, Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich always envisioned Hiller to be played by an African-American and Will Smith was specifically chosen not because of his performances on Fresh Prince of Bel Air or in Bad Boys but because of his performance in the 1993 comedy-drama, Six Degrees of Separation.

I like to consider Independence Day to be at the center of what I call the Will Smith ’90s trifecta which alongside 1995’s Bad Boys and 1997’s Men In Black, three movies which helped establish Smith as a successful and bankable actor and also helped him make the transition from musician to prime-time sitcom star to Hollywood A-lister.

Watching Smith in Independence Day and seeing him in more recent roles you can obviously tell that Smith has matured more as an actor.

In the above scenes you see Smith not only spouting all these good lines but you also see him exhibiting this wild energy that he rarely shows in his more recent roles.

Bill Pullman as Thomas Whitmore, a former Gulf War fighter pilot and President of the United States who at the end of the film personally leads an attack against an alien ship.

Whitmore also delivers probably one of the greatest inspirational and patriotic speeches in movie history.

Pullman has had a pretty extensive career, although the only movies I remember seeing him in were Space Balls, Casper, and Lake Placid. Also, I’m not sure if you would consider this meta but Independence Day was not the only time Pullman played the President of the United States. Pullman would later play the President in the short-lived 1600 Penn.

Fun fact, Patricia, the President’s daughter in ID4 was played by Mae Whitman of Arrested Development and Avatar: The Last Airbender fame.

Jeff Goldblum as David Levinson, a MIT-educated and eco-conscious telecommunications expert who discovers the hidden signal the aliens were using to coordinate their attack as well as comes up with the idea to use a computer virus to disable their defense shields.

Like Pullman, Goldblum has had a pretty prolific career. Although also like Pullman, I haven’t actually seen too many movies he’s been in. Goldblum is probably best-known for playing Dr. Ian Malcolm in Jurassic Park. I know he also played Seth Brundle in the remake of The Fly from 1986. That movie I never actually watched all the way through. I remember when I was like 4 years old it was on TV and my dad asked if I wanted to watch it with him but the parts I saw were too gross and traumatizing so I didn’t’ stay to watch. Off the top of my head I know recently Goldblum had played the Grandmaster in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Thor: Ragnarok and was also the Wolf King in Hotel Artemis. I think today though Jeff Goldblum is probably best known to most people as internet meme due to an image of him sitting shirtless and lying side from Jurassic Park going viral and inspiring an art installation and Funko Pop figure.

Mary McDonnell as First Lady Whitmore who is wounded in the aliens’ initial attack and soon dies in a hospital with the President by her side. I’m assuming it is because of her death that the President decides to personally lead an attack a nearby alien ship. McDonnell has done quite a few things in her career although I only remember her from playing Stands With A Fist in Dances with Wolves which earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Support Actress and President Laura Roslin in the Battlestar Galactica remake.

Judd Hirsch as Julius Levinson, David’s father who’s only purpose in the film seems to be the guy who takes David from New York City to Washington to meet with the President and also to get the government to admit that the Roswell Crash and Area 51 are real.

I haven’t really seen anything else that Hirsch has been in so I can’t really tell about anything else he’s been in but after glancing at his Wikipedia page I’m assuming it looks like he’s one of Hollywood’s go to Jewish guys when they need somebody to speak Yiddish or play a a stereotypical Jew.

Robert Loggia as USMC General William Grey the head of the US Space Command.

Out of all the actors in Independence Day, Loggia is probably the most prolific with a career that spanned more than 60 years and included not only television and movies but videogame voiceovers as well. Some of the roles I know him from are Malcolm’s crazy Grandpa in Malcolm in the Middle, the evil grandfather trying to keep Sylvester Stallone away from his son in Over the Top, and Miami drug dealer Frank Lopez in Scarface. I also thought he played AC Slater’s dad in an episode of Saved by the Bell but I looked it up and it wasn’t him.

Loggia also played toy company owner, Mr. MacMillan in the Tom Hanks movie Big where he plays the duet on the giant floor keyboard with Hanks.

Loggia unfortunately passed away in 2015 with Independence Day: Resurgence being one of his final roles.

Randy Quaid as Russell Casse a former Vietnam War fighter pilot turned alcoholic and eccentric crop duster who was abducted by the aliens 10 years prior to the film. After making their way to Area 51, Casse would go on to volunteer to join the attack on the approaching alien vessel and would sacrifice himself to destroy it when the fire control systems on his F/A-18 Hornet malfunction and he is unable to fire off his last missile.

In the original ending of the film, Casse was originally supposed to sacrifice himself by flying his crop-dusting airplane with a missile strapped to it straight into the aliens’ main weapon. If I remember correctly, this ending was rejected because his self-sacrifice seemed less meaningful and made him look suicidal or something.

Here’s the original ending without the commentary and in slightly better quality if you’re interested.

Quaid has had a pretty decent career which included playing Cousin Eddie in the National Lampoon’s Vacation movies, although right now I think he is better known for being just straight up freaking crazy.

In the film Quaid’s kids were:

James Duval as Miguel Casse, Casse’s oldest son, who was a dick to him early in the movie because of his father’s eccentric behavior but comes to respect and love him in the end after realizing his father was right all along. Duval has done a lot of independent stuff but I do remember seeing him in Go and Gone in 60 Seconds.

Lisa Jakub as Casse’s daughter, Alicia. She’s probably best known for playing the oldest daughter in Mrs. Doubtfire.

Also, the guy who tries scoring with her when the aliens come is Andrew Keegan who was the douchebag, Joey Donner in 10 Things I Hate About You.

Giuseppe Andrews as Troy Casse, Casse’s youngest son who really has no other part other than getting really sick when they’re on the run from the aliens. Andrews I know best from playing Lex in Detroit Rock City and Germ in Two Guys and a Girl back when it was Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place. If you’re like me you’ve probably confused him with Joseph Gordon-Levitt a few times, but seriously, google them and you’ll see they look pretty freaking similar. In fact, I think one of the first google searches that come up when you google them together is a website calling Giuseppe Andrews the homeless version of JGL.

Margaret Colin as Constance Spano, David Levinson’s ex-wife and White House Communications Director who is responsible for getting Levinson an audience with the President when he discovers the aliens’ hidden signal.

I haven’t seen anything else Colin has done so I can’t tell you more about her career.

Vivica A. Fox as Jasmin, Hiller’s stripper girlfriend. Other than leading a group of survivors from the aliens’ attack on LA to the El Toro Marine Corp base she really has no other role in the film other than Hiller’s love interest. In Independence Day: Resurgence Fox’s character is no longer a stripper but a doctor instead.

Fox has had a pretty big career outside of Independence Day with roles in a lot of random things. Her roles include things like Kill Bill Vol. 1 and 2, Batman & Robin, Set It Off, Booty Call, Idle Hands, Juwanna Mann, Boat Trip, Sharknado 2: The Second One, China Beach, Who’s the Boss?, Curb Your Enthusiasm, True Jackson, VP, and Empire just to name a few roles.

Ross Bagley as Dylan, Jasmin’s son. I’m kind of wondering if Bagley got his role in Independence Day due to nepotism since at the time he was also playing Nicky Banks, Will Smith’s little cousin on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

James Rebhorn as Albert Nimzicki, the Secretary of Defense and former head of the CIA. In the film, Nimzicki fulfills the role of the scumbag character who does nothing but give bad advice to the President and also withholds the fact that the Roswell crash and Area 51 are real until halfway through the film.

Rebhorn passed away from Melanoma in 2014 and while he did have quite an extensive filmography I best remember him as the dad from the movie Blank Check.

Adam “Not a Baldwin brother” Baldwin as Major Mitchell, the commanding officer of Area 51.

Adam Baldwin is probably best known to most people as Jayne Cobb in Firefly and Serenity and he’s also been in a lot of other random stuff as a background or supporting character.

Brent Spiner as Dr. Brackish Okun, an eccentric scientist working at Area 51 who is put in a coma after attempting to dissect a captured alien. Originally, I thought he died in Independence Day but if you watch Independence Day: Resurgence it’s revealed that he was just put into a coma and that he is also gay which I really don’t understand why they made him gay.

Spiner is best known for playing Data in Star Trek: The Next Generation and its spinoff movies.

Singer-song writer Harry Connick Jr. as Jimmy Wilder, a US Marine and Hiller’s wingman who is killed in the failed counter attack against an alien craft over LA.

Though he’s only in the film for a short time, Wilder is responsible for delivering a few good lines and doing an impression of Reverend Jesse Jackson which i thought seemed really unncessary…

…he was also part of this embarrassing scene when he finds the wedding ring Hiller planned to give to Jasmine. I remember finding the actual clip on YouTube a while ago but unfortunately it got pulled down so I’m unable to share it here.

While I’ve heard Connick’s name thrown around on various things like Family Guy I never saw anything else he’s done. According to IMDB the closest thing I would have seen him in was on an episode of Ghostwriter in 1994 but I don’t remember that episode that well.

For a sci-fi movie Independence Day isn’t really that heavy on the action. There are really only 2 major battle scenes, and what little action there is is pretty brief. But despite being brief they are still able to convey some strong messages and feelings.

You have the part where the US Military attempts to communicate with the aliens only to be blown out of the sky. While brief, this scene is enough to determine right away what the aliens’ intentions are. Those shots were not fired because of confusion, they were fired strictly out of pure malice.

Then you have the scenes where the aliens start destroying cities. I read on Cracked that in order to get the rolling wall of flame effect the special effects team turned the model city on its side, had the pyrotechnics at the bottom and filmed it from the top looking down. The mass destruction the aliens cause, as they begin wiping out cities, it’s a scale of terrifying never before scene is movies and it is because of this destruction that puts Independence Day at the forefront of the large-scale disaster films.

Then you have the first fight scene which is when Hiller leads a counter-attack against an alien craft. This scene I feel holds up pretty well by today’s standards and it also does well in conveying a sense of futility as we see the US Military’s weapons ineffectiveness against the aliens’ shields before seeing military fighter jets quickly picked off one by one by the aliens’ own fighters. Literally the battle is less than 2 minutes long but in those 2 minutes you see how mismatched we are against the aliens and that is enough to fill you with fear because you see how easily the aliens can wipe us out and there’s nothing we can do to stop them.

This scene you wouldn’t really consider a battle scene since it’s really just the US’s attempt at nuking the aliens. Like the first battle scene it further reinforces how mismatched we are against them which furthers fills you with fear. This scene further emphasizes this because at first, you’re given hope when the nuke takes out the surveillance APC and it looks like we have a chance against the aliens, but once it’s revealed that the aliens were able to withstand being struck by the most devastating weapon in Earth’s arsenal unscathed you see once again there’s not much we can do to stop them because there’s nothing else we can throw at them.

On the other hand, once we get to the final battle of the movie the mood of the film completely changes. After being filled with despair for almost two hours all that negative energy is instantly gone once you see that first missile successfully hit the alien ship—like the people monitoring back at base you’re filled with hope because now you now you know that humanity has a fighting chance against them. Even towards the end of the battle when you realize all the other fighters are out of missiles you still have that sense of hope because even if humanity loses this battle there’s still a chance we can win the war.

Looking back, Independence Day does have some plotholes and absurdities especially when you think about it with today’s logic. In fact, I remember having an issue of Savage Dragon where a police officer tries threatening a supervillain by saying “Freeze dickhead! Or I’ll fill you with more holes than the plot to Independence Day.”

One of the biggest absurdities I can see is that the entire movies takes places over the course of three days. The aliens arrive on July 2nd, start destroying cities before the end of the day. July 3rd, humanity launches failed counterattacks including nuclear strikes, and by the evening we’re able to create a computer virus capable of disabling their defense shields and by July 4th we’re on our way to coordinating a worldwide counteroffensive…

… using Morse code.

Another plot hole that bugs me is the secrecy of the aliens existence I understand hiding it from the general public so they don’t cause a panic, but you would assume the people in the government would still say something to each other. It isn’t until Levinson starts criticizing the government that Nimzicki admits that they’re all true. While he admits it was done so the President could claim plausible deniability and also because the truth was on a need to know basis you would think that after the aliens started destroying human cities that things have reached a point where people needed to know.

Then there’s the dissection scene. After Hiller brings in the alien they captured they bring him into an operating room without any armed guards whatsoever. Even when they realize the alien is regaining consciousness by moving its arm nobody had the common sense to call for security to subdue it.

Then there’s the part where it’s pretty obvious the alien has Dr. Okun under telepathic control, and even after it starts using its power to torture the President none of the members of the Secret Service or the rest of the security detail have the common sense to start shooting at it right away—and even then, once they start shooting you see the observation windows for a room built specifically to dissect aliens aren’t even bulletproof. Seriously? They couldn’t spring for lucite?

This is probably the biggest plothole in the film especially when you look at it from a technological standpoint. is the technology compatibilities and how they’re able to overcome them in such a short amount of time. Talk to a developer today and they’ll tell how much time they spend making sure their apps and programs can work on as many devices as possible. There’s Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, and Linux. Then there are mobile operating systems like Android, iOS, and let’s not forget whatever operating systems SmartTVs and videogame consoles like the PS4 and Nintendo Switch run off of (I would throw Xbox in there but I heard that Xboxes use a slightly tweaked version of Windows as their operating system). How the hell was Levinson able to create a computer virus capable of affecting the aliens’ computer scenes all within a few hours?

There are fan theories on the internet about how modern computer technology was derived from studying the crashed alien craft as well as a deleted scene that’s included in the extended version that showed David sitting in the alien craft with his laptop plugged in trying to get the virus to work.

Even with all these explanations from the internet and deleted scenes it’s still a bit hard to believe especially by today’s standards that the greatest weapon humanity had at this point was a mid-’90s Macintosh PowerBook.

Another plothole involving their plans is being able to fly the captured alien ship into the mothership undetected. They’re basically pulling a Trojan Horse but realistically why didn’t the aliens think it would be suspicious that a long-lost craft is just suddenly coming home now? Also, why didn’t they think to check it out once it docked?

Despite the plotholes, Independence Day does some hold weight even by today’s standards and it’s still a great action movie with enough special affects to satisfy any explosion fetish.