Headscratchers / The Last Starfighter

• I can't help but feel Alex was getting shafted by the Star League. He's essentially a mercenary for the Star League, who apparently can't be bothered to fight for themselves even when facing total conquest. And as a mercenary, it seems like he didn't receive payment for signing up, instead that went to Centauri for headhunting him. Arguably, it worked out in the end, but it still leaves a bit of a bad taste in my mouth.
  • He's not a mercenary, he's a recruit. Problem is, Earth isn't in the Star League, so they have no claim to be recruiting from there. Centauri dismissed that little detail as unimportant (half for money, half for expanding the recruitment pool and finding the best warriors to fight to defend the Star League). Alex's problems all stem from the fact that thirty minutes ago he didn't even know aliens existed, and now he's been recruited to fight on the front lines in their war. Which is really all down to Centauri not having a good sales pitch to convince Alex to come along while informing him of exactly what he was getting into.
• If the game was delivered to Vegas as Centauri intended, he likely wouldn't have been able to find the player he needed. Fate indeed.
  • True, but there would have been many, many more people who would have a chance to play the game, giving a bigger chance of finding someone with "the gift". Considering humanity's amazing ability to deal death, putting a game on Earth was bound to result in recruiting a great pilot sooner or later.
  • Also, it's not the only Starfighter machine (or having a "world record" would be meaningless.) While this machine went to a trailer park, other machines probably went to New York, Tokyo, and so on.
  • In the novelization, there were actually many Starfighter games mentioned, and in fact only a select few were rigged as tests. Centauri would presumably slip the test rigs into the distribution channel after they left the factory. Alex is noted as liking the machine in the park better than the one at the mall because it felt much more responsive.