Johnny Rico will do his part once again!

District 9 director Neill Blomkamp is set to write and direct a new Starship Troopers adaptation for Columbia Pictures, PEOPLE can confirm. The Hollywood Reporter was first to report the news.

The Oscar-nominated director will produce the project alongside his wife Teri Tatchell, who co-wrote the sci-fi thriller District 9 and Chappie.

Starship Troopers is based on the 1959 military sci-fi novel by Robert A. Heinlein. The 1997 movie by director Paul Verhoeven starred several rising stars of the ’90s, including Casper Van Dien, who played protagonist Johnny Rico, as well as Dina Meyer, Denise Richards, Jake Busey, Patrick Muldoon and Neil Patrick Harris.

The star-studded crew appeared as young and sexy military recruits who find themselves on various ends of Earth’s battle with bug-like creatures known as Arachnids. 

Van Dien, 55, who reunited with the cast of the cult classic at the 2024 New York Comic-Con, recently spoke with PEOPLE about his love for the franchise and how it “gave me my career, basically.”

“It’s something that people always associate with me. I can’t go anywhere without people yelling quotes at me,” he added. “When you can have a movie that affects people in that way, in that depth, it doesn’t matter what it is,” he says of fans who have told him how much Starship Troopers has had a lasting impact on them over the years, “This movie, for some reason, really resonates with people.”

Blomkamp most recently directed Gran Turismo for Sony Pictures, which grossed over $122 million worldwide. Blomkamp’s sci-fi hit District 9 earned four Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay for Blomkamp and Tatchell.