I guess it doesn’t have a likeable protagonist per se and is mostly episodic. Maybe it would work better as a Tv show instead? Still I came away disappointed.

Yeah, as a TV show it would almost be an anthology series. Lots of little vignettes told in the same continuity with totally different casts.

I didn't hate it. I just didn't like it that much. What most stuck with me was that it seemed like it required a string of unlikely events/coincidences without which you wouldn't have had a movie. So, yes, episodic in that sense.

If I had seen the movie before reading the book, I think I would have enjoyed both, maybe the problem was our high expectations.

I've always said it should have been handed to HBO to make a mini series out of it.

Felt like it needed the starship troopers sort of treatment as a movie.