Why is it that so many sci-fi properties are based around endless wars? I thought about this while reading Transformers: Historia. Which gave me a canon headache. I didn't love the first couple of issues of IDW's reboot of their Transformers comics. So I thought reading the Historia one-shot would be a good gateway to IDW's first continuity. The one-shot read like an auto-captioning of a Comicstorian video. But it did make me check out Megatron Origin. Which I dropped, because the art so dark you couldn't see anything in a given panel. (But I still need to read the first issue of More than Meets the Eye, which looks brighter.)
I also thought about this while listening to Bolt Thrower. I heard about this band while watching Amoeba's What's In My Bag with High on Fire. Not only was John Peel a fan, but the band also based their lyrics on the tabletop miniature game Warhammer 40k! Like Transformers, Warhammer 40k centers around an unending war in the stars. But unlike Transformers, Warhammer 40k is grimdark. And the mechs don't transformer into muscle cars. The mechs here just brutalize ork aliens.
I thought about this, too, while watching this Gundam anniversary video (see above). I've only seen half of the original series, but Thunderbolt is one of my favorite anime. (And I still need to watch the Bandit Flower compilation film.) But, like Transformers, the franchise shows the two sides of a war. Here, the war is between the Principality of Zeon and the Earth Federation. And, like Warhammer 40k, both Earth and Zeon fighters pilot mechs, aptly called Gundams.
So why are so many sci-fi properties are based around endless wars? I don't know. I just thought I'd bring it up. I can think of others. Starship Troopers by Heinlein (I haven't seen the movie). Old Man's War by John Scalzi. Rogue Trooper. I'm sure I'll think of others in the shower later.