During filming, producer Dave Eddy and some other crew members remarked that it would be great if the film appeared on Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988), which it ultimately did.
During filming, it became apparent to the producers that director Anthony Doublin didn't know how to film the fight and action scenes. When the bulk of filming was finished, Doublin delivered a rough cut that was 40 minutes long and consisted mostly of dialogue. The producers had a meeting to discuss it and decide what to do. They told him he needed to cut the dialogue, but instead, he cut even more of the action scenes. Doublin got stressed out and quit. Once he left, they fired the people who Doublin brought with him, and kept the best ones. Producer Dave Eddy, along with some members of the production, formed a "Damage Control Unit" to salvage the movie as best they could. Instead of reshooting Doublin's scenes, additional scenes were shot by the unit, including the outdoor fight with the boxes, the fight with the fridge and Forrest J. Ackerman's cameo, to achieve the necessary length, adding a voiceover to explain the story and try to tie it all together.
It was released in 1997, making it the most recent film to be featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988), which originally ended in 1999.
Anthony Doublin called "Future War" one of his worst professional experiences and that if he had the means, he would have had his name removed from the film.
Mel Novak's role as Otis, the SWAT Commander was originally a much larger role. In the finished film, however, Novak only gets five seconds of dialogue. Mel Novak and executive producer David Huey had agreed to shoot his scenes in a five day window because he also worked as a minister and was preparing to go on a two week ministry trip. But, later on, Novak called David Huey who was in Florida and said Anthony Doublin was screwing around wasting time, and that there is no way all of his scenes will make it in. Huey promised to make it up to him in another movie. Novak asked for his name to be removed from the film as he found this embarrassing. His name was not removed and he remained infuriated about it for the rest of his life.