Good news for fans of Zeppelins, jet packs and Art Deco helmets; after 21 years, at least according to Vulture, Disney are finally returning to The Rocketeer.
In spite of being utterly awesome, Joe Johnson’s 1991 movie about a pilot who finds a rocket pack and uses it to fight Nazis bombed at the box office, but over the years it’s picked up a pretty large cohort of fans, most of whom (at least if last nights Twitterings were anything to go by) seem rather positive about the potential of a Rocketeer Rebake.
No word yet on potential directors or stars, but Disney are set to meet writers ‘soon’ to work out which direction to take with the property. The original was very much inspired by the success of the Indiana Jones films, and not too dissimilar in tone to Johnson’s far more successful, other WWII superhero flick, Captain America, but there’s no reason for the new version to go the same route.
The comics, written by the late Dave Stevens, were a little seedier than the movie – Cliff Secord, the Rocketeer, was actually a bit of a self-centred bastard, and was very much the jealous boyfriend. No wonder really because his girlfriend was based on Glamour gal, Betty Page. Stevens also included references to pulp magazine icons Doc Savage and The Shadow, and a fairly detailed look at the culture of early studio era LA. All of which could serve as a pretty handy jumping off point for a the version, and could certainly give it a distinctive feel, separate from anything Marvel Studios are doing.
