“The Rocketeer” Reboot in Early Development Stages

1991 Theatrical Poster

Walt Disney Studios has hired Max Winkler and Matt Spicer to write a script for a reboot of 1991’s “The Rocketeer.” This version will be headlined by a black female character and the project is currently called “The Rocketeers.”

The original was based on a 1980 indie comic by Dave Stevens that paid homage to serials from the 1930s and 40s.

The story followed Cliff Secord, a stunt pilot who discovers a rocket pack and suit to die for and becomes embroiled with mobsters and Nazis, as well as Howard Hughes and the FBI. The Joe Johnston-directed movie starred Billy Campbell as Secord, Jennifer Connelly as his aspiring actress (a Betty Page homage) girlfriend, Timothy Dalton as an Errol Flynn-type actor who is a Nazi spy and Alan Arkin as Secord’s mechanic.

When it was released it was considered a flop by the studio and its creative team.

But the film gained a massive following and when the 20th anniversary screening was hosted at El Capitan, fans lined up for blocks to view it. They began plotting a reboot then but the issue was to make it different from Iron Man.

The new take keeps the story in a period setting and offers a fresh view on the characters. Set six years after the original Rocketeer and after Secord has vanished while fighting the Nazis, an unlikely new hero emerges: a young African-American female pilot, who takes up the mantle of Rocketeer in an attempt to stop an ambitious and corrupt rocket scientist from stealing jet-pack technology in what could prove to be a turning point in the Cold War.

Are you excited for the Rocketeer Reboot?

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