In August, it was reported that, after years of attempting to get the project off the ground, Disney was, at last, moving forward with a sequel to the 1991 film The Rocketeer. With award-winning actor and producer David Oyelowo onboard, the premise of The Return of the Rocketeer involves a Tuskegee airman who unexpectedly inherits the jetpack of the original Rocketeer, Cliff Secord. Although the film is still in writing, Oyelowo went on record earlier this month saying that the sequel “[is] still in that 1940s milieu” - news that will please fans of the original.
And yet the 1991 film became a curio. While not exactly a box office bomb (it made a modest profit on a then-substantial $35 million budget), the film was coolly received by audiences, despite some excellent direction from Joe Johnston (then fresh from a smash hit in Honey, I Shrunk The Kids), an amiable leading couple in Billy Campbell and Jennifer Connolly, and a bravura performance from then-James Bond actor Timothy Dalton. His portrayal of slimy antagonist Neville Sinclair foreshadowed his highly successful later pivot into playing villains in films and shows such as Hot Fuzz and Doctor Who.
The enormous appeal of the central concept - who hasn’t daydreamed on plane flights about flying through the clouds on the other side of the window? - ensured that The Rocketeer was destined to come around once more. It may be the case that now is exactly the right moment to reintroduce audiences to the story.
Dieselpunk Has Arrived
Buena Vista Pictures Distribution
The original movie was rather a strange addition to the usual roster of blockbusters that were released in the summer of 1991. That year’s big hits were mostly either out-and-out sci-fi films (Terminator 2: Judgement Day, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country), fantasy films (Hook, Beauty and the Beast), or comedies (The Addams Family, Hot Shots!, The Naked Gun 2 1/2: The Smell of Fear). Nor was the climate on TV much more welcoming to The Rocketeer’s eclectic blend of 1930s period piece and dieselpunk overtones. Sci-fi was dominated by Star Trek: The Next Generation. While the success of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles the following year proved there was a market for television set in the 1930s, it was achieved off the back of a well-known movie franchise.
Superhero Movies Are In
At base, The Rocketeer is a superhero film. After all, Dave Stevens’ creation first graced not the silver screen but the pages of comic books such as Starslayer in the early 1980s. Secord has all the usual attributes of a superhero (mask, nom de plume, extraordinary abilities). Superheroes were not exactly difficult to come by in Hollywood in the early 1990s, Tim Burton’s Batman movies being a case in point.
A Superhero Who Is (Mostly) Down to Earth
The sequel should manage this because - unlike so many of the superhero movies to come out of the Marvel stable in the past decade or so - the suspension of disbelief required to enjoy The Rocketeer is so much smaller than is ordinarily the case. There are no sky beams, no villains transporting through portals from other dimensions; even the tech that gives the main character his abilities is now in existence.
Christopher Nolan tumbled to the possibility of making his Batman stand out from the cartoonish incarnation offered up by predecessor Joel Schumacher in just this way, giving more-or-less believable explanations for the creation of the Batmobile, Batman’s suit, and other Bat-related paraphernalia. The central premise behind the Rocketeer’s jetpack - knocked up by boffins in the employ of none other than Howard Hughes, according to the 1991 film - is even more straightforward and assures few hang-ups in the believability stakes.
