The superhero trend is showing no signs of slowing down, and even though Disney is already using its control of Marvel to drive a lot of that trend, the studio is still looking for another way to capitalize on the popularity of people in masks. To that end, it has cracked open the vaults and pulled out Joe Johnston’s comic book adaptation The Rocketeer, which Walt Disney Studios produced in 1991. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Disney has announced that it’s developing a “sequel-reboot” of that film that’ll be called The Rocketeers, and a young African-American woman (who hasn’t been cast yet) will be replacing Billy Campbell’s white guy from the original.
The first Rocketeer movie was a commercial flop, but Disney has been planning a reboot ever since it realized that the film had taken on cult status in the decades since. That movie was about a guy with a jetpack who beats up Nazis in the ’30s, and this sequel will be set six years later with the original Rocketeer missing in action. When “an ambitious and corrupt rocket scientist” tries to steal the revolutionary jetpack technology, that aforementioned new protagonist will have to save the day.
The Rocketeers is being written by New Girl and Brooklyn Nine-Nine director Max Winkler and his writing partner Matt Spicer. It doesn’t sound like a director or any stars are attached at this point.
