@ the news and the outrage

I'm outraged that they didn't make her Asian-American in light of all the whitewashing that has had everyone so outraged over the past year. At least there'd be a modest yet somewhat relevant historical point of reference to inform the existence of such a fictitious 'Rockette' which they could reference when the inevitably outraged fingers started pointing. The closest America came to a Black female flying anything in that era never really got the opportunity she deserved.

Whatever. I gave up on a sequel over a decade ago. This just sounds stupid, so it's yet another movie I'll skip.

There will be plenty of other non-stupid movies for me to go see over the next few years...

The Rocketeer is one of the greatest comic book adaptations ever made. It faithfully followed the style of Dave Stevens' original comics and was a beautiful homage to the "gee whiz" movie serials of the 1930s. My knee-jerk reaction was "WTF?" but after reading through the story description again, I'm kind of excited that it's a sequel-styled reboot. Dave Stevens never moved the character past the 1930s. The IDW continuations only recently pushed The Rocketeer into WWII. His Post-War adventures have never been told and is ripe for expansion.

Count me as intrigued.

how heavy is the rocket pack?

This doesn't bother me as much because frankly I never thought there would be a sequel and while the original is good I don't think it's as beloved of a name as a franchise like Ghostbusters .

Devilshalo called it back in 2012.

Make her a lesbian and I'm in.

Since it's 6 years after the original.. will she fight Nazis and the KKK?

I loved THE ROCKETEER, but I think Disney is really overestimating the fanbase (unless this isn't planned as a summer tentpole). I remember them promoting the heck out of the first movie, and it tanked, despite getting pretty good reviews.

I loved the original. Saw a lot of fun movies that summer (T2, Robin Hood:Prince of Thieves, Naked Gun 2 1/2, Bill & Ted 2, etc.).

My pen is outraged.

I hope they cast Leslie Jones.

Yeah, I remember the first movie being promoted like crazy and then bombing at the box office.

I think the movie was something that was ahead of its time, and it might have found an audience after "steampunk" entered the popular consciousness a decade or so later.

I also think Disney vastly overestimated the popularity of the comic; it was highly praised by fans, but it was also published in a scattershot manner as a series of back-ups to other comics from a range small publishers, the comics were really rare, and there wasn't much of a reprint program for it. Never mind that Dave Stevens worked at a snail's pace, and didn't make much of an attempt to finish it.

I'll be interested if it's meant as a sequel set within 25yrs the first took place. I just don't agree with the "it will be this gender, and this race" mentality going in.

I'm confused. Are you saying you don't agree with choosing the gender and ethnicity of characters in stories? Because literally every movie ever made has done that.

Gender sure, but ethnicity...I disagree. Why not the best screen test? I believe JJ Abrams really wanted to cast a person of color for Finn, but I also believe Boyega gave the legitimate best screen test. It was never proclaimed from the mountaintop that this character shall be a person of color...at least they had the business sense to not say that.

Melissa McCarthy is perfect for this. Huffing and puffing running around with that pack.

Here's the thing, this sequel/reboot has entered the Wild Wild West territory. "History be damned, reality be damned, we're going to change the character the way we want to change it, regardless of how historically ludicrous that would be!"

Just like James West could never have been a black man in the 1870's or 1880's (a black man trying to arrest white men back then would have eventually been shot or lynched, regardless of his authority - as wrong as that would be, a black lawman of any kind, federal, state, or local, just wouldn't have been accepted), you can't have your main character be a black female pilot in the 1940s! Such a thing never existed. It wasn't fair, it wasn't right, but that was reality.

The politically correct social justice crowd in Hollywood is out of touch with history. Or they think they can re-write it.

At least with Agent Carter the writers understood that a woman, even one as intelligent and badass as Sharon Carter was, would not have been accepted as a field agent by her superiors until she took matters into her own hands. But an, "African-American female pilot," in the 1940's? That never happened and it never could have happened. Not in that environment. There were only a handful of white female pilots in the 1940's. A black woman would have had zero chance of being allowed to learn how to fly. Again, it wasn't right, it wasn't fair, but we can't re-write history.

It's enough of a stretch to say that a rocket pack that allows a person to fly without an airplane could have existed. But to then say that something else that was practically impossible also existed at the same time? It stretches credibility and believability beyond the breaking point.

There are so many ways that Hollywood could find to include African-Americans, Hispanics, Asians, etc, that they don't need to do historic fantasy that attempts to re-write history and undo some of the wrongs that were done then. Hell, an argument could be made that trying to undo those wrongs minimizes them as it could lead future generations to believe that things weren't as bad for some groups back then as they really were.

Ooh...you guys better not see Hamilton on Broadway...I don't think you'll like it.

Too bad there isn't a search engine that can prove everything you just said wrong.

Oh wait, Willa Brown.

Or Bessie Coleman, but she did have to leave to US to become a pilot.

OK, I did not know about her, but it is possible, possibly likely, that she was the only one in the country (and if not, there were damned few and you know it). So are they saying that Willa Brown was The Rocketeer?

It still stretches credibility. It was so rare that it is beyond highly unlikely that she would be the one to get the rocket pack.

Again, a Hollywood agenda trumps (pardon the term) reality.

Which just makes my point - it was almost impossible for a white woman to become a pilot at all, and for a black woman (fighting racism AND sexism among those in charge of who is allowed to learn how to fly) it was, for almost every one who tried, not possible to get past those barriers. It just wasn't allowed by most of those in charge of such things in the United States. Racism and sexism were so rampant that the barriers were almost impossible to overcome.

I just have a problem with Hollywood history revisions that turn movies set in the past into fantasy. At least Sky Captain was an intentional bit of fantasy. When you double down on the fantasy aspects (using technology that didn't exist and saying that things that were extremely, extremely rare - like a black female pilot - coincided at the same time and place with that technology) it makes the movie that much harder to buy into.

Again, by making a black woman a pilot AND The Rocketeer just minimizes the wrongs done to blacks (and, to a much lesser degree, to women) in America at the time. It makes it seem like this was a possibility, when the reality was far different.

It seems like a one-of-a-kind pilot is a great idea for a hero in a movie. Shouldn't the focus of heroes be the extraordinary, not the ordinary?

Or are you just settling for mediocrity? Ayn Rand would not be proud. But her Rocketeer would probably also have a trainpack.