The Rocketeer is my third favorite Disney film. (Tron and Tron: Legacy are #1 and #2, respectively. No, their animated films don’t rate with me, nor their Star Wars. I do like several of their MCU films.) I am also a big fan Dave Stevens’ artwork. I got an issue of Back Issue featuring an interview (1-20-25) and I saw a documentary about him. I’ve also bought a recent Rocketeer comic (5-24-22), though the series was not done by Stevens. Shamefully, I did not own any of Stevens’ original comics. I’d never read them.
I actually remember the first time I saw Stevens’ artwork. I was at the comic book store in El Paso and the owner, Mickey, was doing a commissioned drawing of this picture of Betty. It was somewhat mesmerizing. Mickey was a good artist and doing a really good copy of it, as well. He might have mentioned what he was drawing, but I didn’t have any opportunity to buy the comic at the time, if he even had a copy there.
Stevens passed away in 2008, too young, at 53. The Rocketeer was almost the least of his art projects, but easily what he was best known for. (His commercial artwork was very impressive.) He only did two Rocketeer stories, which were serialized in Pacific Presents and at some other independent publishers. Stevens had plenty more ideas, but comic book work just didn’t pay as well as commercial work. Also, he didn’t work that fast, especially as a perfectionist. This panel of Butch the bulldog is famous for holding up an entire issue for weeks as he wasn’t satisfied with the dog’s paw.
Stevens’ Rocketeer has been reprinted multiple times. I could scarcely believe running into this IDW (the current Rocketeer publisher) reprinting on shelves at Barnes & Noble. Was it a mirage? I didn’t argue. I just grabbed it and ran to the register. It is in the compact format with slick pages. On some level, I sort of wished for a full-size version or even a gallery edition (like the Warlock book I bought later). About a third of this 360+ page book is Stevens’ original work and the rest features short stories by an all-star group of creators. For $14 bucks, this was an absolute steal.
The Rocketeer was a work of personal passion for Stevens. He loved Art Deco and the 30’s/40’s era. Our hero, Cliff Secord, is essentially a self-portrait. Peevy is his animator friend, Doug Wildey. Betty is 50’s pinup queen, Bettie Page. Dave’s relationship with Bettie is a whole another story. You can look that up yourself.
If you’ve watched the movie, you’ll find elements of it in the comics, but they do not correspond. Stevens, working on a serialized story, wasn’t just making it up as he went along with each chapter; he was doing it page-by-page. It’s amazing that it’s coherent at all. When Disney made the movie, the first thing the screenwriters had to do was create an actual villain and a plot.
In the first story, it’s basically Cliff finding the jetpack, being reluctant to give it up, and being chased by the jetpack’s owners. Cliff’s overriding motivation in this is being jealous about his girlfriend, Betty, who gets mixed up in the affair.
This leads into the second story, as Cliff follows Betty to New York, trying to keep her from leaving the country. Cliff’s very dark backstory from his time in the circus comes up while there. He teams up with a character reminiscent of the Shadow (or a combination some other pulp characters) and he stops a murder. Betty does return home to be with Cliff.
I’m kind of glossing over the story, and its fine, but the reason to buy this, or any other Rocketeer reprint, is for the artwork. It’s just stunning. The rest of the volume could have been crap and it would have still been worth it.
It’s not crap. It’s mostly 8-page stories by some the best comic book writers and artists in the industry. The Rocketeer and Dave Stevens had a lot of admirers. There’s a bunch of stories in here and they vary widely in styles, but still keep the setting and dynamic between Cliff and Betty.
The Mike Allred story is a direct sequel to Stevens’ work, but the stories are all episodic. Keeping with the original, there’s not a coherent timeline for Cliff’s adventures, other than WWII happens and the Rocketeer is involved. In a couple of stories, it’s established how he works for the government and he fights in both theaters of the war.
You might wish for more than the peek that these stories give you. I’m sure some of the creators would have liked to have done more. The series editing seemed to be really light in terms of the stories given who was involved in creating them. (A couple of anachronisms slipped in. Dave was a stickler for being authentic in his stories.) The new issue that I bought a couple of years ago, Rocketeer: The Great Race, would give creators more space to work.
It’s hard to pick a favorite among the short stories. There’s a few clunkers. Given the pulp nature of most of them, they’re a bit exhausting to read, so pace yourself. Certainly, Bill Sienkiewicz gets the prize for the oddest, as he illustrates a cartoon spoof of the Rocketeer. Between the stories are pinups by Stevens and others, including Alex Ross paintings.
Okay, this one is a classic. Perhaps the best compliment I can pay is that this trade leaves you wanting more. A lot more.
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