It’s been a few months since we heard about long-delayed Flash Gordon reboot, which means it’s now time to hear about… another Flash Gordon reboot. After all, kids of all ages are just constantly screaming about Flash Gordon, a thing they are definitely aware of, so it makes perfect sense that Fox (and now Disney) would be extremely desperate to cash in on Flash Gordon fever. That previous attempt was coming from Kingsman director Matthew Vaughn, who would be producing the film, with Overlord director Julius Avery directing.
Now, Deadline says that Taika Waititi has been hired to “crack” an animated Flash Gordon movie, which presumably means that Disney and Fox want him to try and figure out how to make this idea appealing to anyone who wasn’t alive the last time Flash Gordon had a movie. Deadline says Waititi is possibly going to write and direct, but it’s “too early” to say for sure. Either way, he has an opening in his schedule after backing out of Bubbles, the animated Netflix movie about Michael Jackson’s life told from the perspective of his pet monkey. It’s unclear if the Vaughn/Avery Flash Gordon movie has been canned in favor of this or if both projects will live simultaneously, but it probably won’t matter as long as the Flash Gordon fans have at least one Flash Gordon to look forward to.
For those of us who aren’t Flash Gordon fans, Queen’s theme song for the 1980 movie is as good of an introduction as you could possibly hope for—and yes, side-stepping any actual description of the Flash Gordon character in favor of simply referencing the Queen song is a longstanding Newswire tradition here at The A.V. Club, to the point where one fresh-faced youngster managed to do it in one of the very first stories he wrote for this site over five years ago. We all got so old, huh? Anyway, here’s the song.
89 Comments
Anyone else remember that crappy Syfy show where Ming ruled everyone by controlling the planet’s ice? That was a thing that happened.I love that the 1980 movie with all its nonsense science had a real life, genuine astrophysicist doing the MUSIC.
Oh yeah. I remember early ads for the show used a bad cover of the Queen song as well. It was crap
I remember that; use of that theme was a dirty, lying trick, as it promised something the show didn’t even come close to delivering.
The passing of Freddie Mercury is making it much harder it get excited about this or the Highlander reboot. Maybe they’ll just get Rami Malek and his fake teeth back…
Late ‘90s/early ‘00s? My father enjoyed that show.
It looked bad, but it also looked like it had lots of space hotties.
I remember various crappy Flash Gordon things since the 80’s movie.. Bad TV shows and cartoons.
Flash Gordon on SyFy basically felt like “Let’s turn this concept and turn it on its head. You know, the boring part of its head.” The flow of gritty “realistic” reboots post-BSG was a fun time.
Fun Fact: Coming off of the box office success of American Graffiti, George Lucas wanted to make a Flash Gordon movie but the rights were tied up in what became the 1980 movie, so he started writing his own space opera movie, which was a little more successful than Flash Gordon.
Just in case anyone wants to try another flavor of Flash Sauce:
I really love Tenacious D but Jack Black is no Freddie Mercury.
Call it The Flash Gordon, where DC’s The Flash introduces Flash Gordon to a new generation and they then team up as the beginnings of a new DC crossover cinematic universe (eventually including Universal’s Dark Universe, and the inevitable Harry Potter reboot) in another attempt to take on their real enemy: the MCU.
Hey, can’t be any worse than MoS/BvS/JL.
Animation produced in Adobe Flash.
DC’s Flash Gordon is Adam Strange
In your movie maybe Flash Gordon is the result of The Flash and Barbara Gordon having a ‘quickie’ on the side. I haven’t seen the next page….
“Dicks not here”????Wally West never got any respect.
I’d go Flashdance Gordon. Cast one of the lesser Helmsworths as a steeltown boy on a Saturday night, just looking for the fight of his life. Brian Blessed playing himself, but himself as a welder or something.
I hope Taika produces this as an all-out ‘70s-style musical with John Cameron Mitchell writing/directing and Queen + Adam Lambert writing and performing the score.Or they could just do that as the Adam Warlock movie. Either or.
Morgan Freeman gif: He’s right, you know.
Let’s gay this place UP !
YAAAAAAAAASWait, Isaac was gay?
I have no idea whether or not Isaac was gay, but I know for sure that the actor, Ted Lange, got pissed off many years ago when he was doing summerstock theater performances in our little gay-centric tourist town and one of our drunken friends kept following him down the street, calling him “Isaac”, and trying to get him behind the bar to make drinks for everyone.
Yeah, so would I. Your drunken friend is an asshole.
R: Isaac… not sure, I just think he’s apropos if nothing else.
So yeah that sounds like you just ruined it. Adam Lambert? JCM is fine maybe if he doesn’t get too Short Bus ish. But you’re just asking for some David LaChappelle landscape of contrived neon. I ask for at least Gregg Araki and he’d probably work well with Waikiki.
I can get behind ALL of these ideas and they should all be jsut one film
One of the reasons Thor: Ragnarok holds a special place for me is because it very much emulates the aesthetic and tone of the fun and bombastic 1980 Flash Gordon film and I can’t think of a better director to take a crack at it, animated or live action.
What’s even more 80s than Thor Ragnarok is 80s Thor Ragnarok.
Lou is MY Hulk.
80s Thor Ragnarok is more 80s than the entire 80s.
Yep, the moment I saw Ragnarok I said a studio should hire Waititi for a Flash remake,
No kidding. In the blink of an eye, I went from “Oh sweet Jesus, they’re remaking Flash Gordon.” to “HOLY FUCK GIVE IT TO ME NOW!!!”Just get Queen and everything will be good.
I’d be down for MUSE doing the soundtrack but then again, I really dug
Mark Mothersbaugh’s soundtrack for Ragnarok and would be onboard with having him compose Flash Gordon as well.
The judges would accept MUSE as an answer.
One of my favorite parts of Ragnarok is the scene where they’re escaping Hulk world in the spaceships, which are PEW-PEW perfect. Watch the quick cuts of Thor/Valkarie/Hulk driving the ships–it’s pretty clear the control are flimsy cardboard cutouts, and all three of them are just driving willy-nilly. It’s a total love letter to cheesy 80’s sci-fi.
I make way too many references to FLASH! AHHHHHHHH! in my daily life so I hope he pulls this project through and I hope he uses the song.
I don’t know, after reading “Taika Waititi” and “animated”, I’m pretty damn sold on the idea!
“Izzit you?”“I’m Flish, mate.”“Yeh. I thot it wuz. Yer Flish. Yer right famus.”“I am?”“Yeh. Ev’rywun knows yeh from here t’ plenit Mongo.”“Fer real?”
“Yeh. Don’ let it go to yer hed.” ~ Taika Waititi’s Flish Gerdin
Pretty sure that was the script for this.
“Good, there’s oxygen on this planet!”
will there be vampires?
Will there be penisorus?
Before anyone says otherwise I’m just going to say that the 1980 Flash Gordon movie is perfect! The music, the cast, the cocaine, brilliant!
The End……?
Which part? It’s all great. It’s only problem is that it eventually ends completely and you have to return to dull real life(unless you just repeat and watch it again).
That Queen song is a classic, although my favorite part is the video where John Deacon is in that lively jumper, looking bored. This is my favorite scene in the 1980 movie. Iconic.
“Klytus, Are your men on the right pills? Maybe you should execute their trainer”
Brian Blessed of course being the best thing in anything he happens to be in.Although I am partial to this scene for, uh, reasons.
Brian Blessed, Timothy Dalton, Topol, Max Von Sidow all kick it up a notch for this movie. My entering puberty self always had a thing for Kala.
I love that every single bad guy – including Barin until his heel/face turn – talked with an audibly sneer to their voice. Such a perfect cast on pretty much all fronts.
“NO! NOT THE BORE WORMS!”
Flash, I love you! But we only have fourteen hours to save the Earth!
Not sure if I’ve noticed it before (probably for the same “reasons”) but her arms and legs are “held” by gold mannequin hands that you can see would be slipped out of very easily. I must be getting old.
Doing this as a straight-laced serious show with anything approaching hard science fiction isn’t going to work.
They need to lean into the ridiculous, candy-colored planetary romance of it all, which makes doing it in an animated fashion a great idea. And Waititi seems unlikely to take it too seriously.
While I don’t think anyone wants a new Flash Gordon, this might end up being a pretty fun piece, if it ever actually makes it to market.
It seems fitting in response to your post about leaning into the ridiculousness inherent in the concept that I share a couple of sketches from the criminally forgotten Big Train which featured among others a young Simon Pegg.
That Queen song is so much better than the movie ever deserved. First time I saw the movie, I was SO JAZZED after that opening credits sequence with Queen’s theme song. And then the movie completely failed to live up to the exciting fabulousness of that song.If Waititi can make a movie that lives up to the promise of Queen’s theme song, it’ll be totally worth it.
There’s a documentary about this movie on Amazon Prime. It seems Sam Jones sabotaged the movie. There was a point he just stopped showing up for work before the it was finished. There’s a reason he hardly ever worked again.
I haven’t seen the doc, but that sounds weird. Wonder if it is DeLaurentis agenda-driven.He actually worked pretty steadily in TV. 82 imdb credits and it didn’t slow down for him much until the 2000s.
How about a reboot of Flesh Gordon?
Only if we can get a return of Little Poop./deep dive
This is actually a really smart hire, given that Thor Ragnarok was already, in many aspects, a tribute to ‘80s space fantasy epics. Just look at the title sequences.
Came here for the “Hawkmen! Diiiiivvvvve”.Looks like I’ll have to provide myself:
If Brian Blessed is not given a cameo I will TURN THIS CAR AROUND!
How did you not come here for ‘Gordon’s Alive?!’
I mean sure, If I had time in my life for two Brian Blessed catchphrases.Though to be honest, this would be the second. Chiswick! Fresh Horses!
I was looking for “flying blind on a rocket cycle”.
Really, every single line from the movie is pure gold.“No! Not the bore worms!”“What do you mean ‘Flash Gordon approaching’?”“Klytus! Are your men on the right pills? Maybe you should execute their trainer!”
“Go Flash, go!”
“Flash! Flash! I love you! But we only have 14 hours to save the Earth!”
“OPEN FIRE! ALL WEAPONS!”“Dispatch War Rocket Ajax to bring back his body!”
Just Flash Gordon?
or….
How did I not know this thing existed?! It’s good to see Roadblock found work after G.I. Joe was disbanded following those congressional oversight hearings.
Main Title Lyrics by:
(yes, you read correctly)STAN LEE
I remember this. There were even action figures!
I’d have been all in on those toys if I’d known this thing existed.
Wait, what is this? And why does it rule?
Mandrake is clearly the best, being the only Victorian magician in a team of interplanetary do-gooders and not giving a shit.
Didn’t James Gunn basically prove their is an appetite for over-the-top science fiction/fantasy adventures in space, with wild colors and improbable places?A different breed of humor, for certain, but all the elements to make a Watiti special is there in the source material.
I bet kids are as thrilled about this as seeing John Carter of Mars in a big-screen adaptation!
Another Flash Gordon reboot and still no Buck Rogers movie? For shame… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_Rogers
What the world needs now is another Ice Pirates. BRING BACK ROBOPIMP!
“Bubbles, the animated Netflix movie about Michael Jackson’s life told from the perspective of his pet monkey…” Uhhhh…WTF? Let’s make a cheeky animated movie about a child-raping pedophile? This is a thing that somehow got approval each step up the ladder? Holy fuck.
I imagine a modern Flash Gordon would work much like the 1980s Flash Gordon: lots of colour and craziness and science fantasy.
Waititi is a good choice, because the advertisements and half of Thor: Ragnarok was more Flash Gordon than Thor.The problem is… the 1980 film was a flop. It rejected the Star Wars look while every other science fiction film was tripping over itself to look like that. And that aesthetic is even less desirable now. The film has a cult following and a lot of fans who loved it as kids (yo!) but it never really had mainstream appeal. And I don’t see how a reboot will capture that feeling.
Flash Gordon is one for the ages. The film came out when I was 11 and I loved it, but in the late 70s early 80s, the BBC used to show the episodic black and white series that was a staple of Saturday morning cinema in the 1930s, and I think I loved that more. George Lucas certainly did as Star Wars borrowed huge chunks of its spirit, not least the scrolling recap at the start.
All the snark here is really unnecessary. Whatever the size of Flash Gordon’s current fanbase, surely you can recognize that its CONCEPT is a corking good one for a fantasy adventure blockbuster?
Shot for shot remake directed by Taika starring Adam Scott as Flash (with a Sam Jones bleached hair job) and Amy Poehler as Dale. Also, Nick Offerman would do justice to Prince Vultan. Timothy Dalton could reprise his role as Prince Barin.
Why not Flash Gordon? Nostalgia is huge right now. Pure cheese is huge right now. Pure cheeses nostalgia should break the box office.