Cinefantastique: Not Crazy about New Buck Rogers Director

Event Horizon's Paul WS Anderson has managed to be named director of the big-screen reboot of the Buck Rogers franchise. Cinefantastique has a short item with some more details, though the writer of the piece is clearly unimpressed with Anderson's work.

I'm not a fan of Anderson's; Event Horizon was an overhyped snooze, for example. But the previous director on the movie, Frank Miller, would not have been my ideal, either. So maybe we'll let Anderson surprise us, though this is already shaping up to be one of those movie development hell stories that goes on so long, it's anybody's guess how it'll turn out. Kind of like the last time Buck Rogers made it to the big screen (and no, I don't think that turned out well).

On the other hand, on the other hand ... While Buck fans are waiting to see what Hollywood coughs up on the carpet when it finally completes the movie, it might be a good opportunity to hunt down a copy of Armageddon 2419 A.D. This slim book contains the first two prose novellas of Buck, and it's far different from anything Glen Larson served up in the campy late-70s/early-80s series. I was frankly stunned with how racist the book was; at the end, it essentially calls for the extermination of the Chinese. So I'm not suggesting that you should read it because it's a worthwhile book, but because it might shake you to the core and make you realize that, Hell, Larson might have actually improved Buck Rogers.

Of course, experienced SF fans will be spending the next year or two rocking back and forth in their chairs muttering, Please don't let it be like the Flash Gordon movie. Please don't let it be like Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. Please don't let it be like the Flash Gordon TV series ...