Courtesy of Disneyland Resorts
Well, so much for the Buck Rogers theory.
It appears as though the idea of a fresh take on the 25th-century hero wasn't too far off the mark, though, as Brad Bird's hush-hush new project, "1952," definitely has a future-world vibe going for it with its official new title, "Tomorrowland."
Speculation has been running rampant for several months as to just what Bird's new movie is all about. Before last week, all we knew was that it was going to star George Clooney and be co-written by Damon Lindelof, the "Prometheus" and "Lost" scribe whose involvement all but guarantees months and months of maddening secrecy and half-assed rumors.
Things took an interesting turn last week when the filmmakers posted a photograph of a suitcase discovered by Lindelof on the Disney lot that apparently kickstarted the entire "1952" project. Inside the case were pictures of Walt Disney himself, which fueled the theory that the film was going to be a biopic of the world-famous entrepreneur (Disneyland itself opened its doors in 1955), and a certain copy of the old "Amazing Stories" magazine that hinted at a possible Buck Rogers adaptation.
It looks like the film is going to be a sort of meta-mix of both scenarios, if one imagines "Tomorrowland" as a fictional spin on one of Disney's own theme park attractions, a la "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "The Haunted Mansion." Our guess is that Clooney will be playing a P.T. Barnum-esque showman and inventor who presides over an amusement park that incorporates ahead-of-its-time technology.
Hmm ... perhaps alien technology, at that? Again, let the theories run wild.
"Tomorrowland" will open in theaters on December 19, 2014.