Disney starts the long countdown on a relaunch of 'The Rocketeer'

LOS ANGELES -- A sequel to The Rocketeer is in very early development stages at Disney, Mashable has confirmed, with an original story that would take place six years after the 1991 cult hit.

Disney has hired screenwriters Max Winkler and Matthew Spicer to start tapping away on what is tentatively being called The Rocketeers, according to people familiar with the studio's wishes for the project.

The project does not have a budget, production schedule or release target -- and could be years away if it becomes reality at all. What it does have is a very specific idea for the story:

In Rocketeers, Cliff Secord has vanished while fighting the Nazis, and a young pilot takes up the Rocketeer mantle to stop a villainous scientist from stealing the jetpack tech. The studio has taken the unusual step of identifying the main character's race and gender before script stage, saying the pilot is an African-American woman.

Producers include Brigham Taylor (The Jungle Book) and two professional athletes -- Blake Griffin (The Los Angeles Clippers) and Ryan Kalil (Carolina Panthers).

The original Rocketeer, from Captain America: The First Avenger director Joe Johnston, was not a box-office hit -- the film opened to $9.6 million in the U.S., good for fourth place. But over the years it has amassed a wide and passionate audience, and is often floated as a film in need of another chapter.

People behind The Rocketeers, first revealed Thursday by The Hollywood Reporter, are calling it a "sequel reboot," a similar concept to the "apple orange," but hey, we'll allow it.