Model Rockets In Movies and TV.

The Rocketry Forum

Help Support The Rocketry Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
They repeated an episode of Scorpion tonight with a "$15 million" rocket launch Walter did to send his sister's ashes up to the stars:
2016-06-06%2022.54.38.jpg

2016-06-06%2022.57.45.jpg
 
On the DIY network Radio Control hobbies, Chris built a Estes Stormcaster. I still cannot find this video anywhere and they won't sell a copy of the show.
 
Just watched Owl City's "Beautiful Times" video, and I think I spotted a classic Estes rocket floating around the kid in the video a couple of times. Looks to be a 3 FNC but I couldn't make out the exact model.

[video=youtube;gfA-tPKPoNs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfA-tPKPoNs&list=RDDYRtvMIWXzE&index=5[/video]
 
Just watched Owl City's "Beautiful Times" video, and I think I spotted a classic Estes rocket floating around the kid in the video a couple of times. Looks to be a 3 FNC but I couldn't make out the exact model.

[video=youtube;gfA-tPKPoNs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfA-tPKPoNs&list=RDDYRtvMIWXzE&index=5[/video]

Ar 2:47 There looks to be the body and fins of a Wizard or another with fins that are basically a rectangle with a corner clipped off and glued to the body, other than that there's the flying lighthouse....
 
In a recent episode of Big Bang Theory Howard digs out several boxes of model rockets from his youth. He is looking for something he can do with his yet unborn son. He finds an unbuilt Estes Saturn V. Near the end of the episode they go out to launch it and it explodes. It bothers me that they show model rockets exploding as I am sure this does not endear the hobby to parents who know nothing about rocketry.
 
In a recent episode of Big Bang Theory Howard digs out several boxes of model rockets from his youth. He is looking for something he can do with his yet unborn son. He finds an unbuilt Estes Saturn V. Near the end of the episode they go out to launch it and it explodes. It bothers me that they show model rockets exploding as I am sure this does not endear the hobby to parents who know nothing about rocketry.

In the spin-off show Young Sheldon there are several episodes that have a scene or two where young Sheldon is doing something rocketry related. They even show a Little Joe II at the end of one of the episodes.
 
Ah! I somehow missed the previous posts on this thread but I'm glad to see it finally.

I think I posted about this in a separate thread but, just in case not, here's a condensed version.

In May of last year, our local NAR chapter (SoAR, #571) was contacted by reps from the TV show "Halt & Catch Fire". They were looking to include some model rocket launches in an upcoming episode and realized quickly that they didn't have the expertise to pull it off. To make a long story short, several of our club members met up at their studio for a couple of group-build sessions.
They wanted to launch 5 rockets at once, drag-race style, using "period correct...ish" rockets and controllers. Knowing that they would likely need to shoot the scene more than once, they decided 4 of each rocket would be enough and it was...barely.

A few weeks after the build sessions, a few of us were invited to the set on the day they were going to film the launches. Since the rockets were finished and we had given them lots of technical advice on how/where to set everything up and launch the rockets, I had thought we would be there just to sit back and enjoy the views. I was wrong. They put us to work and, for a day, the three of us were actual crew members on the set of a real TV show.

The experience was just amazing on so many levels and I wouldn't hesitate to do it all again. The episode aired on Sept. 22nd of last year.

If you go to Google images and enter the search string "halt catch fire connection is made", you'll find several pics from the set as well as some directly from the episode.

here's one to get you started: https://goo.gl/images/vx5xY1
 
There was a scene in the movie Star Trek: Generations where the villian Soran launches a rocket into a star to cause its collapse. This was actually a practical effects scene using a custom Public Missiles rocket model and an Aerotech K motor.
 
Last edited:
There was a scene in the movie Star Trek: Generations where the villian Soran launches a rocket into a star to cause its collapse. This was actually a practical effects scene using a custom Public Missiles rocket model and an Aerotech K motor.

Yeah, I built one of those.

DSCF2490.JPG
 
Freaks and Geeks , 7th episode. They destroy a perfectly good Mercury - Atlas.
 
I just came across this:

Street Hawk - S01E06 - Fire on the Wing.jpg


TV show "Street Hawk", Episode "Fire on the Wing"
 
There was a scene in the movie Star Trek: Generations where the villian Soran launches a rocket into a star to cause its collapse. This was actually a practical effects scene using a custom Public Missiles rocket model and an Aerotech K motor.

Dang, I ever realized why that scene looked so good! And now I really want that motor, what'd it do, planet surface to sun in ~7 seconds?


[video=youtube;fmIaHAtabSU]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmIaHAtabSU[/video]
 
Ah! I somehow missed the previous posts on this thread but I'm glad to see it finally.

I think I posted about this in a separate thread but, just in case not, here's a condensed version.

In May of last year, our local NAR chapter (SoAR, #571) was contacted by reps from the TV show "Halt & Catch Fire". They were looking to include some model rocket launches in an upcoming episode and realized quickly that they didn't have the expertise to pull it off. To make a long story short, several of our club members met up at their studio for a couple of group-build sessions.
They wanted to launch 5 rockets at once, drag-race style, using "period correct...ish" rockets and controllers. Knowing that they would likely need to shoot the scene more than once, they decided 4 of each rocket would be enough and it was...barely.

A few weeks after the build sessions, a few of us were invited to the set on the day they were going to film the launches. Since the rockets were finished and we had given them lots of technical advice on how/where to set everything up and launch the rockets, I had thought we would be there just to sit back and enjoy the views. I was wrong. They put us to work and, for a day, the three of us were actual crew members on the set of a real TV show.

The experience was just amazing on so many levels and I wouldn't hesitate to do it all again. The episode aired on Sept. 22nd of last year.

If you go to Google images and enter the search string "halt catch fire connection is made", you'll find several pics from the set as well as some directly from the episode.

here's one to get you started: https://goo.gl/images/vx5xY1

So who actually built the rockets? Was it your club or people from the prop department? I assume they brought the actors in to shoot a few scenes where they pretended to build something. Anyway, it sounds really interesting.
 
was watching Eureka(season 5 episode 4) and saw this
 

Attachments

  • fargorocket.jpg
    fargorocket.jpg
    12.7 KB · Views: 105
Well, I watched both, so could be. However the Batmobile was indeed supposed to have rocket launch tubes.

https://www.1966batmobile.com/spec.htm



Can’t be sure if they did use them in an episode, but by contract it was supposed to have the capability to fire rockets upwards. Contract says straight up, car's tubes were angled, contract writers not necessarily great fantasy car designers….. :)
It never shot a rocket, just fireworks. It was used in the first episode.
 
As an aside, there's the curious case of the Tripoli Rocketry Association credit in The Naked Gun.

-- Roger
I *know* this is an ancient thread and all... and I don't know if anyone else has ever spotted this... (I did a search or two here....) But I started watching the tube yesterday afternoon and during the opening sceen of "The Naked Gun", when the cop car is driving all over the road and thru bowling alleys and people's houses I spotted something just for an instant.... and thanks to contemporary DVR technology... I got this:


ITSAPHOENIX.jpg

However it looks like an Estes Phoenix to me!
 
Last edited:
So who actually built the rockets? Was it your club or people from the prop department? I assume they brought the actors in to shoot a few scenes where they pretended to build something. Anyway, it sounds really interesting.

Ok, this question is 2.5 years old, but better late than never. Besides, *I* didn't resurrect the thread, and I always like talking about this because it was a lot of fun. ;)

We built the rockets (i.e. SoAR), and the prop department painted them. The build was at the production studio over two nights. They fed us and gave us a tour of the set. The show is on Netflix. Season 4, episode 6: "A Connection is Made." The rocket scenes are near the beginning of the episode, starting about 5 minutes in. I'm really glad I got to help out, because the scenes are exactly how everyone here wishes Hollywood would shoot rocketry - depicting the hobby in a realistic way. Nothing blows up, nothing gets destroyed. Father-daughter bonding. It's a good scene.

The actors didn't come in to shoot building them. In the first scene, the rockets have already been built by one of the characters. But the SoAR members that went to the shoot got to meet the actors. I had to work that day, so I missed out on the fun.
 
Well, I don't know for sure, but is it even possible that there's not one in NCIS, something of McGee's? Or something that's either a victim's or a perp's, and McGee knows all about it?
 
I *know* this is an ancient thread and all... and I don't know if anyone else has ever spotted this... (I did a search or two here....) But I started watching the tube yesterday afternoon and during the opening sceen of "The Naked Gun", when the cop car is driving all over the road and thru bowling alleys and people's houses I spotted something just for an instant.... and thanks to contemporary DVR technology... I got this:


View attachment 428237

However it looks like an Estes Phoenix to me!
That movie a classic
 
In the movie “sandlot” when there trying to get look at “the beast “ in the backyard, you see a lawn dart half way in the ground. Looks like maybe a mid powered rocket
 
Not a whole rocket, but I was watching a clip from Avengers and:

1618287955963.png
 
Thread necromancy.

Well, there's also show necromancy. On a commercial for the revived Pawn Stars, there is a launch clip. Why, I couldn't say. Is someone pawning a completed rocket? It looks to be mid-power.
 
This was briefly mentioned.
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
The Piranha spy car fired rockets from tubes in the gull wing doors.
The rocket was designed by none other than Lee Piester himself.
Rocket's name was April Dancer, after Stephanie Powers character in The Girl From U.N.C.L.E.
uncle2.jpg
UNCLE-AprilDancer.jpg


(Notice when the rocket blows up the helicopter you can see the string holding it up. 60's special effects. )


Semroc had a kit, now OOP:
1618331632192.png
 
Last edited:
Back
Top