Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

by Kevin J. Anderson

In New York City in 1939, a reporter discovers that world's leading scientists are vanishing mysteriously and teams up with a skilled pilot and daring associate to uncover the truth and stop a made scientist out to achieve world domination. Original. (A Paramount Pictures film, releasing Summer 2004, written & directed by Kerry Conran, starring Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Giovanni Ribisi, Ling Bai, & Angelina Jolie) (Science Fiction & Fantasy)

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction, Steampunk, Adventure, Media Tie In, Action, Robots

246 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published April 1, 2004

About the author

Yes, I have a lot of books, and if this is your first visit to my amazon author page, it can be a little overwhelming. If you are new to my work, let me recommend a few titles as good places to start. I love my Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I. series, humorous horror/mysteries, which begin with DEATH WARMED OVER. My steampunk fantasy adventures, CLOCKWORK ANGELS and CLOCKWORK LIVES, written with Neil Peart, legendary drummer from Rush, are two of my very favorite novels ever. And my magnum opus, the science fiction epic The Saga of Seven Suns, begins with HIDDEN EMPIRE. After you've tried those, I hope you'll check out some of my other series.

I have written spin-off novels for Star Wars, StarCraft, Titan A.E., and The X-Files, and I'm the co-author of the Dune prequels. My original works include the Saga of Seven Suns series and the Nebula Award-nominated Assemblers of Infinity. I have also written several comic books including the Dark Horse Star Wars collection Tales of the Jedi written in collaboration with Tom Veitch, Predator titles (also for Dark Horse), and X-Files titles for Topps.

I serve as a judge in the Writers of the Future contest.

My wife is author Rebecca Moesta. We currently reside near Monument, Colorado.

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is a big, dumb, silly movie that's a pastiche of pulp fiction and Saturday morning serials and adventure movies of the 1930s. I liked it very much. Anderson's novelization of the screenplay written by Kerry Conran (who someone should give a billion dollars to so that he could make a Doc Savage movie) is a good, straightforward adaptation. He neither adds nor deletes nor changes anything of substance but does add some clever and amusing flourishes such as noting other perils and challenges that Sky Captain in that alternate 1939 world has faced. Plucky Polly Perkins, Sky Captain of the Flying Legion, the evil Dr. Totenkopf... it's perfect pulp. Buckaroo Banzai fans will probably love this one, too. Grab extra popcorn.

[Matt Kelland · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some novelizations are simple transcriptions of the movie into prose. Others add depth, extending the characterization, building out the back story, or inserting events that didn't make it into the movie, and giving you a richer experience. This is one of the first type. It's a fun read, but really, just watch the movie.

[Wesley Tate · Rating 4 out of 5]

My wife picked this up for me as part of a new Christmas tradition. Just a simple, used book in the sci-fi genre. I had no expectations going into it and never seen the movie. It was an enjoyable quick read. Very campy and somewhat predictable, but that’s what I liked about it. It’s nice being able to turn your brain off and power through a story sometimes. From what others have said it follows the movie along like a script (which I believe the movie came first so makes sense). I would say without seeing that first, it’s pretty true by the way it’s written in length and voice. I wasn’t looking for a deep, complex read. If you’re looking for a quick vacation book in the fiction realm, I think it suites that purpose well.

[Derek · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's just like watching the movie, without the visual interest of actually watching the movie. It splits the difference between the olde-tyme movie serials of the twenties and pulp adventure series in the spirit of Doc Savage or G-8 And His Battle Aces. And like the pulps, the writing is stolid and without flourish; beyond grouping book sections into 'episodes' with cliffhangers and recaps of the adventure in progress, the author doesn't add character to the experience.

The small mentions of the other adventures of the Flying Legion made my day: tunneling-machine bank robbers, mind-control spheres, and weirder things.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

having read quite a few of the 30s pulp novels this novelization is emulating, I had a lot of fun reading this one!! Sky Captain is no Doc Savage but I like him anyway

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think I first saw this movie when I was nine, maybe ten, but I've only rediscovered it recently before finding its official novelization. Now, that's usually a bad thing. Usually, when it takes too long to be rediscovered if you've seen it years ago, you decide if you like it or not. Also, sometimes when the rating for the official film novelization isn't high enough, it probably means it sucks. It means it probably sucks so much that they know we've seen it and heard all about it, and they're hoping that by waiting several months when the novelization appears before the film's official release, we'll all have forgotten just how different it's meant to be from the beginning of its production. It's happened so many times before. Sometimes they even edit the movie before they release it after the novelization! Just for a bit of extra fooling. Thankfully though, this is actually quite good, so who knows what the deal is with it taking so long for the film to be released with the novelization already out now. It's a bit of a visual feast kinda deal. It's done in a sort of fake old style. It's a little blurry, a little flickery, and general looks like an old colorized movie. Which makes sense because it's an alternate history, set in the 1940s and it fills the dieselpunk genre very well. But in the case of the film, in fact nearly everything, aside from the actors, is computer generated. It's done really well, but it means the movie has to be really dark for most of the time. When there is a light scene, you can see the dodgy outlines around the actors where they don't quite fit in with the backgrounds. For the most part though, it looks really good. It does take some getting used to with the whole blurry deal, but once you're used to it you get kind of lost in it for a bit. Then, unfortunately, the novelty starts to wear thin, and you realize that the story is kinda second rate. As for this idea, it's like a tryhard Indiana Jones sort of story. It's about a newspaperman in a technologically advanced 1940s who teams up with an ace pilot in search of the origin of a series of terrorism to New York City from monstrous flying robots, as well as the reason for the disappearances of famous scientists and inventors around the world. It's basically full of go here, do this, go there, do that, but without much substance. However, it does stay true to the old timey sci-fi adventure formula of the 1940s, and in general it's not all that bad. It's hard to complain about a movie that does so many things well, and really seems to have reached it's goal in being presented in this unique style. It's also not a sequel or a remake, which is well worth extra points in my book. Not this book, but my own personal book. It's nicely original, generally harmless for all ages, and fun. Visually, this is a great movie. It's worth a look just to see the nifty style that's used. And dieselpunk is a very interesting and exciting genre, much like steampunk. It's tryhard old fashioned, but the story reminded me a bit of tryhard Indy. Reminded me a little of The Rocketeer somehow...It also makes me think of The War of the Worlds and Fleischer Studios' Mechanical Monsters, as well as Crimson Skies. This deserves to be a cult classic, and you gotta like the production of this film a lot especially, because that's saying enough.

[Robert D · Rating 2 out of 5]

A novelization of the movie of the same name. A mysterious agency is employing giant robotic devices to wreck havoc and steal items across the world. Pucky newspaper reporter Polly Perkins is on the scene for one of the first raids. Authorities of the world call on Sky Captain and his brave troop, known as the Flying Legion, to help defeat the robots. But after the first encounter Sky Captain's secret base is attacked by another way of mechanical creations. With his base all but destroyed and his ace scientist kidnapped Sky Captain, and Polly, being an around the world flight to rescue the scientist Dexter, and destroy the evil Totenkopf!

I was hoping for more character development and story depth, but it barely scratched the surface in that regard. Perhaps there were contract constraints involved. It does do a slightly better job of attempting to convey the aspect of the movie being an tribute to the old serials of the 1930's but overall didn't really offer the same cliffhanger aspects as the serials. No doubt attributable to the movie itself.

[Signy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A P-40 Warhawk that turns into a submarine, giant robots rampaging through an urban art deco city, and flying aircraft carriers! Who cares about a plot when there is so much steampunk literary technology candy to read through. Having said that, though the murder mystery parts were a bit cliché in the vain of Dick Tracy, the world building alone was worth the cover price. I also really enjoyed the ending, with its Wizard of Oz influenced reveal which I won’t spoil here. A great story for anyone into steampunk, alternate timelines or… a P-40 Warhawk that turns into a submarine!

[Phillip · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a novelization of the film, so no surprises that it sticks pretty close to the plot of the film. It's a good dieselpunk adventure story, with clear echoes of film noir, early twentieth century scifi, WWII fighter pilot films, and adventure stories where the heroes save the world.
A video review of the film: https://youtu.be/E6A5C2DrV5c

[Tyas · Rating 3 out of 5]

No need to try and use any real-world logic to understand the way things work in science fiction of the 19th century/early 20th century and the super-robot genre. After all, that lack of totally plausible explanation is what makes those works fun. Granted, with the power of hindsight, what we now think of as innocent understanding about nature and physic s laws was probably based on the cutting-edge science of the time. Still, science fiction is so much fun when there’s more fiction than updated science in it.

And when you read the novelization of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, what you will get is that super-robot logic. Hey, after all, this is not our 1930s. This is the 1930s in another world, where New York is attacked again and again by mad scientists (it has to be mad scientists, in this time of people just waking up to the dangers technology might bring them) and both villains and heroes use ultramodern technology you don’t even see today. (An amphibious Warhawk, anyone?) In our own world, that is. In The World of Tomorrow, the mad scientist Sky Captain is now facing is a German (it has to be a German) twisted doctor who goes with the name Totenkopf, who enslaves other brilliant, good scientists who are powerless against him to give a hand in developing things based on his crazy ideas.

Totenkopf’s fighting machines steal various things from all over the world for reasons unknown, and even destroy the (supposedly) secret base of the mercenary Flying Legion, forcing its leader, the taciturn Sky Captain, to embark on a solo journey, tracing down Totenkopf to destroy him. Well, Sky Captain is not totally alone; a journalist, Polly Perkins, his former flame, insists to go with him, wishing to get sure headliners for the newspaper she works for.

Don’t hope for any in-depth explanation, let alone analysis, of the characters. They are what they are. Nobody knows exactly what makes Totenkopf think the way he thinks and want the things he wants. Some modern readers probably would insist, “But where’s the background of this character? Where’s the psychological explanation for this misbehaviour?” If you’re in for that, I suggest you put your money somewhere else. Neither much is told about Sky Captain and Polly; we know next to nothing about who or what they really are. The only ‘past’ of theirs ever discussed is the misunderstanding in Nanjing several years ago that led to their break-up.

I bet The World of Tomorrow would feel more interesting and convincing in the film format, in which cinematography and stunning animation can cover for a far-too-ordinary plot and rather stereotypical characters. Still, a light, funny, fun read, this novel is – and I felt awed just thinking about the Flying Fortress, being the pathetic super-robot fan I am.

[Tracy Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

Robots attacking New York City and dissapearing German scientists..the story seem unrelated, but Polly Perkins, a reporter for the city paper, has a hunch that they are connected in some way. She is on to the story of a lifetime when she hitches a ride with her ex-boyfriend, Sky Captain, who is a member of the flying legion. She and Sky Captain discover the evil and dangerous plan of the scientist Dr. Totenkof, and its up to them to stop it before the Earth is completely destroyed.

I watched this movie ages ago and felt like picking up the book since it was laying around for ages, begging to be read! It made me want to watch the movie again! The book itself wasn't really great, though. You can tell its just taken play by play from the movie, focusing on the action instead of what any of the characters are thinking. It was kind of entertaining, and not the worst book. Not really very memoroable t me. I think you'd get a better experience from just watching the movie.

[Ed · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the movie, so it makes sense that I'd like the book. It was a bit different in spots, and went more into the background of the Flying Legion and Sky Captain's chief inventor, Dex. They mention other mad scientists that Sky Captain had faced in the past, and I kinda wished there were books telling those stories as well.

[Scott · Rating 1 out of 5]

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