SpaceCamp Deserves To Be Remembered For More Than Bad Timing
In space, nobody can hear you quote Star Wars.
It’s no secret that Star Wars sparked a lot of imitators. 1978’s Starcrash starred former child preacher Marjoe Gortner and future Baywatch star David Hasselhoff as they navigated a shlocky space thriller. 1984’s The Last Starfighter took the space opera element and folded in an everyday American kid hero. On the small screen, Battlestar Galactica became a franchise that persists to this day.
But while all of these stories were influenced by Star Wars’ sci-fi action and unlikely heroes, only one also referenced the effect that Star Wars had on pop culture itself. Forty years ago today, a rollicking adventure rooted in real-world science did just that, but was kneecapped at the last minute by tragic timing.
SpaceCamp has the perfect family-friendly adventure premise: some teens and tweens at NASA’s space camp are invited to sit in an actual spaceship, but artificially intelligent robot Jinx misinterprets sci-fi superfan Max’s (Joaquin Phoenix, then known as Leaf Phoenix) wish to go to space as an instruction. Jinx sets off the thrusters, and the kids are sent up without any plan for their return.
While set in our galaxy, Star Wars’ fingerprints are all over SpaceCamp, especially when leader Kevin (Tate Donovan) is trying to talk Max through a tense moment. To keep him calm, he offers a timeless piece of advice: “Luke! Use the Force, Luke... stretch out your feelings... The Force is always with you.” John Williams’ score makes it a meta moment, but it’s also an interesting bit of cultural history, one that shows how sci-fi can inspire a new generation of scientists as well as a new generation of sci-fi media.
SpaceCamp rockets teens (and their counselor Andie, played by Kate Capshaw) into space.
Unfortunately, SpaceCamp made cultural history for another reason: it premiered only a few months after the January 1986 Challenger explosion. Though it was filmed before the accident, marketing a space shuttle adventure in the wake of tragedy proved impossible, and the movie was a box office flop.
Watched today, though, SpaceCamp is an amalgamation of everything that makes ‘80s sci-fi movies so great, from the high-stakes adventure and major coming-of-age milestones right down to the goofy robots. It’s not Star Wars, but it’s a perfect illustration of the Star Wars effect. It may not top nostalgic lists of the best ‘80s flicks, but for kids who saw it at a formative time, it’s hard to forget. In fact, Disney announced a TV remake in 2020, and while nothing has been heard since, maybe, just maybe, a new generation of accidental teenage astronauts will soon be sent to the moon.
SpaceCamp is available on the Internet Archive.
