Rickety Rocket is a 1979 animated television series produced by Ruby-Spears, which aired as part of their anthology program The Plastic Man Comedy/Adventure Show.
Set in a far-flung future filled with flying cars, cities on asteroids, and all manner of wacky and wondrous gadgets, the show stars four African-American teens- determined leader Cosmo, intelligent (sometimes) Sunstroke, goofy (and overweight) Splashdown, and shrill-voiced Venus- and their sentient homemade spacecraft Rickety Rocket (or Rickety for short). Together, this quintet forms the Far-Out Detective Agency, traveling around the world- and the solar system- to solve mysteries and thwart evildoers.
Tropes in the series include:
- Alliterative Name: Rickety Rocket
- Alliterative Title: What happens when you mix an Alliterative Name with a Protagonist Title.
- Catchphrase: “Rickety Rocket, blast off!”
- Color-Coded Characters:
- Cosmo - Green
- Venus - Pink
- Splashdown - Blue
- Sunstroke - Yellow
- Rickety - Brown
- Dub Name Change: In the Brazilian Portuguese dub, Rickety Rocket is “Buggy a Jato” (“Jet Buggy”), Sunstroke is “Queimado”, and Splashdown is “Moleza”.
- Fake Band: One episode features the Astros, a rock’n’roll group who find themselves threatened by a Theatre Phantom.
- Meaningful Name: Rickety was made out of old pieces of junk and, while he’s not actually that structurally unstable, he certainly looks like he is.
- Midair Bobbing: Rickety is prone to doing then when he hovers.
- Opening Narration: Each episode opens with a bit of narration calling Rickety a “far-fetched mechanical miracle” while the episode shows him being built.
- Pink Means Feminine: Venus is never seen without a pink outfit.
- Protagonist Title: Well, technically Rickety is only one of five protagonists, but still.
- Sentient Vehicle: Rickety; given the sci-fi setting, he’s probably an AI, but in-series his sentience is about as well explained as Speed Buggy’s.
- Show Within a Show: In one episode, Rickety watches The Jasper Jet Ace Show, which stars a fat man who zooms around space in a jetpack.
- The Smurfette Principle: Venus is the only girl in the Far-Out Detective Agency.
- Space Pirates: One episode features a ruthless space pirate called the Cosmic Claw.
- Submersible Spaceship: Rickety demonstrates the ability to fly underwater in “The Deep Sea Demon Caper”, although the fact that he has to extend a glass dome and propellers puts this more in line with Transforming Vehicle territory than the usual use of this trope.
- Telescoping Robot: Rickety, full stop; there seems to be no limit to the amount of panels in his body that can retract to produce a robotic arm (or other useful attachment).
- Theatre Phantom: One episode has one of these kidnapping a musician for being in a band that supposedly “stole his music”. It turns out that he’s actually a shady music producer in disguise.
- Title, Please!: None of the episodes have visible title cards.
- Vehicle Title: Combined with a Character Title, as he’s a Sentient Vehicle.
- Video Phone: This being the future, everyone has one; this is usually how the Far-Out Detective Agency receives assignments. Rickety also has one of these built into him.
