Comic Connections: The Beatles and Rocky/Rocket Raccoon

Welcome back to “Comic Connections”, an article series designed to explain comic book references found in media and pop culture. Today we’re looking at “Rocky Raccoon,” a Beatles song that would go on to have a surprisingly large impact on the creation of a popular spacefaring comic book character. Specifically, we’re explaining how Rocket Raccoon’s origins are directly inspired by this Beatles song.

“Rocky Raccoon” is a song, by the Beatles, released in 1968 on the “White Album“. It is about a man named Rocky Raccoon and his girlfriend, Nancy, who “ran off with another guy.” Rocky challenges this man to a duel, in which Rocky is seriously injured. After having his injuries treated, Rocky picks up a Gideon’s Bible from his hotel room and decides to turn his life around.

While the story of Rocky Raccoon is relatively straightforward, the story of Rocket Raccoon is a bit more out-there. His first-ever appearance is essentially a small cameo in a fledgling story arc, from 1976, that was ultimately left unfinished. In this comic, he goes by the name “Rocky Raccoon” and, for some reason, appears to speak with a British accent.

After this, a more refined version of the character is introduced through an issue of The Incredible Hulk, titled “Now Somewhere In the Black Holes of Sirius Major There Lived a Young Boy Name of Rocket Raccoon!” This comic establishes the character’s name as Rocket Raccoon, though he still occasionally goes by “Rocky” as a nickname, and removes his British accent. Soon after this, Rocket is further defined through his own solo comic series, which mostly continues the same concepts from his guest appearance in The Incredible Hulk.

Over the course of these stories, Rocket is introduced as a citizen of an isolated planet called “Halfworld”. On Halfword, Rocket is the guardian of an incomprehensible book said to contain secret knowledge about the origin of the planet, called “Gideon’s Bible.” The adventures in these stories are kicked off by the kidnapping of Rocket’s girlfriend, who is being used as a pawn in the political landscape of Halfworld. They go on to detail Rocket’s attempt to use Gideon’s Bible to treat an entire planet filled with mentally ill human beings.

With all of this in mind, the connections between the Beatles and Rocket Raccoon start to become more obvious. Both stories involve characters with similar names, detail a story about someone fighting for the woman, and end with resolution from a book called “Gideon’s Bible”. The name of The Incredible Hulk issue Rocket guest stars in is also clearly based on the first line from the song: “Now Somewhere In the Black Holes of Sirius Major There Lived a Young Boy Name of Rocket Raccoon!” vs “Now somewhere in the black mining hills of Dakota there lived a young boy named Rocky Raccoon.” There are definitely major differences between the two entities but they share enough similarities for the inspirations to be obvious.

However, over the course of time, the connections between Rocky and Rocket Racoon have slowly been eroded. Rocket’s solo series began this process by changing the name of “Gideon’s Bible” to “The Halfworld Bible”. Then, later adventures went on to completely retcon Rocket’s solo series and redefine the history of Halfworld. Now, most fans are left without any knowledge about the connection between these two works of fiction.

Luckily, the comics detailing Rocket’s origin are still available for exploration. Anyone can pick up his original adventures and see how much of an influence Rocky Raccoon had on the creation of Rocket Raccoon. A list of these comics can be found at the bottom of this article for anyone curious in learning more.

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Recommended Reading

If you’re interested in reading these comic adventures for yourself, we recommend the following:

• Marvel Preview #7- Rocket’s first comic book appearance. This comic can currently be found collected in Rocket Raccoon and Groot: The Complete Collection (Review).
• Incredible Hulk #271–  in which the modern version of Rocket first appears. This comic can currently be found collected in Rocket Raccoon and Groot: The Complete Collection (Review).
• Rocket Racoon #1-4- Rocket’s first solo series. This comic can currently be found collected in Rocket Raccoon and Groot: The Complete Collection (Review).
• Annihilators #1-4 and Annihilators: Earthfall #1-4 backup stories- in which Rocket’s history is altered. This comic can currently be found collected in Rocket Raccoon and Groot: The Complete Collection (Review).
• Check out ComicBookWire’s “Rocket Raccoon Reading Order” for a detailed explanation of how to approach all of his comic book appearances.