Sky High

Released July 29, 2005 by Walt Disney Pictures and directed by Mike Mitchell, Sky High dropped a John Hughes high school into a comic book. Michael Angarano's Will Stronghold arrives at the floating academy with no powers to speak of, gets tracked into the sidekick class, and hides it from his parents — Kurt Russell as the super-strong Commander and Kelly Preston as the flying Jetstream. Danielle Panabaker plays his best friend Layla, and Mary Elizabeth Winstead's technopath Gwen Grayson turns out to be considerably more than the senior class president.

It was a modest hit, not a phenomenon: about $86 million worldwide on a $35 million budget, with warm reviews that praised how completely it committed to the bit — affectionate about superhero tropes without turning smug. Landing three years before Iron Man kicked off the modern superhero boom, its cafeteria-table take on powers-as-cliques aged remarkably well.

That's exactly why it became a cult movie. A planned sequel and TV adaptation never materialized after the so-so box office, which left Sky High as a one-and-done — endlessly rewatched on Disney Channel airings and DVD shelves, and regularly rediscovered by people startled that the Kurt Russell superhero high school movie is actually good.