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Thunderbirds (TV series)

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 ITC Entertainment Distributions
Thunderbirds
200px

Opening title
Format Supermarionation Sci-Fi adventure
Run time 50 min.
Creator(s) Gerry Anderson
Starring Peter Dyneley
Shane Rimmer
Sylvia Anderson
Country UK
Network 30px ATV
Original run September 30, 1965 – December 25, 1966
No. of episodes 32 (64 in half-hour "cliffhanger" format)
Production Company 30px AP Films - first season; Gerry Anderson Productions - second season

Thunderbirds was a British 1960s television show devised by Gerry Anderson, produced by both Sylvia and Gerry Anderson and made by company AP Films using a form of puppetry called "Supermarionation". The series followed the adventures of International Rescue, an organisation created to help those in grave danger using technically advanced machinery. In particular the series focussed on the head of the organisation, ex-astronaut Jeff Tracy, and his five sons who piloted the "Thunderbirds" vehicles. A popular show, the series is still shown today and has inspired a number of later television programmes and films.

Contents

Origins

Thunderbirds was the fourth children's action-adventure series made by Gerry Anderson's AP Films (later Century 21 Productions). Gerry Anderson developed the Thunderbids plot outline quickly while driving to see Lew Grade to review the next Supermarionation series.

Anderson had been inspired to write the series after a contemporary German mine disaster, where the heavy equipment needed to rescue the miners was located far away - transportation time was a major hinderance in the survival of the miners. The "race against time" element is one of the recurring themes in Thunderbirds. The show's title derived from a letter written to his family by Anderson's older brother, while he was serving in the United States during World War II. In the letter, he referred to an American airbase called "Thunderbird Field"; years later, Anderson decided to use the name because of its romantic sound.

Many of the crew came directly from APF's previous production Stingray, but for Thunderbirds the crew was expanded, and it was shot in a new and much larger studio facility in Slough. It was APF's first one-hour series. Thunderbirds had been in production for several months when ITC Entertainment boss Lew Grade was shown the completed pilot episode, "Trapped In The Sky" and he was reportedly so excited with the result that he immediately instructed Anderson and his team to expand all the episodes from 25 minutes to 50 minutes. Many fans believe this was a wise decision that enhanced the series with more complex plots and characters that drew considerable viewer interest. Grade not only owned ITC, but also part of APF/Century 21 and ATV, through which he broadcast his productions.

Production commenced in 1964 and the series premiered on British television in September 1965 in the ATV Midlands region. Other ITV regions followed, including London on 25 December 1965. Two seasons were produced, comprising thirty-two episodes in total.

Story

"Thunderbirds" TV series (Australian DVD cover) Jeff Tracy's sons (left to right) Gordon, Alan, Scott, Virgil, John (Aquanaut, Astronauts & Pilots)
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"Thunderbirds" TV series
(Australian DVD cover) Jeff Tracy's sons (left to right) Gordon, Alan, Scott, Virgil, John (Aquanaut, Astronauts & Pilots)

Set in the 21st century (stated to be 2026 in the series, retconned to 2066 in the movie Thunderbirds Are Go), Thunderbirds depicts the adventures of the Tracy family, which consists of construction tycoon and former astronaut Jeff Tracy and his five sons, Scott (pilot in charge of Thunderbird 1), Virgil (pilot in charge of Thunderbird 2), Alan (astronaut in charge of Thunderbird 3), Gordon (aquanaut in charge of Thunderbird 4) and John (astronaut in charge of the space station Thunderbird 5). Scott, Virgil, Alan, Gordon and John were all named after Mercury astronauts — Scott Carpenter, Virgil Grissom, Alan Shepard, Gordon Cooper and John Glenn. Together with Jeff's elderly mother, the scientific genius and engineer "Brains", the family's servant Kyrano and his daughter Tin-Tin, the Tracy family live on a remote, uncharted Pacific island. They are, in secret, the members of International Rescue, a private and highly-advanced emergency response organization, which covers the globe and even reaches into space, rescuing people with their futuristic vehicles, the Thunderbirds.

Tracy forms the idea of International Rescue after the tragic death of his wife, Lucille. Buying a small island in the Pacific and secretly converting it into the secret rescue base for IR, he convinces engineering genius Brains (who also uses codename Hiram K. Hackenbacker; real name Homer Newton III) to help him bring IR into operational reality, designing and constructing a series of fantastic machines and equipment. Key to this are the five Thunderbird craft and the many Pod Vehicles transported by TB2.

Some of the disasters attended by International Rescue are the result of accident or misadventure, but many are caused by deliberate sabotage. A recurring villain, The Hood (actually never named in the series, but given this name in the comics, tie-in books and other spin-off media), frequently causes major accidents in order to lure International Rescue's vehicles to the scene and spy on or steal them. Another complication is that The Hood's half brother, Kyrano, is the Tracy's servant, and because The Hood has some degree of psychic power over Kyrano, The Hood is able on one occasion to compel him to sabotage Thunderbird 1's security systems. Kyrano's daughter TinTin is romantically linked with Alan Tracy, as well as participating in many IR missions.

International Rescue's London agent, international socialite Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward, and her cockney butler/chauffeur Aloysius "Nosey" Parker, are often seen chasing The Hood and other villains in the pink, amphibious Rolls-Royce FAB 1, which is equipped with James Bond-style gadgets. (Rolls-Royce actually provided an authentic radiator grille to the production company for closeups of FAB 1 (such as when the retractable machine gun was fired).) Lady Penelope's yacht was called FAB 2.

The characters use the radio sign-off "F.A.B." rather than "Roger" or "Over and out". Anderson was often asked what F.A.B. stood for, but in fact it simply stood for "fab" (short for "fabulous"), a 1960s catchphrase. Later this was unofficially decided to mean Fully Advised and Briefed, following on from P-W-O-R (Proceeding With Orders Received), a similar radio confirmation code in the series Stingray. In Anderson's next series, Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, S.I.G. (Spectrum is Green) would continue the tradition of initialled call signs.

Uniform

Thunderbird pilots wear a mid blue uniform consisting of a poloneck tunic, trousers, boots, and a simplified glengarry cap. Each pilot is identified individually by a coloured bandolier, which holds a sidearm.

When on mission, TinTin sometimes wears a similar blue uniform with a pale blue belt but no bandolier.

Thunderbird vehicles

Primarily designed by special effects director Derek Meddings, the five main Thunderbird craft are:

Thunderbird 1
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Thunderbird 1

Thunderbird 2
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Thunderbird 2

Thunderbird 3
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Thunderbird 3

Thunderbird 4
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Thunderbird 4

Thunderbird 5
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Thunderbird 5

Pod vehicles

Thunderbird 2 was designed to carry specialised rescue vehicles and equipment to disaster sites in one of six interchangeable pods. Pod 4, which contains the submarine vehicle Thunderbird 4 and other undersea rescue equipment, is designed to be dropped from the hovering Thunderbird 2 directly onto the surface of the water. Through the series, there is one example of the pod being retrieved (in 'Day of Disaster').

The pod vehicles which would emerge from one of TB2's pods each week include:

The Mole
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The Mole

The Pod Vehicles were variously stored within the pods as necessary or in TB2s cavernous hangar.

Fireflash

Some episodes also feature the Fireflash, a supersonic airliner built in 2065. It has six atomic motors that enable it to stay in the air for a maximum of six months, however they must be given frequent examinations, or the passengers can only spend 3 hours maximum in the aircraft before succumbing to radiation sickness. Fireflash's maximum speed is Mach 6 (approximately 4,500 mph or 7,200 km/h), and can fly at heights above 250,000 feet (76 km). A novel feature is that the flight deck is built into the tail section. Like the A380 she has two Decks. Fireflash was built especially for Air Terranean (AKA: Terranean Airways) for long flights lasting over a day by jetplane.

Production

Voice cast

Brains
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Brains

The voice cast were all experienced character actors and several were already (or became) regular Anderson performers. Interestingly, David Holliday (the original voice of Virgil in Series I) was the only real American cast in any voice role in the series; all the others were British, Australian or Canadian.

Versatile Australian actor Ray Barrett provided the voices of John Tracy and The Hood, as well as many other one-off character parts. He was regularly used by Anderson and voiced both Commander Shore and King Titan in Stingray. Thanks to his extensive experience in live radio back in Australia, he was adept at rapid changes from one voice to another and he could also perform both English and American accents convincingly. By the time that "Thunderbirds" began, Barrett was a major star on British TV and since his return to Australia in the Seventies he has become one of the nation's senior film and TV actors.

Veteran Canadian actor Shane Rimmer (Scott) went on to appear in — and occasionally write scripts for — many subsequent Anderson productions. Rimmer has an extensive list of prominent TV and movie credits, but he is probably best known for his appearances in several James Bond films and for his role as Capt. G.A. 'Ace' Owens in Stanley Kubrick's Dr Strangelove. Rimmer has appeared in many action, thriller and science fiction films, including Star Wars, and has often been cast in military or political roles.

David Graham, one of Anderson's longest serving voice actors, had previously worked on Supercar, Fireball XL5 and Stingray and was also one of the original voices of the Daleks in Doctor Who in 1963.

Voice cast

Special effects

The programme was notable for the high quality of its miniature special effects, and most sequences still stand up remarkably well forty years after the series premiered. The effects supervisor on all of Anderson's shows from Supercar to UFO was Derek Meddings, who went on to produce special effects for the James Bond and Superman movies (Meddings won a Oscar for the first Superman film). Many of the effects developed especially for Thunderbirds became standard practice in the film industry.

One of Meddings' most famous and ingenious creations was the so-called "rolling road" and "rolling sky" system. The Thunderbirds storylines called for a large number of scenes showing the Thunderbirds and other aircraft flying through the air, landing or taking off along runways, or motor vehicles travelling along roads. Meddings' team quickly discovered that the old method — pulling or pushing models across a static base or against a static background — produced very unconvincing results. Meddings came up with a novel solution to the problem, which he first used in the premiere episode, "Trapped In The Sky". For the famous crash-landing sequence (which so impressed Lew Grade), the Thunderbirds' remotely operated "elevator cars" had to be shown being manoeuvered into position on the runway beneath the stricken Fireflash aircraft as it came in to land, so that the aircraft could touch down without extending its landing gear, which would have triggered a bomb hidden there by IR's nemesis, The Hood.

Meddings' solution was to construct an endless belt of canvas, stretched over rollers and driven by an electric motor. The miniature elevator cars were then fixed in position by fine wires on this "rolling road". The Fireflash model was suspended from wires above the elevator cars and it could be lowered onto the runway, creating a smooth and remarkably convincing descent effect. A similar roller system, painted with a sky background was built at right angles to the runway, and both roller motors were synchronised to provide a matching speed for both elements. When the lights and cameras were set up in the right position and the rollers were activated, the rolling road system created a very convincing illusion of movement. It also proved extremely helpful for the lighting and camera crews, since the miniature models did not move and were therefore much easier to light and shoot. The 'rolling sky' system proved equally effective for shots of flying aircraft. The illusion was enhanced by blowing smoke across the miniatures with a fan to simulate passing through cloud, and by joining the canvas belt at an angle to hide what would otherwise have been a visible seam. Unlike modern special effects, the model was still actually in front of the backdrop — at the time, this produced a more convincing (and far cheaper) effect than bluescreen technology. The 'rolling road' system was later used on several James Bond movies.

The team also quickly mastered the art of creating extremely convincing miniature explosions using materials including petroleum and fuller's earth. These were filmed at high speed, and when slowed down to normal speed they produced spectacular results. The team also became expert at creating a convincing illusion for rocket take-offs and landings. After an exhaustive search, they found a British firm that could make special thrustless solid-fuelled rocket canisters in different sizes, which burned for about ten seconds and which could be fitted inside the various miniatures to provide convincing rocket exhaust effects.

The show was justly praised for the exceptional quality of its miniature vehicles and sets. Some of the main Thunderbird vehicles were built by a professional model-making firm, but many others were custom-made by Meddings and his team from commercial radio-controlled motorised vehicle kits. Joining Meddings' team was Michael Trim, who became Medding's assistant to help design the fantastic craft and buildings of Thunderbirds. Meddings and Trim also pioneered the technique of 'customising' models and miniature vehicles by applying pieces taken from commercial model kits, to add convincing surface detail, for example the giant air conditioning silos either side of Thunderbird 1 in the launch bay beneath the swimming pool were actually a 1960's periscope toy manufactured by Merit.

The Thunderbirds miniatures were also 'aged' with paint and dust to create the convincing illusion that they were real, well-used vehicles. These techniques became standard practice in the special effects trade and were used to great effect in the building of the miniature spaceships and other vehicles for the first three Star Wars films.

Many of the effects team including Meddings and Brian Johnson became respected specialists in the film industry. Impressed by their work on the TV series, director Stanley Kubrick poached several of the Anderson effects team to work on his science fiction masterpiece .

Music

A crucial element of the show's success was its thrilling music score, composed and conducted by Barry Gray, who provided all the music for the Anderson series up to and including season one. His instantly recognisable "Thunderbirds March" is one of the best-known of all TV themes and has become a perennial favourite with brass and military bands around the world. Gray's original master recordings for the Anderson series were recently rediscovered in a storage facility in London and a remastering and CD re-release project is currently underway.

Gray composed a theme song with lyrics for the series that was never used, though a recording of it has circulated on the Internet. The melody was reused for the song "Flyin' High" which is heard in the "Ricochet" episode. For the Japanese broadcast of the series, the Thunderbirds March was replaced by a version of Gray's "Century 21 March" with Japanese-language lyrics.

Original broadcast

A total of 32 episodes of Thunderbirds were made between 1965 and 1966 (although production began in 1964, as indicated by the show's copyright date) for the British production company ITC Entertainment, and first broadcast on ATV. The TV series was financed by Lew Grade's companies ATV and ITC Entertainment. It was originally intended to consist of half-hour episodes, but on seeing the preview Grade decided that it would be much more exciting as an hour-long show. Ironically, when screened in the US, episodes are sometimes split into paired half-hours.

Thunderbirds ceased production very suddenly in the Autumn of 1966, six episodes into the second series. This was a decision made by Lew Grade after an unsuccessful trip to the U.S. to sell the programme. According to published reports of the incident, the three major television networks CBS, NBC, and ABC were all bidding on the series, and Grade felt he could play them against each other to gain a higher price. Unfortunately, when one dropped out, the others immediately followed. Although a genuine hit by that time, Grade still felt that the programme was too expensive to continue without the US market. The programme was instead shown in the US in television syndication with reasonable success.

Episode list

Thunderbirds films

The popularity of the series led to the production of two full length feature films, with financial backing by MGM. These performed disappointingly at the box office, possibly due to the numerous other children's films which appeared in 1966.

Thunderbirds Are GO

Thunderbird 6

2004 live action film

A live action feature film, also called Thunderbirds, was directed by Jonathan Frakes and premièred on July 24, 2004. All of the Thunderbird craft seen in the live action film were based upon the original designs, but with modern refinements, although a modified Ford Thunderbird was used as FAB1 because Rolls-Royce did not permit the use of their name and grill.

The plot sidelined the main series characters in favour of children characters who have to rescue the adults, alienating longtime fans of the show, many of whom are adults. It dispensed with the massive destruction of the series, and in fact includes very little by way of actual rescues. The plot of the 1966 film Thunderbirds Are Go also focused on Alan, the youngest Tracy brother, but he was not actually a child in that film.

The film performed poorly at the box office, with the film opening in 11th place in North America. A North American DVD release occurred in late 2004.

Merchandising

Several companies, including Matchbox and Dinky were licensed to produced die-cast metal and plastic toys based on the Thunderbird vehicles. They proved hugely popular and were one of the best selling merchandising lines of the decade. Original Thunderbirds toys are now expensive and highly sought after collectors' items.

Original novels

A number of novels were published based upon the television series, most during 1966:

In 1992 Corgi Books published four episode novelizations for children based upon the teleplays "The Uninvited", "Brink of Disaster", "Sun Probe", and "Atlantic Inferno".

The character of Lady Penelope was also featured in her own series of novels:

Thunderbirds today

The series has become a cult British institution, popular with both children and adults. Part of its appeal is that it is not particularly child centric - indeed it features no children as main characters, and was intended to be prime time entertainment for the whole family. Famously, in 1992, a re-run on the BBC led to a shortage of Tracy Island models, and so the children's programme Blue Peter helpfully demonstrated how to build a home-made version.

While not as gory as the later Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, puppet characters do die and there is massive destruction on a grand scale. In one episode, the Empire State Building collapses; in another, a terrorist detonates a nuclear device. Thus, it can still be said to focus on issues concurrent with modern times.

Current broadcast

Today, the series is frequently repeated on BBC2 in the UK and RTÉ Two in Ireland. Thunderbirds is also quite popular in Japan, where it was first broadcast in 1966 by NHK. For approximately three years (2000–2003) the satellite channel Boomerang UK broadcast uncut episodes daily, meaning that the complete run of 32 episodes was screened about 34 times. Thunderbirds was also syndicated on the now defunct US cable television network TechTV from August 5, 2002 through June 20, 2004. In Australia, the Channel 9 Network screened the series many times over in the 1970s and 1980s during the Saturday morning timeslot, and on weekdays during school holiday periods. The original (uncut) series was also re-broadcast several times on the Australasian Foxtel cable network in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Channel 9 still broadcasts Thunderbirds at 6:00am (30 minute episodes over a 2 weekends) on a Saturday, 40 years after the show premiered.

Modernising attempts

Some versions screened on the Fox Network and in US syndication in the 1990s used re-recorded voices and music, much to the annoyance of long-time fans. Even more widely disliked was Turbocharged Thunderbirds, a revamped version of the show which briefly aired in syndication c.1995, which replaced the original dialogue with "ironic post-modern" jokes, and live action introductions suggesting the events of the series take place on some strange alien "Thunder world" (with the two teenaged "hosts" controlling the action from a studio set resembling the interior of Thunderbird 5 and referring to Jeff Tracy as "Mr. T"!). Gerry Anderson was reportedly furious and the new version of the series quickly disappeared.

In 2000, the series was remastered with Dolby Surround sound for DVD release. Gerry Anderson, who had not received any royalties on the show since signing away the rights in the late 1960s, was employed as a "remastering consultant". A North American DVD release occurred in 2002.

A new series?

In September 2005, a QuickTime video file titled [Thunderbirds IR] was released on several P2P networks. It opens with music by Barry Gray and a few clips of the classic Thunderbirds 1 through 4 launching, then shows several scenes from an intended new Thunderbirds series from Carlton Television. The trailer shows a mixture of computer-generated imagery, such as internal sets, external settings, and a sleekly-redesigned Thunderbird 1. Scott Tracy, The Hood, and a lighthousekeeper puppet are seen. Scott Tracy is seen to walk, and even do a martial arts backflip! This suggests that the puppets are a combination of anamatronics and traditional supermarionation.

The trailer stated that a new Thunderbirds series would be coming in 2005 from Carlton Television and displays a phone number. The series was developed by Carlton with David Freedman as executive producer and David Mercer who was heading up the Children's department at Carlton at the time. Greg Johnson and Bob Forward were lead writers and Asylum did all the set builds and puppet work. Tim Field was line producer. Dave Throssel and a small team from The Mill TV Dept did the CG work. Steve Clarke directed the short. Gerry Anderson met with the Carlton team in the early days of development and gave his full blessing. However, when Granada and Carlton merged, the series was shelved until further notice.

Credits

Opening

Closing

References, parodies and imitations

References

Parodies

Imitations

Other

See also

External links


>

Gerry Anderson
Television
The Adventures of Twizzle > Torchy the Battery Boy | Four Feather Falls | Supercar | Fireball XL5 | Stingray | Thunderbirds | Captain Scarlet | Joe 90 | The Secret Service | UFO | The Protectors | | Terrahawks | Dick Spanner, P.I. | Space Precinct | Lavender Castle | New Captain Scarlet
Feature Films
Thunderbirds Are GO | Thunderbird 6 | Doppelgänger
Companies/Techniques
AP Films > Century 21 Productions | Supermarionation
Notable Collaborators
Sylvia Anderson > David Lane | Barry Gray | Reg Hill | Derek Meddings | John Read

 

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