61 Thunderbirds

First  watched  : Uncertain

The  crowning  glory  of  the  Anderson  puppet  stable  was  this  one. Thunderbirds  first  emerged  in  1965 , shortly  after  Stingray.  The  premise  was  that  a  reclusive  but  philanthropic  billionaire  Jeff  Tracy  had  set  up  a  non-governmental  agency  International  Rescue  using  space  age  technology  to  perform  humanitarian  missions  when  needed. The  spaceships  were  piloted  by  his  five  dashing  sons  aided  by  bespectacled  geek  Brains. To  preserve  the organisation's  integrity  and  protect  their  advanced  technology  from  misuse  the  Tracys  hid  out  at  a  remote  island  with  concealed  launch  sites. They  also  had  double  agents  elsewhere  in  the  world  to  obtain  foreknowledge  of  any  threats  to  the  operation; the  most  notable  were  English  aristocrat  Lady  Penelope  and  her  lugubrious  chauffeur,  Parker.

The  thing  that  most  distinguished  Thunderbirds   from  the  other  Anderson  series  was  its  50  minute  running  time, double  the  length  of  Captain  Scarlet  or  Joe  90  ( and  longer  than  any  other . For  me  at  least  this  was  also  its  Achilles  heel. I'd  sit  down  excited   at  the  prospect  of  watching  something  longer  and  a  little  more  demanding  and  then  find  my  attention  wandering  especially  when  Penelope  and  Parker  were  on  screen, their  operations  often  seeming  barely   connected  to  the  main  story.  I  also  found  it  a  bit  samey, one  episode  was  much  like  another  and  the  Tracy  boys  were  so  undifferentiated  that  to  this  day  I  couldn't  tell  you  which  one  was  which.

Thunderbirds  was  cancelled  in  1966  after  32  episodes   because  Lew  Grade  overplayed  his  hand  and  failed  to  sell  it  to  the  American  networks  but  it  remained  a  staple  of  ITV's  Saturday  morning  and  holiday  schedules  throughout  the  seventies. ITV  put  it  to  bed  in  1981  and  it  was  off screen  for  a  decade  until  the  reception  for  a  Radio  Five  adaptation  in  1990  prompted  the  BBC  to  buy  it  off  them. When  re-broadcast  in  1991 it  was  a  massive  success  with  huge  merchandise  sales  and  promotion  of  the  series  on  other  programmes  such  as  Blue  Peter  making  models  of  Tracy  Island.  The  series  was  regularly  repeated  through  the  nineties  and  early  noughties  but  suffered  some  brand  damage  from  the  2004  live  action  adaptation Thunderbirds  and  hasn't  been  broadcast  since  2006.  Gerry  Anderson,  who'd  sold  his  rights  back  in  the  seventies, described  the  film   as  "the  biggest  load  of  crap  I've  seen  in  my  entire  life ". However  a  CITV  remake  of  the  series  is  said  to  be  on  the  way.