Thunderbirds: The Complete Series Blu-ray Review
Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman, May 21, 2015
With the recent announcement that
The Muppets are
returning to prime time this fall, broadcast television can once again proudly offer puppeteers some meaningful employment. The fanciful worlds
and characters brought into existence by the legendary Jim Henson are incredibly unique, but perhaps Gerry (and Sylvia) Anderson deserve a
kudo or two for their "Supermarionation" technique, which combined highly articulated marionettes (which included some electronically
controlled features) and incredible scale model work that sought to provide a suitable environment for the stringed characters. Probably the
best remembered Anderson offering was
Thunderbirds, a mid-sixties outing that didn't actually last that long in its original broadcast
run, but which has gone on to achieve near legendary status due to both incessant rebroadcasts, but also feature film adaptations, reboots
and playful homages like
Team America: World Police.
Niche
label Twilight Time released a double feature of
Thunderbirds Are Go / Thunderbird 6 almost exactly a year ago (as this review is being published), and now Timeless
Media Group (an imprint of Shout! Factory) has upped the ante by bringing the entire original series to high definition.
While producer Sir Lew Grade found breaking into the American broadcast market more of a daunting task than perhaps he initially thought it
would be (something that reportedly played into the series' relatively short production run), as I mentioned in our
Thunderbirds Are Go / Thunderbird 6 Blu-ray review,
the series
was broadcast in the Seattle market a few years after its British airing, and I was a member of a near perfect young male
kid
demographic
which would fall unabashedly in love with
Thunderbirds. Even then, though, I was more than passingly aware with how patently
weird the whole
thing
was, with these somewhat creepy looking marionettes marauding through adventures with a mid-century modern science fiction ambience.
The series is built around the exploits of the Tracy family, a
Bonanza-esque assortment of males (in fact Papa Cartwright himself,
Lorne Greene, was evidently the source for the model of this show's dad, Jeff Tracy). Jeff's boys include Scott, Virgil, Alan, Gordon and John,
which if you're incredibly astute you may have noticed also happen to be the first names of then very popular public heroes from NASA. Each
of the boys is frankly somewhat interchangeable in terms of any given episode's plot mechanics, but there are also distinctive, defining
characteristics given to them, including backstories or talents (like Virgil's facility with various Arts). (Here's a bit of trivia for those interested
in the voice cast. Virgil was voiced by David Holliday in the first season. Holliday also had an interesting stage career, and received a
Theater World Award for co-starring in the 1969 Katharine Hepburn musical
Coco, about famous designer Chanel. David got to sing
what is arguably the best tune in the Andre Previn-Alan Jay Lerner score, a smokin' jazz waltz called
A Woman is How She Loves. On another note—no pun intended—Lady
Penelope Creighton-Ward, the aristocratic London presence of International Rescue, is voiced by Sylvia Anderson herself.)
The Tracy Family is the driving force behind a supposedly top secret initiative called International Rescue, an organization which exists to,
well, rescue various people who get into dire straits. This is no mere global fire department, however, for due to Jeff Tracy's immense
wealth, the Tracys have created a high-tech paradise which includes a space station to monitor Earth's various tribulations and a number of
supercool flying (and "swimming") apparatuses called Thunderbirds. Part of the unique charm of the series is seeing the facility with which
effects director Derek Meddings handles the small scale recreations of the Tracys' world. Everything from picayune elements like controls in
the various crafts to larger things like the Tracy swimming pool which retracts to allow the launch of a rocket is handled with amazing skill
and finesse and remains one of
Thunderbirds' most enduring achievements.
There's a fair amount of ingenuity in the various disasters striking folks throughout the series, with the first season opener detailing some
incipient terrorism on the part of master villain The Hood when he places a bomb on a plane. A later episode finds one of the Thunderbird
vehicles damaged by what amounts to friendly fire. This series' answer to
James Bond's Q, Brains, also proves he may have the smarts when it comes to gadgets, but he's sometimes
precariously ill equipped to stay out of trouble himself. Later installments bring back The Hood as well as the
Fireflash airliner which
kicked off the show. Some disasters have rather unlikely if amusing causes, as in one episode where a distraught woman's distracted driving
leads to an incredible explosion (things that go "boom!" are a
Thunderbirds staple) in an ultra-modern underground parking garage.
While there's an unavoidable quaintness to seeing everything done with practical effects, the show is so patently charming while also so
unabashedly outré that it will probably not come in for withering glares from cynically minded younger viewers. In a way,
Thunderbirds looks slightly backwards to 1964's
Jonny Quest
(super secret island hideaway filled with scientist-heroes and lots of high-tech wizardry) as well as presaging newer efforts like
Batman: The Complete Series
(undercover superheroes drop down to their high tech "batcave" to assume new identities). While there's never any real
question as to whether or not the Tracys will triumph over any and all incoming fracases, the sheer technical marvel of
Thunderbirds
should be more than enough to engage children of all ages.
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