Thunderbirds Are Go!© Hunter Peters
Aug 29, 1997
Forget Star Trek and never mind Dr Who, the real breakthrough sci-fi series
of the sixties featured better acting than Trek and far superior effects
than Who. Using puppetry techniques pioneered by Reg Hill and John Read
and the brilliant special effects of future Oscar winner Derek Meddings
"Thunderbirds" ranks as an all time telly classic.
The innovative puppetry became known as Supermarionation. SuperM was
a huge improvement over existing television puppetry. Initially designed
in 1958 by Read and Hill for the APFilms' western themed kiddie show "Four
Feather Falls" (the third APFilms series after the unremarkable "Adventures
of Twizzle" and "Torchy the Battery Boy") SuperM would continually
evolve through such classic programs as Supercar, Fireball XLS, Stingray,
Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Joe 90 and The Secret Service.SuperM allowed
the puppets to move, speak and react in far more realistic ways then ever
before possible. APFilms, under the auspices of Gerry Anderson, his then
wife Sylvia and Arthur Provis, also went to the unusual lengths of molding
the puppets heads to resemble the features of each characters' voice actor.
This, combined with Meddings effects and the meticulously detailed sets
and miniatures helped to create alternate universes where suspension of
disbelief was almost magically achieved. The Anderson Supermarionation series were uniformly technologically
innovative and quirkily enjoyable with such unforgettable characters as
Supercars' Mike Mercury, Col. Steve Zodiac of the World Space Patrol in
Fireball XLS and Thunderbirds' Tracy brothers and the lovely Lady Penelope.
My personal favorites include Joe 90's nine year old super spy and Secret
Service's Father Unwin, portrayed by the marvelous Stanley Unwin. One short article can hardly do justice to Supermarionation, luckily
the Web is well stocked with useful sources of SuperM info... Your first stop on the SuperM Information Highway should be Lester Novros'
amazingly comprehensive Supermarionation Page.Lester has compiled information
on every aspect of SuperM and you'll likely find yourself visiting again
and again. Other general sites of interest include the Gerry
Anderson FAQ List , Adam
Broom's Gerry Anderson Productions' site and Earth
Station 1 which offers a wide array of sound files from
many of the SuperM series. If your interested in specific programs you might want to check out
these sites: Thunderbirds
Thunderbirds
(in French)
Thunderbirds
[Nagano Takaaki]
Stingray
Joe 90 | 
