Category Archives: Thunderbirds

Thunderbirds – 17. Desperate Intruder

Brains is placed firmly in the centre of the action in this week’s episode as he becomes the only member of International Rescue to meet The Hood one on one. When an attempt was made to give him a prominent role in Day of Disaster he ended up being sidelined as the comic relief. Here the focus is only deadly danger and some of the most disturbing moments ever seen in Thunderbirds. There’s no question that The Hood is back to the level of nasty last seen way back in Trapped In The Sky.

Thunderbirds – 15. Day Of Disaster

Day Of Disaster demonstrates that when the ambitious Americans of the Thunderbirds world are daring enough to try and send a rocket to Mars, one pompous Brit in love with his rusty old suspension bridge is enough to bring the project to a grinding halt. Yes, the British don’t always come out on top in Thunderbirds and appear to fundamentally lack common sense a lot of the time – such as Lord Silton being driven all the way to the bank in Vault of Death only to have forgotten his key, or Sir Jeremy Hodge in The Perils of Penelope standing at a locked door yelling about how British he is but not actually trying to fix the problem. Day Of Disaster is the next in a line of episodes which shows us how ineffective, yet loveable, us Brits are in Gerry & Sylvia Anderson’s vision of the future… to say nothing of the amazing sequence when the rocket falls off the bridge.

Thunderbirds – 14. End Of The Road

The construction world of the future is a theme focussed on time and again in Thunderbirds. It often comes back to the idea that despite all the highly advanced and automated technology, it still takes hard work and human sacrifice to make things really happen. Despite all these tech-based endeavours, human characters are still the central focus of such stories, End of the Road being a standout example. It’s an episode full of spectacular special effects and some lovely looking guest vehicles – but also in the middle of it all is Eddie Houseman, a guest character whom we grow to like as we learn about his determination and his loose ties with the International Rescue organisation.

Thunderbirds – 12. The Perils of Penelope

If there was ever a case for Lady Penelope being the real star of Thunderbirds, this episode would be exhibit A. The Tracys take a backseat as Penelope and her bit of crumpet, Sir Jeremy Hodge, get caught up in an adventure full of sleuthing and danger!

Thunderbirds – Extending The First Eleven

For those of you that don’t know, every week I have been writing in-depth reviews of each episode of the original Thunderbirds series. During these reviews I have been closely studying what appears on screen and highlighting bits and pieces which point to how the episode was produced, and which parts worked well or didn’t work so well. Part of that process has involved analysing one aspect in particular which relates to the first eleven episodes to go into production.

Thunderbirds – 11. Brink of Disaster

There’s a general stereotype about Thunderbirds that the word ‘automatic’ should translate to the word ‘lethal’ by default. Brink of Disaster is the prime candidate for that being true. This episode brings us high stakes, with members of International Rescue in danger once again, and some enjoyable characters in the form of Warren Grafton and his crooked gang of businessmen. But there’s also something rather unremarkable about this episode which I want to try and pin down over the course of this review…

Thunderbirds – 10. Martian Invasion

Martian Invasion is a bizarre mix of a fairly ordinary rescue of two film actors trapped in a cave combined with what could have been one of the most important moments in the series – International Rescue’s capture of The Hood. How does this exciting opportunity play out? Let’s take a look.