Sunday, September 24, 2006

Thunderbirds are Go!

5,4,3,2,1....Thunderbirds are go!

Saturday Mornings, 10am and I was sitting before the telly...HTV (Harlech Television) and I was set. My favourite TV show in the whole world. The world of Gerry Anderson was my world. Stingray, Captain Scarlet, Secret Agent and my other favourite Joe 90 who my son loves watching just as much as I did. The schoolyard was full of kids doing the marionette walk on Mondays. The music as I recall was "deadlydesh" as we say in Wexford.

It is amazing seeing my youngster develop passions for the same thing I once enjoyed as a youngster.

As we grew up, Gerry Anderson developed series for the adult world like U.F.O. and his more famous work Space 1999 which has a huge following stateside. Martin Landau was the main star in this series. The premise of the series was that the Moon was being used by earth as a repository for storing nuclear waste. A catastrophic explosion blows the moon out of the earth's orbit and sends it hurtling through space. It actually was a fun series and very popular when aired. The models used were brilliant in concept 7 design, the eagle transporters (pictured) being particularly striking. The design crew of this series led by Brian Johnson (who worked on Thunderbirds as well) went onto work for Ridley Scott in "Alien" and George Lucas in Star wars "The Empire strikes back".

UFO, for me though was the Dog's Bollix of Cult TV. Great premise, a secret organisation set up to counter a sinister alien invasion. Great stuff when you're a teen and the world is full of conspiracy theories. The autopsy of the alien in the first program was incredible (for the time) TV, 11pm on HTV - Saturdays. Great thing I was allowed to stay up & watch it by my mam. (mam= IRE, mom=US, mum = UK). Barry Grays theme music as before in all the other shows listed here was groooovy!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nice blog Pat. My memory was faint on this until i read the entire post. A blissful reminder on "Tintin, Captain Haddock etc. al" and a sentimental evocation of childhood fun.

francis mahon said...

Pat,

Can't beat nostalgia, can you? Hartigan was saying the same sort of thing a couple of weeks ago - how he got as much of a buzz out of his young lad's toys as the kid himself!

Was hit with a massive dose of nostalgia myself yesterday morning - flicking through the channels and happened on "Batfink" - his catchphrase: "your bullets cannot harm me, my wings are like a shield of steel". Remember him, or was he a little past your time?