Gerry Anderson (14 April 1929 – 26 December 2012)
Gerry Anderson was the man who made puppets cool. Before he came along puppets were for little children and silly old people who liked to be reminded of the pre-school days. With Gerry Anderson ‘supermarionation’ concept the puppets looked interesting and behaved like stiff actors. That’s why when Matt Stone and Trey Parker from South Park did a pastiche of Thunderbirds called Team America: World Police a lot of people did not seem to mind that it was a puppet film.
Puppetry is often seen as some Eastern bloc rubbish for the lack of new ideas. Yes it can be artful but in these days of cgi, film technology etc puppets come across as dull. Back in the days when there was no TV or home entertainment I suppose it could be seen as fantastic but with technology of the last 70 years puppets has no place. That’s why Gerry Anderson’s films and story was enlightening.
Apparently Gerry Anderson was not really interested in puppets but saw it as a way of getting into live action, so this makes it ever so more brilliant that when he did he changed the whole nature of children’s TV.
Anderson’s personal life was quite chaotic by all accounts which probably helped making his story lines a little bit more adult in the sense that the puppets tales had smoking, drinking and dealt with dark issues such as death and unfulfilled love. In the end he may have not gained the full financial rewards that should have gone to a genius like himself but he did manage to make puppetry an art form which has a future.
It always amused me that this quintessential British concept had to fake an American accent so that it was palatable to an international audience, re-emphasizing the fact that the 20th Century was the American century.
Here are a list of the TV programs most children in the west will have seen at some time or other.
Television series
The Adventures of Twizzle (1957–59)
Torchy the Battery Boy (first series only) (1960)
Four Feather Falls (1960)
Supercar (1961–62) – first Supermarionation production
Fireball XL5 (1962–63)
Stingray (1964–65)
Thunderbirds (1965–66)
Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons (1967–68)
Joe 90 (1968–69)
The Secret Service (1969)
UFO (1970–71)
The Protectors (1972–74)
Space: 1999 (1975–77)
Terrahawks (1983–84, 1986)
Dick Spanner, P.I. (1987)
Space Precinct (1994–95)
Lavender Castle (1999–2000)
Firestorm (2003)
Gerry Anderson’s New Captain Scarlet (2005)
Tv Theme Joe 90
Thunderbirds – Trapped In The Sky
Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons – The Mysterons
