Remake of the hit 1960's "Supermarionation" television show. In the 21st century, Jeff Tracy, a former astronaut, amasses a colossal fortune and decides that he must use it to benefit others. His answer to this desire is to create International Rescue, a unique private emergency response service equipped with customized designed vehicles and equipment that enable the organization to react to any crisis whether it be in sea, air, land, or space. Jeff's five sons volunteer to operate as the pilots and field agents, as well as "Brains" (real name unknown) who acts as the teams' technical developer and engineer. In addition, Jeff's friend, Kyrano and his daughter Tanusha aka Kayo (based on the original series Tin-Tin character) agree to be the support staff. In addition to the field team, IR also maintains an intelligence network with Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward and her ex-con chauffeur, Parker as the chief agents in this arm. The series depicts this team as they answer various calls for help around and beyond the world while they prevent enemies like the Hood, Uncle to Kayo, from learning and exploiting their secrets. We join the story when Jeff (and probably Kyrano) is missing - presumed dead - and his family are having to continue with his legacy still hoping he might be found safe. Kayo is now head of security and Grandma (who is a poor cook) is in charge of mealtimes! In the future, the Tracy family run a private mechanized emergency response service. This new updated version of TB is something that even my grandson can enjoy. <br/><br/>Looking back at the puppet version and remembering how much I thoroughly enjoyed that. I can never imagine ever going back to that version again. With today's technology in the re-make of a long ago TV series, is great to see that they have kept up with the times.<br/><br/>So come on Lomax 343 you have to admit even for you this has got to be an improvement on plastic and strings - Oops sorry of cause with showing of an occasional human hand. I for one will never go back to the old Thunderbirds again.<br/><br/>Really appreciate the new CGI version. Having now seen a number of episodes including "Fireflash", which is a partial remake of the very first Thunderbirds episode "Trapped in the sky" I feel this is a good series which could get better, with some adjustments.<br/><br/>Firstly there needs to be more background to the characters and to the world they are living in (this could well happen over time as there are still many episodes left in season 1 and season 2 has already been given the go-ahead). But this needs to happen soon, so that we can grow to like the characters and have an understanding of their (future) world. It's all too vague at the moment and is really just 5 boys whizzing about (loudly) in great looking machines. Yes, the original was about that too, but you were given info. right at the start, that Father Jeff Tracy had been an astronaut and that he had set-up the International Rescue organization. In this remake we are not told this. What we are told is the year, that there is a Global force which has col. Casey as one of its leaders and that the mysterious, villainous "Hood" is the Uncle of Kayo, and was somehow involved in Jeff Tracy's disappearance. Hopefully this will all be expanded upon in upcoming stories. And hopefully we will also learn more about Lady Penelope and how she became involved with the team, as this has not been explained at all yet. <br/><br/>We don't need to know everything right away of course, but we do need some more information if we are to become involved as viewers. As it's not a continuation of the original series (Brains could not suddenly be Indian!) more info. is needed. And on that note about Brains I have to be honest and say I'm not in favour of the change to his character. As David Graham is back doing the voice of Parker, as he did in the original, I feel he could so easily have also reprised the voice of Brains as well. It seems very silly to change a beloved character, for no good reason. All it does is upset fans of the old series. The remake of "Battlestar Galatica" did a similar thing, by turning Starbuck into a woman! It seems the producers of these things do this on purpose just to make it a talking point to generate publicity! It does them no favours as fans of the old series are already against them from the start! And to say they just wanted to appeal to a new audience is incorrect, otherwise they wouldn't have taken so much trouble to keep it as close to the original as they have done. So it's clear they wanted old fans to come onboard also. Not the best way to go about it! <br/><br/>Also questionable is the "Fireflash" episode which is a remake of the very first episode of the old series. I'm not sure why this was done-and so soon-was it a homage to the original? Was it a way to tell old fans that although Brains and other things are different, this is still Thunderbirds as they knew it?!! I have no idea, but as a lover of the original series it was nice to see Fireflash again, albeit in re-designed form.<br/><br/>what isn't as nice is the new score. The opening intro, with the same countdwown as the original, is welcome, but the music is missing the power of the original, bombastic Barry Gray theme. And, yes, of course there is too much music in the episodes and too loud. But this seems to be the norm now with shows aimed at a young audience-don't let them get bored with too much dialogue just boom-out the music as much and as loudly as possible! No thought spared for the adults or parents who have to reach for the volume-down button on the remote! <br/><br/>The look of the series, however, is very good. The CGI is mostly extremely well done, although the characters are a bit clunky in their movements at times. But that is a minor point and it could improve in time. The machines and environments all look great, which is probably the most important thing. (I have to say, though, that I did wonder where on earth Lady Penelope & Parker were in the opening episode. It was, presumably, meant to be an English country lane that they were driving on, but it looked more like they were driving around and around on a snow-globe type diorama!) <br/><br/>So, although I feel there is promise for the future of this series, it depends on how quickly the producers start injecting more background info. into it, to get viewers more involved. Seeing all the machines flying around is great but that isn't enough-otherwise we could just play with the toys! Whoooosh!
Lavjybon replied
356 weeks ago