Super Space Theater 2

Back in the early eighties, ITC's New York office put together a series of movie-length compilations of Gerry Anderson's TV shows under the imaginative umbrella title of 'Super Space Theater'. It was an attempt to breathe new life into the properties which were not as big in the US as they were in other countries. There was also the fledgling cable television market which needed cheap product to fill its schedules outside of prime time. 

The titles were: 'The Incredible Voyage of Stingray', 'Invaders from the Deep', 'Thunderbirds to the Rescue', 'Countdown to Disaster', 'Thunderbirds in Outer Space', 'Captain Scarlet versus the Mysterons', Revenge of the Mysterons from Mars', 'The Amazing Adventures of Joe 90', 'Invasion:UFO', 'Alien Attack', 'Journey Through the Black Sun', 'Cosmic Princess' and 'Destination: Moonbase Alpha'. 

There was also an additional film culled from a non-Anderson series 'The Champions' which brought the total to fourteen.

The package was not a huge success in the States. In the UK, they fared better when Channel 5 Video released many of them on VHS into the then new sell-thru video market - The compilations sold very well and prompted them to continue to release tapes with unedited episodes on when the movies ran out. 

There's a good article about the 'Super Space Theater' features on the official Gerry Anderson website. 

Fast forward to 14 April 2021 and it's the very first international Gerry Anderson Day. To celebrate, in my own way, I came up with the idea of imagining a second run of 'Super Space Theater' features entitled 'Super Space Theater 2'. I managed eight - picking specific episodes and depicting them through the medium of faux movie posters. Here they are... 

MEGA TRUCK INFERNO

(Compiled from the 'Thunderbirds' episodes 'Pit of Peril' and 'Path of Destruction'.)

Two mighty vehicles are in danger. The incredible jungle cat SIDEWINDER is trapped in a pit of dangerously unstable explosives. The giant CRABLOGGER construction machine is locked on a collision course with a huge dam that threatens a South American village. International Rescue is their only hope.

THE DEADLY DANGEROUS ADVENTURES OF LADY PENELOPE

(Compiled from the Thunderbirds episodes 'The Cham Cham' and 'The Man from MI5'.)

Lady Penelope and her right hand man, Parker find themselves travelling from the French Riviera to the Swiss Alps as they track down foreign agents.

Features an animated Bond-style title sequence features Sylvia Anderson's rendition of 'Dangerous Game'. 

"The only Super Space Theater movie especially for girls!" 

JET ANGELS IN THE 21st CENTURY (Compiled from the Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons episodes 'Seek and Destroy', 'Model Spy', 'Manhunt' and 'The Trap'.

In the 21^st century, mankind battles a cold war with the strange Mysterons – an alien race from the planet Mars. Frontline in the battle, are the Angels. skilled jet pilots from all points of the globe dedicated to protecting mankind from the skies.

ON HIS HOLINESS' SECRET SERVICE (Compiled from four episodes (TBA) of 'The Secret Service'.)

 

The Reverend Stanley Unwin is no ordinary English country clergyman. He's a secret agent working for the British government!

Features some new specially filmed live action framing footage of the real Stanley Unwin being interviewed by a reporter (Keith Alexander) at a nursing home with the elderly priest relating his adventures as a secret agent with a miniaturised gardener. The closing scenes see the reporter dismiss the stories as the ramblings of a madman.

STRAKER VS STRAKER 

(Compiled from the two UFO episodes 'Confetti Check A-OK' and 'A Question of Priorities'.)

Earth is at war with alien body snatchers. Humans are being kidnapped and reduced to spare parts for a dying race. But they aren't the only victims of this secret battle. USAF Colonel Ed Straker has recently married his fiance Mary. He is unable to tell her that the Earth is in danger and that his work must take precedence over a settled and normal home life. It is a secret that will tear their relationship apart and cost him the life of his only son...

DOMAIN OF THE DEVIL GIRLS

(Compiled from the Space:1999 episodes 'A Matter of Balance' and 'Devil's Planet'.)

Violent alien she-devils from an anti-matter universe take Commander Koenig prisoner. Their strange leader, Vindrus, temps teenage botanist Shermeen Williams into releasing the anti-matter aliens from their dimensional prison so they can take over the galaxy. Will shape-changing wonder woman Maya be able to prevent the catharsis of spurious morality? 

THE UNDERSEA NIGHTMARES OF TROY TEMPEST

(Compiled from the Stingray episodes Raptures of the Deep, Cosmic Cavemen, Tom Thumb Tempest and Pink Ice.)

The evil underwater emperor Titan uses his new nightmare ray on the Captain Troy Tempest. The deadly beam sends him into a dangerous coma – where in a nightmare dreamscape he confronts cosmic cavemen, giant aquaphibians and destruction in a palace of treasures as Titan threatens the world with pink ice.

THE QUESTIONABLE ADVENTURES OF JOE 90 

(Compiled from the episodes Operation McLaine, Double Agent, The Fortress, Project 90.)

There are many strange secrets within the espionage business but none stranger than the case of Joe 90 – a nine year old boy with incredible skills thanks to a brain implant that allows him to become expert at any skill or task. But is it right to use a child in such dangerous situations. This is the report. You are the judge...

Features additional live-action framing scenes with Patrick Allen as Government Investigator Connors investigating the moral aspects of the Joe 90 case.

If you appreciate the incredible effort and imagination I've put into this silly excursion into silliness, then you can show your appreciation by purchasing me a coffee via my Ko-fi account here. Thank you.

Thunderbirds - The Motion Pictures!

As you can tell from an earlier post, I spent a lot of the first few weeks of lockdown creating cinema posters for the Doctor Who episodes that had been picked out for the mass tweet-a-longs. Haven't check the exact number but I did quite a few - including some classic series ones.

During that time, I felt I needed a break from Doctor Who. Yes, the creative juices were still flowing but I just needed to do something a bit different.

I'd just acquired the blu-ray of the original Thunderbirds TV series and was cherry-picking my favourite episodes. One of the many comments levelled at the show was how much like mini-movies each of fifty minute productions were. Indeed, there are some that even have very similar plots to later movies. So I started doing period film posters for some of them. 

Here they are:

Trapped in the Sky

The poster is based on one for Airport 1975 - the second film in the Airport series. The Fireflash that replaces the jumbo jet of the original is actually some cut-out and flipped artwork from an old Japanese model kit box. I had to 'reverse' the lettering on the side of the fuselage. It wasn't until I'd posted it on Twitter that I realised that the Fireflash lettering wasn't actually on the original aircraft. 

Operation Crashdive

This one is based on the poster for Airport 1977 - the third film in the increasingly desperate Airport series. In that film, a jumbo jet crash-lands in the sea (in the Bermuda Triangle of all places) and sinks to the bottom. The crew and passengers survive as the plane remains airtight. It's almost the same scenario as the episode 'Operation Crashdive'. So the choice of film/poster was a no-brainer. The artwork on the original is iconic and I had fun recreating it in photoshop. In this case, finding an image of Fireflash that was the same angle as the original sunken aircraft was difficult. There are very few promo images of it from the original series and I couldn't screengrab an image of it from the blu-ray as I didn't own a blu-ray drive. Instead I found a photo of the original Japanese Fireflash model kit. A few tweaks here and there and it looked okay - especially darkened and tinted blue/green. I think this is probably my favourite of the four posters.


City of Fire

This one was another obvious choice. No prizes for spotting the iconic poster for The Towering Inferno. I needed an image of the burning Thompson Towers (no relation). Again there were no suitable production stills so I had to create it in Photoshop. Luckily, the building is a simple skyscraper and building it in PS was comparatively straightforward. I distorted it and surrounded it with plenty of fire and smoke. It surprised me that it looked pretty authentic looking if a little stylised. The head shots of the family are simple pics taken off the telly and filtered to look more like artwork. I had a bit of fun with the words on this one. I can't help doing that. Please forgive me! 




The Perils of Penelope

I couldn't get the idea of doing a very sixties one for this Lady Penelope-centric episode. Barbarella was a no-no so I went for the much-maligned 1966 movie Modesty Blaise - a European film based on a British newspaper comic strip about a freelance lady spy. The poster is very sixties and is an art-based collage of images of Blaise - so it was a straight-forward task to create a similar design using Lady P - made all the more easier thanks to the fact she wore so many colourful dresses and that there are a lot more production stills of her than there are of Fireflash. I like the look of this one. Very sixties. And it's set off by having an off-white background instead of just plain white. 




Here's some of the textless artwork from the above designs.

And here are the originals:

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Six Gerry Anderson Shows Finally Get Their TVTimes Covers!

I've been doing a bit of design prep for SHADOcon - a convention dedicated to Gerry & Sylvia Anderson's UFO During the process of putting together stuff for the day, it occurred to me that none of their series actually made the cover of the TVTimes. A shocking omission by anyone's standards. 

It was left to their eternal rvival the Radio Times to give Thunderbirds cover status in the 90s during one of the BBC's re-runs of the show. 

Never mind, I said. Let's put things right with the aid of Photoshop...

Thunderbirds Toys for Girls and Boys!

To celebrate the reveal of the brand-new logo for Doctor Who, I've dug out some vintage adverts for Thunderbirds toys. 

Ripped from the pages of TV Century 21 and Lady Penelope comic... literally.

What Brand of Cigarette Did Lady Penelope Smoke?

There's a lot that is different in the new ITV 'Thunderbirds Are Go' series when compared to its sixties predecessor. 

For one thing, none of the characters chain smoke like they used to...

Thunderbirds Mini-album Adventure Not Being Remade.

That disappointing moment when you discover that your childhood heroes don't agree with your politics... 

Happy Tenth Anniversary to New Doctor Who!

I was going to wait until new Doctor Who's tenth anniversary next Saturday before posting this cheeky piece of artwork (based on an early 80s classic) but I thought - what the heck! - why not today instead?

What's that I hear you all say? The anniversary of new Doctor Who was last Thursday? The 26th March?

Well, yes it is... technically! But I'm the sort of person who attaches a lot of meaning to things feeling right. Last Thursday did FEEL like the anniversary. To me, new Doctor Who started on Easter Saturday 2005. And next Saturday is that date ten years on for me. 

So do forgive me this little foible. I'm saving myself up for next Saturday.

If you need any further convincing then see ITV - who are celebrating the anniversary by launching a reimagined version of one of their own highly successful telefantasy TV shows from the sixties on that day in the form of 'Thunderbirds Are Go'. 

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery! 

Crossroads Mini-album Adventures from Century 21 Discovered in Skip!

There was a skip of stuff at the bottom of the street where I live. I had a rummage through it as any good citizen would and what did I find...? A selection of old single records no less. So I scraped the now rancid baked bean juice from them and took them home.

There were fourteen of them in all - mostly original sixties releases. In amongst them was a pleasant surprise!

An original Century 21 mini-album!

Sadly, it was not that 'Doctor Who' Dalek one with the odd narration on it. It was one of the very rare 'Crossroads' ones that I'd only heard talk of in very exclusive and hushed conversations at comic marts. 

If I recall correctly, Century 21 tried their hand at releasing non-Gerry Anderson material back in the mid-sixties and they dipped their toes into new markets with a handful based on the ATV soap opera. 

Needless to say, it didn't really catch on. I mean, who wanted to pay and listen to a show in sound only when they can watch it four nights a week for free on the telly. 

I put the record on and found it to be crap. They used a dreadful 'space-age' version of the 'Crossroads' theme performed on a theremin and the narration by 'Sandy' was inaudible - either due to poor mixing or the actor's adenoids. 

Pretty shit day really...

More "rare" Century 21 Mini-albums here.

TV21 - Today's News Tomorrow from Yesterday!

Paper arrived this morning...

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Unreleased Century 21 Mini-albums Uncovered...

In the mid-sixties, you couldn't move for Century 21 mini-albums - 7 inch 33rpm records each with "21 minutes of adventure". The likes of Scot Tracy and Lady Penelope narrated bite sized audio cut downs of classic Thunderbirds rescues whilst Steve Zodiac and Venus kidnapped a young boy and played sound effects from the moonshot to him. There was even a chance to go on a date with Troy Tempest...!

No Gerry & Sylvia Anderson puppet series was left untouched... except perhaps 'The Secret Service'. (We don't talk about the priest and his little gardener any more...)

There were a few that didn't get released. They tried to make them more instructional at one point but the arrest of Captain Zodiac and Dr. Venus and their subsequent trial put paid to that. 

One oddity was their 'Daleks' record - a laboured re-telling of "Doctor Who's" battle with the Daleks on the planet Mechanus featuring the soundtrack of the final episode of 'The Chase'. It was narrated by an enthusiastic David Graham and book-ended by Eric Winstone's dance band version of the Doctor Who theme. They were going to do another Dalek themed one for Christmas and prepped a cover for it - until someone told them that the series' special Christmas episode - which occurred halfway through a mammoth twelve part Dalek adventure - had replaced the Daleks with a silent movie skit that wasn't really suited to audio... despite Tristram Cary's fun music. 

Here's a selection from the archives. As always, none of this was ever released. It was just another dream episode...!

Would you trust International Rescue with this job?

THE THUNDERBIRDS PREGNANCY TESTING KIT

Unknown maker

Originally available c1995

Price £1 (available at early Poundland stores in the Midlands)

You need someone or something REALLY reliable to carry out certain tasks. International Rescue are one of the most trustworthy organisations in the world (of fiction). Every day throughout the world (of fiction), people trust them with their lives when they need help of a desperate nature. They are the go-to guys when it comes to sorting out emergencies........ especially in the fictional world of 2066.

So let's put their name to a Pregnancy Testing Kit!

(It seems Gerry had a better agent than Sylvia did....!)

SUPERMARIONATION SCANDAL! What if the 'Daily Mail' had published 'TV21?

Click on thumbnails to read more...