Back in December, we lost Gerry Anderson, the man who created such great genre shows as Thunderbirds and Space 1999.
Although Thunderbirds was done with marionettes, it was a pivotal show for many kids growing up, and it helped inspire Peter Jackson to become a filmmaker. Of course, it also later inspired the hilarious parody Team America, created by the South Park team of Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
Yes, it was obvious the Thunderbirds were puppets, but it really did spark the imaginations of a lot of children as they were growing up, and today it’s a big cult fave like Speed Racer.
Now Deadline reports that there’s going to be a reboot of Thunderbirds, and Weta Workshop, the FX house founded by Peter Jackson, is going to help bring it back with ITV Studios from the United Kingdom.
Twenty-six episodes of the new Thunderbirds have been ordered, and the show is tentatively planned to start airing in 2015. Now of course, the big question is how will the Thunderbirds be brought to life? It would be great if they brought back the marionettes or do them with stop motion because it’s a cool thing again, thanks to Frankenweenie and ParaNorman.
On one hand, if today’s audiences saw the wires, they may find it cheesy. On the other hand, if it gets too far away from the original Thunderbirds, it wouldn’t be cool. Deadline reports that the new model Thunderbirds will be “a unique mix of CGI animation and live-action model sets while also paying tribute to the legacy of model locations from Anderson’s original.”
It might be tricky to pull off a combination of old school low-tech and modern day hi-tech, but if they can indeed manage, that would be cool indeed. Personally, I was also hoping for something like this for the Land of the Lost reboot, because the Sid and Marty Krofft shows had great low budget effects, but no such luck, at least not yet.
As an executive for ITV confirmed “Thunderbirds is a highly respected brand that continues to hold recognition around the world. The cult series is often credited as changing the history of animation and action-adventure, and we look forward to taking the show to another level while retaining the much-loved heritage that has endured over the past fifty years.”
So let’s hope they can definitely make the Thunderbirds go! again, and bring honor to Anderson’s cool creation that kids grew up loving, and the inner kids in us still love today.
