I just saw the commercial for this. It looks excruciatingly, painfully, unbearably terrible. For some reason it’s live action. :eek:
At least the puppets on the TV series had kitsch value.
I was actually excited about this until I found out it was going to be live action. Oh, well. At least one good thing is coming out of it–the two Thunderbirds feature films from the '60s are being released on DVD in the US.
Looks to me like they pretty much missed the entire point of why the Thunderbirds franchise could’ve been cool. Making it live-action was the first mistake, of course, but the worst is that it looks like the whole tone is off. The trailer I saw made it look like a big Spy Kids type teen story. The original series was for kids, but it was for kids to pretend they were adults and could fly spaceships and live on a secret island and hang out with British nobility who were secretly spies.
This version just looks like the same old garbage you could get from any one of a dozen other movies, and they’ve completely wasted the license.
Anyone care to venture a guess as to how long into the movie before they reference the original show?
Gerry Anderson said he aimed it at all ages, and some of the drama was definitely adult-oriented. The marionettes drank coctails, smoked cigarettes, became entangled in love triangles, voiced adult complaints, etc.
The original series plays every Sunday morning on the TRIO network - except they run it with constant “Pop-Up video” style commentary, on various trivia and aspects of the production. Said commentary can either be highly annoying, somewhat annoying, or slightly edifying if unnecessary.
I used to love the show as a kid and was excited about the movie. Then I saw the commercial and was reminded why Hollywood totally sucks and can’t do anything right.
Ok, I’m disappointed. I’ve seen the previews. This could have been really cool, if they had taken it one of two ways.
One: ultra-camp. Make it over-the-top and absolutely fun.
Two: summer-movie blockbuster, like Independence Day or somesuch. Again, fun, mindless entertainment.
Did they do this? Noooooooooo. They chose: OPTION THREE!!
Three: make it “Spy Kids in Space”.
Blech.
I’ll probably take the kids, just to give them something to do, but it probably won’t appeal to me.
Well, from what I saw in the previews the acting is even more wooden than the puppets…
Slightly off topic, but can any of the Thunderbirds fans out there tell me what F.A.B. stood for?
I remember that it was the standard acknowledgment on the show, kind of like "roger wilco" but I don't recall them ever saying what it stood for.The creators say it didn’t stand for anything. I’m sure it was inspired by the currency of the word “fab” in the '60s, but it wasn’t a real acronym.
Thanks! That used to drive me crazy when I was a kid. I was always sure that I had missed the one episode where it was explained.Ever since watching it originally as a kid way back when it first came out I understood it to be Friendship and Brotherhood. Maybe from the comic version at the time.
Ah, well, actually they went back in in post-production and added the strings digitally to make it more authentic.
No, I’m making that up. Sorry.
The offical word on FAB from http://www.thunderbirdsonline.com:
*Q: What does F.A.B. stand for?
A: In the 1960’s the buzz word was fabulous. This became shortened to FAB and we use FAB as a code meaning your message has been received and understood.*
There actually was some controversy about Anderson and co. using digital technology to “remove” the strings from the original Thunderbirds feature films for their UK DVD release. Personally, I was agin it.
From the standpoint of profitability and pursuing a known demographic, this actually makes perfect corporate-media sense. I’m surprised it should be so controversial.
And didja all know the director of the flick is Jonathan (“Will Riker”) Frakes? It’s his second feature film outside the Trek universe; the first was Clockstoppers.