The project was realised by Robert Mandell, Vice President of Creative Services at ITC Entertainment’s New York office. He was looking for a way to repackage the old Supermarionation series that at the time were gathering dust. The London office of ITC had cut together a Space 1999 feature using the two- parter, ’Bringers of Wonder’ to make the re-titled, ’Destination Moonbase Alpha.
Finding episodes of the various series that followed a similar theme, Mandell and Starlog writer, David Hirsch help put together several compilations.
Ironically, the first film produced was ’Invasion:UFO’. The original titles and theme were replaced with library music and video effects.
In fact, although at the time any Anderson fan would have been appalled by the cheap looking video effects and titles they are something of a curiosity now. In Thunderbirds in Outer Space, you can spot an Angel Interceptor and several ships from Space 1999 in amongst the superimposed Thunderbird craft.
One thing that is unforgivable is replacing sting missiles with laser beams in the Stingray titles - what were they thinking!
The completed films were shown in America under the title Super Space Theatre and released in the UK on video.
At the time, as most of these shows hadn’t been on TV for quite a while I was quite glad to see them in spite of their shortcomings.
