The Army Game

No mention of Timpo can be complete without a brief look at their soldiers. My earliest memories include toy soldiers, Timpo and Britains standing proud amongst their ranks. Here are some of the later twin sets and a veritable flotilla of landing craft! I know the Britains Deetail Recoiless Rifle and German mortar team are among woodsys memories too!

GONE TO THE DOGS

Following tangenitally on from the recent action figure thread, here are two of my favourite action figures, which for me are unusual as they fit in the seven inch scale. Being a reader of sci fi weekly 2000ad, i was delighted to see a brief range of some of my favourite characters made into toys. Judges Dredd, Death and Anderson headlined the range, but i was pleased to see the two Strontium Dog bounty hunters, originally drawn by Carlos Esquerra make an appearance, in quite faithful detail. Johnny Alpha is almost perfect with his helmet  chest holster and futuristic weaponry and his vampiric colleague Durham Red is modelled after her Mark Harrison reboot style.

Red has her twin pistols which attach magnetically to her leather clad hip. Unfortunately, the line was short lived and never made it beyond six figures.

http://www.2000ad.org/markus/durhamred/

Thunderbirds 2004

With a new series of Thunderbirds in the offing and after looking at the Japanese cartoon series, Thunderbirds 2086, it’s time to consider  the film ‘Thunderbirds’, released in 2004.

 We’re all aware that it’s about as popular as a fart in a spacesuit with Anderson fans, indeed Gerry himself refused some easy cash by turning down an invite to the premier and endorsing it. Has it got any better with age?  As a Saturday morning kids matinee is might have held it’s own, but call it a Thunderbirds remake and suddenly you’re in a danger zone!

The simple philosophy behind Thunderbirds is the fact that International Rescue will  use anything at it’s disposal no matter what the cost  to save lives - that might be a hundred or just a single one -  it’s fairly straight forward  - the hard bit is getting that philosophy across in an entertaining way.

Did the film do that? Well it did to some extent, however seeing how the crux of the story  is having four of the Tracy brothers along with Dad Tracy being rescued by younger brother  Alan, Kyrano’s young daughter Tin Tin and Brains' son, Fermat  is taking that Tracy family nepotism a bit far .

I can see why the writers went down this road - get rid of the boring adults and the kids can play . I imagine it was also handy to have Lady P and Parker helping out. Lady Penelope is the decorative ‘older sister’ type and Parker can provide the laughs!

Actually I quite liked  the characters of Lady Penelope and Parker - maybe it’s because they actually had some character.

The Ford Motor Company being a major sponsor provided Lady Penelope with her  FAB 1 -  a Ford Thunderbird of course.

The CGI special effects were a definite no-no for me. With the odd exception  I’m not that keen on computer generated imagery at the best of times and considering the original series was a ground breaker for special effects you’d think the makers would have built on this.

One little effect  that did raise a  nostalgic smile was the point in the film when Alan and Fermat are about to launch Thunderbird 1 in pursuit of the Hood. Both their arms reach for the launch levers. For a split second we see a puppet hand complete with strings operating the controls.

The Hood is suitably insidious, with a back story providing a motive for his nastiness. 

There’s even a chance for pod vehicles to shine  - a redesigned Firefly and Mole!

I’m sure a lot of youngsters found this film a hoot and rushed out to buy up all the merchandise associated with it. It might have even guided them in the direction of the original series providing another generation of fans. I do hope so.

Let's hope we're all still smiling  after we've all seen the remake!

YARD WARS

Ed's recent mention of playing war brought back fond recollections of battles with my mates in our back garden back in the sunny Sixties. 

 

 

We young boys took it very seriously, even using dabs of brown and green shoe polish to camouflage our cheeky faces amongst the hydrangeas and privet hedges! One mate, who's Mum was a nurse, used to bring along stethoscopes and bandages for our very own field hospital under two deck chairs!

 

 

However, my fondest memories are reserved for the toy rifles we played with. They were simple crude home-made affairs using old planks of wood as the body with metal gate bolts nailed on to create realistic cocking sounds like the one pictured. I think my Dad made them up in his shed but they were basic enough for us to copy and repair ourselves on the battlefield! I can hear that metallic drag and clunk even now! A wonderful wonderful sound!

 

 

It was only when Mum shouted 'Paul, time for tea' that we all called a truce and stacked our weapons ready for the next skirmish in those never-ending summers of lawn wars! Mum's beans on toast and pints of Vimto usually healed any friendships that had been bruised in the action!

 

 

After all, boys will be boys, but I wonder if its politically correct any more for kids to tear round a garden playing war? Did it do us any harm? What do you think readers?

Spacex Space Patrol 1 - Upscaled!

Courtesy of the Kevin Davies Shipyards!

Thunderbirds 2086

With a new series of Thunderbirds being made co-produced by New Zealand company, Pokeko Pictures and visual effects and props company Weta Workshop, I thought I’d take cursory glance at the Japanese TV series from the eighties that hi-jacked the name from  the classic TV show.

Thunderbirds: 2086,  produced by ITC (Japan) under the supervision of Robert Mandell in 1982 is a Japanese anime cartoon series running to 24 episodes. It's original Japanese title is Techno Voyager, however the series uses certain elements from the original Thunderbirds series in that the characters carry out rescues and deal with disasters.

 Like the original series, the International Rescue team operate from a remote island in the Pacific, a vast complex called Arcology which is staffed by over fifty five thousand people. The commander of International Rescue is ex-astronaut, Dr. Warren Simpson, and his chief pilot is 28 year old Dylan Beyda who flies Thunderbird 1.

In the series there are no less than 17 Thunderbird craft, each capable of different functions.

Thunderbird 1 is an advanced space shuttle. Thunderbird 2, like the original series is the transporter. Thunderbird 3 is a mobile laboratory which looks like a tank. Thunderbird 4  is a large submarine, while Thunderbird 5 is a ’Special Ground Operations Vehicle’ . Thunderbird 6 is the space station which has docking facilities for TB1, TB2 and TB3.

Thunderbird 7 and 8 are specialised aircraft. Thunderbird 9 is an manned exoskeleton for space walking. Thunderbird 10 is a small rocket ship. Thunderbird 11 is an armoured car. Thunderbird 12 is a cross between an original Elevator vehicle and The Firefly. Thunderbird 13 is a flying mini sub which is carried aboard Thunderbird 4, as is Thunderbird 14, which is a bathyscaphe!

Thunderbird 15 is a mobile computer. Thunderbird 16 is The Mole, and finally Thunderbird 17 is a long range space probe.

Apart from Dr Simpson and Dylan Beyda, there are seven other recurring characters, including ‘Skipper’ Simpson, Commander Simpson’s 7 year old nephew.
Including Dylan Beyda there are five ‘Thnderbirds’ pilots, which in spite of International Rescue being staffed by thousands are the only characters to carry out rescues.  They are referred to in the opening titles as Cadets, although they all hold the rank of Captain.

Jesse Rigel and  Johnathan Jordan, Jr. are both the pilots of TB 2. Gran Hanson pilots TB 3 and finally, the young girl on the team is Kallan James who pilots TB 4. They all share pilot duties on the remaining Thunderbird craft.

Another  point of interest is the occasional use of incidental music during the action taken from other Gerry Anderson shows like Stingray and Fireball XL5.

Judging by this ad I found on the net it looks like there were toys released although I've never come across them.

I have no idea how successful this series was at the time but being a children’s anime cartoon and being fairly indistinguishable from any other children’s anime cartoon of the time I’d imagine it made it’s money, helped to some degree by tagging the Thunderbirds name to it!