Thunderbirds Are Go…to the Great Beyond: R.I.P. Gerry Anderson
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The groundbreaking creator of such “Supermarionation” shows – in which marionettes could be lip-synced to pre-recorded dialogue using internal magnets – as Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Terrornauts and Stingray – as well as the live-action Space: 1999, which always had a special place in my heart – has died. He was battling dementia for two years now, so this isn’t completely a shock, but it is a great loss, and I’m only glad his family could spend one last Christmas with him on Earth.
Supermarionation quite honestly freaked me out as a kid, but I’ve grown to appreciate its charms over the years, especially when Trey Parker and Matt Stone paid tribute in Team America: World Police. I guess it’s fair to say that I already miss Gerry Anderson more than Pearl Harbor missed the mark.
Did you know Anderson wrote a rejected treatment for Moonraker? I would have liked to see that version. Not that it would have gone the puppetry route, but I could certainly enjoy a movie-length version of this:
About The Author
Luke Y. Thompson has been writing professionally about movies and pop-culture since 1999, and has also been an actor in some extremely cheap culty and horror movies you will probably never hear much about (he is nonetheless mostly proud of them, as he met his wife on one). As editor of The Robot's Voice since 2012, he can take the blame for the majority of the site's content, all of which he creates because he loves you very, very much. (Although he loves nachos more. Sorry.) Prior to TRV, Luke wrote for publications that include the New Times LA, Los Angeles CityBeat, E! Online, OC Weekly, Geekweek, GeekChicDaily, The L.A. Times, The Village Voice, LA Weekly, and Nerdist