Thunderbirds Trapped in the Sky (1965–1966) Online

Thunderbirds is a triumph of TV. It's a real series for children that took them seriously. It didn't treat kids as kids, it treated them as small adults, and in the process gave us real excitement, cutting edge effects and great stories. The premise of the series may seem unrealistic, but the plots were excellent. It contained real people (they may have been represented by puppets, but they were real people) in real situation. They were edge of the seat programs that quite frankly many programs today could learn lessons from. Plus, how many things in these programs have either come true, or indeed look just like the designs of things used by the Thunderbirds team. It's no chance happening that kids (and still adults) love it today just as much as they did when it was made. Why? Because they don't see the strings, they see the program, and the program captures the imagination completely. How many (supposedly) children's programs made 40 years ago do 21st century kids want to watch now? And what's the betting they still will in another 40.

This first episode of Gerry Anderson's Thunderbirds deals with a criminal - The Hood - placing a bomb on an aircraft and International Rescue must go on mission number one to save the airliner and all on board.

Trapped In The Sky - is the hour that nailed Thunderbirds, this is it, best episode of the series and even better than the two Thunderbird motion pictures! Why is it so good? From Jeff Tracy's deep voiced talk of "Boys, I think we are in business", to Scott Tracy's more unique voice tones, to the now topical storyline involving a bomb on a plane, to the miniature effects of Fireflash, to the corny Fireflash pilot saying "I saw her too, she is kind-of cute", to the first ever wonderful visions of the Thunderbird aircrafts, and finally, that almost non-stop run of quality Barry Gray music. That is why.

If you want a short taste of Thunderbirds, without sitting through the whole series, then this is the episode for you, this hour has all that is Thunderbirds.

Trapped in the Sky is the ideal introduction to the world of Thunderbirds. It ticks all the right boxes on how to make an excellent first episode; it sets the scene well, we are introduced to the characters in a way that makes them instantly likable, and the rescue scene, which the whole episode has built itself up to, is the highlight of the episode. The script has a few plot holes, especially the failed rescue attempt by London Airport to remove the bomb, but you couldn't ask for a better start to the series.

Kids were treated to quite a show with the marionette action adventure, Thunderbirds. You got it all, model aircraft carriers and sets that featured large-scale explosions and life-threatening scenarios with potential global terrorism. International Rescue is a top secret organization that comes to the aid of those in need of assistance when threatened by potential terrorism. In "Trapped in the Sky", global terrorist, The Hood (basically modeled after "evil Asian" Fu Manchu, wearing various disguises so he can infiltrate bases and such to try and harm his foreign enemies), plants an atom bomb on a long airliner (with atomic jets) called Fireflash. Fireflash is to land at a London airbase, and The Hood hopes it explodes on landing. A photographic image informs the airbase that the bomb is on board the Fireflash. A valiant effort is tried where a member of the airbase crew tries to use a seat locked to a line attached to a wench on an Airforce plane attempt to enter into the area where the bomb is tied and remove it, but the placement of the bomb and the fact that this is all done in the sky deters from success (the courageous airbase crew member falls out and will have to pull his parachute). But the International Rescue team (led by father, Jeff Tracy; his sons all are part of the team) will try a different approach, sending two aircraft to the London airbase, one a rocket, another a futuristic jumbo jet carrying cargo that could be of extreme importance in the Fireflash coming to a halt safely. Three "landing pads on wheels" will try to pull underneath the Fireflash as it attempts to land on top of them. I found myself quite captivated by this sequence. You ought to just see how the Tracy kid "chutes" into the Thunderbird 2 from the International Rescue homebase, or the little details of the sets, like how the homebase (located on a tropic island) opens doors that look like mountainous walls, or just the London airbase itself. Even the details in the cockpits and the attention to how realistic the aircraft look; you can tell those involved in the special effects painstakingly applied their skills for optimum effect. I can speak for myself when I say that there's a lot of appreciation for how hard those involved in this show worked to create an authenticity even if the marionettes aren't genuine humans (I noticed only a few moments where you actually see strings, because those show's makers found creative ways to shoot around them when possible). I look forward to seeing the global stories involving IR and The Hood with my son in the future as I had introduced him to the show, with him really excited about all the eye-popping goodies the Andersons gave the kids in the 60s and beyond. You can definitely see James Bond's influence on the stories, and the first story for the show was quite a hair-raiser with the Fireflash stuck in the sky seemingly forever as the airbase personnel try to figure out a way to land them safely. Included even was the time clock ticking as the atomic jets would eventually have radiation causing fatal exposure to all on board the Fireflash if the airliner didn't land after an allotted period required. I think that's the real plus to the show: good storytelling, regardless of marionettes or actual humans, can make the difference.

...if landing the plane normally was going to set the bomb off, how does keeping the landing gear up and plonking it down on three cars (two of them remotes which proved hopelessly unreliable as one of them crashed) save the day?

Again totally preposterous but totally brilliant. From a time when we could 'beat' nature and technology was king - can you imagine the protests now if someone said "Let's fill the sky with planes filled with nuclear reactors - what can go wrong?" Throwing rough figures at it, there are around 40 commercial planes going down unexpectedly every year - ignoring military and light stuff. Since 1965 that would have been approaching 2000 Fireflashes. Lots of three eyed fish would have resulted...

Still there's a reason at 52 I still watch all the repeats, and it's because they're brilliant. As a wise person has already reported on these pages, we still don't see the strings.....