One of my heroes, and the reason I'm here, has died

I'm talking about Gerry Anderson, the man responsible for Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Stingray and a whole host of other shows who unfortunatelty passed away today.

But why have I mentioned it here? Well, because of this...



UFO was Anderson's darkest creation. Bad things happened to good people. A secret war between aliens from a dying planet and a small, but determined military force on earth desperately trying to figure out the aliens motives, fight them and anticipate what they were going to do next.

The show looks dated now but if you watch the episodes they are amazing - even to this day. The whole genre of UFOlogy is covered, and there is a massive human element there too, with a LOT of suprises.

This show made an impression on me as a child, watching it - as I did - from the age of about 6 onwards it completely engrossed me and drew me into the field of UFOlogy, and then onwards.

Without this, there would be no Neformore who worked for Parascope on AOL, who joined ATS became a Mod, Super Mod and Live! show host.

So I say thank-you to Gerry Anderson, and heartily reccomend this show to anyone who wants to look it up and who is interested in the genre, because UFO was WAY ahead of its time, and most of, if not everything we discuss today in modern UFOlogy, from secret forces to abductions, conspiracies, subiminal messaging and a whole slew of other stuff is included in it.

RIP Gerry. You actually did change my life.

Reminds me a little of old school X-COM: UFO DEFENSE

Noooo! I grew up with the Thunderbirds and I loved UFO and Space: 1999 when I was a kid.

Thunderbirds was way ahead of its time in some of the concepts portrayed on the show.

The opening themes for those shows, which were composed by Barry Gray, were some of the best TV tunes ever, by the way.

There's a reboot of Space: 1999, called Space: 2099 being worked on now.

Damn! He was a pretty nice guy. I met him, Barbara Bain and Martin Landau (I'm also a big fan of the original Mission Impossible series) at a Sci-Fi convention in Atlanta in 1988. We spent about 20 min. talking about how they came up with the modular configuration of the Eagle from Space 1999. All of the UFO and a bunch of the Space 1999 episodes can be found on YouTube.

reply to post by JIMC5499


In response to your post, the Eagle from Space: 1999 is highly regarded as one of the most plausible space ships created for a science fiction t.v. show.

Man that video brought back memories. I remember having the toys and watching those shows.

Died or was retrieved and rejuvenated?
S&F.

Ah bum... although I thought he was already dead a good while now .

Used to watch all of his lot or the large number of spin offs from the puppet craze such as Joe 90, Captain Scarlet, Stingray(?) and of coarse his first, Thunderbirds.

Thing is, my most favorite shows in my entire childhood at that time where ones that where trying to copy the supermariatronic(?) bandwagon and his attempt at rejuvenating the genre... Terrahawks and the japanese made Star Fleet (Big Dai X) dont make kids shows like that any more .

Never saw much of UFO, all I remember of it is the first episode (or I think it was the first) where they pull out an alien from a downed Adamski like UFO in some English forest and find they've got fake eyes or some such and underneath their reptilian pupils (and no im not mixing it up with V ), just remember strange eyes and being scared poopless from it.

I have a feeling I know what music he'll be sent off with

Originally posted by BigfootNZ
Never saw much of UFO, all I remember of it is the first episode (or I think it was the first) where they pull out an alien from a downed Adamski like UFO in some English forest and find they've got fake eyes or some such and underneath their reptilian pupils (and no im not mixing it up with V

), just remember strange eyes and being scared poopless from it.

Thats actually the opening scene of the credits above

Heres the thing, UFO never scared me - even though I know its actually a very terrifying concept, and the subject matter was soooo dark. Its like I was meant to see it, so I could do all this stuff.

Hand of fate I think.

Originally posted by neformore
Thats actually the opening scene of the credits above

Heres the thing, UFO never scared me - even though I know its actually a very terrifying concept, and the subject matter was soooo dark. Its like I was meant to see it, so I could do all this stuff.

Hand of fate I think.

Heh ill have to give the vid a look then naughty me replying with out at least watching the vid.

I would have been I think 6 at the time and was very much into UFO's thanks to my mum and we had alot of books from the 50-70's about the subject on the bookshelves so for me UFO's as a subject was one part fear and one part love. Guess it was because of the live actors in UFO's case makes the scares that little more solid... then again Sram from Terrahawks scared the crud out of me as well, and looking at him now he's kinda comical... although I do get a slight pang of apprehension

Thank you Gerry Anderson for those childhood nightmares

Edit:- looking at that vid, its funny how memories can look so different inside your mind compared to reality, some times might be best to sick with the memories... good lord, fish net vests...

Make me feel old now will ya...
When I was a kid all we had Fireball XL5
This might have been his intro to making sci-fi productions:



American kids didn't get the good stuff like UFO unfortunately.
Sorry to hear of his passing, sounds like a very creative soul.

Originally posted by Asktheanimals
American kids didn't get the good stuff like UFO unfortunately.

It aired in 1974-1975 on channel 9 in New York. That's how I saw it when I was a kid.

It re-aired later on the Sci-Fi channel.

Gerry Anderson has been one of my heroes all of my life, I am just old enough to remember his very first foray into TV animation shows with Twizzle, then followed by Torchy the Battery Boy, Four Feather Falls, Supercar, Fireball XL5, Stingray, the immortal Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Joe 90, Space:1999, UFO, Terrahawks, Space Precinct, and also he was responsible for The Persuaders, an Avengers-style show from the 60s, starring Robert Vaughn, Nyree Dawn Porter and Tony Anholt.
I believe he also created an animation programme starring the late great Professor Stanley Unwin, playing a Miss Marple-type detective.
Altogether, Anderson has been a part of the lives of millions of people of all ages, and his legacy will never be forgotten.
If ever there were a person that deserves to have their ashes blasted into space, Gerry Anderson is that man, he inspired so many people with his shows.
RIP

I've never seen that UFO show but the intro looks and sounds very cool, very prisoner-esque, makes me want to watch it. I'll have to check it out.

reply to post by Junkheap


I LOVED space 1999, love love loved it. And UFO was fantastic too, groovy music. Very sad about Gerry Anderson. Thanks for posting Op.

reply to post by Razimus


Make sure you do.

It is extremely sinister, a little dated looking but fantastic nontheless.

ETA, there are episodes on Youtube - the insight into an awful lot of subjects we talk about in modern UFOloy, in a series from 1971, is astounding.

reply to post by JIMC5499


Was waiting for someone to drop that for me. lol thank you. I've watched many, many of the thunderbirds, but I'd never heard of ufo. I'm sure it's great, but x-files is what got me really intrigued. I've had an elevated interest since childhood. I was the spooky kid that did reports on ghosts and the paranormal.

I will definitely watch it and possibly report back.

Good Travels Gerry.I learned to love space vehicles and their design since "Fireball XL5",and "Stingray".I was then treated to "UFO" and "Space 1999" both of which are currently in the birthpangs of being remade:ufo-themovie.com...
www.hollywoodreporter.com...
I am now in art school with my paintings and sketches learning graphics programs. I still collect models from these as I find them,to include a 1/48 Lab Eagle and a 1/48 Hawk.

Ahhh... UFO = that was a the weirdest, most poorly scripted, worst-acted, under-funded, corniest, sci-fi show on t.v. - and man, I LOVED it! I ate that show up!

Question: why can't we have space Twinkie-babes with ultra-tight, ultra-short miniskirts prancing around on the decks of the newer sci-fi shows? The new ones all have to wear jump-suits and be-in-charge, and fight bad-ass enemies tougher than the jocks!

Trust me, young fellas, the older shows may have been hoakie, but there was nothing like it - and likely you'll never see it again...

pardon me for asking , but shouldnt this be in other topics like movie/tv type topic instead of here ?

as for that TV series , it only show the nuts n bolts 'ufo' ... no high strangeness and psychic / poltergeist effect like the real UFO cases =D

that moon base might be the one that those remote viewer's viewed .. i mean all these scifi stories and media must influence enough mind to create mental image of something on the moon or beyond and got viewed by remote viewers hehe