Witty and pertinent observations on matters of great significance
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Incoherent jottings on total irrelevancies
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All of the aboveThe marvel of the age
A piece of my childhood died a few days ago with Gerry Anderson. best known as the creator of Thunderbirds, he was also responsible for Supercar, Fireball XL5 and Stingray, all of which I watched (as well as Captain Scarlet and Joe 90, by which time I'd grown out of puppet shows, or at least until the Muppets appeared). Anderson's puppets became a much-loved part of British life in the 1960s, as well as proving irresistible to parodists around the world.
And how many people can still sing along with this?:
And the way in which Thunderbirds 1, 2 and 3 launched gave rise to much mirth (couldn't they just climb up ladders like fighter pilots?), much of it centred around how annoying it would be to be swimming in the pool during a launch of T1.
posted by Rob @ 08:18
3 Comments:
But why climb ladders when you can sit on your couch and be delivered? Wish I could get into my car like that.
Thinking of cars and SF, I always loved the idea as seen in the film "I, Robot", of hangable cars. Will Smith goes to some function or other, and the robot who parks his car simply attaches the front to a hoist which hauls it into a vertical position and sticks it in a rack alongside dozens of similarly hanging cars. OK, you'd need to be more disciplined about leaving stuff lying around inside than I would ever be, but I often think of it when trying to find a space.
Neil Gaiman did a tribute to Gerry Anderson onstage last week somewhere in the US, and was saying that apparently the reason for all the flying scooters in Fireball XL5 (and probably thus for the fancy chutes and such in Thunderbirds) was to get round the otherwise unavoidable jerkiness of puppets walking. Never thought of that, but it makes sense.
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