Missing Thunderbirds footage found in British garden shed

Video Previously unseen footage from the classic British TV show Thunderbirds has been found in a garden shed and restored – where possible – for viewing next year.

The family of a recently deceased former editor of the show found a collection of 22 rusty and cracked film cans in their Buckinghamshire shed. The film inside is currently being restored and digitized. They contain a lot of old material, but also some extended scenes and a previously-unseen new ending to one episode.

Stephen La Rivière of Century 21 Films – who is leading the restoration drive – told the BBC recovering the footage “took weeks, bit by bit.”

“Every night I’d get a link for a download of the latest one that had been scanned … you’d never know what you’d get. Eventually, listening one night … this one played out and it was not the same as broadcast.”

If you’ve never watched the show, the video below offers a good primer and a peek at the recovered footage.

Youtube Video

Thunderbirds was originally conceived as 30-minute episodes, but some were extended at the request of management. It’s thought that the extra footage came from one of these extended episodes that never aired.

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Thunderbirds was the invention of British auteurs Gerry and Sylvia Anderson and was broadcast in 1965. It told the tales of International Rescue, a clandestine group set up by an American financier and his five sons to save human lives. The team had five aircraft, Thunderbirds 1 through 5, which roamed space, the surface and underwater realms of Earth doing the right thing – mostly.

The series was filmed using a process they called “supermarionation” – wire controlled puppets that had basic electronics installed to move the characters’ mouths in sync with the recorded script. It was a technique the duo used to great effect in other shows such as Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, Fireball XL5, Sting Ray, and Joe 90 – and the team behind Team America: World Police appear to have been inspired by the technique.

The show was screened again on British television in the 1990s and gained a new legion of fans. However, this success did not translate to the silver screen, with the 1960s films Thunderbirds Are Go and Thunderbird 6 flopping. The 2004 film Thunderbirds is best forgotten.

It’s hoped the new footage will be released next year as part of the celebrations of the show’s 60th anniversary. Sadly it won’t be seen by David Graham, who voiced four of the show’s characters and then influenced a new generation as the voice of Grandpa Pig in the children’s show Peppa Pig. Graham passed away last month at the age of 99. ®